Page 124 of The Great Dating Fake Off
My heart stops as the photo fills my screen. “What is that?”
“It’s a ring, silly.”
My mind is spinning. It’s two two-liter bottles stuck together to create a tornado. “I— holy crap. You’re engaged? How long have you been together?”
Her laugh is a featherlight trill. “Nora. It’s just a ring. Ruby is my birthstone.”
I blink twice. Sure, I’ve had wine, but I know a left hand when I see it. “It’s on your ring finger.”
“Isn’t every finger a ring finger if the ring fits?”
“No. Not at all.” I shake my head for no one’s benefit but my own. “You gave me a heart attack. I thought you were engaged to a guy I haven’t met whose last name I don’t even know. I really wish you’d text me back once in a while.”
“Oh, honey, I’d never get engaged without telling you. We’re just having fun.”
Fun. When it comes to her and relationships, it’s always fun until it’s not. The shiny varnish of this thing will wear off as sure as the sun setting.
I peer at the doorway that leads back to the dining room. Benji is contentedly holding Tairn as he waits for me.
I turn my back and lower my voice. “Hey Mom?”
“Hey daughter.”
I press the phone harder to my ear, like maybe it’ll bring us closer together. “In all the relationships you’ve had, did at least one of them stand out as being…more?”
I hear something that I like to think is the ocean but could just be poor reception since she’s a world away. “David.”
My heartstrings pull tighter. Key West left its mark on both of us. “Why’d the relationship end?”
She hums, and then a long pause follows. “I guess I didn’t know it was special until after it was over. Hindsight is cruel, which is why I try not to concern myself with the past. I’m sure at the time I thought Patrick ‘McDreamy’ Dempsey was still out there waiting for me, so I wasn’t willing to settle. Between you and me, I still think about— Shit, here comes Nicky.”
A deep voice rumbles in the background. There goes any shot at a meaningful conversation, not that Benji’s kitchen is really the setting for it.
Though with how anxious I’ve been, I’d take just about any pearls of wisdom wherever I can get them.
“Right, I’m saying that’s how I met you! Because I was smart enough to be picky!” Mom laughs her smooth-it-over laugh. “I can’t wait for you to meet him, Nora. Oh, and his last name is Weaver. Nicholas Weaver the third.”
I stick her on speakerphone and go back to wrestling with the corkscrew. I don’t know what I was hoping to hear but knowing my mother—queen of never looking back—still thinks about the one who got away is enough to get my gears turning.
Nicholas Weaver the third gets close enough to the phone that I hear him say the word holidays.
“Baby, do you want to come to his for the holidays? He lives outside Chicago. Sorry—we live outside Chicago. Slip of the tongue, it’s all so new!”
“We can talk about it when summer is over.”
Again, I sound like a stern adult. Because, no, I don’t want to go to this stranger’s house for the holidays.
“I’ll let you get going,” I tell her. “You two have fun and be careful.”
“Hey, that’s my line. Start thinking about Christmas and we’ll talk soon. I’m excited for you to see my new place.”
I say nothing. There are three certainties in my life: My name is Nora, I love books, and my mother will not be living with this man come Christmastime. But weirdly, knowing that brings me a kind of comfort.
She’s always been exactly herself, and I’ve always loved her despite her flakiness—it’s just easier when her whims can’t hurt me anymore. “Love you, Mom.”
“Love you forever and like you for always.”
This well-worn sendoff brings a smile to my face. And I guess those words are magic, because the cork finally pops from the Cabernet, and I refill my glass with way too much.
