Own Me Read online

  He clears his throat and doesn’t answer for a few long seconds.

  “It will definitely make Deo jealous,” he finally says, tying the laces tight.

  I turn around and look right at him. “That’s not what I meant.”

  “‘Eat your heart out’ means to long for something unattainable,” he answers like we’re playing Trivial Pursuit and he’s just delivering the answer to an Arts & Literature question. He flicks his eyes up and down the gown, and his mouth pulls into a tight, flat line that makes my blood rush hot in my veins. “It’s perfect. You should get it.”

  “I don’t know if I like it,” I say, twisting a piece of hair around my finger nervously. It’s actually an honest answer. He’s still staring like he can see through the glittering fabric of the dress, straight to my flushed skin.

  The dress is definitely what anyone would describe as “so Genevieve,” but I’m not sure I’m that girl anymore. I’m not sure I want anyone longing for the unattainable when it comes to me.

  “So if Enzo was the ring bearer and your sisters were maids of honor and Cohen was the rabbi, who was your groom?” he asks, his words slow and measured.

  “Adam, we were little kids. It was just a game,” I say with a sigh.

  The truth is, I used to say my vows holding Deo’s hands and think, I’m gonna marry you for real when we’re grown-ups. And I thought it would break my heart when that didn’t happen.

  But it didn’t break my heart. I never imagined trying on a wedding dress for anyone but Deo, but now that I’m standing in front of Adam, he’s the only one I want to think I’m beautiful.

  I wanted to put on a dress that would take his breath away.

  “Here.” He pulls out his wallet and hands me a credit card. “You should get it. You look incredible. I know this marriage is for show, Gen. But I like thinking the little girl in her mother’s lace tablecloth gets to wear her dream dress. Even if she’s settling for a stand-in groom.”

  “Adam,” I say, but he turns me around gently and undoes the lacing. “Get the dress, Gen. The look on Deo’s face when you walk down the aisle will be worth whatever it costs.”

  I rush into the dressing room and pull the dress off with shaking fingers, hanging it back up before I put on my clothes and brush away the tears.

  Why the hell am I crying?

  Is it over what I’ve lost? Or what I should have said but didn’t…or can’t?

  When I’m composed, I fling the door open and hand him the card without making eye contact.

  “You don’t want it?” he asks.

  “It’s all wrong,” I say through my teeth.

  As he follows me out I hear him mutter, “I know.”

  No. You really don’t, Adam. You have no idea.

  Chapter Six

  Adam

  “Are you ready to go inside?”

  I run my thumb along her knuckles as I hold her sweaty palm against mine. Genevieve looks up at me, her pupils so huge her gray eyes look black.

  I realize for the first time that I’ve seen her sad and angry and frustrated, but I’ve never really seen her scared. The other night at the observatory was probably the closest we’d come before. But even then she looked more furious and worried than anything else. Her eyes were too busy trying to order me down off the ledge to register any true fear.

  But now? Those eyes belong to someone who’s afraid, and it surprises me how deep the look cuts at me, how much I want to be the one who takes that fear away.

  I think back to the way her face looked in the dress shop when she was remembering her childhood playing “wedding” with Deo, and I realize I’m out of my depth. I consider Gen my best friend, but our relationship has consisted of school, classes, and campus socializing. I’ve never met her parents and have only bumped into her siblings here and there.

  What we need is flashcards, lists, photo albums…concrete evidence I can study and memorize in a detached way. Because I think there’s a reason we don’t know all that much about each other, despite being friends for as long as we have.

  Maybe I was scared to get too close to her, to become part of her life outside the comfort of the university. Maybe I liked being able to compartmentalize our friendship, especially since I was always so aware that she was hung up on her longtime crush. Gen’s dating life basically consisted of burning through pretty-boy assholes while she waited for Deo to wise up and notice her.

  I never wanted to be one of her disposable boyfriends, and I knew her heart wasn’t going to be in a real relationship. What we’re doing now feels like a stroke of luck—and like the worst kind of settling.

  I never would have chosen to be with her on these terms, but circumstance didn’t offer me any other option. And now I have to open up. I have to let her in or I risk exposing her to legal problems. I won’t let her offer of help turn around and bite her in the ass.

  “I’m ready,” she says. Her voice is an insecure murmur, so soft I don’t even see her lips move when the words come out.

  “Because we can go. We can do this another time.”

  I say it, but I don’t really mean it. We’re short on time as it is. I feel like a tool. Even if this was Genevieve’s idea, she’s in this crazy situation, about to lay it all out to her family over Sunday dinner, because of me.

  “Let’s just get it over with,” she says, taking a small step closer to the door.

  “Genevieve?” I slide my hand up her forearm and pull her toward me. “We don’t have to do this. Any of it. We can call off the entire thing right now. You just say the word.”

  She stares up at me, unblinking. A calmness takes over her features, and they soften.

  “Hey, we’re bonded now, right? No turning back. Let’s do this.” She turns the brass knob with a confidence I think she might be faking.

  As soon as the front door opens, the booming noise of voices and laughter and the amazing smells of home-cooked food waft out. It should calm my nerves a little, but instead it has the opposite effect.

  I’m about to bust into this happy family gathering and blow it all to hell. Genevieve senses my hesitation as I linger in the doorway, and she links her fingers through mine.

  “Hey, all!” she calls as we enter the cramped living room.

  Every surface is covered in some tchotchke. Every inch of wall space has a photograph of a smiling kid or a wedding or someone in a shiny graduation cap.

  It’s a far cry from my home in Tel Aviv.

  Dad got rid of most of the excess when Mom died. There are a few pictures of me here and there, but they stop right around the time I’m nine, because that was the last year someone cared enough to hang up a picture of me. So the apartment I’ve lived in my entire life is like a cross between a museum and a time capsule. Nothing like the Rodriguez house, which is lived-in in the best way possible.

  It feels like a home.

  “Genevieve, we were waiting to eat—” The voice of the woman in the kitchen falters when she sees me holding Genevieve’s hand. “You brought a guest!” A slow smile creeps across her face, and I feel knee-buckling relief wash over me.

  “I did. This is Adam. Adam, my mom, Dinah,” she says, pointing to the woman at the stove, then to a younger one already seated at the table. “My sister Lydia.”

  Lydia pours wine into the glasses that have been set out, and the smug look on her face is exactly the way Genevieve described it. She looks 100 percent unimpressed with me. “I didn’t know we could bring dates, or I would have brought someone.”

  Deo, looking like a beach bum, jumps out of nowhere and gives Lydia a quick, hard noogie that tangles all the perfect hair on one side of her head. It almost makes me like him for a single second.

  “Deo! Ass! I just got my hair blown out!” she screeches, and runs her hands over her hair, trying without much success to get it to lie flat again.

  Deo blows on his knuckles. “Don’t say knucklehead things, and you won’t feel the wrath of these knuckles of pain. You know the
se shindigs are always open invite. That’s why I’ve been showing up to get my grub on for years.”

  “Adam, you remember Deo, my brother’s best friend,” Genevieve says pointedly, shooting me a warning look.

  I smile because that’s what she expects, but I kind of hate the way she’s laughing at how he clowns around with her family. It’s not something I’m ever going to be good at. Not at all. I’m not a natural joker, and big, loving families make me feel like some orphan pressing his nose to a window he’s not supposed to be looking through.

  “Where’s Whit?” Genevieve asks, and I notice the way her shoulders tighten when she says the name.

  Why does the mention of Deo’s wife still bother her so much?

  Deo plops down in his chair and leans it way back. It’s an impolite thing to do at a dining table, but who the hell am I to judge anything? I’m the asshole barging into this whole scene, about to marry this much-loved girl and possibly ruin her life in the process.

  That’s a hell of a lot worse than some rough manners.

  “She had to work. I told her I’d bring home leftovers.” Deo shrugs and rubs his stomach. “I did warn her that I can’t promise there will be any leftovers if Mrs. R. is making her wild mushroom mole enchiladas. But Whit knows the rules: you snooze, you lose.”

  I know there has to be something redeeming about this guy for Genevieve’s heart to be so crushed when he fell for someone else, but I really don’t get it.

  She turns to me and says, “I know you’ve met some of them once or twice, but there are a ton of us. My brothers, Cohen and Enzo, Cohen’s fiancée, Maren, my sister Cece, and my dad.” Genevieve makes introductions around the room as people carry in plates of food and smile at me. I look at every face, blind with a panic I can’t stomp out.

  Her voice sounds like it’s in slow motion and under water, and every face is blurring into every other.

  I wish my brain devoted less energy to recognizing minute patterns of cell morphology and sporulation, and gave a little neuron power to remembering important names. Like the names of the people who make up the family of the girl I’m going to marry.

  I don’t want to fuck this up. Please don’t let me fuck this up.

  I need flashcards. Pronto.

  “Sit down.” Genevieve leans against my shoulder and her whisper tickles my earlobe.

  I pull out her chair for her, because it’s what I do anyway, but also because there’s not a chance in hell I would dare not to—not while six sets of Rodriguez eyes watch my every move.

  Well, they’re watching my every move until Genevieve’s sister, Lydia, makes a production of clanking her silverware around and crossing her arms with a heavy sigh. She sucks up all the attention and seems to love it that way.

  “You aren’t eating, Lydia?” Cece asks with a raised eyebrow as her sister puts all her silverware into a neat pile on her plate.

  “No. I’m on a strict juice cleanse,” Lydia announces, and again tries to smooth the lump Deo left in her hair.

  “Stupid,” Enzo coughs the word into his hand and Cohen snorts from across the table.

  “It’s healthy. Not that you’d know anything about that,” she says smugly. “Enjoy eating all the fried crap you want while you’re in your twenties. That diet is going to lead to a nice little pot belly the minute you hit thirty.”

  “You can still remember hitting thirty?” Enzo asks, pressing his eyebrows low like he’s asking a serious question. “The details have to be getting fuzzy as the decades roll on, right, Lyd?”

  “Not at the table,” Mrs. Rodriguez says, her voice soft but firm. Everyone clams up and sits a little straighter.

  I respect the hell out of the woman already. This is her family, her element. She made all of this, and she obviously knows exactly how to control it. What am I doing intruding here? And, more than that, what the hell is she going to do to me when the reason for my intrusion is revealed?

  The family passes food around and makes small talk, but I can feel a table full of eyes on me the entire time. I’m cutting my food precisely, hoping I don’t drop any, hoping I don’t absently put my elbows on the table—an old habit my own mother never managed to break me of.

  I haven’t been this nervous since I was about to board the plane to America, and even that seems small time by comparison. I’m here with the baby of this tight family, and they are all judging me, wondering what the hell my intentions are. I’ve got to say something.

  “Thank you so much for having me. This is delicious.” I attempt a charming smile. “These knishes, wow.”

  There’s a snap of fingers from across the table.

  “That’s where I’ve seen you before!” Enzo points at me like he finally found the answer to a question that’s been driving him crazy for weeks. “The engagement party, right?” He nudges Maren, who nods in agreement. “You were working the engagement party!”

  All of my accomplishments, and this is what my soon-to-be in-laws will know me for. I’m the guy who passed out the knishes.

  “I was.” I nod, swallowing the food that suddenly feels like it’s lodged in my throat. I should have kept my damn mouth shut.

  Genevieve leans over and curls her fingers around my wrist, her thumb tapping in time to my racing heartbeat. “Adam was filling in for a friend. His real job is in the lab at my school. He’s a scientist.”

  Her voice vibrates with pride, and I try not to squirm like a kid caught in the middle of a huge whopper.

  I should correct her. I should tell them that I’m barely qualified and about to be deported, but I watch the way her eyes sparkle when she talks about me, and all I’ve accomplished, and then I watch how her parents nod at her like she’s stumbled upon the Holy Grail, and I don’t have the heart to say a word.

  “That’s quite impressive, Adam,” Gen’s mom says, dabbing at her mouth with her napkin. Genevieve looks like her mother. They both have delicate features, the same almond shaped eyes that shine with sincerity, and, when they speak, you can’t help but stare at their mouths. “What area of science are you involved in?”

  “I study yeast.” I keep it simple, because most scientists I know have a way of getting rambly and boring when they talk about what they do.

  “Yeast?” Mr. Rodriguez curls his lip. “Like a baker?”

  “Yes!” I agree, until I see his eyes narrow.

  His daughter with a scientist? Good. His daughter with a baker? Not so good.

  Okay, maybe I overshot the simplicity.

  “It’s complicated, Dad,” Genevieve cuts in. “He studies it. He has petri dishes all over the lab, and charts, and he’s working on this enormous paper that will probably end up in a journal.”

  “About yeast?” her dad asks, smoothing down his moustache and frowning. “What’s a bright guy doing wasting his time on yeast? We know what it does. Why not study something useful? Cancer or nuclear power. Something like that.”

  I work hard to keep my expression completely blank. If Genevieve’s family expects me to cure cancer, I’m screwed before I even start.

  “Well, yeast is actually pretty complicated,” I say, braced for someone to yawn or groan. But every single person stares at me, waiting for my brilliant explanation. A single bead of sweat rolls down my spine. “Right. So, yeast is a fascinating eukaryotic cell.” I see multiple pairs of eyes glaze. “Um, which just means that it has a membrane bound nucleus.” More glazing. “And I study how its genomes respond to certain environmental changes. Because, basically, if we can master our understanding of the eukaryotic cell, we’ll have an easier time understanding more complex cells.”

  Genevieve bounces in her chair, her eyes shiny and her expression giddy. “See! He’s brilliant. One day he’ll be Dr. Adam Abramowitz, and he’ll be in the major journals for science and—”

  “Wait, Adam Abramowitz? Isn’t that— Are you her tutor?” Lydia asks, pulling her eyebrows together in a look that would typically spell something like confusion, but her sneaky grin
says she’s anything but puzzled by this.

  “I do… I have…yes, I tutor Genevieve.” I nod slowly.

  I open my mouth to say what an excellent student Genevieve is, but snap it shut when I think of the innuendo they could spin from that.

  I pray her parents don’t see me as some perverted TA taking advantage of their little girl. There’s nothing technically—or legally or morally—wrong with what we’re doing. Other than the semi-sham marriage we’re rushing into to secure my visa.

  Fuck.

  “Aren’t there rules about teachers dating their students?” Cohen growls, his hands gripping the edge of the table. He’s looking at me like he’s about to drag me out back and beat the crap out of me.

  “He’s not my teacher.” Genevieve trips over her words trying to explain. “He’s a friend, helping me out with a class. Don’t even try to make it sound all shady, Cohen. And you, Lydia, aren’t you, like, dating your boss?”

  Lydia’s head jerks back and the smug smile falls from her face, replaced by a defensive frown. “He’s not my boss. Why would you say that? I actually have more years of experience in law than he has. He’s my partner. In law! I mean, we’re work partners, so I have no idea why you’d assume he’s my boss.”

  Genevieve snickers, eyes lit with glee. I haven’t seen her fired up like this before. “Oh, I don’t know, because he hired yo—”

  “Enough,” Mr. Rodriguez says. “¡Cada comida no tiene que convertirse en una lucha! ¡Actúa como adultos!”

  I flick my gaze to Genevieve who shakes her head quickly, as if to say she’ll translate later.

  “Who’s your team, Adam?” Enzo asks, sitting back with an expectant expression, like my answer will reveal my true character. I’m thankful he’s decided to change the subject, but sports? It’s like this family is trying to torpedo any chance I have to not look like a complete assclown.

  “I…uh… I actually don’t follow a whole lot of sports,” I confess.

  Enzo’s face contorts in utter disgust, and he looks at Cohen as if to say, Can you believe this total douchebag our sister brought home?