Mom
Did you meet her at a coffee shop?
That was short-lived jubilance. I tell my momone timethat I had a date with a woman I met while I was working at the coffee shop for a change of scenery …
Caleb
I know her from work.
I mean, I do a lot of things for work. This could probably be true.
Mom
Does she live in her parents’ basement?
I blow out a breath of defeat.Idon’t even live in my parents’ basement anymore. I moved to Houston to get away from these types of comments—despite the fact that Iownmy parents’ house and the basement is a nice apartment that I spent a lot of cash upgrading. She doesn’t call it the basement when she tells her friends about the space she lists on the GetAwayHome vacation rental site.
I massage my temples and try to have patience. Ever since I almost eloped, she’s gotten a lot more intense about making sure I have the “right” kind of wife—i.e., someone who earns a good living. She’s convinced that because I’m self-employed, I’m barely scraping by.
Caleb
I’m working right now. I’ll talk to you about this later.
Mom
Take five minutes away from your computer. I need details about her food choices. Does she have any allergies or sensitivities?
Well. I don’t know this fake date—that I haven’t found yet—well enough to say.
Caleb
I’ll message her and get back to you when she lets me know. I really have to get back to working. Talk to you later. Love you.
She can’t argue with me deferring to my date, and thankfully, my notifications go quiet. I close down the app just in case.
“Okay, sorry, guys,” I report into my headset. “Ready to go.”
“Let’s go get the file,” Malia says. Something about her voice settles the irritation the conversation with my mom gave me. Malia’s voice is always calm but assured. I’ve told her before that I think she should try being a 911 dispatcher if she ever wants to change careers. She has the kind of voice you trust in a tense situation.
And maybe stopping a pretend war by gathering intel on an assassination that was staged by a big tech company isn’trealdanger, but I’m certain the way she always sounds like she has things together probably translates into real life.
Malia and Tyree pick up the drop without a problem, and we make our way back to the little cottage on the outskirts of game Copenhagen. Once we have the files safely tucked away there and have secured the perimeter of the cottage, we sign off for the night.
And I turn my attention to the problem of my date to Carlie’s wedding. The most pressing issue is that Mom will be textingme again in the morning to find out if I know my date’s food preferences. That’s really reason enough to get this figured out. If I convince a friend to come to my sister’s wedding with me, I’d like to have the decency to feed her a meal she wants to eat, for both the rehearsal dinner and the wedding itself. Because to keep Mom from trying to matchmake me with any of the super-successful women that will likely be attending Carlie’s wedding (and can apparently support me in the manner of living I’m used to), I will need a date that looks like a serious enough relationship to keep Mom at bay. And there will be some very successful women there, thanks to the fact that Carlie’s fiancé, Law Card, is a famous pro-football player and the son of a United States senator.
Lots of high-powered lawyers on the guest list. I’d bet big money on that.
I run down the list of women I know through work, since that would be the easiest thing to do after already starting the lie with that. I own my own company, but it’s a solo gig. I contract out for anything that needs done that I don’t do myself. I have a lawyer on retainer, but she’s married with three teenage boys, so that’s not an option. The person who does my taxes and payroll is a guy. Thereismy virtual assistant, but that’s off the table. Dating an assistant is highly inappropriate.
Okay, so I’m going to have to get creative about what I define as someone I work with. My brainstorming is interrupted by another text. (A ding on my phone this time—did I seriously not silence it?) I groan.
Mom
Let me know if you need any cash for your date! You know your dad and I are happy to help out for a special occasion.
Caleb
Why would I need money for a date when both of the dinners are free…
