As I deal out the cards again, the back door opens and Valencia, Marcus, Easton, and JT emerge with drinks and small plates of appetizers.
Gramma Sharon talks with them as we trade cards back and forth. This hand lasts a little longer, but once again it’s her who calls out “Gin!” first. While she shuffles the cards, Valencia talks about Easton and how he’s doing in school.
“Yes, yes, yes,” Gramma Sharon says. “He’s very smart, we all know.” She turns to him. “But tell me something exciting. You’re living in New York City! Tell me about the fun things you’re doing. Your brother survived being kidnapped by a psycho and living on the streets. Whatcha got, kiddo?”
“Mom, please.” Valencia takes a big sip of her wine.
Easton glares and it startles me for an instant. But then he seems to realize he might be feeling a little resentment from Gramma Sharon’s words and his face relaxes. He turns back to her with a shrug. “Not all of us can be so lucky.”
I’m about to open my mouth to playfully scold him before I realize that, for a second, I forgot I’m pretending to be someone else. Like I’m in some bizarro world where I was born to a different family. I’m not Nate, and his familydidn’tget lucky.
“It’s not about luck,” Gramma Sharon says, discarding an ace. “It’s about applying yourself. You’re a small fish in a big pond now. You have to stand out. Stop trying to be so ordinary and get people to notice you.”
“Easton is anything but ordinary,” Valencia says. She smiles at him, and he returns a half-hearted one of his own.
Gramma Sharon’s eyebrows go up in a manner that says she doesn’t quite believe that, but she lets the subject drop as she asks Marcus how work is going instead.
The rest of dinner is much calmer as Gramma Sharon backs off of her pushy questions. Not that I minded them. She wasn’t really pushing me much; she was pushing Easton. And maybe Easton deserves to be pushed. Valencia talks about him like he’s a genius, but Gramma Sharon did have a point with the small fish in a big pond comment.
After dinner, Marcus and Valencia bring the dishes into the house as Gramma Sharon takes out her cards again.
“Now we play rummy,” she says. “Look up that one.”
“Isn’t that what we were playing before?” I ask.
Gramma Sharon shakes her head. “We were playingginrummy. Gin rummy is a two-player game. Rummy you can play with up to five.”
So again, I look up the rules. Marcus and Valencia return with the pies and dessert plates. Gramma Sharon hands me the cards and tells me to deal while she cuts the pies.
“But don’t deal in Easton,” she says. “He cheats.”
Across the table, Easton rolls his eyes.
“He was seven, Mom,” Valencia says.
But Easton doesn’t care. “It’s fine, JT and I are going out soon anyway.”
So I deal in Marcus and Valencia, leaving out JT and Easton. Gramma Sharon hands me a plate with two huge slices of pie on it, then asks everyone else what they want.
She was serious when she said she wanted me to eat pieces of both pies, and despite how full I am from dinner, I can’t help but try both. They’re delicious.
After dessert—and after Marcus wins one out of the four rummy games we play, while Gramma Sharon wins the rest—Easton and JT say they’re going to a friend’s house.
“Call us if you need a ride home,” Valencia says.
“I’m not drinking, Mrs. B,” JT says.
She gives him a skeptical look. “Smoking weed and driving is still driving under the influence, John Thomas.”
“I promise I will never do that.” He quickly adds, “...with Easton in the car.” Then says good night and sprints off the deck and around the house, leaving only a scowl from Gramma Sharon in his wake.
Easton kisses Gramma Sharon on the cheek, then Valencia and Marcus, and says good night. Shortly after they leave, the sun sets, and Gramma Sharon stands and puts the remaining pie on a plate, telling Valencia to make sure I eat the rest.
“Nate.” She hands me the empty pie plates. “Walk me out to my car.”
My chest tightens and I look to Valencia and Marcus. They both seem to think this is normal, so maybe I don’t need to be concerned yet.
I step off the deck and wait for her to say goodbye to Marcus and Valencia, then hold out a hand so I can help her down the steps. We walk quietly around the house. I expect her to turn to me and tell me she knows I’m full of shit. For police cars to come flying down the street, lights and sirens blaring as she pulls a badge out of that orange purse of hers and says she’s a retired detective.
