“You invited him?” Mom practically screeches, and then looks at me, like I should also be horrified by this.
I smile at her, and then walk to him. I pluck the present from his arms. “Ben. You’re looking smug as usual.”
He lets out a short, startled laugh. “Thanks?”
Mom gapes at me as I deposit the present on the table with the rest. Keith, Janice, and their offspring look confused.
“Everyone, this is Ben Owens,” Grandma says loudly. “He’s the host of that podcast. You know the one.”
Ashley’s mouth falls open. Brian starts furiously texting. Keith and Janice look like they’re still waiting for the punch line.
I steal a glance at Dad. He’s glowering in the corner. Karen rushes over to Mom and whispers something in her ear.
A group of older ladies with matching poufy permed hairdos appear at the door, and Grandma walks over to greet them. Mom joins her, pointedly avoiding looking at Ben.
Everyone else is staring at him, so I stroll over to stand beside him. Usually everyone is staring at me. Us being next to each other makes it easier for them.
We’re both silent for a moment.
I point to the small bar set up on the far wall. “Drink?”
“God, yes.”
* * *
An hour later, I’m sitting in the middle of the table with Grandma on one side and Ben on the other, an arrangement Grandma insisted on. （“It’s my birthday, I get to decide where we sit!” she’d gleefully declared, ignoring Mom’s protests.） I’m on my second glass of wine and the room is pleasantly blurry around the edges.
They squeezed every possible chair they could up to this table, and my arm keeps brushing against Ben’s. He is not blurry. In fact, he is in too sharp a focus, and I do my best not to look at him at all.
I’m suddenly reminded that it’s been at least a month since I had sex, since Nathan and I had been in a dry spell pre–murder revelation. It’s been much longer since I had really great sex （thanks for nothing, Nathan）。
The waiter stops behind me and refills my nearly empty wineglass.
Well, that’s not going to help me stop thinking about sex.
I reach for the glass, and then change my mind. Instead, I use two fingers to push it away a few inches.
Ben watches me, and our eyes meet as I sit back in my chair. I quickly look away.
Betsy is across from us—the friend of Mom’s who brought the excellent 285-calorie brownies to tea/wine—and she’s openly staring at Ben. He’s pretending not to notice.
“Bruce,” Betsy says.
“Ben,” I correct, and reach for my water.
“Ben. You know that saying, he had a face for radio?”
I laugh mid-sip, nearly choking on my water.
“Betsy!” Mom exclaims.
“What? We were just talking about it the other day!”
“I’ve heard that, yes.” Ben looks amused.
“You don’t have that. In fact, I’d say it’s a damn shame you decided to work in radio.”
Laughter rises up from the table. Even Dad chuckles.
“Thank you.” Ben reddens like he isn’t often complimented on his good looks. Like he hasn’t visited r/Podcasts on Reddit and seen the threads discussing how cute he is.
“How did you get into that?” Keith asks. “Podcasting?”
“I loved podcasts. I was obsessed with them, actually. Especially true crime. So, I decided to try one myself.”
“Just like that?” Karen asks. “You weren’t even a crime reporter before, were you?” I can tell she doesn’t actually need him to answer this question. She’d googled him extensively earlier. Probably made it all the way to page five.
“No, I covered mostly lifestyle and entertainment as a journalist. True crime was more like a … hobby of mine. I actually had a bunch of cases that I’d dabbled in over the years, participated in those sites online where amateur sleuths try to solve stuff. When I decided to do my first case, I picked the one that I had the most information on already, just to try and make it easier on myself.”
“Did you solve it?” Keith asks.
“Of course he did.” Janice bats his arm. “I told you all about it.”
Keith frowns like he has no memory of that conversation, or maybe most things his wife has said to him.
“I did,” Ben says.
“You remember,” Janice says to her husband. “The teenager who was killed on prom night out in South Carolina. They found her body in the trunk of a teacher’s car, but the guy swore up and down he didn’t do it? Plus he had no motive and an alibi.”