Isn't She Lovely (Redemption 0.5)(43)

Despite the fact that my dad’s almost as cluelessly snobbish as my mom about most things—he once said he couldn’t understand why everyone in Manhattan didn’t just get a driver so the city could get rid of the damn taxis—he’s been developing this sort of jolly-old-man persona over the past few years, at least in social settings. In the office, he’s still the business-minded tyrant I remember from my childhood.

As though reading my mind, he takes a sip of his drink—whisky soda, unless he’s been changing it up lately—and turns to face me. “You haven’t been in the office much.”

I resist the urge to sigh. “I told you, Dad. I just want one summer off. I’ll be spending my entire adulthood at Price Holdings. I don’t want to burn out before I even get started. And I drop by whenever I can.”

I hate that I sound like a whiny little boy, but I mean what I say. I really do want the family company. Someday.

But today I just want … hell, I don’t even know. I don’t remember ever having questioned my path before, but I guess my breakup with Olivia was the catalyst for everything turning upside down.

When we were together, everything felt so mapped out for me. In a good way. Then the relationship fell apart, and I just needed … a break? A change? It’s why I pushed to do the summer class with Martin Holbrook even though I didn’t know the first thing about film.

And it’s why I lied to my parents and told them I had a new girlfriend when I didn’t.

I wasn’t ready to go back to being the old Ethan. The Ethan who was the perfect son, the perfect boyfriend, and the perfect heir to the company.

I guess one could say I’m on vacation.

Stephanie is my vacation. Or something.

My dad finally lets out one of those parent-like sighs. “Fair enough. I forget that you’re only twenty-one sometimes. I suppose everyone deserves a chance to sow their wild oats.”

I mentally congratulate myself for not rolling my eyes at the sheer dad factor of that phrase. “Is that what you think I’m doing this summer? Sowing wild oats?”

Dad shrugs, the ice clinking against his glass. “Your mother seems to think so. Says that this Stephanie girl’s just a bit of fluff you need to get out of your system.”

“Before settling down with Olivia,” I say, not bothering to keep the derision out of my voice.

My dad shrugs again. “Personally, I like Stephanie. Sweet without being sugary, you know?”

I smile a little as I picture the real Stephanie with her goth glower. “She’s definitely not sugary.”

“It’s good to see you happy again,” my dad says.

I pause in the process of scraping the last bit of frosting off my plate with the side of the fork. It’s not a statement I’d expect my father to make. The man’s good-natured enough outside the office but not exactly effusive.

“Yeah, well, breakups tend to be a blow to one’s mood.”

He lifts a shoulder. “I’m not talking just since the breakup. I’m saying you seem the happiest you’ve been in years.”

I don’t respond. I don’t know what he’s seeing, but that can’t possibly be true. Olivia and I were happy. Enough. I mean, maybe we’d gotten a little comfortable with each other. And perhaps a little more settled than we should have been for being barely twenty-one.

But I was happy.

Wasn’t I?

The stupid girly song ends, and the DJ must be starting to wind down the party for the night, because it’s another slow song.

My dad grunts and sets his empty glass on a nearby tray. “I suppose that’s my cue to go find your mother. She always complains that I never ask her to dance.”

Huh.

My dad finds my mom, who accepts his hand with a reserved little smile as he leads her to the dance floor. I watch them for a moment, wanting—wishing—that I could look at my mom without thinking about that day. That I could go back. Which is stupid, obviously.

I’m so busy watching my parents that I don’t see Stephanie until she’s at my side, her presence surprisingly comforting.

She doesn’t suggest that we dance again, and I don’t either. It’s like there’s an invisible line, and we both know that dancing again would push us across it.

“Wanna get out of here?” I ask.

“Hell, yes. My feet are killing me.”

I want to tell her that it’s her own fault for wearing skyscraper heels. It’s like part of some female code that they have to wear the most uncomfortable shoes imaginable and then complain about them.

But I know she’s wearing them for me. That if it were up to her, she’d be wearing her scary black boots and glowering in the corner. Another reminder that none of this is real.

The thought is more depressing than it should be.

“So how’d I do?” she asks after we’ve slipped out a side door into the warm summer night.

“You mean did anybody catch on to the fact that you have major Wiccan tendencies? Nah, I think we’re good.”

“Excellent,” she says with a pleased little smile as she grabs my arm and lets me half support, half drag her along the sidewalk as I keep my eye out for an available cab. “Two down, one more to go.”

I’m not following. “Two of what down?”