The drive to their house—my childhood home—takes just ten minutes from work, which makes me feel even worse for not fitting in visits with them more often. As always, the front door is open and I let myself in, tossing my crossbody bag down on the small table inside the foyer, keeping my cell phone in my back pocket as I wander through the house looking for them.
My mother is in the kitchen, slaving away over the stove, making it look a lot harder than it probably is to make a stew and some biscuits. There’s a lot of things she’s great at in life, but no one would ever accuse her of being a housewife. She’s more the kick ass in her career, hire help around the house kind of lady, so I appreciate that she’s taking the effort to make a home-cooked meal for us today.
She turns around when she hears me approach, putting the metal spoon down on a ceramic spoon rest and lifting her arms to greet me. “Jellybean!” Her enthusiastic greeting drives the knife of guilt farther into my gut.
“Hi, Mom.”
She stops coming in for a hug as she realizes something about me is different. A lot of somethings, actually. This is the first time she’s seen me all done up since Alex and I developed my new look. Last time, I came clean-faced, hair thrown back as usual. But now, her bare arms come out to her side, fists resting on her hips as she assesses me.
Those honey eyes rake me up and down, taking in the new hair, the pop of makeup that gives my face just a little more life, highlighter accentuating my round eyes, button nose, and full upper lip. She makes a noise of approval as she sees the outfit: an oversized cream sweater that hangs down to my upper thighs, tight jeans that show there’s some shape under the bulk, and little suede booties that complete the ensemble. My new wardrobe is pretty sweater-heavy for a southern gal, but I’m cold so much of the time that I’ve been able to get away with it all summer long so far, and it’s already the end of August.
“Well don’t you look lovely, Jellybean! Your daddy is gonna lose his mind to see you all gorgeous like this when it’s not even a special occasion.”
My head falls down in embarrassment, my newly shorter hair hanging forward to cover my face. The difference between myparents and Aaron’s is so evident in situations like this. While we both come from loving families, both only children with our parents still happily married (what are the odds?), mine had me pretty late in life (okay, I’m more of a miracle baby if we’re being honest), whereas his parents had him as teenagers. Our parents are almost three decades apart in age, and it shows.
Most of our taste in nerd culture, music and video games came from his parents, while mine were the stricter influence, the “realistic” ones who pushed for my college education, and thought he’d never make it in film.Hisparents moved their family to Atlanta from Alabama (where he was born) right after his thirteenth birthday to help him follow his dream. No need to tell you how that worked out.
Most of our teenage years were split evenly between our two homes, but there’s a significant difference in the environment of each. His mom, Carrie, will probably wink at me and give me a huge hug next time she sees me, without embarrassing me. I should’ve known my parents would make a big deal out of me not dressing like a street urchin anymore.
Mom doesn’t let me hide from her, pulling me and rocking me side to side briefly in a maternal embrace.
“Aaron still out of town?” she asks, as that’s the answer I gave her when, at my birthday dinner last week, she wondered why he hadn’t been around with me lately. She obviously knows I’m not working for him anymore, but I haven’t gone any further than I had to into that story. Unease curdles my insides at the thought of having to come clean on our falling out.
Before I can even answer, she curses suddenly and pulls back rapidly at the unmistakable sounds of the stove bubbling over.
“I’m gonna need another five or ten minutes on this, sweetheart. The table is already set and your father is probably still in the shower after he mowed the lawn all morning, so you just keep yourself busy for a few minutes, okay?”
“No worries, Ma, I’m gonna check out the treehouse.” Not sure why those words left my mouth, but my feet are headed in that direction now, so to the treehouse I go, I guess.
Dad had it built for my eighth birthday—sixteen years ago as of last week—and while time has left its mark on the exterior of the structure, it’s still as solid and sound as ever. The ladder is a little trickier to climb in booties than Canvas slip-ons, but I make it work, plopping down on the platform that overlooks my parents’ property and letting the memories from this place overtake me.
This is the place we’d come to celebrate when things were good, to commiserate when they weren’t, or where we’d analyze when we weren’t sure whether they sucked or were about to be fantastic.
This is where we digested the news he’d landed his second major role. We’d celebrated the first one, of course, but the second one is what really hit home for him. He finally accepted it might not be a fluke. That his charm, his innate likeability, that natural talent combined with all his hard work of learning his craft might be paying off, making him a dependable addition to any set, a fast favorite of every director he’d worked with to date.
“I have you to thank for this,” he says quietly, much more serious than his usual demeanor.
“What do you mean?”
“Fishing for compliments?” His easy grin tells me he didn’t really mean it as a dig, but I blush all the same.
“Nevermind. Don’t answer that.”
“Not to get all cheesy on you, but I hope you know how much your friendship has meant to me since we moved here. It would have been a shitty few years without you, ya know.”
The smile diffusing my face could probably light up all of the Georgia Aquarium if I let it keep going, so I tamp it down. His friendship is absolutely everything to me, too. But if I openup about that to him, more than the words of a friend would probably leave my lips. So I tamp those down, too, settling for zipped lips and a contented smile.
“I mean it, you know. The more I get my roots in the industry here, the more thankful I am to havethisbetween us.”
My eyes lift to find his, and he’s looking at me so deeply, I swear it’s my soul he’s seeing, not my eyes.
“There’s a lot of shady people, some shifty shit. Some people have a circle they’ve spent decades cultivating. And some people seem to have no one, which might be the saddest part. But I’ve already seen what happens when you let the wrong person in, and I’m just thankful I have you. You helped me get here in the first place, and you keep me grounded, Gem. I’m not wandering lost in my new life. You keep me focused, and give me something to look forward to coming back to. Not losing myself in the lifestyle, or the bullshit that comes with it.”
His words soothe something deep inside me. Some fear, some worry that he could lose sight of the wonderful person that’s come to mean more to me than anything or anyone else.
No words are coming to me that would do justice to what he just said to me, so I just drop my head sideways until it’s resting on his shoulder and revel in being in his company.
The fact that he thinks it’s me keeping him from falling into the fame, an ego, the vices that are so easily available in Hollywood, that’s not something I’ll take for granted.
