Total pages in book: 160
Estimated words: 153268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 766(@200wpm)___ 613(@250wpm)___ 511(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 153268 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 766(@200wpm)___ 613(@250wpm)___ 511(@300wpm)
Mom needed someone next to her. The accusations Dylan had hurled in my face the night our friendship had perished crashed over me like a tsunami. About me being a shitty friend. Maybe I was a shitty daughter too. After all, I had managed to successfully avoid Staindrop for five years. I’d seen my parents plenty—we’d met in Portland, New York, and some places in between. But I never made the journey here.
Then I thought about being a parent. The act of sacrificing—your time, your sleep, your money, your attention, your concern, your love. All for…what? So that one day, your kid would give you half a hug and tell you that everything will be okay, then run off to New York, leaving a trail of half-assed apologies?
Mamushka always told me that when you became a mother, you expanded. Found ways to provide more of you to meet your child’s needs. Maybe it was time I expanded as a daughter too. Rose to the occasion.
“I’ll…I’ll stay here for a while,” I heard myself say. No permission was given by my brain for my mouth to utter these words. And yet, here they were. Out in the wild. Entering my mother’s ears before I could stop them.
“You’d do that for me?” Her head snapped up, eyes flaring with hope.
This woman changed your diapers. Band-Aided your boo-boos. Paid for your utterly useless degree. You are not going to bail on her just because you are frightened of Dylan Casablancas.
And that was what it boiled down to: Dylan. Row was long gone now. He became a world-famous bad-boy chef: restauranteur, reality TV judge, and Michelin-starred prince. Over the years, he had graced my television screen in frightening quantities. Smiling his dimpled smirk during morning shows before Thanksgiving to teach viewers how to make the perfect, moist stuffed turkey. Opening a new restaurant in a trendy European location on E! News, a Victoria’s Secret model draped on his arm, or as a grumpy judge in a low-stakes Netflix reality TV show, scowling at fancy dishes and barking obscenities at hopeful chefs. An entertainment columnist had once written, “Ambrose Casablancas is what happens when Gordon Ramsay and James Dean have a secret child.” I felt the entire sentence in my bones.
“Yup, I’m here for you.” I wrapped an arm around Mom’s scrawny shoulders. “We’ll make comfort food, watch movies, catch up. I’ll stay until January first, how does that sound?”
Let me tell you how that sounded to me—terrible. January first was eight weeks from now. That meant I’d bump into Dylan at some point. Into other people I wanted to see even less.
“Oh, Cal.” Mom patted her nose with a crumpling piece of tissue, mustering a grateful smile. “If it isn’t too much trouble.”
“Not at all. I missed you. I want to spend time together.”
If my bank account could speak, I was sure it’d tell me I was high. I couldn’t simply take time off. I still needed to work in order to pay for my Williamsburg apartment. And by “apartment,” I meant shoebox. A terribly expensive shoebox. I had to figure out a way to make money in Staindrop, and God knew the answer wasn’t going to be through my pipe dream, my unrecorded true crime podcast, Hot Girl Bummer.
“Only if you’re sure.” Mom clutched on to my arm. “I don’t want you to stop your life for me.”
“Don’t worry, there’s literally no life for me to stop.” I pulled her into another all-consuming hug, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “We’re going to have a blast, Mamushka. Just like the old days. You’ll see.”
“Really?” Hope painted her face.
“Really. Nothing will ruin this for us.”
As I said that, the door flung open and in walked Ambrose Casablancas.
And a very pregnant Dylan.
CAL
“I’d Do Anything for Love (But I Won’t Do That)”—Meat Loaf
Dylan was pregnant.
Eighteen months pregnant by the look of it.
With triplets.
Holy shit, her belly was huge. Who was the father? Hodor? When had she gotten married? How come no one had told me?
“Mom,” I whisper-shouted, tugging on her sleeve, feeling the full weight of the entire continent pressing against my sternum. “Why didn’t you tell me Dylan got married?”
Terror laced through my veins. I was entirely unequipped to face the Casablancas siblings. Especially Dylan, who had ripped my heart out of my chest the last time we’d spoken and stomped on it until it had dispersed into dust. And what was Row doing here, anyway? Didn’t he have a reality TV contestant to yell at about their stew tasting like a diarrhea puddle? Because that had actually happened. I remembered watching that episode in horror and thinking, I had this man’s salami stuck in my canal.
Mom dazedly stirred her gaze from her sponge cake to the door, where people clamored around a ridiculously glowing Dylan.