Own Me Page 13

  I bite back a groan. This argument sounds weak to my own ears. I can’t even imagine what Gen thinks. Luckily, she isn’t the type of girl who leaves anything up to the imagination. She just says what’s on her mind.

  “I know this isn’t a real marriage, Adam, but I expected more from you.” She lets out a long sigh. “My family isn’t a collection of dates and birth places. They’re people. And I think it would be much better for you to spend time with them instead of studying them.”

  “I will,” I promise. “As soon as I know all the facts, I’ll be happy to relax and spend more time with them.”

  She shakes her head so hard her hair falls out of her bun. “No, Adam, it doesn’t work like that. You can’t think you know people because you memorized their vital statistics. That’s not real. That’s not life.”

  “It is for us,” I argue. “For what we’re planning. We don’t have the luxury of getting to know each other organically. We can’t just leave it up to chance.”

  I pull up to the ice cream place and feel a spike of nerves when Gen announces, “I’m not hungry.”

  I’m not a total idiot. “Is this about my plan to memorize information about your family?” I ask. “Because it’s illogical to deny yourself ice cream because you don’t agree with my ideas.”

  She saunters up to the counter and stares at the menu like she might order, so I stay by her side. Suddenly she tells the pimply teen working in the back that she wants a banana split, extra marshmallow sauce, triple cherries, extra sprinkles on her whipped cream, and a double scoop of chocolate, no vanilla. I order my usual vanilla cone.

  As I pay, she stares at me with her huge gray eyes and asks, “Is our ice cream order some kind of terrible metaphor for the two of us?”

  I pocket the change and we move to the side to wait for our order. I lean against the counter, and Gen steps in the space between my feet.

  “You’ll have to be more specific,” I say.

  “I ordered the big, crazy dessert with all the extras that will probably melt before I’m halfway through with it. You got the plain, responsible cone.” She tucks a few long strands of hair behind her ears. “So, is that us? Oscar and Felix? Marlin and Dory?”

  I shake my head. “Are you comparing us to animated fish?”

  “Are we?” she asks, a sardonic smile tugging at one side of her mouth.

  Our orders are up before I can answer. We take them and head to a small table outside the shop.

  “Try some of mine,” she says when we’re both seated.

  I eye the scoop of gooey ice cream warily, but open up and let Genevieve feed me a bite. She watches my face like a hawk stalking her prey.

  “Good?” she demands.

  “Yes,” I say, but she snorts like she doesn’t believe me. “It is good, Gen. Just because it’s not what I would have chosen for myself doesn’t mean I can’t appreciate the fact that it tastes good.”

  She jabs her spoon into the fluffy pile of whipped cream. “When you can choose, you choose simple.”

  “Right.” I relish the pleasant flavor of my vanilla cone. “I like to keep things simple.”

  “Doesn’t that get a little boring?” She twirls her spoon in her fingers.

  I shrug. “Maybe. I’ve never been all that exciting.”

  “I’ll make a deal with you,” she says, sucking the cherry into her mouth and nibbling at it in a way that makes my mouth go dry. “I’ll agree to learning about you using your facts and flashcards, if you’ll promise to keep trying to get to know more about me my way.”

  “Your way?” I have to move quickly to lick the dripping ice cream off the edge of my cone. “What does ‘your way’ entail exactly?”

  “Finding out facts organically,” she says, her voice a drawl. She dips her finger in a drip of marshmallow sauce and licks it off with the tip of her tongue. “Learning about each other like two friends who agreed to get married instead of two robots exchanging software.”

  I’m watching her slowly work her way around the sundae, devouring the banana pieces, pushing the walnuts to the side, eating half the strawberries and all of the chocolate ice cream. There’s no rhyme or reason to how she finishes her treat, but she seems to be enjoying it.

  I can’t help noticing just how much, and it makes my blood run hot.

  She pops a second cherry in her mouth, stem and all, and gives me a closed-mouth smile when she sees me watching her. Her mouth works back and forth, and then she sticks out her tongue. On the end is the cherry stem. Tied into a neat knot.

  “So, you can, uh, tie a cherry stem into a knot,” I observe idiotically. It feels like my tongue’s tied in a knot just like that cherry stem.

  She places it on her napkin. “Now there’s something the flash cards wouldn’t have covered.”

  My brain can’t stop trying to work out what the hell her tongue did to accomplish that trick.

  It also can’t help thinking that, no matter how fun and sweet and sexy Gen’s information sessions are, no immigration official is going to care about the flexibility of her tongue.

  No matter how badly I’d love to explore her oral acrobatics, I need to stick to what will save us if the legitimacy of our marriage comes into question.

  I brush the twisted little knot off the napkin, pull a pen out of my pocket, and jot down a few notes. She snatches the napkin from my hand when I’m done, then sighs.

  “‘Where was your mother-slash-father born? On what date? What schools did you attend? Are you up to date on all your inoculations?’” She pinches her lips together. “Adam, is this a date or a job interview?”

  I look down at the cherry knot, up at her big, gorgeous eyes, and over to the napkin she holds with shaking fingers.

  The napkin that could be our only hope if Citizenship and Immigration Services decides to investigate our marriage.

  I know what she wants to hear. I know she wants me to show a little vulnerability, a little humanity.

  And I will. As soon as I’m sure marrying me won’t upend her life.

  “It’s a marriage interview. And we need to cram.”

  She shoves the melting remnants of her ice cream to the side and we dive into numbers and place names and dates that all help me stop thinking about the way her tongue licked up the marshmallow sauce and tied that cherry-stem knot.

  Facts and figures are what I’m good at, and they help me make sure I have the best possible chance to save this marriage.

  And maybe if I manage to keep her out of jail for marriage fraud, I can ask her to show me exactly how she tied that damn cherry stem into a knot. It’s a goal I’m shamelessly ready to pursue.

  Chapter Seven

  Adam

  After the partially disastrous dinner with her family, it’s easy to half forget most of the lies we told for the sake of smoothing things over. But I can’t let go of the fact that we don’t know enough about each other, that our web of lies will catch up with us eventually and spell trouble.

  I can’t let that happen.

  “Just three more sets,” I coax.

  Genevieve flops back on my bed and pounds the mattress with her fists. “No!”

  “Gen, please. Two more,” I bargain.

  “Fine,” she snarls, popping back up. “You know, I got a C minus on my last trig quiz, and I still can’t remember the names of all your Aunt Haneen’s kids.”

  “And grandkids,” I remind her. “My cousin Shahar just had her third.”

  Thanks, Sha. Your freakish fertility means that every time I go home I get reminded of how I’m slacking when it comes to my career and starting that big Jewish family.

  “Your cousin has kids already?” Gen asks. “I thought your oldest cousin was twenty-two.”

  “No, my oldest cousin is Yael, and she’s thirty-two. But Shahar is only twenty-five. She’s married to a rabbi, so they’re all about expanding the tribe.” I try to make a joke, but Genevieve’s furrowed brow lets me know she didn’t even catch it.

  �
��Okay, wait, Shahar and Yael are sisters?” she says as she tries to peek at the flashcards on the bed.

  “No, Shahar and Yael’s mothers are sisters,” I remind her. “Aunt Haneen’s kids are Shahar, Noam, Amit, and Aviya. Aunt Dalia’s kids are—”

  “Wait. Wait a minute,” Genevieve says, putting her hand up. She grabs a pad and pen and starts to jot. “Okay. Aunt Haneen has Shahar, Noam…and Ori?”

  “No, it’s—”

  “Don’t tell me!” she cuts in. She closes her eyes and presses her hand to her forehead. “I’ve got it. You just said it. Aviya!” she exclaims, then shakes her head. “Okay, that’s Haneen’s other girl, but who’s the other boy? Noam and…Yosef?” she guesses, looking at me through one squinted eye.

  I grimace.

  “Ido?”

  “That’s Shahar’s middle son, who’s named after my great-grandfather on my mother’s side.”

  I intended for that tidbit to be helpful, but it only serves to fluster Gen even more. The notebook flies past my head and hits the wall behind me. Gen buries her face in her hands to muffle her frustrated scream.

  “Gen?” I put down the index cards and hold a hand out, slowly, just touching her shoulder. “It’s Elyakim.”

  She opens her fingers so she can see through the spaces between them. “What?”

  “Aunt Haneen’s other son is Elyakim. But you were probably confused because we call him Eli. Actually we call him MooMoo—which he hates—and we tried to stop, but we’ve been doing it forever. I could explain, but it’s a long, weird story about the first time he saw a cow in a petting zoo and—never mind. It’s a pointless story.” I wind down, because Gen’s eyes are getting wider and wider the more I talk, and it’s making me pretty nervous.

  “Adam, I can’t do this,” she says in a shaky voice.

  “Do what?” I do my best to ignore the icy clench of worry in the pit of my stomach when I try to imagine what it is, exactly, that Gen can’t do.

  “I will never remember all these lists, all these dates and random facts.” She gestures to my index cards, her eyes welling up instantly. I’ve seen this exact look on her face before, most recently when she was trying to cram for that damn trig quiz she didn’t exactly ace. I was supposed to be helping her, but I’ve been so overwhelmed lately. We’ve needed to move quickly to get ready for this wedding and to absorb all the necessary information about each other’s lives and families. It’s been beyond stressful. “You don’t even have pictures to go along with the names.”

  “My aunts have all the family photos,” I explain lamely.

  She scoots a little closer on the bed. “You could tell me stories,” she suggests, her mouth finally shaping into something like a smile. “Like the one about MooMoo. I guarantee I won’t forget Aunt Haneen’s other son’s name now. And if I knew the story behind it, and maybe some stories about your other family members—”

  “We don’t have time for stories,” I interrupt. I hate the way her face falls, and I know it’s because my tone was too harsh.

  How do I explain that my childhood was spent surrounded by family members who loved me even though I resented every one of them? Do I tell her the story of the time all my aunts showed up at my house to beg my father to take me out of the four chugim—extracurricular activities—he signed me up for to keep him out of his hair for the maximum amount of time, and how, though they were acting on my behalf, I screamed at them that they weren’t my mother? Do I tell her the story of how I stuck both hands into Yael’s bat mitzvah cake, which my aunts slaved over, just because I was jealous she was getting such a huge party when no one had remembered my birthday that year? Do I tell Gen about the time when I was in high school and was supposed to pick up Noam from elementary school, but instead I ditched him to go out with some friends and he was hysterical by the time his father went to find him?

  Do I make up funny stories about the times I lashed out, pouted, or sank into depression because I felt like an inconvenience? Do I even attempt to explain what it was like to be at the mercy of a father who didn’t seem to know how to show any affection after my mother died?

  The thing is, my past is full of hard memories, and I’m not proud of the person I was then. I love my family deeply, but I always knew I needed to find my own way. Looking back is hard for me. Going back would be almost impossible. In fact, I’d never even think about making the trip back to Israel unless I had made a success of myself. Unless I could prove that I didn’t grow up to be the selfish, angry, entitled asshole I know my family expected based on all those years of crappy behavior.

  “I don’t have a photographic memory like you do,” Gen says, flicking an index card with her finger. “I don’t know anything about these people other than the bare facts.”

  “But the only thing you need to know is the bare facts,” I point out. “No immigration interviewer is going to ask you about how my cousin got his family nickname. But they will expect you to know his legal name and how we’re related.”

  “Don’t you think it would sound more convincing if I knew real life details?” she presses. “I mean, think about how easy it is for you to remember that Cece is my sweet sister who likes to nerd out at college and Lydia is my driven sister who thinks being a lawyer means she can lord it over all the rest of us. Right? What would it be like if you just had to rote memorize their names and birthdays?”

  I rub a hand over my face. “It’s not fair that I get a kind of cheat sheet to learn about your family when I would prefer the flashcard method, and you have nothing but flashcards when you’d prefer social networking. I’m sorry about that, Gen. But short of flying you out to Israel for a weekend so we can do a crash course in face-to-face introductions, this is the best I can do.”

  “You’d prefer the flashcard method?” She repeats my words slowly, and there’s this tingle in the underused social area of my frontal lobe.

  But I’m too stupid to heed the warning.

  “Of course. We have no time to spare. Dinners are nice, but cheat sheets are nicer.”

  I smile.

  She most definitely doesn’t smile back.

  “Is my family that irritating to you?” Her words are so quiet I have to lean in to hear. Alarm bells start to go off.

  “No. Of course that’s not what I mean at all,” I stutter. “Your family is really nice.” I sound unconvincing even to my own ears, so I decide to switch tactics before I get myself into any more trouble. “We’re lucky we get to do the social bit with your family, actually. Mine is great, but they’re definitely a little unhinged and kind of suffocating. I mean, it’s a good thing you and I won’t ever actually have to make that trip to Israel I lied about at dinner.”

  I can see I’ve said something wrong again. Gen’s face crumples.

  “You lied about Israel?” she whispers.

  “No! I mean, I lied about taking you to meet my family. You don’t have to do that.” I feel like I’ve somehow lit this entire situation on fire and am running in circles, causing more damage with every word, but I can’t stop. “I wouldn’t drag you to meet them.”

  “I’d love to see Israel,” she says, her gray eyes trained on my face.

  “Okay. It’s kind of boring there,” I tell her, as the bile sloshes in my gut. She looks unconvinced. “And my father is pretty judgmental. He’s not a ball of laughs to be around. He expects greatness out of me, and if I show up in Israel without having made some huge changes to my current situation, I’ll never hear the end of it.”

  “Isn’t getting married a huge change?” she asks, and we both go still. She waits for me to say something, but I just gape like a fish out of water until she gets up off the bed and nods. “I see. Getting married to a certain type of girl probably would be, right? A nice, smart Jewish girl with a ton going for her would be impressive. But getting married to someone like me? An almost dropout with no real motivation? I guess that’s not so impressive.”

  She grabs her purse and starts stuffing index cards
into her bag by the fistful, tearing and creasing them as she goes.

  “Gen, wait, no. I didn’t mean that. Not at all. That’s not what I meant,” I say, frantic in a way I’ve never been before.

  “It’s fine. Forget I even said anything,” she snaps, heading to the door. “I’m just stressed from all this…studying. I’ll take this all home and memorize it, and I promise I won’t let you down if we get that interview.” She takes a deep breath. “Good-bye, Adam.”

  “Wait.” I put my hands out, grip her by the shoulders, and try to pull her closer, but she won’t budge from her spot by the door. “Nothing I said before came out right. You misinterpreted what I said.”

  Her smile is small and tight. “Hey, this is how marriages of conveniences work. I’m not an idiot. I was taken off guard for a second, but it’s fine now. Trust me, the more honest we are with each other, the better. I really need to go study for trig now. And try to remember MooMoo’s real name. Moshe?” she guesses.

  “Gen, please let me explain—”

  “Ah!” She nods. “Eylakim. See, Adam. I told you I won’t let you down.”

  She whirls around and leaves before I can tell her that she never could.

  …

  A few days later Gen is back at my place. She’s agreed to memorize the information I give her about my family on her own, and I’ve agreed to try not to be such an idiot. No matter how many times Gen assures me I did nothing wrong, I can feel a difference between us, a subtle chilliness from her. I guess I should be okay with that. I wanted to keep it clinical didn’t I?

  But if I got exactly what I wanted, why do I feel so shitty?

  “So, Marigold is going to do all the flowers.” Genevieve sits cross-legged on my bed, chewing on a pen and holding a notebook in her lap. Her hair hangs, silky and black, down around her shoulders, and I realize how badly I want to kiss her.

  I want to rip the pen and notebook out of her hands and kiss her, lie on top of her, peel her clothes off, and keep kissing her until she’s hot and wet and moaning my name.

  “Adam? Adam!”

  Her voice brings me back from my dirty, hot, sexy daydreams.