Chapter 9

At midnight, Henriette and Miles decided to call home to check in while I went into the kitchen to make us a snack.

Miles’ call reminded me of how Fred talked to his Dad over the phone. Henriette surprised me by talking to her Mom in French.

By the time they were back at the table, I had everything ready. I decided to use the linen napkins and china plates I’d brought from the china cabinet I had in my storage space.

“Wow, this looks cool!” Miles exclaimed.

“Yeah, this is great!” Henriette agreed.

“Thanks. This is the way my namesake loved to do midnight snacks.”

“This is real china, isn’t it?” Miles asked in amazement.

“Yes. My namesake bought a china cabinet for me when I was born, and stocked it with a full set of china, matching linen napkins, and a full silverware set.”

“Wow, that’s cool!” Henriette said, putting some sandwich fingers on her plate.

“Do you use the silverware?” Miles asked.

I shook my head. “I gave it to Louisa. She’d always wanted one.”

“Very nice of you. Also brave of you to use fine china.”

I laughed. “My namesake used hers all the time. We never broke a dish. She said the only way she could justify such an extravagant purchase was to use it as her everyday set of dishes.”

“She sounds really cool.”

“Yeah, she was.” I sighed. “So, do you guys get along with your parents?”

“Yep!” They answered.

“Our parents are good friends, so we spent a lot of time together as kids.” Miles said.

“Both our Moms are nurses. Part of the reason we moved here was so my Mom could go to nursing school.”

“Yeah, so our Moms totally bonded over that.” Henriette said, smiling.

“Cool.”

“So is your Mom French, Henriette?” I asked.

She shook her head. “She’s Mexican. My maternal grandparents, who are French, adopted her from some teenage couple they met at church.”

“That’s interesting. I’m adopted, too.”

“Really?”

“Yeah. I was the product of a company affair, and was adopted by an executive in the company who was my namesake’s nephew. Dad wanted to run the company one day–it’s a family business–so he decided to name me after the head of the company.”

“Interesting.” Henriette said. “My Dad and Grandpa have a business together–they do upholstery. Mostly for cars, but they’ll make chairs, too.”

“That’s neat.” I said. “What about your folks, Milo?”

“Both sides have been in the US since the Constitution was signed. My paternal grandmother remarried after her first husband was killed in the Korean War, when my Dad was a little kid. She married his best friend, my Grandpa Herschel. When his family came from Poland in the late 20′s, their name got changed to Lublin, which was the town they were from.”

“I did a report on that town as extra credit for history class junior year.” I said. “Really sad how they pretty much got wiped out.”

Miles nodded his head. “My Mom’s side is a lot more normal. Most of them live east of Chicago, so I don’t see them much.”

“More sandwiches and milk?” I asked.

“Yes!” They exclaimed.

“Glad you like them.” I said, rising and picking up the platter.

“So what was it like to live in Mermirabuena?”

“Okay, I guess. My folks really weren’t the parenting type, which is why my namesake ended up taking me under her wing. I moved in with her when kinda got kicked out in high school.”

“What do you mean?” Miles asked as I refilled our milk glasses.

“Well, I was fighting with my Mom over not wanting to do all this stuffy girlie shit like have a debutante party, and I was getting in trouble with my first girlfriend, who was the school drug dealer. So I started spending most of the time at my namesake’s house. My Dad was sorta on my side until I refused some advances from a client of his. Then he told me he thought it would be best if I stayed with my namesake on a permanent basis.”

“Oh, wow.” Miles and Henriette said together.

“Yeah, high school was crazy.” I set the second platter of sandwiches down, and sat back down.

There was a knock on my door about an hour later, right after we finished the second platter of sandwiches. I opened it to find Andy and Nora, who both looked slightly flushed.

“Come in.” I said, smiling.

“You two ready?” Nora asked, looking at Henriette and Miles.

“Yes, we are.” They said. Henriette picked up the dishes and piled them on the platter. Miles took them to the kitchen.

“Oh, thanks!” I said.

“Thanks for the snacks.” Henriette said, hugging me.

“And thanks for the posters.” Miles said.

“We’ll call you tomorrow. Er, later today.” Henriette said.

“Great!” I said. “Have a safe drive!” I said.

When they left the building, I turned to Andy. “Want to sleep over?”

Andy blushed. “Uh, no, sorry. But let’s have lunch tomorrow. I’ll order a pizza.”

“Okay, great! Well, good-night then.” I went to kiss Andy, but he hugged me instead.

“Good-night.” He said, and left.

I closed the door behind me, feeling confused. On one hand, I was quite happy that I’d found two people I could date. On the other hand, I had a feeling that Andy was already starting to fall in love with Nora, which was something I didn’t expect.

After the pizza had arrived at Andy’s and we were sitting at his table, I asked him what he thought of Nora.

“Nora’s everything I missed about my ex-girlfriend, and a whole lot more.”

“You must like her a lot, then.” I said.

“Yes, I do.”

“Are you going to start dating her?”

“Yes. She’s definitely the kind of woman I can very easily fall in love with, and I think I’m ready for that again.”

“Does this mean our sleep-overs are over?”

Andy sighed as he nodded. “Yes. I have a feeling she’ll probably start sleeping over on weekends.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.” He was blushing slightly as he looked at me. I looked at him carefully.

“You slept with her last night, didn’t you?” I asked, amazed.

“Yes, I did.” Andy answered. “We just felt so strongly for each other, that we decided to go for it.”

“Was it good?”

“Yeah. So, what did the three of you do?”

“Talked about practically everything under the sun.”

“So, is anything more going to happen with you and them?”

I nodded. “We’re going to start going out together and see what happens.”

“Really? All three of you?”

I nodded. “I’ve never done anything like this before, but it seems like the right thing to do. They love each other, but they both like me and I like both of them. So we’re going to spend a lot of time together and see what develops.”

“I don’t know if I could do that.” Andy said.

“We’ll see if I can do it.” I said, laughing. “It sounds wonderful in theory, but who knows what will happen in practice.”