Page 37 of Talk Birdie to Me

“Gary?” Their mother looked back and forth between the two of them. “Why don’t I know about a Gary? When did you meet him?”

Taylor giggled.

The traitor.

After Geena had saved her from baby talk, this was the thanks she got.

“About a week now, right?” Taylor winked. “Unless we’re talking about the first time you met him, which was two weekends ago.”

“When do we get to meet this Gary?”

Geena glared at her sister. “I assure you, you don’t want to meet him.”

“Well, I’m sure he’s better than that lousy ex of yours, so I’ll be the judge of whether or not I want to meet this new man. You should bring him over next weekend. We can do this again, all of us. You know your father is happy for any excuse to use that new smoker.”

“Gary is a bird, Mom.”

Their dad walked through with a tray of brisket he placed on the counter. “Who’s a bird?”

Her mother squinted. “Is that some new slang for something?”

Austin entered with a big grin, clearly having heard the conversation and having been briefed by Taylor at some earlier time. He scratched his short beard while Taylor clapped her hand over her mouth. But neither could stop their laughter from escaping.

“No, Mom,” Geena said. “He’s a literal bird. An African grey parrot, to be exact.”

“You know, honey, most people who get divorced get themselves a new wardrobe or a car or even a vacation. Why on earth would you buy a bird?”

“I didn’t buy him,” Geena said. “He just sort of… showed up.”

“Right,” Taylor said. “Gary’s the bird, and Cody’s the guy.”

Geena glared again. “He’s a guy, not the guy. The guy who Taylor told I’d be glad to take care of that obnoxious bird.”

That wasn’t exactly true. Well, the part about Cody bringing him was true, but Gary had so far been much less obnoxious than she’d expected. Although she hadn’t let him out yet today. But he’d gone in so easily yesterday, and the whole pooping on the paper trick was a nice bonus. She was almost getting used to his filthy chatter.

Her dad aimed his tongs at Geena. “So Gary is the bird you’re watching for your boyfriend, Cody?”

Geena let out a long, exasperated sigh, while she looked at the ceiling and counted backwards from five. If she continued to look at the ceiling and breathe and count, she wouldn’t murder her whole family with the lasers that were surely about to shoot from her eyes.

“Cody is not my boyfriend.”

Taylor squeezed Austin’s arm as he wrapped them around her from behind. Then she chimed in with, “Right. They only went on one date.”

Geena made a mental note to never do another favor for her sister ever again.

“Yes, we went on one date. Technically.”

“That’s not how technically works,” Taylor corrected. “The date was a date. There’s no technically about it.”

“Fine. We had one date two weeks ago. Then he brought me a bird. He checked on Gary last night and brought pizza. So that technically was not a date, since he was specifically there for the bird.”

“I’m confused,” their dad said, placing his tongs on the tray and swapping them out for a carving knife. “Why did he bring you a bird?”

Their mother ignored that question and asked, “How did you two meet?”

Geena cringed internally. She wasn’t embarrassed that she used a dating app. It was on a whim after James had been hounding her for weeks to try it. Cody was her one and done with that experiment.

So no, she wasn’t ashamed of trying it. She just didn’t want to justify online dating to her mother.

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