"This is Julian Thorne," I said, filling the silence. "My boyfriend."
"Your..." Mom started, then stopped, clearly recalibrating everything she'd assumed about this visit.
"Boyfriend," Dad finished, moving forward to shake Julian's hand with the automatic politeness of someone raised in the South. "Well. This is... unexpected."
Before Julian could respond, before I could try to ease the awkwardness of the moment, the doorbell rang from inside the house.
I frowned. "Are you expecting someone?"
My parents exchanged another one of those looks—the kind that told me they knew exactly who was at the door and I wasn't going to like it.
"I'll get it," I said, moving toward the house with growing suspicion.
When I opened the front door, my worst fears were confirmed. Standing on my parents' front porch were Danny Heathrow and Steve Jeffords—two of the men my mother had specifically mentioned during one of our last phone conversations as potential dating prospects.
Danny was holding a bottle of wine and wearing what was probably his best button-down shirt. Steve had brought flowers and was clearly freshly shaved for the occasion.
They were here for a setup. My parents had invited them to spend time with their daughter, not believing that said daughter was no longer single and had just introduced them to a boyfriend they'd assumed was fictional.
"Vivienne!" Danny's face lit up with the enthusiasm of someone who thought he was expected. "You look great. Your mom said you were coming home for a visit."
Behind him, Steve was nodding agreement, both men clearly under the impression that this was some kind of arranged introduction.
I stood in the doorway, speechless, realizing that my parents' careful expressions suddenly made perfect sense. They'd been planning an intervention. A parade of eligible bachelors to prove that their daughter didn't need to invent boyfriends to make them happy.
And now Julian—very real, very present Julian—was standing on the back deck, probably wondering why I was taking so long to answer the door and come back.
This was about to become very complicated.
25
Julian
The surprise on Tom and Linda Ellis's faces was almost comical. I could see them recalibrating everything they'd assumed about this visit, about their daughter's mysterious boyfriend who they'd clearly thought was a figment of her imagination.
"So you're real," Linda said finally, and I caught the slight embarrassment in her voice.
"Very real," I confirmed with a smile, hoping to ease the awkwardness. "Though I understand why you might have had doubts. Vivienne mentioned she hasn't brought anyone home in a while."
Tom was studying me with the careful assessment of a father sizing up his daughter's choice in men. "What kind of work keeps you busy on Thursday afternoons?"
"Fashion design," I said. "I have manufacturing partners overseas, so conference calls don't always respect normal business hours. Today was a production issue that needed immediate attention."
"Fashion design," Linda repeated, and I could see her trying to reconcile this information with whatever preconceptions she'd had. "That's... interesting."
Before I could elaborate, I heard voices from inside the house—Vivienne's voice, and two distinctly male voices that didn't belong to her father. The conversation lasted longer than it should have for a simple door answer, and when Vivienne finally returned to the deck, she wasn't alone.
Two men followed her outside, both clearly dressed for an occasion. One carried a bottle of wine, the other flowers, and both had the eager, hopeful expressions of men who thought they were here for a reason.
Vivienne moved immediately to my side, her body language tense in a way that put me on alert. "Mom," she said, her voice carefully controlled, "Would you like to make introductions?"
I felt the pieces click into place withcrystalline clarity. My eyes flicked to the table with eight chairs around it and the abundance of food, the careful expressions on her parents' faces, the surprise that I actually existed—they'd planned this. They'd invited eligible bachelors to meet their supposedly single daughter.
"This is Danny Heathrow," Linda said, gesturing to the man with the wine. "He went to high school with Vivienne. And Steve Jeffords, he just moved back to town." She paused, and I waited for her to introduce me as Vivienne's boyfriend, to clarify the situation. Instead, she said, "And this is Julian Thorne."
No explanation. No context. Just my name, floating in the air like I was another potential suitor in their lineup.
I was about to correct the oversight when we all heard the doorbell ring again from inside. Vivienne's sharp glance at her mother was met with a guilty blush and averted eyes, confirming my suspicions about the scope of this ambush.
