Page 30 of A Break in Communications

Was Lucy Masters into me? I thought I’d throw up. What a—repulsive thought. The thought that she’d enjoyed the kiss—that maybe she’d want to do it again—had she actually been looking to join me in the shower?

Lucy met my eyes, just for a second that made my throat feel tight, and she came down the steps, sighing hard and carrying a bundle of something with her. “Grandma, please do not start rambling to Anna about incontinence—”

Her grandmother put her hands up. “She’s going to get there one day, too.”

Lucy came down off the bottom step, and I felt my heart miss a beat as I saw the bundle she had in her hands—a flower bouquet. With violets. It was just a coincidence. She didnotask Veronica for my favorite flower too and then go get them for me. My heart beat faster with this anxious weight, not knowing what I was supposed to be—ifLucy Masterswas interested in me, I couldn’t keep doing this whole thing pretending to date her, even if it caused problems with Gould. Even if I didn’t get the promotion. Was she thinking about that kiss too?

Lucy beamed at me, and she offered me the bouquet, crushing my hopes and making everything tangled inside me when she said, “Good morning, gorgeous. Vern said violets are your favorite.”

Dammit, Veronica. I needed to… have a word with her.

Ugh—I guess it wasn’t her fault. She thought Lucy and I were actually together. If it were someone I was actually dating,I’d have loved them to show up with a bouquet of violets, find out my favorite things and surprise me randomly with them…

“Lucy,” I said, putting on the bestoh-you-shouldn’t-havevoice I could and smiling sweetly at her. “Oh, god, this is beautiful. Thank you.”

“Not even the smallest fraction as beautiful as you deserve, darling, but I’ll keep trying my best.”

Her grandmother rolled her eyes. “Ah, gag me. She’s okay at best.”

“Grandma.” Lucy sighed, turning back to her. “Please stop insulting my girlfriend.”

“I’m just saying, I expected better,” she said, her hands up.

“Okay, Grandma, just consider thatIlike Anna a lot and that very same person, me, is the one who decides what you eat for dinner most days. Keep that in mind and think carefully about that as you decide what next to say about Anna.”

To my own horror, I snorted, and I put a hand over my mouth, keeping myself from laughing any further. I was not laughing at Lucy’s comments. Just… satisfying to see her giving someone else a hard time instead of me.

Her grandmother put her hands up. “I wasn’t saying a word. Except that your girlfriend is very lovely and has such warm eyes.”

“Mm-hm. That’s what I thought, Grandma.”

Her grandmother turned back to me. “So, you do cook, right? Lucy’s not putting up with a freeloader who sits around eating her cooking and complaining about her unless that freeloader is me.”

“Hm… I try, but I have it on my sister’s authority that Lucy’s a better cook.”

She clicked her tongue at me. “Well, what are you doing? Get learning. My granddaughter deserves someone to cook for her, for once. I hoped maybe when she said she was a lesbianthat she’d get a pretty housewife, but you’re barely pretty and you can’t even be a housewife?”

“Grandma,” Lucy said. “Remember what I was just talking about?”

She laughed. “Oh, I’m just playing with you. But I mean it. Don’t forget to spoil Lucy. She’s always doing it for other people, and other people should reciprocate. Except me. I don’t have to.”

“So,” I said, “do as you say, not as you do.”

“Oh, absolutely,” she said. “God, can you imagine? If you were as nasty and mean as I am? Why, we’d have to have you strung up and carted out of here.”

“I’m a bit on the serious side in general, but I’ll be… extra nice to Lucy to balance you out.”

Lucy gave me a weary smile, stepping up next to my side and slipping a hand to my lower back. I almost jumped away, feeling her touch like it was the only thing that existed. Like—not in a romantic way, like having a gun to my forehead would become the only thing that existed. Why did she just step up and slip a hand onto my body like it was so natural? My head spun with the thought of what she might have had in her mind—like maybe she wanted to move her hand lower and take a handful of—I forced my mind back to the present moment.

“Please just ignore everything from Grandma’s mouth,” she said. “I left her dinner in the fridge, so we can abandon her here. Shall we?”

“Shall we abandon your grandmother together?” I laughed. “I feel like she would disapprove if I didn’t say yes, honestly.”

“Oh, get on out of here,” her grandmother said. “Give an old lady her peace. I need to go read a book. I hear your girlfriend’s a big reader and I need to outread her.”

I waited until we were outside—until I’d led Lucy to the car and got the passenger door for her, and I got in and huddled my coat tighter around me as I turned the car back on and crankedthe heating up—before I turned to Lucy and said, “Whatdidn’tVeronica tell you about me?”

“Hm?”

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