Page 31 of Boyfriend of the Hour

“For your information, Idohave a lead on a new job,” I said. “Rochelle’s waiting tables, and she invited me to join her.”

It was sort of the truth. By way of omission. They didn’t need to know whatkindsof tables Rochelle was waiting, or the fact that I didn’t really want to do it.

Because I felt bad about snapping at them all again, I waved the envelope at them. “Thank you for this, though. I will use it. And…I am grateful for the breakroom, Lea. It’s better than the street.”

Kate sighed. “We’d never let it come to that, you know.”

Did I? I wasn’t so sure.

I accepted kisses from Kate and Frankie as they left, but Matthew lingered behind with Lea. Clearly, the two oldest had been planning something without the others.

“Spit it out,” I said as I flopped onto Lea’s saggy gray couch. I’d stay for a shower. God knew I needed one.

“Listen,” Matthew said as he sat in Mike’s ratty old armchair next to me while Lea hovered near the door. “I talked to Nina last night, and she’s all right if you want to live with us in Boston for a while. Get a change of pace, and maybe get back on your feet. We can just throw your stuff in the back of my car and drive up tonight if you want.”

I stared at him. “You want me to move toBoston?”

Matthew nodded. “It’s not as bad as you might think. The pizza’s garbage, and I’ll cheer for the Red Sox when I’m dead in the ground, but I’m actually pretty happy up there.”

“But there’s no…there’s like two dance companies there,” I said. “What would I even do?”

“What are you doing here?” he posed back at me.

I couldn’t answer that. And my brother knew it.

Instead, I made a face. “Isn’t Nina about to give birth literally any day now?”

“Two months. But yeah, we’re getting close.”

Matthew looked unbearably proud. If I wasn’t already so grossed out by my big brother making googly eyes at his socialite wife, I’d have been happy for him. He deserved a little happiness after taking care of the rest of us. But that didn’t mean I needed to be the accessory to his life.

“I don’t need to go to Boston just to be useless up there too and get in the way of your marital bliss,” I said. “I’m doing just fine with that down here.”

Not even a little bit true.

Matthew and Lea shared a long look as Lea moved to sit beside me on the couch.

“I’m worried about you,” he said finally.

“Yeah, join the club,” I cut back. “Wejusthad this conversation last night.”

“Which I hear went straight to shit after you stormed out,” Matthew said. “But this isn’t really about that. You want to live inthe breakroom, live in the breakroom. You want to bartend and keep trying to dance, do that. But something happened this last year. You used to walk into a room and be the life of the party. Now you’re just kind of…”

“A bitch?” I suggested.

My brother sighed. “I was going to say bitter, but if you want to roll that way, sure.”

He pulled on the brim of the fedora he’d worn since Nonno had died. It was almost like a crown, if a crown could be an unbearably old-fashioned gray hat worn by pretty much every other grandpa in Belmont.

He was a good-looking guy. All my friends always had crushes on him when we were growing up. But to me, he would always be my big brother. The one who had basically been the next best thing to a father to me since I was a baby.

“You gotta get some decent threads, Mattie,” I told him, with no other reason than simply to bug him. Because that’s what baby sisters did. “You go home looking like this, and Nina is going to think she married a geriatric.”

Matthew just cast me a long look with the green eyes all us Zola kids shared, and for the first time, I noticed the lines starting to form at the corners and the bits of silver appearing just over his ears. My brother wasn’t a young man anymore. He had been carrying adult responsibilities most of his life.

“You’d get bitter too if the one thing you were put on earth to do became impossible,” I said.

But Matthew shook his head. “It practically killed me to stop being a D.A., kid. Since college, I knew I was supposed to go after the bad guys. But now I’m working at a cushy firm, barbecuing on the weekends, and kissing my wife every chance I get. Sometimes, things change for a reason. I don’t think it’s just the knee that’s bothering you. It’s something else.”