“Which one of you is Quentin’s girlfriend?” one of them asked, crossing his arms and glaring with accusation at Aunt Julie and the twins.
When Aunt Julie’s head snapped my way, I smiled all reassuring-like. “I’m Quentin’s friend, who’s a girl. We work together at the pool.”
He sized me up, right before the door opened the rest of the way and Quentin’s mom stepped forward. “Hello, so nice to finally have you and the girls over, Julie,” Mrs. Ford said, although I didn’t miss the way Mrs. Ford looked at me…dangerous. “And you must be Jade. This is Silas”—Mrs. Ford rubbed the older boy’s head—“and this is Abe.” The younger one stood up taller and checked out the twins, deciding whether they had cooties. The verdict: yes.
Mrs. Ford must have noticed me glancing around, because she waved toward the sliding door in the kitchen—“Quentin’s out back”—before turning to Aunt Julie.
Quentin’s out back. No Hi, I’m Mrs. Ford. Welcome. Or What’s your name? It was obvious Mrs. Ford wasn’t a fan, but how could she not like me when she didn’t even know me yet?
Maybe I really did give off a dirty skank hippie vibe.
As I wandered through the house, I noticed how different it was from Aunt Julie’s tidy, bordering-on-compulsively-clean house. Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t filthy or anything like that, but stuff was out of place. Furniture appeared used instead of on display. Toys were scattered around counters and floors. Dishes sat in the sink. It was a house that was lived in.
When I swung through the sliding glass door, the first thing I noticed was Quentin’s dad hovering over one of those big bright baby bouncers. He was tickling and making faces at the baby girl inside, and she was eating it up. Her chubby little thighs jiggled as she bounced up and down, giggling so hard that she was making spit bubbles.
His dad was clearly preoccupied, so I wandered over to where Quentin was hovering in front of a grill, his back toward me.
“Look at you, Chef Boyardee.” I smiled as I moved up behind him, noticing the way he was holding his tongs like he was ready to fight a medieval war with them at any moment.
When Quentin peeked over at me, his eyes widened at the same time his breath seemed to get stuck in his throat. “Look at you,” he said, waving his tongs as he inspected me in a way that made my own breath fail to cooperate. When his gaze ended on where the hem of my dress was floating above my knee, one side of his mouth lifted. “You didn’t have to go and get all dressed up on my account.”
I crossed my arms. “I didn’t. It’s the nation’s holiday. I got dressed up for America’s birthday.”
“Sure, convenient. I’m wearing a pretty dress because the United States is turning two hundred and fortyish years old. FYI, Jade, America’s blind as a bat. It can’t see what you’re wearing or not wearing to its birthday.” When he said not wearing, he wiggled his brows a few times.
My arms crossed tighter, but this time it was to keep my stomach from coming unraveled from the way he was studying me. “You don’t seem to be having a difficult time looking.”
He shook his head slowly. “Fifty states. Three point eight million square miles. Twenty thousand cities. Three hundred and twenty million people. That’s a lot of looking to make up for.”
Okay, so yeah. I was kind of thrilled I’d changed for Quentin Ford, even if it was something as minor as wardrobe.
“What are you working on there?” I checked the barbecue to distract myself—and hopefully him. He wasn’t as easily distracted as I was.
“Portobello mushrooms. I marinated them and everything.” Pinching his tongs a few times, he started to turn them over, distracted.
“You made these?”
“Yeah.” I must have been giving him a shocked look because he sighed. “They’re big mushrooms, Jade, not nuclear physics.”
His dad was now stationed in front of the other giant grill built into the big deck, flipping over what looked like burgers and hot dogs.
“Why aren’t you grilling them over there on that thing? It looks big enough to fit a thousand mushrooms.”
When Quentin shrugged, I noticed the way his shirt tugged across his shoulders, like it wasn’t quite large enough to fit him.
“I didn’t want them to, you know, come in contact with any of that devil food known as meat over there.” His eyes flashed at me. “No meat by-product on your pure vegetables.”
My arms uncrossed. “You’re kind of thoughtful when you put your mind to it, you know that?” I nudged him, saying it like it was a secret.
“Not thoughtful, just self-serving,” he whispered, playing along.
“How is you making me mushroom burgers on a separate grill self-serving?”
He stepped out of arm’s reach, which meant he was about to say something that would earn him a swat or a slug. “Because by doing so, I’m banking on you letting me round second base later tonight.”
I was stunned, but before I could fire off any comeback, he clapped his tongs at a heap of stuff stacked up close by. Baseball mitts, bats, balls, and a few plastic plates lying at the ready.
“We’re on separate teams; we already drew straws earlier.” Quentin was gloating by now, loving that he’d totally pulled one over on me. “I make you dinner, you let me slide into third.”
My hand settled onto my hip. “You can have third. I’ll be the one sliding into home.”
He leaned in closer, until I could smell the faint scent of soap clinging to his skin. His green eyes were shining down at me. “Lucky for me I play catcher.”
My expression gave the impression he was annoying me, but that wasn’t quite right. Flustered was more what I felt, especially with the way he was looking at me. A sharp cry roused me from my temporary hypnosis.
Quentin’s gaze immediately moved from me to where the baby was. “Baby or barbecue?” he asked, already handing over the tongs like he knew my answer.
I knew more about babies than I did barbecues. There’s no way Mom or I could be trusted around an open flame.
“Baby,” I said immediately, backing away from the tongs.
“Really?” Quentin said. “Most teens I know are more scared of babies than they are of becoming a social outcast.”
I walked over to the bouncer. “I’m already a social outcast,” I said.
Crouching down so we were mostly at eye level, I held out my arms to see how she felt about me picking her up. She wasn’t crying anymore, but she was blinking up at me like she wasn’t sure what to think.
She gave that a moment’s thought, examining my face like she was reading some kind of ingredient label pasted to my forehead. Then she bounced around a couple of times and cracked a smile as she held out her pudgy little arms toward me.
“I like you, too,” I said, hoisting her from the bouncer carefully. Quentin’s dad had disappeared inside, so I wandered back toward Quentin and the mushrooms. He wasn’t watching the grill, though; he was watching me, an odd expression on his face as I moved closer. It was one I’d never seen on him before, and one I couldn’t decode.
“She likes you,” he stated, waving his tongs at her when she started to shimmy and coo in my arms when she saw him.
My shoulder rose. “She’s got good taste.”
Quentin leaned in to make a face at her, which made both her and me laugh. “She picked pureed peas over apple sauce for breakfast today. Not so sure about this one’s personal taste.”
Grumbling at him, I shifted the baby onto my hip. She was wiggling and not exactly dainty. “Lily, right?”
“That’s right.” Quentin nodded as he placed the mushrooms on a serving plate. “Almost ten months.”
“Not walking, then, yet?”
Quentin glanced over, another bit of surprise on his face. “Not yet, but thank God for that. We can barely keep up with her right now.” From the way sh
e was moving and shaking in my arms, I could believe it. “How do you know so much about babies?”
I shifted my weight, my arms already starting to feel tired. “Some of the bands Mom toured with traveled with their families. A few had babies, and I was pretty much the default babysitter.”
Quentin closed the grill. “You continue to surprise me.”
I bowed my head. “Why, thank you. I’m very astonishing.”
“Yeah, kind of like how astonishing it was to learn your mom’s band is one of the biggest bands in the world right now.” He gave me a sideways look as we headed for the picnic tables that had been lined up together.
And busted.
“Sorry. That’s not usually something I brag about to people I just meet. Tends to make them treat me all weird and think I’m cooler than I really am. Then they wind up disappointed after they get to know me.”
“Yeah, because you’re so disappointing.” He motioned at me. “Note the heavy sarcasm in my voice.”
“Duly noted,” I said, wondering why he was looking at me with so much intensity.
Suddenly the glass door banged open and a line of people filed outside. Aunt Julie and Mrs. Ford were loaded down with salads and bowls of chips, and Mr. Ford was carrying a huge tray of all things meat from his barbecue. Quentin’s brothers pretty much slid into their seats like they were practicing for tonight’s ball game.
A few more people I didn’t recognize emerged from the house, until the benches around the tables were nearly full. Quentin got us two seats when he plopped a couple of grilled mushrooms near his brothers. They quickly backed away, making a cross with their fingers like they were warding off a vampire.
“Mind hanging on to her one more minute? I’m going to grab her high chair real quick.” He was already heading for the kitchen.
“Under control,” I answered, waving down at the twins, who were sitting across the table from Silas and Abe, blinking at them like they were animals. Actually they did kind of eat like animals, but Mrs. Ford didn’t even notice. Aunt Julie, on the other hand, matched her daughters’ stares.
“Just in time,” Quentin said, carrying a high chair. He attached it to the table, while Lily tried to get ahold of a chunk of my hair and give it a yank.
“Oww,” I said, attempting to pry my hair from Lily’s death grip.
“Sorry. Should have warned you—Lily loves hair.”
By the time I freed my hair from her hand, she’d found another clump with her other one. “You don’t say.”
“Here, let me take this hair monster before you decide to never come back again.” Quentin’s arms swooped down to take Lily.
“Please,” I tsked, scooping some spinach salad onto my plate when it came around. “It would take a lot more than some baby yanking my hair to scare me away.”
“Define a lot more.” Quentin paused in the middle of buckling Lily in.
“Oh, I don’t know. Some guy forcing me to play baseball when I still bear the emotional scars from my first and only game. I got beaned in the face by a ball.”
Quentin winced. “Pitcher out to get you?”
I blinked at him. “I was the pitcher.”
He covered his mouth, trying to hide his smile. “How is that even possible?”
He was teasing me. He wasn’t exactly being subtle about it, either. “Talent,” I answered.
“Or lack thereof,” he muttered. “But anyone who manages to hit themselves with a ball gets a pass on the baseball game, I guess,” he added quickly.
“Thank you.”
“You managed to drop a few balls into that carnival game, though,” he said, taking a seat.
My eyes lifted. “That’s different. That’s a carnival game—for fun. Baseball is a sport, the opposite of fun in my book.”
Quentin took one of the rolls, poking and smelling it. He still didn’t look too sure, but it cracked me up when I saw that his plate mirrored my own. Mushroom, spinach salad, and a vegan roll.
“Can Lily eat this?” he asked, ripping off a little morsel and pinching it.
“Of course. They’re only rolls that aren’t made with butter or eggs.”
Quentin looked doubtful, then took his own bite before breaking off a few small pieces for Lily to work on.
“Not bad,” he said as he chewed. “Better than that charred slab of tofu you made me eat last week.”
“How would you know? You barely took two bites.”
“Two bites too many,” he muttered, trying one of the mushrooms. He didn’t grimace as he ate it.
“So your mom doesn’t work anymore, right? But did she before Lily?” I asked.
“She used to, yeah,” Quentin said. “But she took last year off.”
“What did she do?” I asked.
“She was a school counselor. She worked at my high school before we moved.”
My fork stopped midway to my mouth. I didn’t see that one coming. Mrs. Ford wasn’t someone I’d feel comfortable approaching for advice on delicate matters.
“Really?”
Quentin made a face. “Really.”
“Awkward?” I guessed.
He smiled. “Only extremely.”
Lily decided just then that tossing her cup was a better idea than drinking from it. I snagged it from the patio and wiped the mouthpiece off with my napkin. “What does your dad do?”
“He’s a software engineer. He mainly does contract jobs, so we can pretty much travel anywhere in the world and he can find a job.”
My forehead started to crease. “Why did you guys move, then?” I asked, but that was right when Lily sent her cup sailing again. Into the dirt.
“Warming up for the big game.” Quentin bumped his fist against Lily’s as he went to retrieve her cup. It was coated in dirt, so he went inside to get another one.
By the time he came back with a new cup, his brothers had already cleared their plates and started setting up the bases for the baseball game. Like Uncle Paul and Aunt Julie, the Fords had a large and level yard. Unlike Uncle Paul and Aunt Julie’s yard, it was a space that was used instead of admired, as the bare patches of grass and trampled flowerbeds proved.
“Death Ninjas, you’ve got five to finish your dinners before a mandatory warm-up!” Silas hollered over at the tables, taking a few practice swings with a bat as long as he was tall.
His dad popped off something about “picking a nicer way to phrase that” while I made it a point to eat as slowly as possible.
“Death Ninjas?”
“Versus the Bonesaw Bruins.” Quentin set the clean cup in front of Lily and gave her a look that suggested if she tossed that one into the dirt, she was out of luck.
“I told you, I don’t play baseball,” I hissed across the table at him as more people started to join his brothers in the yard.
“Clearly. You hit yourself with the ball as the pitcher.”
This time, I took a play from Lily’s book and sailed a roll in his direction. He just caught it and stuffed it into his mouth, chomping on it as he grinned at me.
“It’s baseball with them”—Quentin’s eyes drifted to where his brothers had now moved on to using their bats as swords, before leaning across the table—“or fireworks with me.”
“Fireworks?”
“You said you wanted an American summer. What’s more patriotic than fireworks on the Fourth of July? Well, except maybe baseball.”
“Let’s go,” I said, grabbing my now empty plate before he could change his mind.
That was when Mrs. Ford came up, leaning over Lily as she started unbuckling her from the high chair. “My, my. It appears someone decided to paint themselves with their dinner instead of eating it.”
Lily peeked down at herself before looking back at Mrs. Ford, her eyes wide. “Yeah, don’t give me that innocen
t face. Your dad tries the same thing on me and it never works.” Mrs. Ford chuckled when Lily started helicoptering her arms as she lifted her from the chair. “But lucky for you, you’re much cuter.”
Mrs. Ford gave Quentin’s head an affectionate pat as she carried Lily inside without a single acknowledgment in my direction. I wasn’t sure if no acknowledgment was better than a negative acknowledgment, though.
“Does your mom not like me?” I asked quietly, as gently as I could. I didn’t want to offend him or come across as paranoid, but he’d have to be oblivious to not notice the way his mom seemed indifferent toward only one person here tonight.
“She’s just protective,” Quentin said, distractedly cleaning up the remainders of Lily’s dinner.
“Why does she think she needs to protect you from me?”
“I think she’s more worried about protecting us from each other.” Quentin started to stand, chucking his leftovers in the trash.
“What does that even mean?” I asked, getting up.
“I don’t know. She’s a high school guidance counselor.” Quentin indicated inside, where his mom was wiping down Lily’s face. “She’s seen some shit, you know?”
I took a moment to consider all the things and situations Mrs. Ford had run across in her line of work. I didn’t have to think long. “Okay, I get it,” I said, following him into the yard, making sure to give the sparring baseball players a wide berth. “So you’ve got an overprotective mom, and I’ve got an underprotective one. That should even us out at least.”
Quentin checked over his shoulder at the table. “Yeah, but you’ve got an extra-overprotective aunt.”
I watched my aunt eyeing us warily.
“She’s seen some shit, too,” I said, waving at her. “She’s trying to make sure I don’t end up exactly like my mom.”
Quentin was quiet for a minute as we approached the chairs and blankets he’d apparently set up for our fireworks viewing. He even had a bucket full of candy and snacks.
“Yeah, but your mom turned out pretty okay, right? I mean, she’s the lead singer in some huge band, and her daughter is all right, too.” He nudged me and motioned at the chairs, letting me take the first pick.