But this feud is stupid. It doesn’t serve the community. It doesn’t serve my family. It doesn’t serve Amanda’s family. And I truly am sick and tired of half of the updates I get from my family about life back home being nothing more than them bitching about something the Andersons did.
There’s a reason I don’t live in Tinsel anymore, and it’s not about turkey or fruitcake or wanting to live someplace where Christmas is only a small part of the year.
Not that I see the end of the feud making me want to move home, but at least I’ll quit making excuses to get off the phone with my family faster and faster every time we talk and planning shorter and shorter obligatory visits every time.
I don’t even read half their emails anymore.
Uncle Rob’s face does nearly the same thing Lorelei’s just did.
The back door bangs open, and Aunt Teeny charges out, followed by my cousin Esme, who’s a few years older than me.
Uncle Rob’s been the fruitcake master of the family for about twenty years now. Esme’s been his shadow since she moved back home after getting a business degree. Grandpa asked me a few years ago to move home and help us expand into adding an ornament shop—fruitcake doesn’t make the profit gingerbread appears to make, which is also a sore spot for my family—and when I declined, he roped Lorelei into it instead.
“I didn’t just hear someone say that our Dane is engaged to one of thoseAndersons, did I?” Aunt Teeny says.
Esme catches her six-year-old daughter, Jojo, by the arm as the kiddo darts out of the house too.
She doesn’t look nearly as horrified as her parents.
I glance at Amanda and try to silently telegraphLet’s start with her, but I think she’s quicker on picking these things up than I am.
“No running outside until the smoker’s off,” Esme says to Jojo, but she’s staring at me the whole time.
Lorelei tumbles out the door, too, followed by my grandpa, my grandma, and my dad.
Whole family’s here.
And why am I here?
For my grandparents’ sixty-fifth-anniversary party.
Which is happening this coming weekend.
The day before Vicki Anderson, Amanda’s grandmother, is having her own anniversary party to celebrate half a century of working at the Gingerbread House. Where apparently she’s announcing her retirement.
She planned her party on purpose to steal our thunder,Grandma told me when I arrived in town yesterday.It’s not even her real work anniversary. She started at the bakery right after her honeymoon, and she would’ve been married to that Anderson man for fifty-eight years this year. You know she’s making up that this is her fiftieth anniversary. It’s all a scam to get more attention on her and steal any attention on us.
Don’t care if it’s intentional or not. I care that the animosity stops and my family recognizes me—and Lorelei, and probably Esme too—as more than trophies and pawns.
I don’t know how they can live here. I truly don’t.
I drop my arm from around Amanda’s shoulders and link my fingers through hers instead, tugging her along and ignoring the blip in my chest at the way her tiny hand fits inside of mine.
An hour into this, I’ve decided the next time I get a fake fiancée, she won’t be someone I’ve ever had a crush on.
“Yes,” I say to Aunt Teeny. “You heard right. Everyone, this is Amanda. Amanda Anderson. One ofthosegingerbread Andersons. And we’re getting married.”
“Next month,” Amanda adds. “In Vegas.” She gives them all a finger wave like it’s totally normal to tell your family’s enemy that you’re eloping with one of them soon. “Nice to meet you all. I can’t wait to get to know you better.”
Objections erupt around the backyard.
“Vegas?”
“Next month?”
“How long has this been going on?”
“I thought you hadn’t dated anyone since Vanessa.”
