-1-

“Juliana! Hi! I’m so, so, so, sorry !”

A man who must be Alex Haley speed walks toward where Mom, Annabelle Grace and I are waiting outside of Bleu Plate.

Mr. Haley was not at all what I was expecting.  Mom had said the couple renting Grandpa’s Airbnb were about a decade older than she and Dad but Mr. Haley looked younger than my parents in skinny black jeans with blown out knees, a faded Britney Spears concert t-shirt and high top Converses with a pride flag on the side. The edges of a tattoo sleeve peak out from the rolled up left sleeve of his acid wash jean jacket.

He was a total contrast to my straight and narrow Dad who always tucked his ironed t-shirts into his ironed jeans.

“I’m so,so,so sorry we’re late. Luce was carrying and I didn’t realize until we got in the car,” Mr. Haley continues at a rapid fire pace. “He didn't get the concealed carry permit thing so we had to go back to the apartment and then my Uber app was being weird and—oh! Oh my god! Is this your baby ? Hi! Look how cute!”

Annabelle Grace, my baby sister, loved attention from strangers and at 16-months-old she seemed to know exactly how to turn up her cuteness for maximum attention.

AG squeals and reaches for Mr. Haley when he opens his arms to her.

“Aww, she’s so precious,” Mr. Haley smiles at my baby sister, bouncing her. “And so blonde! Just like her mommy.”

“They always start out that way but the Clark genes eventually take over,” Mom says running a hand through her hair. “And this shade is from a bottle.”

“Mine too,” Mr. Haley winks, pushing back a strand of pale blonde hair that had fallen out of the knot at the back of his head.

He shakes hands with me and then he and Mom start talking excitedly about hair dye , barely giving each other room to finish a sentence before seamlessly moving on to a new topic. It was so weird seeing my mom talk to someone who wasn’t one of my aunts and for her topic of conversation not to be family gossip.

The only thing I knew about the Haley-Grace family is that they were from Las Vegas and had a son my age.

Mom never got friendly with any of the renters in my Grandpa’s short term rental apartment but for some reason when she’d met Alex Haley and his family—who were using  the Airbnb for 30 days until they could find a longer lease---she’d decided we needed to go to brunch with them.

Bleu Plate, a fancy brunch buffet in downtown Hartford,  wasn’t the type of place my family could usually go to with all us kids but they only had to bring me and AG. Spencer didn’t like the idea of being set up on a playdate with some kid she didn’t know and quickly got herself invited to a sleepover. Peyton , Tennessee  and Carter were at an event at the Children’s Museum with Grandpa, his wife Tess and their daughter.

Mom signals to Dad, who had been sitting on a bench a few feet away from the restaurant on his phone.  Dad had been assigned a cohort of first generation college students to mentor at the Coast Guard Academy and they were  all so anxious and always calling, texting or e-mailing him. His hip had been hurting him all day and he couldn’t stand in front of the restaurant with Mom and I.

I feel like a third wheel listening to Mom and Mr. Haley talk and I’m kind of glad when I spot what must be the rest of Mr. Haley’s family approaching.

His son, Nova, looked like a mix between a baby faced Kurt Cobain and the  jawlined social media guys my cousins and sister were always drooling over. He’s got on distressed skinny jeans and black Doc Martens. His forest green flannel is open to reveal a shimmery white camisole. I recognize the double G Gucci logo on his belt and the Louis Vuitton pattern  on his backpack. . His lips, nose and ears are covered in piercings.

He has AirPods in and is tapping intensely on his phone—which was in a glittery purple case.

Mr. Haley and his son look similar with their long hair and slight stature but his husband, Mr. Grace is a total contrast. He looked like a cross between an football player and the guys we saw on Wall Street when we went to visit the city. He’s in a wheelchair, which Mom hadn’t mentioned so I'm not expecting it. He’s dressed more formally  in a fitted white button up shirt, starched, creased dark dress pants and wingtips. A gold chain hangs around his collar. 

He looks about as excited as I am to be here

The whole family seemed entirely too cool to be friends with my family.

And if they could afford labels like Gucci and Louis Vuitton, it didn’t make sense that they were living in my Grandfather’s crappy AirBnb. Most of the renters were parents of Academy students who needed a cheap bed for a few nights.

Nova  glances up from his phone as he gets closer to us and notices his Dad holding my baby sister.

“Awww, baby!,” Nova squeals like an excited little kid, abandoning his phone. His face breaks into a smile and he starts literally bouncing on his heels. “Oh, she’s so cute ! Aw, I want to hold her,  can I hold her--”

“Sure--” Mom starts.

“Maybe later,” Mr. Haley interrupts, giving AG reluctantly back to Mom. “She needs to go back to her mommy.”

Nova rolls his eyes and  goes back to whatever he was doing on his phone. I  glance over at Dad who was thankfully still on his own phone and hadn’t seen Nova’s eye roll. Dad treated eye rolling was like giving the middle finger and he totally would have called Nova out on it. Hell, he probably would have punished me just for witnessing it.

Mom shoots Dad an impatient look and calls his name. He signals for us to go ahead inside the restaurant without him.

The  interior is all rustic wooden tables, and succulent centerpieces. The expansive brunch buffet  is on a high rise in the back and I spot chalkboard signs indicating a made to order omelet station and acai bowl bar. On the wall next to the hostess stand there is a huge living flower wall.

“Wow, look!,” Nova says, pointing to the flower wall and using the same excitable tone he used about AG. “Dad, let’s take a picture in front of it--”

“Later, sweetheart. Ms. Julianna made us reservations--”

“---But we have to take it now because of the light,” Nova whines pointing to the restaurant’s skylights. “It’ll be really quick I promise. Please ? It’ll look so fu--so cool--”

“It’s fine,” Mom says. “I need to go check and see if our table is even ready.”

Nova grins and absently tosses his phone in the general direction of Mr. Grace without even checking to see if he was paying attention to him. They loop their arms around each other’s backs and strike a side profile pose seamlessly. Mr. Grace wordlessly snaps the picture from three different angles and then holds the phone out for Nova to take.

Mr. Haley looks over Nova’s shoulder as he starts editing the photo. Not that it needed editing, they both looked like models.

Just then Dad finally comes inside, he slings one arm on my shoulder and holds out his open hand to Mr. Grace.

“Rhett Clark,” Dad says by way of introduction..

“Luce Grace,” Mr. Grace says flatly, taking Dad’s hand. “Those two are mine.”

He’d inclined his head to where Mr. Haley and Nova were now taking a selfies with their tongues out using the Snapchat flower crown filter.

They had matching tongue rings.

Dad, Mr. Grace and I don’t seem to have anything to talk about and appraise the floor silently.

“What happened to you ?,” Mr. Grace asks abruptly, inclining his head to the cane Dad was leaning on today.

People didn’t usually just come out and ask about Dad’s cane or limp…but the guy was in a wheelchair so I guess he could say whatever he wanted.

“Long story. I was a rescue swimmer with the Coast Guard and had a bad night a few years ago,” Dad explains. “Ropes got tangled and everything that could have went wrong did. Shattered my entire right hip. You Coast Guard ?”

Mr. Grace scoffs at the question and Dad frowns.  He was usually good at picking out his fellow guardsman.

“Marine ?”

“No.”

“Army ? You seem military--”

“Never. Not into that shit.”

They go back into an awkward silence. I’m not sure my Dad was capable of small talk that wasn’t about the military.

“J told me your husband was a nurse…I didn’t catch what you did,” Dad says.

“My mother and I have an IT business.”

“My mom ran her own business too…a hair salon,” Dad says. “She passed away last year.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Yeah...Amazing woman. Raised me and my sister on her own.”

“Mine did too…except there were three of us--,” Mr. Grace says and clears his throat.“But..my little brother…he…he and his wife died in an accident. My sister lives in New York... Ma wanted to be closer to her and Lex was in between jobs so we decided it was time for a change .”

“I’m sorry about your brother," Dad says. "It’s hard when you leave home, huh ?”

“As long as I’ve got Lex and the kid it doesn’t matter where I live.”

Dad nods his head slowly. When Mom comes over Dad takes her hand and twirls her around and then  kisses her on the side of the forehead. She looks at him like he’s crazy and then he gives her a stupid grin that makes her shake her head with a laugh.

“They had some cancellations,” Mom reports and turns to Mr. Haley. “Are you okay with the boys having their own table ?”

“Um, sure, that’s fine with me,” Mr. Haley smiles pulling on the collar of Nova’s shirt. “Let me just have a little chat with this one first about expectations.”

Mom goes back to the hostess stand and I watch Nova nod along as his Dad says something in hushed tones. Then Nova gives his Dad his wallet.

Weird.

“Welcome to Bleu Plate. Which one of you wants the patio table ?,” an approaching hostess asks us.

“I want to eat outside!,” Nova says brightly and then turns to me. “Oh. Is that okay, Mason ?”

I nod, kind of surprised a guy like him even cared what I thought. Mom gives me an encouraging look and mouths “have fun” before the hostesses takes them one way and Nova and I the other way.

-2-

We’re put at a small table in the back corner. The waitress comes over immediately to take our drink order. Nova tries to order a grapefruit mimosa.

“I think I’ll need some ID,” the waitress teases.

He looked just barely 16, let alone 21.

“Thought I’d try,” he shrugs. “Can I have grapefruit juice in a fancy champagne flute ?”

We both end up with water. In water glasses.

The buffet line is amazing and the food is just as good as all the reviews I’d read online this morning said—especially the triple berry pancakes.

“Fuck. I hope my Dad doesn’t go through my wallet. My last good fake ID is in it,” Nova says randomly once we have our plates and start eating.

I don’t have a response for that. Before I can ask why his Dad even took his wallet he’s moved on.

“Oh, hey, did you know my government name is Grayson ?,” he grins.

I shake my head no.

“Mason, Grayson. Mason, Grayson. Mason, Grayson,” he sings,  swinging his fork. “It’s so funny our names rhyme. How silly.”

“Maybe it means we were supposed to meet ?,”

“Yeah, no one is going to believe The Powers That Be are playing that kind of long game,” he says and then looks off into the distance.

“So,” he says snapping his attention back to me. “What do you like to do, Mason ?”

I don't like talking about my hobbies so I shrug.

“Oh, come on! You have to do something. Tell me,” he pouts as he starts cleaning up the pattern of the fruit in his acai bowl with a teaspoon.

“Sometimes I paint miniatures,” I tell him, even though the truth was it was all I did. “It’s nerdy. They’re from D&D and stuff but I don’t play…I just like the character designs. It’s kind of dumb.”

“No, it’s not. And so what if it is ? I like to paint too!,” he grins, eating from his other plate---which was just a pile of maple glazed bacon. “Do you play video games ?”

“Not really. I mean…when I’m with my cousins and sister I play as that green alligator thing in Mario Kart. That’s pretty fun.”

He puts both hands over his heart and gasps in an exaggerated gesture. It’s such an endearingly weirdo thing to do.

“Okay, you did not just call Yoshi a green alligator thing!,” he says in mock offense. “I like Yoshi. He’s the  cutest thing ever but I’m always Daisy when I play Mario Kart—oh unless it’s Mario Kart 8 with the downloadable content. Then I’m Link because he has a cool bike and  I think he kind of looks like me.”

“My sister Spencer is obsessed with Mario Kart,” I tell him. “She is going to be so mad she didn’t meet you.”

I don’t tell him Spencer is also obsessed with Link too. She had huge secret crush on the video game character. She had an entire folder of Link fanart on her phone and she and Laci were writing a not-so -secret Zelda fanfic together.

“Aww, I wish I had a sibling.” Nova says taking a picture of his perfectly manicured and uneaten acai bowl. “I mean…I have a godbrother but he’s like 31 and  so boring. It takes a lot of work to make him fun.”

He lays his phone on the table and opens up his Instagram. He had over 700 posts, most of them were videos of him skateboarding and pictures of he and his Dad. Nova pulls a lot of weird faces in his pics but his Dad is crazy photogenic.  I’m surprised Nova only has 6 followers.

“This is funny. Here, look. This is my godbrother, Sky,” he says tapping an Instagram post and sliding me the phone.  “You can scroll through if you want.”

🎄 🎄 🎄 MERRY F-ING XMAS, WAKE UP @SkylarMax!!!!! When you steal my bed and make me sleep on the couch you get a very personal wake up call…Time to see how much coal Santa left me! #Xmas2019 #naughtyisnice 😊

I scroll and there is another Christmas  picture of him grinning in front of a giant Christmas tree in a fancy looking loft. He’s posing with a gorgeous Asian girl wearing a form fitting velvet dress and stilettos. He’s holding up the freshly unwrapped Louis Vuitton backpack with the caption:

 BEST XMAS EVA ! TY TY  TY TY! @ThisEloiseOwnsThePlaza #xmas2019   ❤️ 💚❤️ 💚

There are a few more Christmas posts with what look like the Asian girl’s sisters. It looked like all his designer stuff had been gifts from them.

 I scroll to a more recent post. It’s a photo of his Dad sitting cross-legged  on a picnic blanket at the beach. He looks delighted by a fluffy white cupcake with sparklers and a 48 candle on it that is being presented to him. Mr. Haley is wearing a gray wifebeater and cutoff shorts--he's got tattoos on his back, right arm and sides. Above the picture Nova has added the text: You’LL ReGrEt ThEm WhEn YoU’rE oLdEr. OkAy BoOmErS.

The post has another image in it and when I slide it I see an image of Nova with a mischievous look on his face and making a fist to show off a wrist tattoo that reads I Solemnly Swear I’m Up To No Good. The post caption reads:

@VBAStudios artists are amazing at tats but not at spotting fake IDs. I’ll probably be on lockdown for a month for this but I mean....I get it from my daddy. #LVTattooCon19 #hp #always 😜⚡

“You like Harry Potter ?” I ask showing him his post of his tattoo. He’d eaten the entire plate of bacon and was now slow working on the acai bowl.

“No,” he says taking his phone back and pulling his sleeve up to reveal his Marauders wrist tattoo. “I fucking love Harry Potter. My favorite character is book Ginny. I also have a thing for Tom Riddle.  I would die for all the Marauders. But not Peter, obviously. My favorite book is Half Blood Prince and my favorite movie is Order of The Phoenix. I will not be argued with. Now you. Who’s your favorite character ?”

I think about it.

“Hermione,” Nova says at the same time I do.

“Jinx! I knew it!,” he claps.

“Do you want to follow me ?,” he asks brightly.

 “I don’t have an account but I’ll tell Spence to follow. I’m surprised you don’t have more followers.”

 “I used to have a lot but I had to shut down my account and reopen it as a private one.”

 “Why ?”

 He looks up and his eyes roll around his head like he is thinking about something.

 “Okay, I’m going to tell you something about my Dad,” he says in a hushed tone. “You have to promise not to be weird about it.”

 “I won’t…My mom was  actually in a cult--”

 “Yeah, I know--”

 “You…do ?”

 “I head my Dad ask her when we moved in. Luce and his mom literally listen to APR all day, I've heard her episode like 8 times.”

“Oh--”

“Yeah, now promise you won’t freak out when I tell you what I’m about to tell you ?” 

“Um…okay ?”

My half-ass response seems to satisfy him.

“My Dad used to be a sex worker. Like...the porn kind. It was long time ago. I don't know,  he grew up dirt poor and kinda fell into it.”

Nova seems way too comfortable saying the word porn in public and I feel myself getting hot as I try to figure out how not to be weird about it. I don’t think I’d ever talked about the existence of porn or sex with anyone. I temporarily forget how to use my fork and just start eating my pancake by ripping a strip off with my hands.

“Anyway, I posted a picture of Dad and I at his job on IG and the parent company that owns his job thought it was cute   and reposted it on their official Twitter. The picture went a little viral and someone recognized him.”

Then creeps posted like screenshots and gifs from stuff he did.Which gross and also…how ?  It was kind of a half joke half hot take machine on Twitter but it got out of hand. He was working with children and some of the donors didn’t like what was happening so he left. Since then he won’t let me have a public account which is so stupid. Like, what’s even the point ?”

“That must have sucked—um, I mean been hard—really difficult,” I cringe. “I can’t believe he told you about what he used to do.”

“They sucked at hiding it.” he shrugs. “When I was little I was obsessed with 80s rom coms and wanted to know how he and Luce met--”

“So…they were both--"

“Ew, no,” he laughs. “Atleast I don’t think so ? Can you imagine ? All I know if they met on a porn set.”

I couldn’t imagine knowing that. When Mom was giving me the sex talk she'd gone into her bedroom to get a condom to show me and I’d locked myself in my room from awkwardness after being burdened with the knowledge my parents had condoms.

“Speaking of things that suck,” Nova  says taking a straw to the remnants of his acai bowl. “What are the schools like here ? I think we’re going to the same one.”

“I don’t know. We moved here during the end of the school year so I did online school to finish out the year,” I explain. “I did live here with my grandfather for a year of middle school...I think you’ll fit in.”

“Fitting in is overrated,” he shrugs, which must be easy to say when you look like something a Wattpad fic spit out.

“My sister and I still need to go to the high school and register at some point. You can ride along with us if you want.,” I offer.

Nova brightens up suddenly and sits up in his seat.

“You can drive ? Do you like, have a car ?”

“Yeah,” I say, feeling weirdly smug I finally had something on him.

“That’s so cool. I barely get to sit in the front seat and we didn’t even bring our car from Vegas,” he mumbles. “Hey, will you let me practice driving in your car ? And maybe help me with some driving stuff ?,”

“Sure.”

“Great!  I’ll call us an Uber.”

“Wait—what—why ?”

“So, we can go to your house, get your car and you can help me with driving stuff--”

“But…Right now ?”

“Yeah, why not ?, It’ll be fun!”

“What about our parents ?”

“Oh. Right.”

He deflates momentarily and then perks back up.  I can practically see the lightbulb going off above his head. He scrolls through his phone, mouths ‘perfect’ and then starts a FaceTime call with his Dad.

“Um, what are you doin-“

“Did you see the new Fantastic Beasts?,” Nova asks me as the FaceTime connects.

“No, I didn’t really like the first two--,”

“Hi, Dad!,” he chirps when the FaceTime connects. His Dad is frowning into the camera.

“Nova, we’re in the same restaurant,” his Dad says under his breath. “If you need to talk to me come over here--,”

“But--”

The call hangs up and Nova rolls his eyes before looping his arm loosely through mine and walking us towards our parents’ table.

Annabelle Grace was having the time of her life eating a bowl of oatmeal with her hands. She gets all jumpy when she sees me and offers me some. My Dad is showing Mr. Grace a video of the upper body workout he’s been doing and  it sounds like my Mom and Mr. Haley are talking about being raised ultra religious and side effects of antidepressants.

Nova and I couldn’t be farther apart but they all strangely had a lot in common.

“Dad!” Nova chirps. “Mason  also likes Harry Potter and he just told me he hasn’t seen the new Fantastic Beasts movie and if he’s going to be my first friend here I can’t really stand for that. There’s a movie theater down the street.  Can we go see it ? The last $5 show starts in 10 minutes. Please, please, please ?”

Mom puts her hands over her mouth to hid her big smile. Great, now she thinks she made me a friend. If she only knew that he…seemed like a lot.

“I don’t know,” Mr. Haley says. “The Clarks might have things to do--,”

“No, no it’s fine.” Mom says a little too quickly. “Annabelle Grace’s stroller is in the van. She can take her nap in it. I think the beer garden across the street has a brunchtime happy hour special. We could go there and wait.”

Mom looks over at Dad who nods. Dad never said no to a beer, especially not a cheap one.

“Yay!,” Nova says, raising his arm in victory. Jesus, even his belly button was pierced.  He holds his hand out to his Dad. “I need my wallet back, Daddy.”

His Dad reaches into the impossibly small pocket of his pants and pulls out a thin leather wallet. Nova opens it and I see a debit card and Nevada ID with the name Grayson Hollins Haley-Grace on it. I also see another ID behind it that must be his fake ID.

“I’m watching your bank account,” Mr. Haley warns.

Nova kisses his Dad on the cheek, spins on his heels and in his enthusiasm manages to run right into Mr. Grace’s wheelchair. He tumbles ungracefully into his stepfather's lap.

“Nova!” his Dad says under his breath.

“Watch where you’re going,” Mr. Grace scolds sharply, pulling him off him. “How many times do I have to tell you to get your face out of that god damn phone and pay attention to where the hell you’re going ?”

Mr. Grace sounded even scarier than my drill sergeant Dad but Nova doesn’t look at all fazed by it

 -3-

Nova and I walk the two blocks to the Hartford Center Regal Cinema and buy tickets for the matinee showing of the Fantastic Beasts movie but instead of going into the theater we walk one street over.

Nova pulls out a phone. I know it’s not his phone because it’s not in the sparkly purple case from earlier but a utilitarian looking black leather one.

The phone is turned off and he has to turn it on. It floods with notifications and alerts.

“You have two phones ?”

“No, I had to take this one off Luce,” he explains nonchalantly. “We have to use his Uber account, I don’t have one. Luce is like super old and paranoid and only looks at his cell phone once every three days so he won’t notice it’s gone.”

It doesn’t fully  strike me this is a bad idea until we’re in the back of an Uber Black and driving out of downtown Hartford. I should tell Nova I changed my mind and want to go back.

But I don’t really want to do that.

I didn’t really  know how to make friends so I’d been spending a lot of time with my family. It was suffocating and we were always doing little kid stuff. I liked the idea of going off and doing my own thing with a boy my age.

It was surreal pulling up to my own house in the Uber. Nova wants to start driving right away but I manage to convince him to let me drive us to the empty county government building parking lot where we can practice.

He had a lot of chaotic energy but it all seemed to focus when he got behind the wheel. He’d driven with a friend in Las Vegas and  knows the basics. With a few minutes of practice he’s backing into spaces and parallel parking like an expert. He’s making a three point turn around an island in the parking lot when he suddenly eases the car into a U-turn and drives into traffic.

“Whoa, no! What are you doing ?!” I shriek. I ilterally shriek.

“I just want to try something,” he smiles, excitedly. “I got it.”

“Um, you don’t have a license,” I remind him. “You can’t be on the road. We could get in so much trouble if a cop stops us.”

“I know, I’ll be careful,” he promises.

I try to get myself to breath and just when I think I’ve headed off a panic attack he gets into the lane for  I-91.

“ARE YOU GETTING ON THE INTERSTATE--”

“Calm down. No one is on the road this time of—SHIT!  Okay, that guy came out of nowhere,” he says as he nearly hits a car getting on the on ramp, “I just thought it’d be fun if I took a picture at the Welcome to Connecticut sign for my Instagram story.  It’s only like 20 miles to Massachusetts. It’s so cute how close all these little states—"

The car jerks as he speeds up and I was seeing red. We could get in an accident and die.

Or worse, get in an accident and have to call my parents.

I could just see it now. Dad would kill me. I ’d be waking up at 5AM and doing push ups for him until I was 40. I had to take control of this situation.

“NO! PULL OVER RIGHT FUCKING NOW!,” I shout louder than I knew I was capable.

“I’m doing fine--,”

“I don’t care. This is my car, pull over. Now.”

“Ugh, fine, okay.” he sighs. “But where do you expect me to--”

“On the shoulder!”

“Shoulder ?”

I guide him to the shoulder of the highway and the minute the car is off I fling open my door  and walk around to the driver’s side. The cars on the highway behind me zip by, blowing my hair everywhere. He sulkily climbs over the console to drop into the passenger seat.

“I’m sorry,” Nova says in a small voice as I  slam my  door and pull us back on the interstate. “Please don’t be mad at me, Mason.”

I hear a familiar click and hiss and turn to see Nova with his Doc Martens up on the dashboard, lighting a fucking cigarette. He takes a long inhale that only brings more attention to his stupid perfect jawline. As he exhales, a wispy stream of smoke spills from his lips.

When people say smoking makes you look cool he was probably the person they were imagining.

But I knew for a fact it wasn’t cool. At all.

“You can’t do that in here!,” I shout, because shouting seemed to be the only way to get him to listen.

“Oh, no, it’s just tobacco--”

“I don’t care. Put it out.”

He makes a single perfect smoke ring and then tosses the butt out the window.

“My bad,” he says. “It smells like smoke in here so I thought it was cool--,”

 “This is my great uncle’s car,” I explain. “He smoked a pack a day for years. Then he had one of his lungs removed because he had stage 3 lung cancer.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah.”

Uncle Deacon had smoked a lot more than tobacco but I don’t  tell him that.

“Are you mad at me, Mason ? I thought we were friends.”

“I…Look, we can’t be friends if you want to do  illegal shit like this,” I explain. “My dad is like crazy strict and  when I get in trouble it really sucks. I’m not like…bad. I don’t like getting in trouble.”

“So what, you think I’m a bad kid ?,” he spits. His mood had shifted from playful to pissed.

I give him a pointed look and he crosses his arms.

“I’m ain't like bad. I don’t like gettin’ in trouble,” he mimics me in a borderline offensive southern accent and then adds under his breath. “God, you’re such a fucking baby.”

His flippancy cuts me and I’m suddenly pissed too.

“And you're fucking spoiled. You think I don’t know when someone is using me ? You only wanted to hang out with me because I have a car--”

“I did not and I am not spoiled!  Take that back--”

I turn the music up so I can’t hear him and turn off the exit ramp so I can turn us around back to Hartford.  I consider kicking him out the car so he to find his own way back but think better of it. Especially since I had no way of getting back to the restaurant once I left my car at the house.

I’m fuming when a loud bump shakes me out of my thoughts.

-4-

The car jerks and I fishtail into the left lane. I just barely right the car but it starts to stall, thick white smoke billowing out the hood. My car was an old piece of shit but it wasn't this shitty.

“Fuck,what did you ?,” I ask him, frustrated.

“I'm not the one driving,” he says, sitting up as I  pull over on the shoulder.

I turn the car off, wait a second and then try to start the car again.

And it won’t start.

Fuck me.

Nova reaches his hand into the dashboard console. I try to swat him away but he’s got fast reflexes and hits the button that opens the hood. He opens his door and walks to the front of the car, popping the hood and putting it up with the stick thing.

He tosses his head back and makes a show of pulling all his blonde hair into a high ponytail with a velvet scrunchie.

Then he takes his fucking phone out and looks into the camera like he’s about to take a selfie. 

I jump out of the car to stand in front of him.

“You are not putting this on Instagram--” I warn him.

“I’m not—ow!,” he screeches. He’d  reached to touch something  on the engine that must have be hot because he shoves the tip of his finger in his mouth. 

“Get away from it,” I tell him. “You don’t know what you’re doing--”

“I don’t,” he sings. “But she does,”

His phone was connecting to a FaceTime call with a contact listed as HBIC. When the call connects I see a brunette girl with small features and a freckled upturned nose lying in an unmade bed covered in laundry. She crinkles her sleepy eyes and glares at us.

“Wake up, bitch it’s like 1PM,” Nova greets her cheerily.

“You better get this fucking time difference shit straight,” the girl grumbles into her pillow. “You know I don’t get up before 12 on a Saturday, fuckface.”

“Time difference. Right. Anyway, I need you, babe.” he says and points to me. “This is Mason. We met this morning. Mason this is Holland. His car is fucked up and we’re stranded and we have to get it back to his house before his parents find out we took it.”

Holland laughs and sits up. Messy dark brown hair halos around her face. Her chest is spilling out of a  camisole and her bottoms are tight cheerleader shorts. I’m not sure where I’m supposed to look.

“How the hell have you already caused this much trouble ? You’ve barely been there two weeks.”

“I’m very determined,” he shrugs. “Oh, you won’t believe this. Mason let me drive. I was like on the interstate and everything--”

“Nova!,” she chastises him. “What the hell ? I can’t believe you fucked up some kid you don’t even knows car--”

“I didn’t, Ms. Judge-y,” Nova protests. “If you let me finish you’d know I only drove for like a second. Then he flipped out and made me pull over. Mason was driving when it broke.”

“Did you really flip out on him ?,” she asks.

“I mean…I didn’t mean to. I’m not usually like that I probably overreacted--,”

“No, that’s good, babe.” she smiles with a nod. “Because you can’t be friends with that one if you can’t tell him when he’s being a little cunt. Can’t believe it only took you less than 24 hours to get done with his shit. That’s a new record.”

Nova gives her an affectionate  middle finger.

Holland rolls out of bed and the camera jostles as she walks around a cluttered, junky apartment. She pulls a litter of Coke out of the fridge and then settles at a folding table---putting the phone on some kind of holder.

“Alright, boys," she claps. "Show me the engine.”

Nova moves his phone around my exposed engine to show her everything. She starts giving him instructions on what to do but they keep bickering  so I get tasked with following Holland’s orders while Nova just holds the phone. It goes a lot faster because I know the basic parts of a car from my Dad.

After half an hour Holland diagnoses that I have a cracked gasket. We’re able to use the duct tape I had in the trunk to temporarily repair it. She tells me she’ll overnight me a replacement part and to call her when I get it so she can walk me through installing it.

When I offer to pay, she refuses.

It takes over an hour to get it all done and once we finish I drive us to my house , wash the grease and sweat off my shirt and then Nova calls an Uber to take us back to the movie theater. The entire ride back to the theater Nova gives me a detailed rundown of what happened in the movie we were supposed to be seeing in case my parents ask.

When we get back to the theater he sweet talks the ticket taker into letting him go to the concession stand to buy a bag of popcorn. I can’t stomach the thought of more food but he inhales half the popcorn.

He sprinkles some popcorn crumbs on my shoulder.

“Hey--”

“We have to sell this thing,” he says with a shit eating grin. “Ready ?”

“Um, hey, look… I’m sorry I yelled at you,” I tell him. It had been on my mind the whole time. “I’m not usually like that I was just--”

“It’s fine,” he shrugs. “I know I get a little carried away sometimes. My bad.”

“Yeah, but you  saved my ass--”

“That’s what friends are for,” he sing songs.

Even though the idea of being his friend terrified me I liked the way it sounded. We were both going to be new kids when school started so we’d need each other.

“The actual movie got out over an hour ago,” he says getting back to the task at hand. “So if they ask why we’re so late we just say we got lost coming back.”

I nod even though I doubt any of them would believe that.

Which is why I’m confused when we walk to the beer garden’s outdoor patio  and our parents don’t seem at all concerned about where we’d been.

 -5-

I spot Annabelle Grace’s stroller first and then I see all them all sitting around at a hightop table, even Nova’s stepdad. Mr. Haley whispers something to Mr. Grace, puts his hand on his face and then pecks him on the lips. They kiss again and then start full on French kissing at the table.

My parents exchange an amused looks and then Dad sticks his tongue out and makes an exaggerated making out face at my mom and she laughs. Then they all start talking in hushed tones about something that they were all finding insanely hilarious. I’d never seem my mom hold back laughter so hard.

“What’s so funny ?,” Nova calls, skipping toward the table.

“Hi, sweetheart!,” Mr. Haley beams as he spins in his barstool to face Nova.  He stumbles out of the chair and hugs Nova. “Awww, I missed you, sweetheart. I love you so much. Was that movie as terrible as it was the first  time ?”

“Lex,” Mr. Grace grumbles in an exasperated tone.

“Aww, I love you too, baby,” Mr. Haley slurs, stepping back and rubbing his hand on Mr. Grace’s chest. They stare intensely at each other like they’re about to fight.

“Hey, cut it out!” Nova cries when they start open mouth kissing again. “We’ve had this talk. I should never have to see that.”

“Mason! How was the…how was the…oh, what is it ?,” Mom asks waving to me. “The Percy…Hunger…Potter thing ? He…was in Hungry Grames.”

“That ain’t a thing,” Dad teases her. “Damn, J. You’re such a Mama.”

Mom squints at him and then giggles into one of the many empty wine glasses in front of her .

Oh.

Oh.

They were drunk. The table was littered with empty beer pitchers and wine bottles.

When my Dad got drunk his good ole boy accent came out and he  got excessively silly. But I’d never seen my Mom drunk. Apparently she got airheaded and giggly.

Thank God my baby sister was asleep for this.

Mr. Grace seemed to be the only one of them who was still sober. He was looking a mix of stern faced and slightly amused as Nova and Mr. Haley are start dancing to the pop song playing on the speakers.

“You goin’ have to drive, son,” Dad says to me handing me the car keys as he wobbled up to his feet. “I hate seein’ this boy get older but praise the lord we always got a DD! Ain’t that right, baby ?”

“I wish we had one of those,” Mr. Haley sighs putting his arms around Nova and side hugging him. “But this one hasn’t quite earned the privilege to get behind the wheel.”

Nova and I exchange a look that no one notices.

Nova helps his stepdad  from the hightop  chair and back into his wheelchair. I make sure Annabelle Grace is secured in her stroller while it looks like Mr. Haley is showing my mom a dance.

“Hey, ya’ll wanna a free ride ?,” Dad asks Nova’s parents as we walk toward the parking lot.  “We gotta go over ya’lls  way to get the rest of ‘em.”

“Yeah. Thanks, man.” Mr. Grace nods.

Dad sits in the front seat and is so preoccupied tapping out a rhythm on his thigh he doesn’t criticize me once as I drive them. We get to the Airbnb and Mom and Mr. Haley have an overlong goodbye.

“I gotta admit I didn’t want to do this but it wasn’t bad,” Dad tells Mr. Grace while he pulls his wheelchair out of our trunk.

“Me either,” Mr. Grace says pulling himself out of the car and into the chair. “But I had a good time.”

“What did you just say, Luce Grace ? You had a good time ?,” Mr. Haley teases Mr. Grace in a way that feels very Nova-like. “Does that mean I don’t have to do that thing I’d say I’d do to make you come out with us?”

“No,” Mr. Grace chuckles, grasping his husband’s wrists. “You’re still doing that--”

“Make me--”

“Gladly.”

“You’ll have to catch me first.”

Mr. Haley pull his wrists away and takes off running towards their apartment laughing. He’s surprisingly fast  and Mr. Grace follows behind.

Nova follows after them shouting about not locking him out. They’re all almost to the door when Nova turns around and bounds back towards our truck. He motions for me to roll down my car window.

“Wait,” he says breathlessly. “ We have to take a selfie.”

We’re probably late picking up my siblings but my parents seem unconcerned. My Dad is telling my Mom some stupid ball joke that she’s not getting and he’s explaining it in detail while saying “C’mon you ‘member, J” every other word.

I hop out of the driver’s seat and Nova throws his arm over my shoulder, getting so close to me some of his hair sprawls on my shoulder. He holds out his phone, turning it to selfie mode.  I smile normally and he makes a silly face before snapping the picture.

Later that night I get on Spencer’s Instagram account and I see he posted the picture. He captions it:

Did We Just Become Best Friends ?  I Think So ! #sowemeet

---

A/N

This probably isn’t what you had in mind when I said UL/Vice crossover. The idea of Juliana/Rhett  and Haley/Luce meeting had been in my head FOREVER but  I wasn’t sure what the plot would be. Then Nova came along and Mason moved to Connecticut and it all kind of clicked. I’ve had this idea forever but I needed to get Mason to CT and introduce Nova so if you are reading this it’s a bit bittersweet.

All of my fanfics exist in this UL-verse. My next fanfic, By Your Side, is a continuation of Nova/Mason's story but I’ve added a few LL friends. I’m fudging /changing character ages and roles so you never know who will show up and how….

Also, I realize Haley comes off as a little mean to Nova when has asks for things but it's because Haley he's trying to be respectful of Juliana's time and space. He doesn't want to put her in a position to have to say no to Nova.

 

***UPDATE***

 

SHV: CP!Shawna ? Hello ? CP!Shawna ?

CP!Shawna: Wait…You’re…summoning me ?

SHV: Well, I’ve been thinking. So We Meet and By Your Side were fun to write. Could we do a third fanfic ? Maybe like an adult version with the parents ?

CP!Shawna: I mean it would be absolutely ridiculous but we could tie up some EPOH loose ends. We could also turn the heat level up and  finally write that Rhett pipe laying someone asked about....

 

* one week later *

 

SHV: Oh, oops

CP!Shawna: What ? You didn’t write it ?

SHV: Oh, I wrote it. It’s called Night Out! I even came up with a fun prank to pull on the readers but….um, in the process I also outlined a 4th THING

CP!Shawna: What could you have possibly outlined---Is this….Is this a whole ass AU!Lucely backstory ?

SHV: It just...came out ?

CP!Shawna: Okay first, title of you sex tape, and secondly….Why is it so long—

SHV: Title of your sex tape—

CP!Shawna: Speaking of sex tapes what is going on with you search history ?  Why is so much of your browsing history about the 90s and—wait, is this why Haley is suddenly 47 in this fic instead of in his 60s ?

SHV: *shrugs*

So, yeah that Vice AU  “Years” I have on the FF and AU page  is a Lucely AU backstory. I haven’t shared a “cover image” because it’s still very much a WIP. It takes place in the lates 90s and early 2000s and I am having a lot of fun with music and pop culture references.