Rock Bottom Girl(58)

Me: Bless you. P.S. They all think this is real so, you know, dress sexy and get ready to French kiss the hell out of me.





She responded with a middle finger emoji.

“Well?” Uncle Max demanded.

“Joke’s on you, jerks. Now we gotta quit playing so you can help me clean up.”





35





Marley





I don’t know what kind of place I expected Jake to live in. But it wasn’t the pretty brick two-story with big windows and wrap-around porch. My curiosity had been piqued when I picked him up last night. And now I was going to get to see behind the curtain. See how Jake Weston, former teenage rebel and current history teacher/cross-country coach, lived.

There was a tidy front lawn with a big maple tree and actual flower beds. Sure, they looked a little neglected, but the whole package still said “family home.” This was a place where people would gather for Thanksgiving and a girl would make an entrance on the stairs in a poufy dress on prom night.

This was not a bachelor pad designed to debauch women. Not a Jake Weston residence.

There was a freaking welcome mat at the front door. Next to it rested a pair of those five-finger running shoes that must have been too smelly to make their way inside.

I reached for the bell but paused when I heard a noise from within. It sounded like someone was dragging something heavy across the floor.

“We don’t have enough time to actually dust,” I heard Jake yell. “Just kinda blow the bigger dust bunnies under the furniture.”

“Hey, yo! What do you want us to do with the lo mein that’s stuck to the sink?”

Was that Floyd?

“Just chisel it off as best you can! And hurry up. She should be here any second!”

“You have any nudie magazines that need hiding?”

“If I knew I was going to be playing janitor, I would have stayed home tonight.”

“Just shut up and try to get some of the smears off the kitchen table, okay?”

What the hell was I walking into?

I pushed the bell, and several voices yelled “Come in!” at the same time.

Before I could turn the knob, the front door opened, and the foyer beyond filled with a mob of people.

“Um. Hi,” I said.

“Hey, Mars,” Jake said, muscling his way through their ranks to give me an awkward and out-of-breath peck on the cheek. He had a wet, dirty rag in one hand, and when I eyed it, he tossed it over his shoulder.

The bearded man behind him wearing a t-shirt that said Queer caught it in mid-air.

“Come on in,” Jake said, reeling me in like a fish. “I believe you know everyone except for my uncle. Uncle Max, this is my girlfriend Marley. Mars, this is—”

The bearded man yanked me out of Jake’s grip and gave me an enthusiastic hug. “You have made me so happy,” he said. “Now, I just need to take a quick selfie with you.”

“Oh, I, uh.”

Jake broke Max’s hold on me. “Uncle Max, let’s let her breathe for five seconds before you go rubbing Lewis’s nose in this.”

“He always thought you’d go gay in the end, but I knew all you needed was a special woman to get you to settle down,” Max said, tapping away smugly on his phone.

“My uncles are gay. They always assume everyone else is too,” Jake explained. “They were heartbroken when my cousin Adeline married her husband.”

“It would have been so much fun to have lesbians in the family,” Max sighed.

“Definitely.” I had no idea what to say to anything. I wasn’t even sure why I’d come over.

“What’s up, Cicero?” Floyd waved. “Still have a job?”

“Hi, Marley,” Bill Beerman spoke up, his voice barely a squeak.

“Hi, guys. Oh, Mrs. Gurgevich. I didn’t recognize you.” Mrs. Gurgevich looked…ravishing? She was decked out in sparkle from her fancy caftan to the very large diamonds on her fingers. “Wow, those are some rings.”

They looked like hefty engagement rings. Four of them. I’d seen the woman every day of my junior year of high school and didn’t recall her wearing a single piece of jewelry.

Mrs. Gurgevich wiggled her fingers. “Let Ms. Cicero in, gentlemen,” she said, clearing a path through the testosterone.

“What’s going on?” I hissed at Jake as everyone peeled off to the right of the—I knew it—prom dress-worthy staircase.

“The teachers want the dirt on what went down with Hooper, and my uncle wants proof of monogamy so he can blab to his husband about it.”

“Why does it smell like Lysol in here?”

He skated a hand over the back of his head. “You probably don’t want to know.”

I heard a galloping coming from upstairs, and we both watched as a blond furball launched itself down the stairs.

“Homie!” Homer planted his front paws on my chest and shoved his cold nose into my face. “Hey, buddy! Wow. Are greetings like this why people have dogs?” I asked.

“Geez, I wouldn’t know. He just kind of grumbles at me and then pushes his food dish around when I come home,” Jake said, eyeing his dog.

“You have a nice place,” I said, glancing around the foyer as I gave Homer a good scruff. The trim work was dark, the hardwood original, and the ceilings high. There was a living room with a lot of glass and a lot of built-ins to one side of the staircase and what looked like a dining room turned poker den on the opposite side.