Royally Jacked (Romantic Comedies, The) Read online

  “Lets just say there’s no girlfriend. Okay?”

  “Fine,” Jules says, but it’s obvious she doesn’t believe me. And I don’t want to clarify by pointing out that my mom is the one asking for the divorce, not my dad.

  “So who are you going to choose?” Christie asks. “If that’s what dinner is really about.”

  “I don’t know.” I hadn’t thought about choosing. I know that sounds stupid beyond belief, given that my parents are now going to be living in two different houses, but it just didn’t occur to me. I guess, in my gut, I kind of believed my mom would get over it and move back home. Pull an Anne Heche and decide she’s not gay after all.

  I’m getting way depressed now. Maybe I should have told just Christie, and not Jules. Or kept my stupid mouth shut entirely.

  “Your mom’s going to get the house, right?” Jules asks. “The wife always gets the house. It’s kind of a rule.”

  “Um, actually, she’s getting an apartment and my dad’s going to stay in the house.” I really don’t want to get into the details with Jules, so I grind what’s left of my cigarette against the side of the Dumpster and I lie. “I think she wants to feel independent or something.”

  “Damn.” Jules looks at her watch. “Gotta go. If I’m late coming off break, I’m gonna get fired.”

  She got in trouble Monday for not cleaning the Frosty machine the right way, so she promised the manager she’d redo it today. She’s dying to get moved up to cash register so she doesn’t smell like french fry grease at the end of every day.

  “Listen, Val,” she sniffs, “I’d normally tell you to stay with your mom, but if you’re going to lose your bedroom and have to move into some tiny apartment—”

  “But how could you not live with your mom?” Christie says in shock. Christie’s been coming over to my house since preschool, so she knows my mom pretty well. At least, the way my mom used to be.

  “I don’t know,” I admit. And it’s true. I can’t imagine not living with Mom. But I feel the same way about Dad. I don’t want to not live with either of them.

  Jules drops the butt of her cigarette into the snow, then pops two cinnamon Altoids into her mouth and passes the box to me before Christie steals one. “I gotta go. Call me tonight and tell me what happens. ’Kay, Val?”

  “It’s probably going to be late.”

  “First thing tomorrow then,” she says, tucking the Altoids box back into the pocket of her black polyester Wendy’s pants. “But call by nine. It’s Saturday, so I’m on the lunch shift.”

  Once she’s crossed the parking lot and ducked into the back door, Christie lets out a painful-sounding sigh. “Don’t listen to her, Val. You know how she is.”

  “Yeah.” I give her my “whatever” shrug.

  “It’ll be okay. And you know I’m here for you if you need me. Anytime, day or night. Just call me,” she says, adjusting her hood so her hair is tucked inside.

  It kills me how pretty Christie is without even trying. She had one zit—one—a couple months ago, and it was very nearly a cigarette-smoking emergency situation, she was so certain her boyfriend would dump her. As if. Over a zit? I wanted to smack her back to reality. First, over her lack of zittiness (is that a word?), and second over her boyfriend insecurity. He’s totally into her. Still, she could do a lot better than Jeremy Astin, if you ask me. But Christie’s way nice, and pretty much my best friend, so I don’t want to hurt her feelings by telling her this. She loves Jeremy, even if he is a little too much into cross-country and runs in public wearing those icky nylon shorts, even when it’s icecold outside.

  I’m just about to say good-bye and walk back to school to get my junk out of my locker when I see a familiar green Toyota SUV in the drive-thru. It’s my mom and, to my horror, Gabrielle is with her. Why I have no clue, since Gabrielle is a crusader-type vegetarian.

  Before I can say something to Christie to keep her from seeing them, she grabs the sleeve of my coat. “I almost forgot to tell you, with Jules here and you telling us about the divorce and all, but Jeremy said that he and David were talking in the library yesterday, and your name came up.”

  Since I have had a crush on David Anderson since, like, kindergarten, I actually look away from my mom and Gabrielle and pull Christie another step behind the Dumpster.

  “Are you serious?” I ask, trying not to sound too excited, even though Christie knows I would just die to go out with him. “Who brought me up, David or Jeremy?”

  “David did. He asked Jeremy if you were with anybody.”

  My heart does an instant flip-flop in my chest. You have got to see David to know why. He’s a total, one hundred percent hottie. Surfer-blond, with these fantabulous green eyes I can’t even look into, they’re so freakin’ gorgeous. He could bump Paul Walker or James Van Der Beek right off the cover of Teen People and females everywhere would rejoice, I kid you not. Even those who are still whining about Dawson’s Creek going off the air. And even though he’s never asked me out, I think we’d totally gel. I mean, we share a group of friends, we both have parents in politics, and we’re hyper about our grades. “What did Jeremy say?”

  “He played it cool. Said he didn’t think so, but he knew a couple of other guys liked you.”

  “Wow. Good one.” Jeremy just scored major points with this, as long as David didn’t catch on to the bluff. Maybe Jeremy does deserve Christie after all. “Then what happened?”

  “That was it. But Jeremy definitely got the impression he’s interested. Like maybe we could all four go out sometime.”

  I think I am going to collapse. Right behind the Wendy’s Dumpster, snow and old french fry muck and all.

  Christie is grinning now, and I know she’s excited she distracted me from the whacked situation with my parents. “Jeremy told me about it before saying anything to David because he wasn’t sure how you felt. If you want, I bet he could hook you up. Seriously. Would that not be the best?”

  “Well, yeah!” I force myself to chill, though. “But don’t make me sound desperate or anything. And don’t tell Jeremy that I’m too into David, if you haven’t already. That’d kill it right off.”

  “Okay. I didn’t say anything to Jeremy, I swear. I wanted to tell you first.”

  This is why Christie is number one on my A-list, even if she is Miss Perfect. I guess I’m lucky she’s going out with Jeremy, or David would be all over her. They could be Mr. and Miss Perfect.

  Oh, damn. What if David’s only interested in me because I’m Christie’s friend? It wouldn’t be the first time a guy asked me out because he thought it’d get Christie to notice him.

  Of course, at exactly the moment this occurs to me, a familiar car horn blasts not twenty feet away, practically rendering me deaf.

  “Val-er-ieee! Oh, Val-er-ieee!” My mother is pulling into the parking spot nearest to the Dumpster and has her window down. I see Gabrielle in the passenger seat popping the top off a salad and picking out the croutons. Guess they’re not whole wheat or something.

  I brace myself for Christie to ask who’s in the car. Why, why, why me? I hate lying to my friends, and Christie, of all people, would be most likely to understand.

  But I am not ready to deal with this. Not yet, not even with Christie. Maybe I can say Gabrielle’s a neighbor. No, wait, Christie knows all my neighbors. Maybe someone from the Boosters? Or Mom’s book club?

  Geez, I despise lying. I don’t think I can do it.

  My mom sticks her head out the window and asks if we want a ride. Thank goodness, Christie says no, we’re heading back to school. My mom waves and takes off, but I can tell she’s curious. And so’s Christie. Her mouth is hanging open, and she’s watching the back of the SUV as it rolls out of the lot.

  Book club. I’m going to say Gabrielle’s from book club.

  Ohmigod.” Christie looks like she’s just swallowed her Altoids the wrong way. “What did your mom do to her hair?”

  Two

  “Dad,” I whisper, “what’s a t
imbale?”

  I should never have asked him to bring me here. For one, I can’t read half the menu. For two, he still hasn’t said what decisions we need to make.

  And for three, I’m still thinking about David Anderson. And the fact that it’s Friday night, which means Jeremy probably won’t see him again until Monday at school, since cross-country season is now over and Christmas break is only a week away. No more Saturday meets or practices where they can get together to discuss moi.

  “It means that it was baked in a mold,” Dad explains, and I can tell he’s thrilled by his own knowledge of this useless information. I guess it is his job. “In most cases, the dish is cream based.”

  In other words, seafood timbale is probably going to be disgusting. “Oh,” I say. “I’m not a fan of creamy.”

  Or molds. Only Jell-O should go in molds, and even that’s iffy. But I don’t want to upset Dad, since I did ask to come here and he’s shelling out the big bucks.

  “Me, either,” he says. “But you might like the crab cakes.”

  I’m not a big seafood person either, but since the rest of the menu’s steak (I definitely don’t like big hunks of meat), I decide to go with Dad and order the crab cakes to start and the poached snapper. It comes with mushrooms, which I do like.

  Honestly, though, I could care less about the food. I want to know what this dinner is all about. It’s not just a reward for saving the Mottahedeh from Mom, and we both know it. As soon as the waiter’s gone, I look at Dad. I’m just too scared to ask. Thankfully, he brings it up first.

  “Valerie, I told you last night we had some decisions to make.”

  He looks nervous and Martin Winslow rarely gets nervous about speaking. I mean, he’s on the speed dial of not only the current president of the United States, but several former presidents, which means he’s used to talking to anyone, anytime, about all kinds of strange topics. So I’m tempted to tell him to do whatever, that I don’t want to be involved. Especially since my opinions don’t seem to carry much weight. I mean, I thought I was being brilliant by suggesting my mom and dad have a cooling-off period before rushing into a divorce. The only way I know my mom even heard my opinion was that she later informed me she’d been “cooling off” for a decade.

  “Well, now that your mother and I aren’t living together any longer, we need to decide where you should live.”

  Before he’s even finished speaking, I can feel tears coming up in my eyes. I try to play it off by taking a long sip of my Diet Coke. I hate that Jules was right about this.

  At least she had the Dad-has-a-girlfriend thing wrong.

  “Well, I’m not sure Mom wants me with her,” I tell Dad. “Not living with her anyway.” Its the first time I’ve said it aloud, but ever since she made her announcement, it’s what I’ve been thinking.

  Dad shakes his head, and I start feeling bad for him, too, since Mom definitely doesn’t want to live with him. “No,” he says, “she does want you to live with her. And so does Gabrielle.”

  I can tell he hardly wants to let Gabrielle’s name pass his lips, but he’s making an effort to be polite about it all. He takes a sip of his wine and adds, “I guess she and Gabrielle have a two-bedroom apartment, and you’d have your own bathroom. So it’s something to consider.”

  “But Gabrielle’s going to try to tell me what to do, right?” I remember when Jules’s stepfather—the guy her mom married in between being married to Jules’s dad and remarrying Jules’s dad—used to boss her around. One minute he acted like he was her new best buddy, but the next minute—as soon as Jules’s mom wasn’t around—he’d walk all over her. I remember thinking how glad I was I’d never have to deal with that. But now I guess Gabrielle’s going to be my stepmom. Or something.

  “I don’t know Gabrielle well enough to speak for her,” Dad says, his tone making it clear he has no interest in knowing Gabrielle either. “But I know your mom will do her best to make you happy, no matter what problems she and I might have. She loves you as much as she ever has.”

  I think about this for a minute while I fish a roll out of the bread basket. “Do you want me to live with Mom?”

  “I want you to do whatever you want. But your mother and I have talked about it, and whatever you decide now, we want you to know you can change your mind. We’re not going to fight about custody. We agree that you’ll be fine with either of us for the next two and a half years, before you go to college, and that you’re mature enough to make your own decision.”

  Wow. I just stare at Dad. I totally expected him to ask my opinion, just to make me feel like I had a say, then do whatever the hell he and Mom wanted to do.

  My dad gives me a look, though, that clues me in to the fact things aren’t so simple.

  “What’s the catch?”

  “Well, if you move in with your mother, you’ll switch schools. Her apartment’s closer to Lake Braddock. I’m sure you could finish out the year here, but then—”

  “Forget it. I hate Lake Braddock.” No way do I want to graduate from there. And how could I leave Christie, Jules, and Natalie? Let alone David. Not that I have David to leave—yet. But I never will if I transfer. “Besides, if I stay with you, I can see Mom whenever. I mean, she’ll only be a few miles away.”

  I think this will be okay. I’ll have my friends. I won’t have to let anyone know what’s up with Mom, at least not right away, since I know I’m going to cave and cry if I tell them now. I have to get a grip on this whole thing first.

  And Dad won’t be so lonely if I’m home. Mom has Gabrielle, but he doesn’t have anyone. Well, except me. “I’m staying with you, Dad, definitely.” This wasn’t nearly as painful as I thought it’d be. “If that’s all right, I mean. I kind of like my room, so keeping it would be a plus. And this way I can stay at Vienna West.”

  Dad twists in his chair, and that’s when I notice he hasn’t even touched his roll. “That s the other part of the catch, Valerie. But in a way, I think it’s good news.”

  I flip my hand in the air over the table in a get-on-with-it way.

  He leans forward and keeps his voice so quiet I can hardly hear him. “I’m about to be transferred.”

  “Transferred? To where?” As far as I know, there’s only one White House, and that’s his thing. He’s been there since I was five, which means he’s on his third president.

  “Well, you know President Carew is quite conservative.”

  “Oh, yeah.” He’s, like, the hero of the right wing Republicans. The Moral Majority pretty much got him elected. The guy’s very progun lobby, antiabortion, and totally against legislation that allows gays to marry or to adopt kids, yadda yadda yadda.

  My dad is a registered Democrat, on the other hand. He’s voted that way every election since he was eligible. Even though he’s occasionally called on to help fix whatever media-catastrophe-of-the-moment there is at the White House, I’ve never once heard him utter a single word criticizing Republican presidents for their mistakes. Or cheering on the Democrats, come to think of it.

  The way I figure, who cares who’s in the Oval Office or what they do in their personal lives if the economy is good, health care is improving, and everyone’s employed?

  But Dad never talks about his political beliefs to anyone. I only know where he stands because I pestered him about it once for a solid week and he finally told me. He also told me it was his job not to have a political opinion, or even a personal opinion of the men he’s worked for—some of whom I think drove him insane—so I need to keep the information to myself. Especially the fact hes never voted for a Republican in his life—including the Republicans who’ve employed him.

  “Well, President Carew is up for reelection next year, and his staff will come under a great deal of scrutiny. With your mother and I divorcing, and given the unusual circumstances—”

  “You’re getting fired because Mom’s a lesbian?” I try hard to keep my voice down, but a man at the next table glances our way. I can’t help it thou
gh. This is just so wrong.

  “No, Valerie.” He reaches across the table and puts his hand over mine, probably as much to shut me up as to comfort me. “No. I felt, with the election coming up, that I needed to tell President Carew what was happening. We both decided it would be best for the administration if I took a job elsewhere. I don’t want this to become a political issue any more than he does. Could you imagine if Tim Russert threw it out for discussion on Meet the Press?”

  I start feeling sick to my stomach, because I know stuff like that happens all the time.

  Geez, I hate how D.C. works sometimes.

  “The president was very understanding, and he found me another position. A great opportunity, actually.” He lets go of my hand, and I can see he’s actually excited he’s getting canned. “Do you know where Schwerinborg is?”

  I do, but only because we did Europe in World History and Geography last year. We had a quiz where we had to fill in all the names of the countries on a map of Europe, and I aced it. Schwerinborg was one of those dinky countries like Andorra, Lichtenstein, and San Marino, where you couldn’t write the country name on the actual country. You had to fill it in on a line that pointed to the country.

  Most of the class missed it. They either had no clue, or they wrote in “Smorgasbord.” We all laughed about that forever, because it totally pissed off the teacher. She thought they were being smart-asses.

  “Its very small, and it’s in the Alps, between Germany and Switzerland,” Dad explains, trying to get me jazzed about this. “They have a lot of skiing, and it’s quite beautiful. I’ll be chief of protocol to the royal family. I’ve been offered a two-bedroom apartment in the palace. The palace itself looks a lot like the Louvre—remember when we went there a couple of years ago on vacation?”

  I remember the Louvre. I adore art, and spending the afternoon there was the highlight of the trip for me. Warning: The Mona Lisa is underwhelming, but if you ignore that, there’s a lot of other good stuff in there. And the building itself is really pretty.

  The waiter brings our crab cakes, and they’re surprisingly good. “So, let me get this straight,” I say between bites. “You’re not even going to live in Virginia anymore? You’re moving to Schwerinborg? And you’ll be living in the palace?”