章節 45: Is That Her?!
Aunt Mel continued giving them a hard time about their eating habits until she joined them in the living room to watch the rest of the father-son Monopoly showdown. They were pretty into it so she turned her attention to her second child.
"How are things going lately, Jonah? I know you had a doctor's appointment a couple of weeks ago."
"Things are fine. Work is going well, my pain isn't too bad, and—"
"He's been texting and calling a cute girl nonstop," Troy interrupted.
"Troy!" Jonah protested as his ears turned red.
He hadn't even realized he was listening in on their conversation. He had seemed focused on the game a few seconds ago! Why couldn't he have stuck to that?!
Aunt Mel's girlfriend radar was suddenly primed and ready. She started asking a bunch of questions without stopping for breath. "What's her name? How old is she? What does she do? Where did you meet her? Is she nice? Why didn't you tell me about this sooner?"
Jonah scowled at his oblivious cousin's back. "I didn't tell you because I didn't see a reason to. It probably won't go anywhere; she hasn't even seen my whole face yet."
This did not deter her. "How did you meet her then?"
"Online," he lied. "I'm on a dating website. I wanted to see if I could talk to people first before they see me and jump to conclusions."
This was a plausible explanation because the few pictures on his social media accounts were taken of the left side of his face only. He hated having his picture taken period but sometimes it was unavoidable because Aunt Mel liked having proof they did things together as a family. So he always turned his head unless the pictures were taken from enough of a distance that his scars weren't noticeable.
He had to lie because if she ever found out what Troy had done to get out of work, she would probably kill her only biological child. She was the last person aside from Marty and Eden that they ever wanted to know about this.
She looked at him expectantly. "And? You didn't answer the rest of my questions!"
Jonah sighed. "Her name is Eden McBride. She's twenty-three and is a chemist at a pharmaceutical lab. She's very nice and I enjoy talking to her but that's it. We don't have any plans to meet any time soon and I doubt that will change. Troy shouldn't have brought it up."
"Yes I should have," he piped up as he handed over a ton of rent money to his dad after landing on a property with three houses. "She's all you ever talk about anymore."
While that was arguably true, Jonah was fairly certain he knew the real reason. If Aunt Mel and Uncle Bob knew about her, it would be harder for him to wimp out because they would ask about her all the time. That traitor.
"Aww, honey, she sounds great!" Aunt Mel said enthusiastically. "What does she like? What sorts of things do you talk about? Does she have siblings? Tell me more about her."
She had asked for it. He may as well tell her.
"We have similar senses of humor and tastes in books and movies so we've been exchanging recommendations a lot. But she also likes Jane Austen stuff. And she's a big hiker so we've swapped stories about hikes we've been on.
"She has one older brother but she's also close to her best friend's family so it's like she has three extra siblings. She's a lot of fun, easy to tease, and has the most dazzling smile I've ever seen in my life. Happy?"
"Very," Aunt Mel said in a satisfied tone. "I want to meet her."
"I haven't even met her yet!"
"Well, it seems like you will soon enough with the way you talk about her." Jonah was about to retort when his phone buzzed in his pocket. She noticed immediately. "Is that her?!"
"…yeah."
He checked the message and saw that it simply said 'Are you busy or can I call you?' Troy and Uncle Bob were still deep in their game and he didn't want to be rude and leave his aunt alone but he hadn't talked to Eden for days.
"Um…she asked if I was busy or if she could call me. Would it be too rude to take a call now?" he asked hesitantly.
Aunt Mel practically shoved him out the door. "Go! You're a grown adult; don't stay in here on my account. I'll be plenty entertained watching those two bankrupt each other. Don't keep her waiting!"
Jonah went up to his old bedroom to call her. "Eden? What's up?"
"Sorry, I just…can you talk about something completely random right now? I don't care what," Eden requested.
Her voice was shaking and it sounded like she had been crying. Oh no. Something must have happened at home after all. It sounded like she needed a distraction every bit as much as he had yesterday.
If she wanted him to talk about something random, he would give her something random. He would come up with all the random things in the world if it would prevent her from crying.
"Have you ever had those practical joke jellybeans that look like they're normal but are actually a really gross flavor?" Jonah blurted. "My aunt got those for us a few years ago and they were completely traumatizing. I don't think I can ever eat another peach-flavored jellybean again…"
He continued with the full story, being sure to give as much dramatic detail as possible, as he frantically wracked his brains for something else to entertain her with the second he ran out of things to say about jellybeans.
He wanted to ask what happened but it wasn't his place since she didn't seem to want to talk about it. She had looked like she was perfectly fine on Friday evening though. What on earth had happened between then and now?
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