“What?” I asked defensively. I found this in your kitchen.
“This will be your kitchen too soon. God help us.”
“Very funny. Why do you assume that I’m going to move in with you?”
“Because we’re getting married? And that usually works better if you live in the same place.” He went over to the counter, grabbed a potholder, and emptied my failed culinary experiment into the garbage. It was probably an act of mercy.
“Maybe you should move in with me. A bunch of your stuff is there already. I don’t even have a drawer here.”
“That’s because you don’t need clothes here.” He smirked.
“We haven’t even discussed it, though. You can’t just make decisions for us as a couple without even consulting me. We need to discuss things.”
“Okay, we’ll discuss it.” He held his hands up like he was a scale, weighing the options, and I sensed more sarcasm on the horizon. “On one hand we have the upscale, secure building in one of the best neighborhoods in Philadelphia. That would be my place.” The scale tipped a little to the right. “On the other hand we have the tenement in the ghetto. That would be your place.” The scale evened out again. “I don’t know, babe, that’s a pretty tough choice. Oh wait! No it’s not!” The scale slammed down to the right.
“We should still discuss it,” I said through gritted teeth. “Married people discuss things.”
“What is there to discuss?”
“Don’t you understand? It’s not the choice itself. It’s that you want to make it unilaterally. If you want to marry me, you need to include me in the decision-making.”
“Fine. Do you want to move in with me, Lily? It’s a nice place. It’s true, it isn’t quite as colorful as your place. We don’t have any drunken cougars or tattoo artists named Vixen. And there are no mafia hit men living here, but there are lots of cafes and shops nearby!” he said with a sunny smile.
“It seems like the better choice,” I growled, glaring ominously.
“Well, I’m glad we discussed this, honey.” He smiled. Communication was something we were definitely going to need to work on.
“What did Cameron want?” I asked, changing the subject before I killed him.
“He wanted to know if we wanted to come over tonight after we left my parents’ place. Jessica is all moved in now, and they invited Braden and Gabrielle, and Mark and Braden’s sister, Beth.”
“Beth is back in town? That’s great.” I had gotten to know my friend Gabrielle’s sister-in-law, Beth, fairly recently, but we seemed to hit it off really well. Then it dawned on me … “What did you say?”
“I said we would be over later,” he answered, going over to the fridge and pulling out some grapes.
“Again, without even asking me,” I said, getting seriously annoyed. I saw him pause and take a deep breath. He was getting annoyed too. He turned and put the grapes down on the counter. He was more than annoyed. He was angry. Uh oh. Just like old times.
“Lily, do you not want to go see our friends tonight?” he asked, sounding exasperated.
“I do want to see them, Adam, but I want you to ask before you answer for both of us.”
“Look, if it were something like, should we buy a house, should we have kids, then yes, I obviously see the merits of discussion. But I knew you would want to be there if your friends were getting together.”
I could see that he was pissed off. In the past, I would have held my ground, but the point I was trying to make was about communication, and fighting wasn’t communicating. I took a deep breath myself and counted to ten mentally. Then, I walked over to him and put my arms around his waist, looking up into his angry but still beautiful brown eyes.
“You’re right. I do want to move in with you, and I do want to see our friends tonight, and I’m glad you know me so well. But I need to have a voice in this relationship. I fought enough battles with my parents over the right to have my own opinion. Please, will you just ask? I’ll probably agree.” He just stared back at me for a moment, and then I saw the anger fade.
“Okay. I’m going to go watch some football. How do you feel about that?” he asked. I couldn’t help myself, I smiled.
Chapter Three
As I walked up the drive to his parents’ front door later that afternoon clutching my Entemann’s pound cake, I turned to Adam nervously. He had proposed the previous Saturday night, and we had agreed to hold off on telling them until we saw them in person today.
“Now, I think we should wait until we’re all relaxed and sitting down …”
“Uh huh …” he answered, sounding like he was only half listening. He reached out to push the bell as I shifted my weight from foot to foot and felt my palms begin to sweat even in the November chill.
“And we’ll stress that we haven’t discussed the details …” I went on, my voice sounding higher pitched than normal.
“You had better let me hold the cake,” he said, relieving me of my contribution to dessert.
The door flew open and Adam’s mom stood there beaming. His dad stood beside her with a friendly smile. They invited us in, and the second we cleared the doorway, Deb Roth’s eyes flew to my left hand as if angels had tipped her off.
“Oh my God!” was all I heard before she clutched me to her bosom in a death grip that could have earned a World Wrestling Federation belt. I gasped and tried to hug her back but my arms were pinned to my sides. I now understood why Adam had wanted to hold the cake. Luckily, he intervened before she cracked my ribs.
“Mom! Come on, let her go. She’s turning blue.” Mrs. Roth immediately turned her attention to her youngest child and only son.
“My baby! My sweet little boy!” She clutched onto Adam like a drowning woman to a life raft. I grabbed the cake back just in time.
“Congratulations,” Mr. Roth said pleasantly. “It’s about time.”
“What’s going on?” Adam’s sister, Abby interrupted before I could explore the meaning of that comment further.
“Look!” Mrs. Roth let go of her baby boy and gestured toward my engagement ring. It might as well have been the Ark of the Covenant there on my left hand.
“Oh, wow,” Abby exclaimed, sounding amazed. “Is that an engagement ring?”
“She finally caught me,” Adam replied smugly and I gave him a raised eyebrow.