The Bride-In-Law

She was tempted to say, “Whatever,” a response that was heard a lot around school, and not just from the students. As in she would do whatever it took to get out of this mess. Whatever it took to get him out of her house.

But she didn’t. Annie simply wasn’t a “whatever” kind of woman.

“I found them,” she called out from halfway down the stairs a few minutes later. “And would you mind taking Bernie her mail, as long as you’re going out there anyway?”

Tucker had dumped the fruit into the bowl on the table, helping himself to one of her apples. He was studying the snapshot of Eddie holding a naked brown baby and squinting into the sunlight. She’d stuck it on the refrigerator in a magnetic frame as a constant reminder of a man she found all too easy to forget.

He took the mail, glanced at it absently, and said, “AARP, Special Olympics and an International Male catalog. Do I need to get her to sign for it?”

“Yes, why don’t you do that?” Her eyes took on a steely glint, and Tucker told himself he deserved it. His company manners had deteriorated since his divorce.

“Sorry. Any messages?” He shoved the mail into his hip pocket and waited for her to have the last word. He knew her type. She’d manage to have it, anyway.

“Just one. You can ask your father how long he plans to keep my cousin in that disreputable place.”

“Why? Has she been complaining? Funny, she looked pretty comfortable last time I saw her.”

“Bernie’s never been one to complain.” He lifted an eyebrow at that. “That doesn’t mean your father didn’t get her there under false pretenses.”

“You think he ensorcelled her?”

“He en-what?”

“It means—”

“I know what it means!”

“Yeah, well—I read it in one of my son’s comic books.”

“Why am I not surprised?”

“Hey, don’t knock comic books. You’d be amazed at what you can learn from those things.”

She rolled her eyes, and even behind the lenses, he couldn’t help but notice their size, clarity and color. He wondered if she ever wore contacts and decided she wasn’t the type. That would suggest vanity. Whatever her faults, vanity probably wasn’t one of them. About all she had to be vain about, so far as he could see, was a pair of world-class ankles, and she ruined the effect of those by wearing ugly platform shoes.

She held out the glasses, and he took them and started to ram them into his pocket along with the mail, then thought better of it. “I don’t suppose you have a case for these things?”