Unfortunately, they’re not going to leave, and I don’t have a choice right now.With my shoulders almost sagging down to the floor, I open the door and plant a smile on my face.
“Oh, hi,” I say as cheerfully as I can.
There’s almost an entourage filling the threshold of my door.Besides my mom and Ines, Aunt Jessica, who is Ines’s mom, and my other cousin Sophie, heavily pregnant, stand in my doorway.
My apartment is not big enough to fit five grown women.I can barely move around it myself without stubbing my toes, sometimes twice a day.
Superb.
“Adalynnie.”My mom draws me in for a big hug, her lips cold from the subtle snow falling outside as she kisses my cheeks.The familiar scent of her perfume, one she’s used for as long as I can remember, comforts me just as it did when I was five.
“Adalynn.Oh my word, are you all right, dear?”My Aunt Jessica says, hugging me for a quick moment before she sets me aside and scrutinizes my face.
“Oh dear, I must send you the number of my aesthetician.She’ll do wonders for those frown lines, your complexion, and your eyebrows.My dear, why have you let yourself go?Are you all right?”
“I’m perfectly fine, Aunt Jessica.”Umm, this is just how I always look—resting frown face and unkempt eyebrows—all against a backdrop of whatever my aunt thinks is wrong with my complexion since she didn’t specify.
Aunt Jessica was a beauty queen in her younger days, and she doesn’t look a day over forty.Enough said.
“Adalynn,” Ines says next, a striking resemblance to her mom.She hugs the air between us and makes no attempt to hide the look of horror as her gaze scans my attire.
I wasn’t expecting guests, and if I were, they would have called beforehand, and I would have changed out of my loose track bottoms that have seen better days and my old faithful robe, Charlotte.Yes, I named my robe Charlotte; don’t ask me to explain; it’s no one’s business.I also would have brushed the disaster that is currently my hair.I was experimenting with a new style.On half of my head.It wasn’t going well at all.
Standing next to Ines in her designer coat, designer dress, boots, flawlessly applied makeup, and commercial-ready hair, smelling like a rose garden, I look like a street urchin who smells like three vanilla cupcakes.
I’m on holiday; I’m not counting calories.I mean, I don’t count calories normally either, but...What do they know, anyway?It’s called the clean-slob aesthetic.
“Addie,” Sophie, my other cousin, says next.At least she hugs me like she means it—well, as much as she can with her belly in the way.I hate the name Addie, and that’s all Sophie ever calls me, but she’s all right when she forgets she’s supposed to look down on me like everyone else does.
“This is a...pleasant surprise,” I say.If awkward were a person, I’d be it.
“Well, I twisted your mom’s arm into coming to the city with us for some last-minute holiday shopping, and since we were here, I decided on the spur of the moment that we should come and see you,” Aunt Jessica says, literally rearranging the decorative cushions and throws, then dusting off the seat of my sofa before she sits.Her daughter does the exact same thing.
“I wanted to call first,” my mom says with an apologetic smile.“But Jessica thought we should surprise you.”
“Oh, it’s no problem, Mom,” I say, trying to make her feel better.If Ines is my bully, Aunt Jessica—my dad’s sister—is my mom’s bully.
My mom and Sophie take a seat, thankfully without any fanfare, which leaves me standing in the middle of my living room.Can this get any worse?
“Our shopping was a success.We found these lovely decorative glasses at a small vintage store—just lovely—and they go well with our theme for the table this holiday season,” Aunt Jessica says.
“Oh, speaking of the Christmas table,” she continues, “Adalynn, dear, with Ines just married,” Aunt Jessica beams at her daughter, who makes a show of flashing her diamond ring at me.“And since you don’t even have a fiancé, much less a boyfriend or anybody really, you’re going to have to sit with the kids for our Christmas Eve dinner.It’ll just make everything neat and tidy and keep the seating in even numbers.You do understand, don’t you, dear?”
And there it is.
