“Where did you find him?” Mom whispered to a beaming Gemma.
“Would you believe, in Central Park?”
“We were just there yesterday,” Mom said.
I tried to catch Philip’s eye and warn him, but he never took his eyes off Gemma. I wasn’t quite certain how magical he was other than that he’d been enchanted and didn’t seem too shocked about it. He’d managed to hide his origins from Gemma, so he might get through dinner without causing a scene.
We got Thanksgiving dinner on the table with a minimum of disasters, and Jeff and Philip were both intimidated enough by Dad to keep their mouths shut. I got a better sense of why dates in high school had been few and far between for me. Between my dad and my three older brothers, it would have taken a very brave boy to come anywhere near me.
Ethan arrived just in time for dinner. “Sorry I’m late,” he said as he came through the door. “I got sidetracked catching up on some work. Good to see you again, Mr. and Mrs. Chandler.” I introduced him to Jeff and Philip, and then we gathered around the table to say grace.
Dad made us all hold hands and bow our heads. Jeff looked baffled, but he followed along. I hoped Dad went for a shorter prayer instead of the sermon he could sometimes preach on Thanksgiving. “Oh Lord, thank you for bringing us all together here today,” he began. It looked like we were in for the long version. Midway through, there was a yelp from across the circle as apparently Marcia had to keep Jeff from sneaking something from the table. Ethan spent the whole time massaging my hand with his thumb, which felt nice even as I feared it would earn a lightning bolt from heaven. There had to be something wrong with flirting during a prayer. I wasn’t sure which I feared most, God or the wrath of my father if he caught us. We all joined in a hearty “Amen!” when Dad finally brought the prayer to a close.
Then it was time to dig in, and we worked our way around the table to fill our plates. As Ethan put a slice of turkey on my plate, he whispered to me, “Is something wrong? You look stressed.”
I debated whether I should tell him, but I felt like I needed one sure ally in case things got weird. “I figured out yesterday that my mom’s immune to magic. That must be where I got it.”
He nodded. “I see. So now you’re constantly worried about what she’s going to notice.”
“Yeah. I almost ran out of explanations yesterday. Please don’t say anything about work. I want to get her home to Texas without having to tell her the whole story. You’re as immune as I am—as she is. Help me look out for anything I’d need to explain. And please don’t tell anyone about this when we go back to the office.”
“What are you so worried about?”
“I just—I just want things to be normal. I can handle my job being totally whacked out, that my boss is Merlin, and that I have a fairy in the office next to me. I can even handle the fact that on every date I try to go on things tend to zap in and out of existence, or scary things try to hurt me, or even that people who think they used to be frogs serenade me.” I noticed his confused look and said, “Long story. But I need my family to be normal. Not for me, but for them. My life has changed. Theirs doesn’t have to. I want them to be able to go home and be happy, understand?”
“I think I see your point,” he whispered.
“What are you two lovebirds doing whispering over the turkey?” my mom called out from across the room.
“Of course, with my family, ‘normal’ is a relative term,” I said with a sigh.
Ethan laughed and handed me a glass of Mom’s traditional cranberry punch. “I’m not sure any family is truly normal,” he said.
There wasn’t room for us to sit at the table with all the food on it, so we took our plates to the living room and sat on the floor, the dining chairs, or the sofa. I tried to think of a safe conversation to start, but Mom beat me to the punch.
“I hope you like everything. I’m sure it’s different from what y’all eat for Thanksgiving up here, but it’s traditional for us back home.”
There were mumbles around the room about how good the food was. Food seemed to be a safe topic. “I know a few people were surprised by the corn bread dressing I made last year,” I said.
“My mom used to make oyster dressing, before she gave up cooking entirely,” Ethan commented. Mom looked like he’d uttered a blasphemy. Okay, so maybe food wasn’t such a safe topic. I’d seen from my oldest brother’s marriage that what to serve for holidays was a bigger source of marital strife than money or sex. A corn bread dressing person and a sausage stuffing person weren’t likely to see eye-to-eye. Oysters in the dressing could be grounds for a holy war. I noticed with great relief that Ethan didn’t seem to have any problems eating the dressing we’d made.