The Divorce Party

“I’m here,” he says.

Which is when she turns to Maggie.

“And you’re here!”

Maggie waves hip-side—small, shy—and Nate drops his bag, letting go of her hand and moving toward his sister.

He bends down to give her a hug, an overly gentle hug, as though he’ll break her. Maggie laughs, knowing this is what he is worried about, and because it is so nice to watch him with Georgia. Even with her huge stomach, even holding on to that huge taffy tub, she looks so small next to Nate. She looks like she belongs to him.

When Georgia pulls away, she holds out her hand for Maggie, who takes it.

“I’m glad to meet you,” Maggie says.

“I’m glad to meet you too,” she says. “You don’t smoke by chance, do you?”

“No, she doesn’t, Georgia,” Nate says.

“Was I talking to you? I was asking Maggie.”

“And I am telling you that Maggie doesn’t.”

Georgia turns back to Maggie. “No one is asking anyone to give me one. But someone’s going to have to smoke a cigarette for me. Sometime soon. And I thought maybe you looked up to the task?”

Maggie smiles at her. “I’m not sure if that is a compliment, but I can do that.”

“Excellent.”

“Can you not attempt to kill my girlfriend as soon as you meet her?” Nate says.

Georgia rolls her eyes, and she rolls them again in case he missed it. Then she hands Nate the keys, and opens the backseat door for herself. “You can drive. I’m lying down in the back with my tub o’ candy.” She pauses, points her finger at him. “But I feel the need to warn you that if you tell me I’m huge, or that I’m growing, or that I look anything but like the most gorgeous pregnant person you’ve ever seen, I’m going to toss this candy at you. Even if it runs us off the road.”

Nate opens the passenger side door for Maggie, winking at her. “So maybe this isn’t the best time to say that you look like a house?”

Georgia slams Nate in the arm with the taffy, and Maggie starts to laugh. “Any brothers?” Georgia asks.

Maggie shakes her head. “I wish.”

Georgia pulls on her taffy, throws a piece at her brother, hitting him on the arm. “Really? Even now?”

“Less so,” she says, and they all get in the car: Nate and Maggie up front. But instead of lying down like she said she was going to, Georgia wraps her hand around the back of the driver’s seat, and sticks her head between the two front seats.

“So we need to talk, Nate,” she says.

“You don’t waste any time,” he says.

He is just pulling out of the parking space, and down the main street of town: restaurants and surfing stores appearing on Maggie’s left, the beach and ocean getting larger on her right until she can hear the water, feel its breeze.

“Well, if you ever called back your pregnant sister, I wouldn’t be so anxious. But you need to be prepared. You need to be prepared before we get back to the house. It’s like the twilight zone around here.”

Maggie immediately feels uncomfortable, like she shouldn’t be present for this. So she rolls down the window, tries to listen to whatever is happening outside.

But Georgia taps her on the shoulder. “Can you close that? I need you to hear me. Because I’m going to need you for backup.”

“For what?” Maggie asks.

“For when Nate pretends this isn’t a big deal, and you’re going to have to help me convince him that it is.”

Nate looks at her in the rearview mirror. “What are you talking about?”