Page 22 of What Happened Last Night

“I’m happy mowing,” Mack said. “I don’t want to trade.”

“No trading.” Mom was firm. “No complaining. I’ve told you all a hundred times, the only way to get out of chores is to get married, but you never listen. Now go.”

When my brothers were gone and Dad had vanished to the backyard to barbecue, Mom turned to me.

“What’s my job?” I asked.

“You’re with me in the garden,” Mom said.

We went to the backyard, where Mom did her gardening, and got to work. We pulled weeds, mulched, and watered. Jay waved at us before turning the power washer on the back deck. After he left, Mack arrived in his sport sunglasses and baseball hat, mowing around us. Dad’s job was food, and he appeared and disappeared, moving between the barbecue and the kitchen. My back ached and my hands were sore even through the gardening gloves I wore. When Mom said she was putting her kids to work, she meant it.

“How’s the new job going?” Mom asked me.

“Really good.” I kept Will’s phone in my back pocket, set to vibrate in case someone called. He was still traveling and had meetings all weekend, so even though it was my day off, I wanted to be available if he needed me. So far, my phone hadn’t buzzed.

“Have you met any musicians?”

“Yes, several.”

“How well do you know them?”

I glared at her. “Mom, stop.”

She gave me a look through her sunglasses. “I’m just checking. I worry, you know. You shouldn’t waste precious time with a musician. They aren’t marriage material.”

So it was starting already. “The ones I’ve met are very nice, actually. And they have wives or serious girlfriends.”

“Really.” Her dry tone said she didn’t believe a word of it.

“You know what, Mom?” I put my hands to my lower back and stretched, looking up at the sky. “I think I’ll hook up with a musician. He’ll be twenty years old. I’ll follow him on tour, and I’ll do some drugs, and then I’ll get pregnant to top things off. How does that sound? Do I get out of gardening if I do that?”

“Don’t tease me,” Mom said. “Reggie says your hours are very unusual in this job and you come and go at strange times. Is your boss difficult?”

This was the joy of living above my mom’s sister. She spied on everything, and she told my mother all of it. I had to make the sacrifice in order to get the discounted rent. “My boss is just fine,” I said.

“It sounds like he doesn’t keep a proper schedule, and I noticed you checking that phone on a weekend. Don’t let him work you too hard.”

“Will doesn’t work me too hard,” I argued. “He’s the nicest boss I’ve ever had. He’s smart and he’s kind. I don’t work nine to five because the schedule is flexible. He trusts me to get the work done instead of micromanaging every minute of my day. It’s how he is, because he’s a genius who has always worked for himself instead of in a toxic corporate culture.”

I realized too late that I’d said too much. My cheeks were hot, and not just with sunshine and exertion. Mom gave me that laser glare that missed nothing.

“Who is he?” she asked. “Who is your boss?”

I turned back to the weeds I was pulling. “He’s just my boss, Mom.”

She didn’t buy it. Aunt Reggie would get a phone call before the evening was out, and she’d be on even higher alert. “Is he married?”

“That’s none of your business.”

“Luna McQueen, if you are lusting after a married man, then I didn’t raise you right.”

“I’m not lusting after anyone!” I was absolutely, one hundred percent, lusting after Will Hale. “I’m not dating anyone, and I’m not sleeping with anyone. I live like a nun.”

“It isn’t right,” Mom said. “You’re beautiful and you’re thirty. You have a good job. You should find a man. Someone who’s right for you, who can commit and give you kids. You only have so many years for children. Don’t you think it’s time?”

“Mom, stop.” The only thing that made this slightly less annoying was that Tanner, Mack, and Jay all got the same treatment from her. Mom lectured them about “marriage material,” too.

But tonight wasn’t my night.

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