Mandy nods and passes us, the redness I’d noticed in her eyes growing stronger with each step. Pam sighs like she finds this situation tiresome. “She’s being too hasty.”
“Pamela,” Glenn warns.
“You think she should stay with him?” Jake asks in shock.
“She has a young family to think about,” Pam says with a tut.
“Unbelievable.” My best friend throws his hands in the air and heads through the kitchen to the patio doors that lead outside into the bitter cold.
“So dramatic.” Pam rolls her eyes and walks into the living room to join her grandchildren who have luckily been distracted by my boys being gracious hosts, engaging their new guests in a board game.
Glenn gives us a tight smile before following his wife, leaving Nel, Lis, and me in stunned silence in the hallway. I look down at Lisa, knowing I can’t say much as the kids are just in the next room, I don’t know what they may have heard of that, I don’t want to add to it.
What the fuck?I say without words.
I know.She shakes her head slightly.
What should we do?
Divide and concur.
Agreed.I nod.
“I uh, I’m going to check on Jake,” I tell Nel, pulling away, but Lisa grabs me before I make it, her flat expression telling me,nice try.
“Nel is going to check on Jake,” Lisa says firmly. “I’m going to make sure Mandy is okay and you are going to make sure Jake’s parents are settled, have drinks, and are suitably entertained.”
I know the expression on my face would be more suited to one of our children than me, a thirty-five-year-old professional with a mortgage and a savings account. “But they don’t like me.”
Nel snorts and then claps her hand over her mouth like that might trap the sound back inside. I look at my sister with an unimpressed frown and she makes a real show of schooling her features into something resembling sympathy. “They don’t likeanyone,” she mostly mouths to avoid being overheard.
“They like you,” I argue.
“Maybe they’d like you more if you hadn’t got Jake so drunk when he was seventeen that he came home in only his underwear and a traffic cone on his head.”
I gasp like a scandalised mother on a soap opera. “He told you about that night? We swore secrecy!”
She rolls her eyes. “It was eighteen years ago and we’re getting married, we don’t have secrets.”
“Uh, what’s this about?” Lisa asks and my eyes widen in agitation at Nel.
“Nothing.”
“Clearly not,” Lisa says. “But we don’t have time right now, so I’ll get it out of you another time. Go shmooze the old folk and we’ll be back to rescue you ASAP.”
I’m unable to make another argument before they both disappear, and I’m left silently screaming at the ceiling before putting on my most charming smile and heading into the living room.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“Mouth open, tongue out, Angel.”
LISA
Lunch.Done.
Supplies I need for the Christmas Party.Bagged up and waiting by the front door.
Boys.Entertained, fed, watered, and on their best behaviour.
