"I know that!" I can practically hear her eye roll. "Where have you moved to?"
"Hope Springs."
"WHAT? You've left the city to go and live in a tiny backwater."
"It isn't a backwater. It's a really nice place. Everyone I've met has been so kind." I leave out the bit about Holden's psycho ex and Blake, the father from hell. And the strange looks I've been getting everywhere I go since the whole outburst at the parade.
"What made you move there?"
"I got a new job."
Carmella exhales with relief. She really is my father's daughter! "What kind of job?"
I spend the next five minutes babbling about my new role in way more detail than I would usually share with my sister. She asks lots of questions throughout, and I'm hoping that I've fulfilled her interrogation while I've ordered and paid for my lunch and started wandering across the road.
Then she drops the big question.
"That all sounds great, but I really don't get why you moved. What prompted you to look for a job all the way out there?"
I could lie, but Carmella's my sister. We may not be joined at the hip, but that doesn't mean I want to treat her disrespectfully. There will come a time when everything will be out in the open, and she'll know I lied. I don't want our relationship to be permanently spoiled. "I had a vacation fling after Natalie's wedding."
"Ooohhhh...a new man. And you've moved in together. That's so exciting. Who is he?" she gushes, all in one rush of breath.
I pause, and the silence stretches long like mozzarella hanging from a slice of pizza. "You know Natalie's husbands?"
"Well, not in person, but I've obviously seen the pictures she posts on Facebook. She's one lucky girl. Why?"
"Well, she introduced me to their cousins."
"Wow. Is there a family resemblance? If so, you're one lucky girl too."
I smile, thinking that she's really hit the nail on the head. I am lucky. So, so lucky. "Yes. All the Banburys are gorgeous."
"So what's his name? Maybe we can double date?"
I swallow the nervous lump in my throat, thinking that Derek's head might explode if I turn up with four men on a double date. This is the moment of truth—my ultimate confession. There is no going back from this.
"Their names are Karter, Kane, Holden, and Harris."
"Cool names," Carmella gushes. "So, which one is yours?"
She's really not getting it. "They all are."
I wish we were face-to-face because a part of me wishes I could see her shocked expression right now. Maybe it would make this whole thing less nerve-wracking and more amusing.
"They all are," she repeats slowly. "As in you are dating all four of them."
"Yep."
"Four?" she asks again.
"Yes, four."
After a break, Carmella breaks into a nervous titter. "Four. Well, I can see why you've been hiding out for three months. Dad is going to freak."
"Dad freaks about everything," I remind her. "I can never do anything right."
"So you decided to do everything completely wrong?" More silence draws out between us. "I...I didn't mean that the way it came out," she stutters. "I meant that you haven't exactly tried to make things easier on yourself."
"Maybe I don't want to," I say. "Maybe I've spent too many years trying to toe the line, and all I've really done is make myself miserable. I've finally found a job that I love, and a place to be that fills me with joy. If Dad really loved me, he'd be happy. I mean, how many women get to be looked after by four men? I don't have to lift a finger in the house. There is always someone to carry the shopping and hang a picture. There are no money worries in my life. And they're so good to me."
"But four men..." I'm expecting her to say something else negative, but instead, she makes an overwhelmed whistling sound. "You're a whole lot more woman than me, that's for sure. I can just about handle one man."
For a moment, standing outside my office building, my mouth hangs open like a fish gasping for oxygen. Did my uptight sister just make a sex joke?
I splutter with shocked laughter. Who is this person that I thought I knew? "You'll be surprised what you can handle when it's dealt out by the right men," I say. "But I don't want to make this conversation all about me. I'm so happy that you're engaged. You guys will have to come and stay when I'm a bit more settled."
"We will. For sure. And thanks. But I'm still freaking out at what Dad is going to say."
"If he asks you anything about me, just tell him to call me. I don't expect you to mediate between us. These choices are mine, and I'll deal with the fallout."
She sighs as though the very idea of Dad's ranting wears on her too. "I just wish there didn't have to be fallout. I wish that Mom was still here to mediate and smooth things over."