“I’m making two pies for Christmas Eve, Parker. You don’t need three pies in one week.”
“Says who?”
Erin had never been more glad to move on from a conversation.
On the whole, dinner was, embarrassingly, very much like the breakfast the three of them shared in Virginia. Erin tried to focus only on Parker, but not in any noticeable way. She worried both that she was paying Cassie too much attention and too obviously ignoring her. Parker seemed carefree—oblivious, if Erin wanted to be rude about it, but she didn’t. She was grateful for Parker’s lack of suspicion.
Like at breakfast, they just had to get past the initial awkwardness—which was worse: playing footsie or getting too close to the truth about sexting?—and then it was smooth sailing. Cassie and Erin got along too well, even after everything.
As Erin went to clear the table, Cassie put a hand on her arm. Erin froze.
“What are you doing?” Cassie said. “You cooked. You don’t clean up.”
A smile spread slowly across Erin’s face. She looked at Parker instead of at the way Cassie’s cheeks went pink.
“You heard her, Parker,” Erin said. “Cleanup’s on you.”
She sat back down, lounging across her chair like she was getting the royal treatment.
“Why are you being so polite?” Parker asked Cassie. “You’re never like this at school.”
“I’m a good guest. You’re never this much of a baby at school. Being around your mom make you revert back to toddler behavior?”
Parker stuck her tongue out at Cassie, giggling halfway through it. Cassie laughed at her, and Erin’s heart did a little stutter step in her chest. This would all be easier if she didn’t like Cassie so much.
Seven
CASSIE
Cassie washed and Parker dried and Erin sat on a stool at the kitchen island, chatting away. Cassie was glad her back was to Erin. She couldn’t look at her.
Not because of anything in particular so much as because of … everything. Because Erin had made her feel awful. Because Erin was gorgeous. Because Cassie wanted to kiss her or fight her or maybe both.
It wouldn’t have been terrible to make Erin feel bad, the way Erin had made Cassie feel. Cassie was definitely that petty. But she was afraid it would prove Erin right—that Cassie was childish and had a crush on her.
Plus, even though Erin had been kind of a bitch on the phone, she’d apologized a few days later. And she seemed to be trying to make up for it, or something. She was being nice. Cassie could absolutely be an adult. A good guest. A good friend, who didn’t sleep with her friends’ moms, no matter how hot they were.
That was why it was better to be facing the sink, looking at the suds and not Erin’s face. She was really fucking pretty, and Cassie was trying to not let it be a problem.
“Time for the tour,” Parker said when they finished cleaning.
They’d dropped their suitcases in the hall when they arrived, too hungry to bother with them. Now Parker grabbed them both without asking and led Cassie up the staircase.
“You’ve already seen the first floor,” she said. “There’s a basement, too, where we will be spending New Year’s Eve definitely not getting drunk.”
“I’m not stupid, Parker,” Erin called up the stairs. She wasn’t joining them on the tour, thankfully.
Parker grinned at Cassie. “Some of my friends’ parents think they are perfect angels, so we still act like we don’t drink. But my mom’s really cool about letting us as long as everyone gives her their car keys when they arrive.”
“Nice,” Cassie said. The thought of Erin as the “cool mom” was too much.
Parker’s room was at the top of the stairs. Paintings and pencil drawings covered her walls. They got steadily better in quality as you looked around the room, like a testament to practice makes perfect. There was a mirror against one wall, with pictures of her friends stuck in the sides. The room was very lived in, even if Parker hadn’t actually lived here in months.
“Hey,” Cassie said, fingers finding the edge of a photograph right at eye level. It was of her and Acacia, huge grins on their faces, both flicking off the camera.
“Yeah, I put it up at Thanksgiving,” Parker said. “I think it really captures both of your personalities.”
Cassie felt—loved. Or something. It was gross. “Who even prints photos anymore? Were you born in the nineties?”
“Oh, shut up.”
They continued the tour. The guest room where Cassie was staying was next to Parker’s, though much more standardly decorated. On the other side of Parker’s room was the bathroom, stark white except for the rug in front of the sink, which looked like a bi pride flag. At Cassie’s raised eyebrows, Parker gave a half smile.