I’M KIND OF in love with James’ mother.
When I walked downstairs half an hour ago, the house was quiet. Even in such a big space, I could tell that James and his siblings weren’t around. I tiptoed to the kitchen anyway, hoping to find some coffee, and ran into Sandra instead.
She made me pour-over and insisted on us eating cookies for breakfast. What an icon.
Now she leans back in her chair, bare feet tucked underneath her, and takes another sip of coffee as she looks at me. I have the sense some sort of interrogation is coming. The first and only time I met Darryl’s parents, his mother immediately asked how many children I was planning to have. Sandra could say practically anything and would instantly be better than her.
“You’re wearing my son’s sweater,” she says.
I flush, looking down at myself. It’s just a gray McKee sweatshirt, but on me, it’s baggy and the sleeves flop over my hands. I roll them up, picking at a random thread. “His is cozy.”
She smiles. She has a kind face, natural in its age, with crow’s feet around her eyes that add extra softness to her smile. There’s nothing artificial about her. Even now, she’s just wearing a t-shirt that occurs to me might be Richard’s, and soft cotton pajama pants. Her tongue is stained blue from the frosting on the cookies. Her tortoiseshell glasses frame her face like a character from a Nora Ephron movie. This is the woman who has loved James throughout his whole life. Every win and every loss, every triumph and crisis. She was by his side through everything that went down with Sara.
“James has told me so much about you,” she says. “He was afraid of telling his father, but I make us have regular phone calls, and lately, they’ve been all about you.”
“You’re not making him,” I say honestly. “He’s always happier after you call.”
“You’ve been spending a lot of time together.”
I nod. Even though I have my dorm room, I’ve been spending more and more nights at James’ lately. As the semester was wrapping up, it just made sense—we had work to do for the writing class, and it’s not like I could go to the apartment to get a break from the dorm. Plus, he has a hang-up about me driving home alone late at night. I suspect it’s an excuse to keep me in his bed, but I don’t intend to ever call him out on it. It makes me too happy.
“I was worried, after Sara—he told me you know about Sara—that he would punish himself. What happened was horrible, but it wasn’t his fault. That’s not how a healthy person responds to a breakup.”
“No,” I agree softly. “She’s doing okay now though, right?”
“Yes. I still talk to her mother from time to time. She’s safe and finishing up her degree at a different school, close to her cousins.”
“That’s good.” I pick up my coffee mug, even though it’s nearly empty, and take a small sip.
“But tell me more about you. He says you’re a photographer?”
I tuck my hair behind my ear, looking at the Christmas tree instead of her. The den has another tree, one that I can recognize; it’s decorated with rainbow strings of lights and homemade ornaments from when James and his siblings were little. Last night, Sandra explained that they always do a formal family portrait with the tree in the foyer—it’s ended up in magazines before, usually alongside press for the foundation—but she likes the silly pictures they take in the den way better.
“Yeah,” I say. “I mean, it’s my hobby.”
“Oh,” she says. “That’s not what you’re studying?”
“Um, no. I’m going to be taking over my mother’s diner when I graduate.” I force myself to look at Sandra and smile. “It’s a cute little place not too far from McKee. We’ve got the best pie in the Hudson Valley.”
She considers that. “What’s the best flavor?”
It’s not the question I’m expecting. I smile for real. “Well, it’s famous for the cherry pie, but I’m partial to the lemon meringue.”
“You love it?”
“It’s where I grew up.”
“And it’s your dream?” She shakes her head as soon as she says that. “I’m sorry, I’m prying. It just fascinates me, what passions people have. Of course, in my family, my boys all have the same passion.”
“You must be so excited for James to go into the NFL,” I say, grasping at the weak opportunity for a conversation change.
“Excited? Yes. Terrified? Also yes. I watched my husband get knocked down routinely by men built like freight trains for seventeen years. It’s not for the faint of heart, Bex.”
“At least they don’t usually fight like they do in NHL hockey.”
“Don’t even get me started,” she says, shaking her head. “This is why Izzy is my favorite. Volleyball doesn’t usually involve flying fists, thank goodness.” She winks. “Don’t tell the kids I said that.”
“I’m sure Izzy would rub it in their faces for years to come.”
“You’re starting to get how our family works.” She sets her coffee cup aside. “I can see my son cares about you. A lot. And I know you’re probably going to think this is weird, but thank you for that. He deserves to have someone in his corner. He’s so serious all the time—he was that way even as a boy. Always following the rules, always giving everything his all. But when he looks at you… his whole face lights up and he just relaxes. It’s beautiful.”
She stands up, gathering up her mug and mine, and cups my cheek. “And I may not know you all that well yet, but that’s what I see when you look at him.”
She goes into the kitchen, leaving me alone with the Christmas tree, presents overflowing from underneath. The fireplace crackles; she lit a fire as soon as we walked in earlier. Can she really see that when she looks at me, or is she just imagining it?
My feelings for James have gotten so deep. It’s like I was swimming in the shallows for a long time, and now suddenly I’m realizing I’m nowhere near the shoreline. He leaves me breathless. Every time he calls me “princess,” my heart does a silly little somersault. He’s cheesy, he’s romantic. Maybe he is the kind of person who follows the rules, but he bent them when we made our deal, and I have the sense he never looked back.
I hear James’ laughter. He bursts into the den along with his brothers, his eyes lighting up as soon as he spots me. When he ducks to kiss me, I push him away; he’s sweaty and cold all at once. He manages to press a kiss to the top of my head, grinning as I swat at him.
“Sorry I had to leave you,” he says.
“You know I don’t mind. Unless you make me tag along. Then we’d have a problem.”
He crouches, so we’re eye to eye, and raises one of his eyebrows. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah,” I say, voice breathier than I intend. Before him, I’d tell you sweat was gross, but now? I kind of want to lick the bead that’s trailing down the side of his face.
And by the way he’s looking at me, he knows what I’m thinking. Clearly, I’m nowhere near as cool and collected as I’d like to be.
“What would you do to me?” he teases.
A million thoughts are racing through my head, but before I have a chance to tease back—or maybe just push him back onto the floor and kiss him, sweat be damned—we’re interrupted. Aside from when Cooper accidentally walked in on us hooking up, and the time Laura almost burst in on us taking a shower together, we’ve had pretty good luck with privacy. Less than twenty-four hours at James’ house and his little sister has interrupted twice.
“I’m putting on The Family Stone,” she declares, flicking James on the cheek as she walks by.
“Please, no,” James groans. “I’ll do anything, Iz. Anything to avoid sitting through that pain.”
“Rachel McAdam’s incapable of making a bad movie.” She glances back at me. “Right, Bex?”
I look between my boyfriend and his sister. If I agree, I’ll win some points with Izzy, but James will pout.
Eh, he can take it. It’s not a sack delivered by a freight train of a linebacker, to use Sandra’s phrasing.
“You know what, Izzy? You’re totally right.”
JAMES OPENS the taped-together Monopoly box with the same reverence afforded to historical artifacts. The board looks like I remember from the couple of times I’ve played this, as do the cards, but the little silver game pieces? Instead of those, he sets out a strange assortment of objects. A button, a toy soldier, a locket with a broken hinge, what looks like a shoe for a Barbie, a sparkly pom-pom, and a dented bottle cap.
“Bex is the guest, she should pick first,” Sebastian says from across the coffee table. We’re all on the floor by the Christmas tree, mugs of spiked hot chocolate (except for Izzy) in hand. I thought I’d have some girlfriend privileges here, maybe be able to be on a team with James, but that went out into the chilly December night the moment I saw the gleam in his eyes. I might be snuggled into his side now, but once the cards are drawn, he’s The Enemy.
Fine. I may need to admit defeat whenever we go to the arcade to play hoops, but I can beat him in a board game for sure.
Cooper looks at me with intensity in his deep blue eyes. “If you take that button from me, I will lose my shit.”
“The button?” I glance down at it. “I figured that would be the one no one wants.”
“The button is luckiest,” James says. “Then the shoe.”
Izzy cracks her knuckles. “I’m getting that shoe. You ruined me last year, James.”
“Which is the unluckiest?” I ask.
“The toy soldier.”
I shake my head. “Three guys and no one wants the toy soldier?”
“He’s the soldier of death,” Richard says dryly from his spot on the couch. Sandra is tucked into his side; they’re the only ones paying attention to the movie playing. It’s a Wonderful Life.
I swallow back a sudden swell of emotion as the memory of watching that movie on the diner television with my mom hits me. When I was little, she loved it, the way she liked other classic things—music and art and fashion. After my father left, the movie made her too sad, and I’ve never pushed us to watch it. I haven’t seen it in years.
“The only fair thing is to dump them all in the middle,” Sandra says. “Everyone makes a grab for it.”
“Do you really want Seb to get Coop into a headlock again?” says James.
She raises her eyebrows at her son. “All’s fair in love and games.”
“Well said, darling,” says Richard, punctuating that with a kiss.
James wrinkles his nose, but I smile. The bittersweet ache in my chest won’t go away tonight. We had breakfast for dinner—apparently a Callahan family tradition on Christmas Eve—and that reminded me of the diner. A big, cozy family event like this? I never had that; even when I had both of my parents in my life, it was just the three of us. No older siblings to tease or younger siblings to torture.
“Okay,” James says, shoving all the pieces into the center of the board. “On three. Three, tw—Cooper!”
