“Wow, Mr. Auster,” Mom said, sounding a little breathless. “You sounded like some kind of supervillain.”
Dad smiled evilly and wrapped his arms around her waist. “Do you need me to take over your city with a devious scheme, Mrs. Auster?”
“I do love devious schemes, Mr. Auster.”
And I opened my mouth to say something about how gross they were being, about how nobody wanted to see or hear that, but I stopped when I caught the look on Vince’s face. He was smiling fondly at them, like he was so happy that he could even be here to witness the travesty in front of us. I reminded myself of why we were here and closed my mouth again. If it made him happy to see them happy, then who was I to ruin that?
UNFORTUNATELY, DAD’S suspicions of us didn’t let up as we sat down to dinner. I could see him eyeing the both of us as if he was waiting for the other shoe to drop. Vince and I didn’t have a specific plan beyond asking them at some point. We hadn’t really told them about the plans for the wedding party. They knew that we’d wanted to do this wedding our own way and didn’t seem to mind having minimal input.
“And that’s how I ended up finding out that I had consumed my twin when I was in the womb,” Nana said, finishing a story that I wasn’t sure was true or entirely sane.
“Wow,” Vince said. “That’s amazing. That’s just like that episode of Corazón que miente we watched last week. What are the odds?”
“Oh,” Nana said. “That’s right. Okay, I might have gotten it from that. To be honest, I don’t remember much of my childhood. They found me in the woods when I was sixteen. The Wolf Girl, they called me. ‘Beware of the Wolf Girl,’ they said. ‘She’ll come at Christmas and steal your presents and your uvula.’”
“We looked into an assisted living facility,” Mom said. “But we just like her too much to ever put her there.”
“That and the fact that they knew I’d cut them out of my will,” Nana said.
“You have fourteen dollars,” Dad said.
“If you get it in pennies, it seems like a lot,” Nana said.
“That’s true,” Dad said. “Hey, Paul?”
“Yeah?” I was distracted trying to put as much lasagna on a piece of garlic bread as I could.
“Do you have tumors and/or are you dying?”
“No,” I said, satisfied with the ricotta cheese to noodle ratio. “I don’t have—hey!” I glared at him. “You’re trying to trick it out of me!”
“So there is something.”
“Ooh,” Nana and Mom said.
“What? No. And even if there was, why do you automatically go to tumors?”
“You always go to worst-case scenario first,” Dad explained. “That way, if that’s not it, anything else will be better by comparison.”
“I like it when he gets logical,” Mom said, sipping her wine and smiling somewhat lecherously at Dad. “It does things to me.”
“I can’t even with this,” I said to no one in particular.
“You’re dying?” Nana asked. “Can I have your stuff? Ever since your father pointed out I only have fourteen dollars, I have this strange urge to become much more materialistic.”
“I’m not dying.”
“Darn it,” Nana said. “Oh, I mean, yay. That’s good. That’s… good. Vince? What was the name of that poison they used in Corazón que miente when they wanted to kill someone without leaving any evidence behind?”
“Uhh,” Vince said, scrunching up his face. “I don’t remember? I’ve had to learn too many things this week, and sometimes I have to forget other things to know the new things. I don’t know the poison, but I can tell you about the concerns coming out of North Korea.”
“No,” Nana said sadly. “That’s okay.”
“Good,” Vince said, looking relieved. “Because I don’t remember anything about the concerns coming out of North Korea. I had to forget that in order to remember to wear a tie to dinner tonight.”
“You’re not wearing a tie,” Nana pointed out.
Vince frowned as he looked down at his tie-less chest. “Ah, man.”