I was biased of course, but I also wasn't the only person who thought so. They had to have fought and disagreed in the past, but they had kept me far away from it. Something they had done for the past thirty years had worked because here they still were. He still pulled chairs out for her, and they still ate together at the table when they were both home. I wasn't afraid my mom would be introducing me to a Greek guy she was going to turn into my stepdad anytime soon, or ever. My parents were a bright spot when the darkness felt like it completely engulfed everything. They were good people, good to me and each other. They had values and stuck to them. My mother had been with my dad way before he had ever had a cent to his name and with everything my dad had accomplished, he wasn't a dick about it.
They pulled me back sometimes when I felt like there was no hope. You could still be your own person, be a good father, wife, husband, whatever, even when everything around you crumbled in moral decay and decadence.
"Are you guys almost done?" I asked.
"I am. Evie?"
"No, he isn't," my mom said, taking another dress off a hanger.
"Should I give you two a minute?"
"Now look, Evie; you scared our son away," my dad said, taking a pair of shoes off his rack and chucking it into his suitcase. I walked out, shaking my head. What was that like, I wondered. I hadn't dated seriously for the past couple years and hadn't met anyone recently that I had wanted to take it to the next level with. Sometimes when I did, I'd have a good feeling about someone, then they'd change when they learned what my last name was. I wasn't in a hurry or anything, but if my parents wanted grandkids, I was the only way they'd be getting them.
Mom had been dropping hints basically since my balls had descended and had gotten progressively more obvious about it as the years had gone by, but dad had been more interested in me continuing his good work at Porter Holdings than he had been in my romantic life. I wasn't thirty yet; there was still time. The chances of finding a person I loved as much as my father loved Mom though? I didn't even know if things like that still happened anymore. My fault for being born in the swipe right era of history, I guess.
It would happen when it happened, or it wouldn't happen at all; there was that too. Was there anyone I would volunteer to spend all that time with? I couldn't stand clingy, and I lived alone for a reason, even when I had been dating. If nothing else, the swipe-right technology was good for one thing: working off enough steam so blue-balls weren’t a problem when you made bad decisions.
Gina, their housekeeper, met me on my way down the stairs. She had been coming up to tell us that breakfast was ready. Mom and Dad had been getting packed all morning when I had gotten to the house; neither had even had coffee yet. I thanked her and told her that I would let them know. Walking back into the closet in their room, my mother was hunched down over my dad's suitcase, rearranging the clothes he had thrown in there.
"I don't see why you don't just carry another bag."
"Because there's room in yours," she said.
"You might as well. I know there's no way you aren't shopping."
"Then get rid of some of these so I can have more room," she shot back.
"Guys," I said, interrupting their little back and forth. I told them the food was ready downstairs. They joined me after about ten minutes, once Mom was happy with the amount of extra space she had managed to make in dad's suitcase, I guessed. Usually, they liked eating out on the terrace when the weather was good, but it was getting too cold for that. I had eaten before coming over, so I just had coffee, sitting with them at the breakfast table, right off the kitchen, overlooking the lawn outside. The trees had been dropping yellow leaves, and soon, the whole green field would be carpeted in snow.
"I can't believe you guys are leaving me here," I joked.
"If you want to guilt us, try harder," my dad said. He started eating the piece of French toast that my mom had spread with lemon curd for him. They were so in sync, it had to take years to become so in tune with another person. I could swear that they talked in code.
"Well, you'll be back in time for the best part," I reflected. Compared to the snowfall in the mountains, we didn't get that much, but it was still cold in the city and colder for those of us who weren't going to be swimming in the Mediterranean Sea this time tomorrow.
"Vacations are taken by those who earn them," my dad said philosophically. "If you start now, this'll be you in thirty years."
"Five," my mother said, stirring cream into her coffee. "He'll meet someone before then."
"I don't know about that," my dad said. "You've seen the way he is. Besides, has he even gone out on a date this year?"
"If the time comes, we can help the process along," my mother said ominously. They did that sometimes, talked about me when I was right there to get me to react. It was mostly playful, but my mother had tried to set me up before and would probably try some more in the future if I didn't get it done myself fast enough for her.
"Whoever she is, make sure she's pretty," I said, grinning.
My mother laughed. "I don't think there's a problem with the supply; I think he's just being difficult," she said imperiously, sipping her coffee.
"Give the kid a break," my dad said.
"You're too easy on him," she said. I watched them, entertained. Why did so many people hate their parents? Mine were great. "All that gray hair you have coming in, somebody ought to be calling you grandpa." That one got him. He laughed. I didn't know about all that. Kids would logically come after finding a woman, and I wasn't exactly on the hunt. One hurdle at a time, I thought, and even then, I wouldn’t get my hopes up too high.
"Do you guys shit talk me like this in public?" I asked.
"Of course not, dear. Only when you can hear us," my mom said, smiling sweetly at me. Good to know. Lucky me. It was only going to be ten days, but I missed them already.
The flight was going to last thirteen hours at least, not counting any stopovers. Since it wasn't a commercial flight, I got to see them off from the runway. Maybe it was time we all went somewhere together, I thought, watching them climb up into the craft. Maybe. I'd ask them what they thought when they got back.
Chapter Four