Page 3 of Olivia's Only Pretending
Gracie laughed. “As if Victor won’t somehow end up there, too.”
“Seriously,” my mom chimed in.
I opened my mouth to respond, but then Victor, who was measuring spots in the living room for the bookshelf, let out a loud cackle. “I’m taking that as an invitation.”
And I felt a tiny thrill at the idea of Victor cementing himself in our group.
“For all we know, Mom is going to have some guy she’s bringing along by then.” Lucy elbowed Mom in the side. “You should see the number of DMs she’s gotten since we set up her account on that dating app, Love Local.”
“The question is, have you replied to any of thesemanyDMs?” I asked.
“I have.” Mom’s eyes twinkled. “I’ve replied to a few.”
“She’s replied tofour!” Lucy said, scandalized. Lucy was only three inches taller than me at five foot three to my five feet and had scooped the phone up and was holding it over us. I wondered how our tiny redheaded crew looked to broad-shouldered, six-foot Victor.
“Four?” I gasped. I couldn’t imagine Mom flirting with one man, let alone four.
Gracie groaned. “There’s enough man drama in this family. We don’t need more.”
“Is that flaky Austin still giving you the runaround?” Mom said, her voice full of concern, while holding the pitcher in her tight grip. Austin was a tense subject for Gracie.
“I don’t want to talk about Austin.” Her voice dropped, with all the fun and energy zapped.
Not Austin again.
“Did he message you again?” Lucy asked, ignoring Gracie’s attempt to avoid the subject. We all leaned closer to the phone screen.
“He called.” Gracie rubbed her forehead.
“Did you answer?” Mom asked.
Gracie just sighed, which in Gracie language meant she definitely answered.
“Do not meet up with him, Grace.” I grabbed the phone and stared her down as seriously as I could through the tiny phone screen. Austin and Gracie had been off and on for two years now. “I know when he reaches out, it always includes an invitation to get coffee or dinner and talk things out?—”
“You’ve given him enough time already! He’s maxed out on chances!” Victor called from the other room. He’d been privy to the Austin drama. He had some strong opinions.
Gracie just mumbled that she knew. It wasn’t very promising.
My mom poured our glasses. “Before we lose Gracie to rehearsal”—she took a sip—“tell us how you’re feeling about creating your new course, Olivia?”
Excitement bubbled in my stomach. After years of teaching courses with topics given to me, my department had room for a special topic class, and I’d been invited to design the class and teach it. I was putting together a proposal for review by a committee.A class designed by Olivia Rhodes—the only thing for it that wouldn’t be chosen by me was the registrar number.
For years, I’d had so many ideas, but now that I was about to start working on my proposal, I wasn’t sure what direction I wanted to go. “I’ve been going over old classes to get an idea of what the department would like or need. There’s also a class topic that one of our tenured professors, Dr. Lewis, is really pushing for me to go with.”
“What ideas haveyoucome up with?” Gracie asked. She slipped on her sneakers while balancing her phone in the air overhead. “I don’t care about old classes or your fellow professors.”
I took a sip, my mouth sour and salty. “I have a few ideas I’ve toyed with, but none sound like something the department would like?—”
“But what wouldyoulike?” Victor shouted from the living room. His measuring tape snapped shut.
I closed my eyes. I’d like to teach something that made my students think about history in a new way. Like this old house did for me and Victor as we researched why the crown molding was so important or why the original windows were significant.
I loved what I did because you could study history through the lens of anything. I’d taken a course in school that studied American history through vampire literature, taking notes on Bella and Edward like a textbook and learning what it told us about our culture at that time.
While surveying old class descriptions, I hadn’t found any classes like that. But I wanted to teach a class that got the students’ eyes lighting up like we did in that vampire class.
“I’d just like to have a successful new class!” I shouted so Victor could hear. “I have to get it approvedandhave a certain number of students sign up if it’s going to make it.” What I wanted couldn’t be at the forefront of my mind. I didn’t want to get my hopes up just to get shot down on my first try.
