Free The Lucky Kind by Alyssa B. Sheinmel Page A

patterns chart up there with their having held hands on parents’ day.
    “Okay,” I say finally. Now I wish I hadn’t held Eden’s hand when we came out here. I could have kept up a pretense that we were just friends, and we were just studying together.
    “Well, Eden,” my mother says. “That’s an unusual name.”
    “Yes, well, my parents are unusual,” Eden says, and she laughs, and my mother does, too.
    “Before I forget, honey,” my mother says, turning to me, “are Stevie’s parents coming for Thanksgiving next week?”
    Stevie always comes to our house for Thanksgiving, and when they’re in town, his parents come, too. That sounds like they abandon him on Thanksgiving; they don’t. In theory, he’s supposed to go with them wherever they go, and he always did, until the year we were ten. For some reason, their trip was canceled at the last minute and we invited them here. Ever since then, Stevie’s opted out of traveling with his parents and spent the holiday with us. His parents have only come once since then, I think. But my mother always asks.
    “No, they’re going to Aspen, I think.”
    “A little early for skiing,” my dad says. I think that’s the first thing he’s said since I introduced Eden.
    “I don’t think they even ski,” I say, shrugging. “There was some restaurant there that had a special Thanksgiving dinner thing they wanted to do.”
    “You’re kidding,” my mother says. She takes off her coat and reaches for my dad’s, and I realize they’ve been standing in their own home for about ten minutes now with their coats still on.
    “Anyway—” I say, ready to say something like, Eden and I have to go back and get some more studying done.
    “What’s your family doing for Thanksgiving, Eden?” my mother interrupts.
    “Um, I honestly don’t know,” Eden says, and I look at her, surprised.
    “You don’t?” I ask.
    She shakes her head. “We usually go to this other couple’s, these friends of my mom’s, but they’re getting divorced now so—”
    “Your parents are getting divorced?” I interrupt.
    Eden looks at me like I’m plain stupid.
    “No, the other couple is.”
    “Sorry.” Come on, it’s not the most far-fetched thought in the world.
    “Anyway. So I don’t know. We might skip it this year.”
    My parents look completely heartbroken. I mean, you’d think Eden had just intentionally stomped on Pilot’s foot or something. Thanksgiving is a very big deal in our house. My parents have been spending the holiday together since they first started dating, even though sometimes that just meant the two of them and fifteen pounds of leftover turkey. I know they think I should invite Eden, and I know they’re both surprised I haven’t yet.
    And even though that seems like a lot of family togetherness, I still say, “Well, you should come here. If your parents are going to skip it.”
    “Oh, I don’t want to—”
    “If your parents won’t mind, Eden,” my father breaks in, “we’d love to have you.”
    Eden smiles at my dad, in that big, warm way she doesn’t do very often, and I can tell my dad, at least, thinks I did a good job catching this girl.
    “Okay, great, then,” I say. “Well, Eden and I were studying, so …”
    “Yeah, midterms,” Eden says. “Your son is a big help.”
    “I’ll bet,” my dad says, and I can’t tell if he’s joking.
    I close the door behind us, though I’m not sure why since I can’t imagine messing around now that my parents are home. It never bothers me when Eden’s parents are home at her house. And I’m surprised that I feel this way about it now.
    “Well, that went well,” I say.
    “Yeah,” she says, and I can tell there’s something else on her mind.
    “What’s the matter?” I say, even though I kind of don’t want to know. I mean, I want to be, you know, a good boyfriend and everything, but also have absolutely no desire to get into anything right now.
    “Nothing,” she says, and I