Pretty sure that would be a mistake to blurt out.
“Amanda has informed me that she requires a proper courting.”
“She has? You mean, practically marrying a cat after drinking entheogenic wine in Vegas wasn’t enough?”
“Apparently, she requires more.”
“She always was a demanding child,” Pam says. “Ice cream was never enough. Had to have her jimmies on top, too.”
I see where Amanda gets her dry wit.
I’ve never talked to the mother of someone I’ve dated, much less bantered with one, so this conversation feels about as comfortable as my breeches right now.
“Courting is a tradition done in preparation for marriage,” she says softly.
“Yes.”
“Is that...are you two planning for this?”
One of us is.
“Mom!” Amanda calls out. “Can you help me with these buttons?”
Saved by the costume.
Pam starts to stand, her body achingly slow as she rises up. It’s like watching the Tin Man stand before having his hinges oiled.
“Coming!” Pam calls out.
I break out into a sweat instantly.
Damned thick clothing.
A minute later, Elizabeth Bennet walks through the front door, Amanda’s hair tucked up in the bonnet, her face framed by a three-quarter-circle hat with ruffles.
She looks, well...
Ridiculous.
“Charming. Shall we?” I hand her two EpiPens. She tucks both in her purse.
“Where are we going?”
“Courting.”
“I meant, where specifically?”
“I thought we’d visit Louisa May Alcott, then Henry David Thoreau.”
“How about Shakespeare?”
“Wrong century. And continent.”
“Where are you really taking me?”
“‘I hoped to obtain your forgiveness, to lessen your ill opinion, by letting you see that your reproofs had been attended to,’” I declare, pulling out the first of about five lines from Pride and Prejudice that I’ve memorized.
She looks at me like I just answered her in Mandarin Chinese.
“Excuse me?”
“Say ‘Darcy’!” Pam announces, holding the iPad up.
“Crazy!” Amanda gasps.
“Close enough,” I mutter, taking her hand and placing it on my forearm in a formal style, giving the camera a closed-mouth smile. I’m doing my best to look like Colin Firth, which means pretending to look constipated.
These pants have about an hour of life left in them. It’s not that hard to pretend.
“You kids have fun!” Pam says, chuckling. “I’ll email your dad a photo.”
“Why?”
She seems genuinely perplexed. “Because you two look cute.”
“I don’t understand.”
“And because he’s your father. He must like seeing you enjoying yourself.”
“Still don’t understand.”
Pam’s shoulders lower and the look she gives me deepens. “Don’t you—”
“Mom. It’s fine. Go ahead and send the picture to James.” She peers down the road. “At the rate the neighbors are recording us, the pictures will be all over social media in a half hour anyhow. James can just log in to one of his accounts and download whenever he wants. Jessica Coffin’s going to have us all over her Twitter stream within the hour.”
Not if I have anything to say about it. I wonder if Cassandra’s completed our little project yet. If not, soon.
Amanda squeezes my forearm with a sigh of recognition. “How about we just go on to whatever the next crazy stage of this set-up involves.”
“You asked for it.”
“I asked for courting. Not nineteenth-century courting.”
“Blame Gina.”
“Gina? What does your admin have to do with this?”
Shit.
“You look so beautiful in that dress.”
“Gina arranged this?”
“The sunlight makes your eyes look like honey.”
“Honey made by bees,” she says savagely. I start to correct her. Shannon’s allergic to bees, not me, but I’m not stupid. Don’t correct a woman when she’s angry.
Especially when she’s angry at you.
“Gina arranged this? You handed over your courting plans to your administrative assistant?”
Will reaches for Amanda’s hand and helps her up into the carriage, where I hastily get us settled and shut the door.
“Busted,” she mutters, turning away from me. “Let me guess. I told you I wanted to be courted and you buzzed Gina and told her to arrange the whole thing.”
Shit.
“No! No, not...not really.”
“But close.”
“If it’s any consolation, I got felt up by Hyacinth Bucket’s identical twin.”
She screws up her face in confusion, opens her mouth to start to ask a question, then slumps in resignation. “I can’t believe this. I just wanted a few dates at Legal Sea Foods and some Netflix and Chill.”
Hold on.
“But noooooo. Mr. Let-Me-Get-You-A-Six-Foot Animatronic-Bear-and-an-Array-of-Solar-Panels-at-a-Fair-Trade-Coffee-Plantation has to turn himself into Fitzwilliam Darcy.”
“You wanted the seven-foot bear? Because I can get you the—”
“Andrew!”
I frown. It makes me look even more like Colin Firth.“You really would have been happy with some lobster tails and binge-watching series television while having sex?”
“Not the ‘while’ part, but yes.”
“You said you wanted to be courted!”