Page 22 of Feast

“It made as much sense as anything else,” Halley said with a shrug of her shoulders, left bare by the pink sundress she wore.

“Sure, if I had amnesia.” Maddie shook her head. Her parents’ marriage had been a disaster, and everyone—even her grandparents, who were so Catholic they refused to go to a mass that wasn’t said in Latin—had breathed a sigh of relief when they’d finally divorced.

“What is it, then?”

Maddie shrugged, feeling embarrassed and awkward. “I guess I just got used to seeing Dad as just…a dad. Mom remarried a year after the divorce, but everything with Dad stayed the same. He just kept working the farm and teaching and he never really dated, and I stopped thinking about him finding someone new.”

“And then he did.” Halley nodded, her pretty face sympathetic. “I get that. I had some trouble with it too, at first.”

“You did?” Maddie stared at her sister with surprised relief. “Really?”

“Sure. I went to spend the night at Dad’s once when Lance and I were fighting, and do you know what I saw when I walked into the kitchen?”

Maddie made a face. “If you’re going to tell me you walked in on them fucking, please don’t.”

“They were dancing.”

Maddie blinked. “Dancing?”

“To that Springsteen song he loves, the one on the live album?”

“‘Waitin’ On A Sunny Day’,” Maddie murmured.

“That’s the one,” Halley confirmed. “They were wrapped around each other, swaying to the music, and smiling.”

She lifted her hands, then let them fall. “Just smiling into each other’s eyes, like they were a couple of Disney dogs sharing a plate of spaghetti. And I thought, ‘well, this hussy is trying to steal my dad away’.”

Maddie choked on a laugh. “Hussy?”

“I’d caught Lance talking to some girl online and I kind of had hussies on the brain,” Halley admitted.

Maddie bit her tongue to keep from spewing her opinion of Halley’s on-again, off-again boyfriend.

“I was ready to yank her away from Dad by her hair and toss her out on her ass.” Halley gave a helpless shrug. “But then I saw the look on his face. He loves her, Maddie.”

“Does she love him?” Maddie asked baldly.

“Well, she hasn’t told me she does,” Halley said. “But when Dad was making gooey love eyes at her, dancing to Springsteen in the kitchen, she was making them right back.”

Maddie sighed. “Dammit.”

“She’s nice.” Halley laid a hand on her sister’s arm. “You can see for yourself, now that you’ve moved back.”

Maddie wasn’t sure she wanted to see for herself. “I should’ve stayed in Chicago.”

“Well, I’m glad you didn’t. I’ll be glad to see more of you.”

“Me too,” Maddie admitted. “Want to do a girl’s night soon?”

“Really?” Halley beamed. “That’d be great. You want to come to Mt. Pleasant?”

“I really don’t,” Maddie said firmly.

“Come on,” Halley cajoled. “We can hit the college bars, play cards at the casino. It’ll be like old times.”

“My old times were not good,” Maddie reminded her. “I have no intention of reliving them. You can come to Grand Rapids.”

“Okay,” Halley said agreeably. “We’ll make a weekend of it.”

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