Page 126 of First-Time Caller
I said I wanted fun and Aiden delivered. At least four times, he delivered.
“Hey, Lu. I told Maya to go upstairs and wash her Colonel Mustard mustache off. It was freaking me out the whole drive home. Every time I glanced in the rearview, it was like I had a tiny Danny McBride in the back seat.” Grayson pads his way into my kitchen without looking up, studying something on his phone as he beelines for the fridge. “And are you aware that Cindy’s mom is an absolute witch? I counted at least six Live, Laugh, Love signs in her hallway. Just the hallway. God knows what those bathrooms contained. Potpourri, I bet, and not the fun kind. I’m worried about the influence she’s having on our kid.” He grabs a yogurt from the top shelf and knocks the door closed with his hip. “I think we need to start screening—oh my god, you had sex.”
The yogurt drops to the kitchen floor, Blueberry Burst bursting across my hardwood. Grayson looks at me with his eyes blown wide.
“Oh my god,” he breathes. “Oh mygod.”
“Stop it,” I hiss, listening for Maya upstairs. “Shut up.”
“Absolutely not.”
“Nothing happened,” I try, not convincing in the slightest. “It was just—”
“Don’t you lie to me, Lucille. You’re standing there bowlegged, you’re wearing the same sweatshirt I saw Aiden in two weeks ago, and you’re making a cup of coffee without the cup for the coffee.”
I blink at the coffee machine, spitting out coffee straight onto the countertop. I curse and reach for the closest thing to contain it. A cereal bowl in the shape of a grapefruit.
Grayson points at me. “You had sex with Aiden.”
“I—” I consider lying, then decide it’s not worth the effort. I rub the sleeve of the sweatshirt across my cheek and nod. “Yeah. Yeah, I had sex with Aiden.”
Grayson props his hands on his hips. “And?”
“And what?”
“How was it? Wait, don’t answer that.” He reaches into his back pocket for his phone again, fumbling with it. “I need to text Patty.”
“Patty?”
“Patty,” he says, forehead pinched in concentration as he rapidly types something out. Somewhere above us, Maya is blasting Olivia Rodrigo, singing along at the top of her lungs. It warbles through the floorboards and straight into my brain.
I rub my knuckles across my forehead. “Why are you texting Patty?”
Before I can even finish that sentence, my front door slams open again. Patty comes skidding into the kitchen with a bottle of champagne in one hand and her apron in the other.
It is nine thirty in the morning.
I frown at her. “Did you run here?”
“Obviously.”
“Why?”
“Because Grayson used the code word.”
“What’s the code word?”
“Apricot jam,” Grayson offers, crouched down on the floor, wiping away the exploded yogurt. I look at him, then Patty, then him again.
“What doesapricot jammean?”
Patty slams the champagne bottle on the countertop. “It means you had sex, you little trollop. Come on. Give Mama all the details.”
“I’m not—you have an established code word for when I have sex?”
“Among other things,” Grayson mutters under his breath, tossing yogurt-laden paper towels into the trash. He shuffles excitedly over to the fridge again and pulls out a bottle of orange juice. “It was with Aiden,” he tells Patty.
Patty starts twisting at the top of the champagne bottle. “Of course it was with Aiden. Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday is a master class in thirst from those two. Half of Baltimore has been waiting with bated breath for them to start banging live on the air.”
