As her dad asked for a table for two, Victoria looked around the restaurant. She wasn’t a brunch sort of person. Usually she and her dad played golf a couple of times a month, but until she was back in the land of normal, brunch was the best she could manage.
“My golf swing is going to be messed up when I finally get back to it,” she complained as they were shown a table. “I’ll have to take a few lessons to remember what I’m supposed to be doing.”
“Or you could wait and let me kick your ass for the next few games,” her father said with a smile as they were seated. “That would be nice, too.”
“Are you becoming a gloater? You’ve always been so gracious about being better at golf than me.”
“No gloating. Just me reveling in my superior status.” He winked at her.
She glanced at the other patrons. There were families with young children, girlfriends hanging out and a couple that seemed so into each other Victoria figured they’d just had sex before going out for brunch and would be heading right back to bed after they’d eaten. She wondered if Shannon and Aaron were still in the adoration stage or if their relationship had moved on and evolved. They were engaged, so planning on spending their lives together, although she knew from watching her parents that just because a relationship had a few miles on it didn’t mean the love in any way faded.
“If I have the chorizo omelet, will you tell your mother?”
“You shock me.” She looked at the menu. The chorizo omelet was all things bad. There was the sausage, of course, plenty of cheese and a side of refried beans. She supposed the sliced jalapenos were technically a vegetable, but doubted there was enough to count as a serving.
“You go, Dad.”
“Was that ano?”
Victoria rolled her eyes. “You know I won’t rat you out to Mom.” She paused. “I guess I wouldn’t rat her out either, but I can’t imagine her ever doing anything quote-unquote forbidden in front of me. Or in life. She’s a rule-follower, which is nice. It makes her predictable.”
And a predictable Ava was safer for her.
Their server stopped by and offered coffee and juice. Victoria only accepted the former because she didn’t need any unnecessary calories. She’d put on about six pounds during her recovery—an amount that didn’t sound like much, but on her small frame it was nearly a size. Now that she was in a walking cast, she was going to head back to the gym. She couldn’t do much in the way of cardio, but she could start lifting weights and adding a little muscle.
They placed their orders. Victoria asked for a half serving of eggs Benedict with a side of hash browns—her last hurrah before she went high protein/low carb, starting at dinner that night. Between that and cutting out alcohol for the next two or three weeks, she should be able to drop most of the weight pretty easily so by the time she got her cast off, she would only have to worry about the atrophy in her left leg.
Her dad waited until she’d added milk to her coffee and had taken the first sip before saying, “Your mother mentioned the two of you had talked.”
“We did. All is well.”
“So you’re perfectly fine with everything that’s happened?”
“Of course.”
His steady gaze made her want to squirm.
“You have to admit, it’s an incredibly strange situation,” she said, unable to keep from speaking. “All of it. Although I guess technically nothing has happened—everything we’re talking about happened over twenty years ago. Interesting how it still has impact today.”
“It really was a family name,” he told her.
“Dad, I know. You told me, Mom told me. Any daughter was going to be called Victoria.” She knew that in her head, even if she did have trouble believing it in her heart. “I’m fine.”
He nodded slowly. “Shannon was never real,” he said. “We knew Cindy was pregnant, and we were doing all the things, but it wasn’t as if we ever held her or brought her home.”
“Given that she was still in Cindy’s uterus, holding her would have been kind of gross.”
He didn’t smile. “My point is she was an idea.”
“Ideas are powerful, Dad. Governments have been toppled because of an idea. Countries go to war over ideas.” She paused, realizing that maybe she wasn’t making the best case for herI’m fineargument.
She cleared her throat. “But I get what you’re saying.”
“Do you ever wonder about your mother’s parents?”
She blinked. “There’s a change in subject, and not really. Mom’s mother died when she was born, and her dad died when she was in her twenties. Long before you had me. They’re not anyone we talk about.”
Now that he’d asked the question, she realized her mother never talked much about what her life had been like growing up. There hadn’t been anyWhen I was your ageconversations.
