"Do you ever dust?" she asks, her nose wrinkling slightly.
I let out a sigh, because it's all I can do. "So let me guess, you're here to talk about Thanksgiving, huh?"
She sits down, gingerly, on my sofa. "Yes. Have a seat, Meghan."
This is my place.
I do what she asks.
"I thought you might listen to reason if I could speak to you, face to face," my mom says. "Besides which, your father and I haven't seen the city in a while. We're looking forward to playing tourist for a few days. I'm sure you're busy with work, but I hope you'll join us whenever you can disentangle yourself."
"I'm very busy these days," I tell her, feeling my phone buzz in my hand. Shit. "Excuse me, Mom. I just have to use the restroom."
Hurrying down the hall, I shut the door behind me and stare at my phone.
I'm coming over.
Shit. Shit shit shit.
It text him back hastily.
Please don't
I can't explain why. I'll never hear the end of it if I do. He doesn't answer for a moment, and I'm pretty sure I have several small heart attacks waiting for his response.
Too late.
The doorbell rings. My pulse hammers so hard it hurts, and I run to the front hall, pulling the door open with such force that it slams against the wall.
Adrian's standing there with his hands behind his back, still dressed from work but slightly unraveled. His tie is loose, his jacket gone, and his sleeves rolled up, and if my fucking parents weren't here I would have immediately jumped on him.
The look on my face gives him pause, just seconds before my mom's voice echoes through the hall.
"Who on earth is that, Meghan?"
For a moment, he looks like a deer in the headlights, but he recovers quickly and steps inside. "I'm so sorry," he says, as my parents approach like they're on a lion-hunting expedition, and my boss is Aslan himself. "I didn't know Meghan had company. How are you? Adrian Risinger, Meghan's boss."
He sticks his hand out, and my dad goes first, hesitantly.
"We know who you are," says my mom, in a tone that lowers the temperature of the room by about twelve degrees. "Five years, and never once did you ask Meghan to work Thanksgiving. Now, all of a sudden, you need her all week? It's completely unheard-of."
Adrian's still got his other hand behind his back, holding a small white box. I have an inkling of what it might be, and it's certainly nothing work-related.
"Yes, well, I'm sorry about that," he says, smoothly. I've seen him put on this face before in front of the senior partners, but they're not my mom. "But, you see, working over Thanksgiving gives us a distinct advantage with the Japanese company I'm trying to partner with. My competitors won't get to them until after the holidays, so if we strike while the iron is hot-"
My mom closes her eyes, doing that angry, dismissive hand gesture she's so good at. "No, no, no. I don't want to hear it. If you're determined to do this, that's fine, but leave my daughter out of it. She will be at our family Thanksgiving."
Adrian cocks his head. I can feel something changing in the air, like he's bristling a little.
"With all due respect, Mrs. Burns, your daughter's absolutely indispensable. I need her." He glances at me, and his eyes momentarily storm with a thousand secrets. "It's not my intention to ruin your family celebration, but can't you perhaps postpone it?"
My mother lets out a shrill laugh, and I cringe. "I'm sorry, are you trying to tell me how to run my family affairs?"
"Are you trying to tell me how to run my business?" Adrian counters, taking a step towards her.
My heart stops.
"You don't own my daughter's life, Mr. Risinger." My mother stares him down, but the expression on her face isn't one I've seen before. "And I don't need you to tell me how indispensable she is. I know she's smart, I know she works hard. She's too smart to be working for you. If you're going to keep her as a secretary, the least you can do is respect her personal obligations." She takes a deep breath. "Meghan, if you don't stand up to him, he's never going to respect you. No man will. You're never going to get a decent job on a music major if you can't act like a force to be reckoned with."
"Fine, Mom. Fine." I throw my hands up in the air. "I'll come to Thanksgiving! Okay? I'll come. But I'm getting my own tickets. Now please, I need to go over something with Mr. Risinger. I'll call you in the morning, okay? We can make plans."
"Oh, I think your father and I will be just fine," she sniffs. "Don't put yourself out."
"I thought you said you wanted…"
She waves her hand. "Don't worry, it's not all that important. Obviously you're very busy."
The look that she shoots me with makes it very, very obvious that Adrian's lie didn't go over quite as well as I'd hoped.
"Sleep tight," is her parting shot, before she shuts the door.
I take a second to just breathe.
"Good God." Adrian collapses on the sofa, staring at me with wide eyes. "Should I call a priest?"
A hysterical laugh bubbles up from my chest. "Oh, she's not…she's not that…"
"See, you can't even say it." He chuckles. "It's all right. You're allowed to agree that your mother might be a demon, so long as you're not the one who actually said it."
Sighing heavily, I walk into the kitchen. "All I have is rum, but at least it's good - and ninety proof. Is that okay with you?"
"Unless you have something stronger," he says. "Like heroin. Or bath salts."
Snickering, I pour us each a glass and bring them over, sitting down beside him. "I'm sorry you walked into that."
"I'm sorry," he says. "I mean - I came over here to apologize, but I didn't anticipating having to apologize for this."
I give him a look. The softness is back, in his face, his voice - it came on so gradually in Austin that I almost didn't notice the change, but now I can see it clearly. "You do have a few apologies to deal out."
He drinks the whole glass in one swallow. "I know. Would you like a refill?"
I manage a giggle. "Haven't even started. Plus, I'm afraid that was the last of it. I haven't hit up the liquor store lately."
"Shit. Anything else?" He's already headed into the kitchen.
"Just some wine I got. Haven't tried it yet. It's some seasonal new harvest thing."
He's pulling the bottle out of the fridge. "Beaujolais nouveau? Oh, well - it's a little juvenile, but it'll do."
I roll my eyes. "Christ. You really don't know how to do apologies, do you?"