Not that I was looking. Or noticing. Or mentally photographing for later appreciation.
As Noah led us toward the airport exit, Mom linked her arm through mine, squeezing with both tenderness and intensity. “He is very handsome,” she whispered at a volume thatcould probably be heard in Denver. “Good shoulders for carrying grand babies.”
“Mom!” I said. “We’re organizing an environmental festival, not planning a wedding.”
“Why not both?” She waggled her eyebrows with exaggerated meaning.
Noah’s Jeep sat in the pickup lane. Once again, I almost had to pinch myself to make sure what I was seeing was real. When he’d picked me up that morning, I’d almost fainted. The vehicle I’d come to associate with mud and mechanical failure had undergone a miraculous transformation. The exterior gleamed in the morning sun, windows crystal clear, even the dent in the passenger-side door somehow hammered back into place. Not a single splatter of mud.
“This is your vehicle?” Mom ran an appreciative hand over the hood. “Not nearly as bad as Samantha described. What did she call it again, Henry? Death trap on wheels?”
“Something like that,” Dad mumbled, trying not to get sucked into it.
Noah glanced at me, eyebrow raised.
“Well, like its owner, it cleans up pretty nicely when it wants to,” I said.
“So you washed it special for us?” Mom clapped her hands in delight. “So thoughtful!”
Noah loaded the suitcases in the back, then held the passenger door open for Mom with a gallantry that made her positively beam. “Such a gentleman, too.”
Noah looked at me pointedly. “Thank you. Ialwaystry to be.”
“Where’s Yeti?” asked Dad, who climbed into the back with surprising agility for a man who claimed knee pain whenever it was his turn to take out the trash.
Noah turned the key in the ignition, starting up the Jeep. “Ileft Yeti back home,” he answered, carefully navigating back toward the main road. “Didn’t want her getting fur and drool all over you.”
Mom waved away his concern. “Nothing scares us. Samantha once brought home a frog from the school pond. Kept it in a soup pot for three days before we found it.”
“Mom, please.”
“She named it Soup.”
“She was a very practical child,” said Dad.
“She was a very messy child,” said Mom.
“Stop talking, Mom.”
“Bossy too.” Mom patted Noah’s arm like they were co-conspirators in the “Embarrass Sam” club. “Even as a baby. She used to scream and cry if I didn’t carry her everywhere.”
“Some things never change,” Noah replied, shooting me a sidelong smirk.
“I must say, Noah.” I braced myself for whatever was about to come next. “You’re not nearly as mean as Samantha said you were.”
“She said I was mean, did she?”
“Oh yeah. Every night when she called us from her fancy hotel room.”
“Mom.”
“Every night. Noah did this. Noah did that. Noah, Noah, Noah.”
“Mom.”
“Sounds like she talked about me a lot.”
“You have no idea,” Dad grumbled.
