“Bye, Eleanor! You’re still my favorite granddaughter!”
“Grammie, I’m youronlygranddaughter,” Eleanor points out seriously.
“Hug your sister for me,” Mom commands, delusional as ever.
“Um, sure.”
Eleanor installs herself on the anti-popcorn towel I’ve spread over the couch, Yeti click-purring at her side. He’s better at remembering this is where he lives now. He still hates it when KrisKristofferson stirs the pot by pretending to gnaw him, but he puts up with it in return for Eleanor’s devotion to finding all his favorite scratching spots.
“Hel-loooooooo,” comes a yodel from the front door. “Who wants to see the cool rocks I brought?”
“Stellar!” I forget I meant to be chill and rush to squeeze her. She’s tiny, so I can pick her up and jiggle her until we’re both laughing uncontrollably. She’s here for a couple of days, then back out to her clinic for another seven weeks, so I have to go hard on the hugs. Especially because she’s acting so casual about her breakup. She only does that when she’s hurting badly. I’ve learned not to push her; she’ll open up in her own time. Unlike Tobin, who opens up never.
Except he did, in the truck.
“Auntie Stellar!” Eleanor yells.
“El’s Bells!” Stellar shouts back. “Did you build me a Lego Millennium Falcon?”
“I ran out of gray.”
Eleanor and Stellar open negotiations on what colors the Millennium Falcon can be and still remain canon. I bring over the grown-ups’ bowl of popcorn for our sacred movie ritual, which consists of Stellar and me talking over, through, and around the action onscreen.
If it’s a rom-com, she’s criticizing the unlikely coincidences while I’m squeeing over the near-misses and delicious tension.
If it’s sci-fi, I’m pointing out romance subplots, and Stellar’s telling me to pay closer attention whenever an important character is about to be killed.
And regardless of genre, both of us are doing a comparative gender analysis, because as a pair of thirsty bisexuals we don’t hate it when Uhura wears a miniskirt, we just want Kirk and Spock to wear a bit less also.
True to form, Eleanor’s asleep before Elle Woods gets dumped by her boneheaded boyfriend. “Emmett,” I moan when Luke Wilson smiles. “I’m trash for a soft boy. Trash. Did Jen get in touch about the money?” Maybe a sneaky question will trick her into opening up.
“Jen’s being an ass.” Stellar idly twists her platinum hair into a swooping topknot over undercut sides. She’s gorgeous—a tiny, gritty millennial Marilyn Monroe. “I shouldn’t have trusted someone who wanted me to take her name after marriage, when that name is Keller. What was it you said about rhyming names?”
“I said it was very Julia Gulia. LikeThe Wedding Singer.” Stellar deflected me all too easily with that last-name gambit. Just like I deflected Tobin when he changed his last name to Renner-Lewis, like we agreed, and I didn’t change mine. He doesn’t even know why—I knew if I didn’t bring it up, he wouldn’t either, and I’d never have to explain.
“I should’ve known not to get myself into any situation with a rom-com equivalent. You know, the queer rep in this movie is not ideal. I wish the lesbian character had a girlfriend. And some dialogue. Speaking of dialogue, how’s that… marriage counseling thing? It’s going well?”
“It’s going. We’re doing our third session this Saturday.” Less than a week after our last one. I intended to space out our scenarios, run out the clock. But lately I feel sotender,like there’s a spot of exquisite pain I want to check over and over again. Like I want him to kiss it better.
This inexplicable kissing impulse goes against everything I’m trying to accomplish: be my own person; succeed on my own merit;get magic,for fuck’s sake. It doesn’t have to be the biggest or best or loudest magic. It just has to be enough. It just has to bemine.
“And Amber’s supportive?” Stellar doesn’t criticize my sisterto my face, but she does ask careful questions about what I’m willing to put up with.
The answer is: a lot, because of Eleanor.
I’d do anything for Eleanor, and Amber knows it. She’s a terrific mom—she’s built a real community around her daughter, with family and friends and autism supports. And me.
Our relationship broke once already. If I push back, it could happen again.
“Amber’s still Amber,” I say, glancing at Eleanor even though she sleeps like the dead. “She’s not exactly inviting me to go running or join her book club. But who needs her, when I have you?”
We make scrunchy faces at each other.
Onscreen, two women mock Elle’s dorky, awkward study buddy.
I cringe. “I hate this part. They make it seem like this guy shouldwantto date people who were mean until Reese Witherspoon pretended she slept with him. Sorry, but no.”
It’s like the times people made fun of my spreadsheets or my finger tapping, but changed their tune when they saw me with Tobin or Stellar. And then they acted insulted when, unlike in the movie, I didn’t forgive and forget.People think you don’t like them, Liz.Well, for some people, that was true.
