She was no longer scrawny, her eyes weren’t sunken in, and her pink-purple hair looked luscious and flawless—roots to tips. She wore a white A-line shaped dress sprinkled with red cherries, pairing it with strappy blue sandals that made no sense at all, unless you were Emilia LeBlanc.
“Oh, Rosie,” she said when I threw myself on her, making us both stumble backwards as I smothered her with my love. “I’ve missed you like a limb. Does that even make sense?” She peeled me off of her for a second so she could examine my face, caressing my cheek. Her huge, pink diamond ring sparkled so bright, I was momentarily blinded by the sunlight reflected through the rare twenty-one-carat stone.
I should have been jealous.
Jealous of her engagement and house and fiancé and proximity to our parents. Jealous of her health. Jealous because she had so much, because I had so little.
Swanky Italian villa or not, she deserved it. And no, it wasn’t weird that she’d missed me like a limb, because I’d missed her like a lung. Bitch got me addicted fresh from the womb. She had the talent of taking care of me without making me feel like a burden, something Mama never managed to excel.
Millie smiled, holding my shoulders and scanning me, doing the usual inventory.
“You look too good,” I complained, scrunching my nose. “I hate it when you set the bar too high. You always do.”
She pinched my shoulder and laughed. “Where’s your boyfriend? Thought he’d be coming with you?”
For a reason beyond logic, I found myself blushing as Dean crossed my mind. Millie, of course, was talking about Darren. I never bothered to tell my family we broke up. Millie had enough on her wedding-planning plate without me dumping the breakup into the mix. The plan was to tell them tonight, but I was going to use any excuse to postpone the inevitable. I would rather get a dental treatment from a mechanic than break it to my parents.
“I wanted to spend some time with my family, one on one.” I plastered on a smile. She quirked her eyebrow, silently calling me on my bullshit, and smoothed my light brown hair with her palm.
“I still can’t believe you have a boyfriend,” she mused. “I thought you’d never settle down.”
“Well, I’m getting old. Twenty-eight is like sixty-five in cystic fibrosis years.” I shrugged. “We’ll revisit this subject at dinner.”
Where I will crush your hearts and tell you Darren is no longer in the picture.
She nudged me toward the hallway with a snort.
“Mama is waiting for you. She’s in the kitchen, making a casserole.”
My favorite dish. A zing of warmth slashed through my belly. She remembered.
There was hardly any resemblance to the way my parents treated Millie and me. They respected, admired, and consulted with my older sister, whereas I was babied, smothered, and treated like a cracked egg that was about to spill at any minute. Daddy was a trillion times better than Mama, though. He, at least, adored my snarky personality and cheered for me finding my independence in New York. Mama was too busy worrying about my health, she didn’t have time to fully get to know me, to fall in love with the person I was. Always in full-blown mama bear mode, without taking a second to get to know her cub.
To her, I was the token sick child, the punk, the rascal. The silly girl who risked her life to work at a stupid café in New York instead of opting to live close to her family. The girl who never settled down with a nice boy.
Because Vicious is such a nice boy.
That was the second reason why my family was oblivious to my breaking up with Darren. Dating a doctor meant that they got off my case after Millie moved to Los Angeles. Admittedly, it was part of Darren’s charm. His—unbeknownst to him—ability to keep my parents from drilling in my ear about coming back to California and living under their roof like a sad, introvert bubble boy.
I wasn’t a bubble boy. I was a music-buff pixie who made a mean cup of coffee, read Vice magazine, made anxious mothers to premature newborns laugh, and was always up for a good party. I was a person. With traits and ideas.
But in Todos Santos, I never felt this way.
“Is Daddy around?” I played with Millie’s electric hair as we started our way to the kitchen.
“Went downtown with Vic.” She ushered me forward. A mouthwatering aroma of earthy vegetables, cinnamon, and succulent meat wafted in the air. “I needed a few things from Walgreens. They’ll be back in a few.”
In the kitchen, the anticlimactic meeting with Mama had reminded me why I packed a bag and moved to the other side of the country as soon as I graduated from high school. She hugged me, patted my cheeks, and asked me when Darren was coming, making me feel like a consolation prize.
I opened my mouth, ready to spill the beans then and there, but Mama interjected before I could form any words, telling me that she was proud of me, that she was so happy that I ‘finally found a respectable man to settle down with.’
Go on and just say it, I wanted to bite out. Not anyone is noble enough to sacrifice so much for a sick girl.
“I reckon he’s mighty busy. Hope you aren’t giving him a hard time for it, Rosie. I’m just glad he can make it at all.” Mama patted my cheek a little too hard, her heavy chest rising and falling to the rhythm of her breaths. Mama was a big woman, with big brown hair, big blue eyes, and big everything else. Ever since I could remember, she had a thin layer of sweat coating her smooth skin. I used to love feeling it stick to my flesh as I hugged her.
“Well…” I cleared my throat. I should get it over with. Peel it off like a Band-Aid. “Actually…”
“Can’t wait to meet the boy. I even bought a new dress. First impressions are everything. I have a feeling about this one, Rosie.” She dangled her finger in my face. “You’ve been living together for a while now, and he knows your situation with…”
I knew exactly with what. Ever since I told my family about that situation a year ago, shortly before Millie had left, they started treating me like an old arthritic dog with bladder issues.
Darren was supposed to arrive on the same weekend of the wedding. He thought that, by then, we could also break it to my family that we were next in line.
He thought wrong.
Mama buying herself a new dress for their meeting meant she was no less than ecstatic. Her usual attire didn’t exactly give Carrie Bradshaw a run for her money. I let her soak in faux bliss, saving the bombshell for when I wasn’t sleep-deprived and slightly jet-lagged.
Living in New York meant that I called the shots and cherry-picked the information I shared with my family. My parents and sister had no way of knowing I broke up with my boyfriend. No one could tell them.
Other than Dean Cole.