I grinned so hard my cheeks hurt. “You brought mac and cheese to Wisconsin.”
“I can guarantee you’ve never had mac and cheese likethisbefore.”
I was still grinning when she reached me. The casserole was warm between us, but I set it aside on the porch railing because there was something else I needed more.
I kissed her.
Not long. Just enough to feel her breath hitch and to remind myself that she was real and wasn’t a dream and that she was actually standing in my parents’ driveway. Her lips were cold from the early November air, but she kissed me back like she’d been waiting all day.
When I pulled back, her smile was softer now. “Hi.”
“Hi,” I echoed back, still a little dazed.
An awareness of our surroundings and my little sister’s prying eyes came rushing back to me. I grabbed the dish from the railing and nodded toward the curb.
“Hey, Paige—grab Eva’s suitcase, will ya?”
Paige, obviously star-struck, not so unlike her older sister, jogged off without complaint.
I turned on my heel and stormed up the porch steps. “Hey, Ma! We might need to go out for more food!”
My mom poked her head around the corner from the kitchen, eyebrows raised. “Oh?”
Eva stepped through the front door just behind me and pulled off her sunglasses. “Hi, Mrs. Bennet,” she greeted. Her smile was so warm it could have melted snow. “Have room for one more?”
My mom blinked in surprise, and then beamed. “We always do.”
Dinner that nightwas everything I missed about being home.
There was nothing fancy about the meal—just some good old-fashioned, Midwestern comfort food. A pot roast my mom had probably started right after we got back from the grocery store. Steamed green beans. Mashed potatoes drowning in butter. And now, thanks to Eva, a bubbling tray of golden-brown mac and cheese that practically demanded you ruin your appetite before anything else made it to your plate.
Phones were tucked away. A big glass pitcher of two percent milk sat sweating on a cork trivet in the center of the table. Dishes were passed around, elbow to elbow, family-style, with overlapping conversations and clinking forks and my dad periodically mumbling about the Badgers’ prospects that year like anyone was listening.
Eva fit in so seamlessly it almost hurt.
She asked my dad thoughtful questions about his job. She complimented my mom’s cooking so sincerely that my mom actually blushed. And Paige—who had barely said two words all night—kept sneaking glances like she couldn’t believe she was sitting across the table from a real-life celebrity.
If I’d let myself dwell on it for too long, I would have been self-conscious. My parents’ house was modest, a little worn down in places, with mismatched chairs around the table and a front door that stuck when it swelled up in the summer months. Eva had just come from a beachfront resort with a professional hair-and-makeup team.
But she didn’t flinch. She didn’t try to shrink herself or make anything about the dinner feel like charity. She just joined in with the loud chatter. Took second helpings. Asked for the recipe.
I caught her looking at me across the table, cheeks glowing, and she mouthed,You’re so cute.
After dinner, the table broke up slowly. Plates were cleared, leftovers packed up, the dishes washed and put away. Everyone squeezed into the living room to watch a movie my mom had picked. Eva and I sat next to each other on the couch, openly holding hands, our thighs pressed together.
At the end of the evening, Eva hugged everyone goodnight like she’d known them for years.
We stood at the top of the basement stairs in a quiet moment. Paige and my parents had gone down the hallway to their respective bedrooms, their doors clicking shut one by one behind them. The house had settled into that soft stillness I remembered from childhood—faint creaks in the floorboards, the hum of the fridge, the occasional whoosh of the furnace kicking on.
I gestured downstairs. “My room’s the second door on the left. Bathroom’s in the hall. Towels are under the sink.”
Eva glanced down the steps, then back at me. Her voice dropped, almost teasing. “You’re not joining me?”
“My parents are playing it cool, but I think they’d throw a fit,” I said with a smirk. “I’m on the floor in Paige’s room.”
“Boo,” she pouted, just loud enough for me to hear.
“Would Clyde and Virginia Montgomery let us share a bed under their roof?”
