“To him?”
“No, to you.” He pokes my side, making me laugh. “Meant every goddamn word.”
“There you are,” Aunt Kitty says as she comes into the living room, where I’m putting my shoes on. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”
“I’ve been in the house all morning.”
“You’ve been impossible to find.” She flops back on the couch, takes her neon yellow visor off her head, and starts fanning herself with it. “I wanted to talk to you about something.”
“What’s that?” I ask, my nerves skyrocketing, because does she already know?
“The boys.”
Oh shit.
Seriously, did Rupert already let it slip?
“What about them?” I ask, attempting not to fidget or seem nervous.
“They’ve been around for some time now and I think that it would be in our best interest, since they’ve done so much for us, to invite them over for dinner.”
Relief floods me as I ask, “Invite them over for dinner?”
“Yes, we never had a proper welcoming for them given how you were trying to vehemently kick your fiancé out of the house.”
“He’s not my fiancé and I wasn’t kicking him out. I was asking a stranger to vacate our home.”
“Either way. We never truly welcomed them to America, and I think it’s about time we put on our hosting pants and show them what fine ladies we can be.”
“I don’t think they would care,” I say, trying to nicely nix this idea.
“I care.” Aunt Kitty sits up and places her visor on her head all askew. “Do you know what kind of effort Rupert has put into my career?”
“Career?” I ask. “Aunt Kitty, that’s not a career.”
As if I slapped her, she leans back, looking fully insulted. “It is so a career.”
“No, a career is something that you do daily that helps pay the bills. What you’re doing is not paying the bills. I’m paying everything with the odd jobs I have throughout town.”
“Yes, and you’re living in my home for free.”
It’s the first time she’s ever said anything like that to me, calling it her home. It’s always been ours, and sure, her late husband owned it and left it to her, but she’s always made it a point to call it our home.
“I thought it was our home?” I ask, my voice quieting.
“Well, it is, but you know what I mean.”
“No, I don’t actually,” I say. “I thought that we shared this home together, and now you’re making it seem like we don’t. If you don’t want me living here, then I can go somewhere else.”
“Stop that.” She motions at me. “It was a slip of the tongue.”
“An insulting one,” I reply.
“Not to be immature about this, Renley, but you were the one who commented on my career.”
“Because it’s not a career,” I say, standing from the couch. “I love you, Aunt Kitty, but you have to know that what you’re doing is not a career.”
“It might not be conventional,” she says, sitting up, her expression morphing into something sad. “But it works for me, and you’ve known this about me. You know what my dreams are, what I like, so I don’t see why this is a surprise.”
