Page 27 of The Accidental Dating Experiment
She wants Juliet to date a Darling Springs dude this week? While she’s living in Eleanor’s house with me? While we’re working on the cottage together? No. Just no. That can’t happen.
Because…fuck.
Because it fucking can’t. It can’t. That is all.
Juliet offers a thanks but no thanks smile. “I’m fine, Mom. I just need to regroup.”
But her mom tuts. “With a love doctor as your co-worker? Please. I bet together we can get you the best matches. Right, Monroe?”
I’m speechless. Because if I speak, I’ll spew fire.
Harriet races on down the track. “Let us help you like the two of you just helped me. Monroe and I can find you some matches here and pick the best ones for you.”
“I’ll be fine, Mom,” Juliet insists.
“But if this artist guy turned out to be a jerk, and you aren’t getting to that second date, maybe it’s time for a new strategy.”
Yes. Yes! It is. Thank fuck someone else said it.
Harriet’s eyes twinkle. “Just think. You can be my dating wingwoman. We can do it together!”
Juliet stares at her mother like she’s gone mad. But as Harriet presses, my mind is whirring with a new idea to solve Juliet’s date-picking problem.
10
DATING WITH MOM
Juliet
I stab Rachel’s name on my phone and slam it against my ear. It rings once. “Answer, please,” I mutter as I tromp toward Pick Me Up, the nearest coffee shop. I need caffeine, and I need sister time, and I need an answer ASAP.
I pass a tattoo shop dubbed Blue Roses, bustling with customers and displaying art with fine linework of vines, foxes, skulls, and blue roses. I’m wondering which came first—the art or the name—when Rachel answers.
“Hey! What’s going on?”
I cut to the chase. “We need to talk. Now.”
I’m still worked up. When breakfast ended, I told Monroe I needed to talk to a client and I’d get the bike later. I told my mom I’d call her tonight, and I marched downtown.
“Okay, talk,” Rachel says. “I’m at the store, though, so if a customer comes in I have to go.” I near the next block. A consignment shop called Second Time Around boasts vintage blouses in the window, but I refuse to look at the pretties right now.
“Your mom wants me to be her new dating bestie!”
Rachel scoff-laughs. “My mom?”
“Yes. Your mom.”
“She’s always my mom when you’re worked up.”
“Because she is,” I sputter, building up a new head of steam, dodging a pair of older men power walking. “This is such a thing your mom would do. And I’m left to deal with it because you went out and got yourself married. You met a perfect man in Carter, and Sawyer’s dating Katya, and I’m left to be Mom’s dating buddy. She was like, let’s do it together.” I pass a small-batch ice cream shop with delectable flavors like tequila and lime, and I’m pretty sure that’s a need. A tonight need. Maybe it will help me make sense of New Mom. “And she wears Converse now. She doesn’t wear mom shoes. Help me, Rachel!”
Rachel’s just laughing. Or maybe chortling. Whatever it is, she’s definitely doing it at me, not with me. “But you’re the dating expert. So now you have to help Mom figure out how to date!”
Across the street, a pack of yogis floods out of a studio and into the Pick Me Up coffee shop. With an aggrieved groan, I turn at the corner, then stop and lean against the bright green wall of the town library, where the scent of lavender wafts through the air. It smells so nice, it almost relaxes me. Almost. I’m still completely baffled.
“I don’t know who she is,” I say quietly to Rachel.
She pauses briefly, then asks, “Is that really what’s shocking you? Or is it that Mom’s enjoying dating and you’re not?”