Chapter 5
“You’re late.” Nicky’s mom, Erin if Tricia remembers correctly, frowns at her daughter and her friend as they get out of the car.
Nicky rolls her eyes, but checks her phone. “Just a few minutes. We hit traffic on the way.” Tricia holds back the smile that she nearly sends Nicky’s way.
“From church?” Erin doesn’t look convinced, but this is Nicky’s family not Tricia’s. In Tricia’s most of the time they were just surprised that she would show up.
Family dinners.yeah. Too much business being discussed for ‘plausible deniability’ to be an option if brought before a court. She’s not a big fan of being dragged out for questioning. Been there. Done that. She’s still not for sure what that one time was for.
The cops thought they had something, but then found out they had nothing. Wonders there with Uncle Gino being friends with the old commissioner back in the day. Well, more like friendly rivals that knows the only way to keep one of the family in jail would be to really have the case locked and sealed air tight. Kind of hard when the person who supposedly did the crimes was in another state at the time.
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Boyle.” Tricia interrupts her girlfriend before Nicky gives voice to the anger that Tricia can see starting to come to the surface. Getting into a fight with her mom before Sunday dinner hadn’t been a part of the plan, at least the part that Tricia remembers. “I asked her to stop at one of my cousin’s places to pick up a little something for dinner.” Tricia holds up the bag that she’d been holding ever since they got out of the car. “Didn’t feel right coming without bringing something.”
Erin turned her attention to the girl standing beside her daughter. “Who are you?” Before turning back to her daughter. “Nicky. This is a family dinner.”
“Mom…” Nicky started, before looking at Tricia who had an eyebrow raised. She was going to let Nicky take the lead on this one. “I’ll explain inside.” She finally decided, before looking back at her mother. “Really. I will. Just not right now. Okay?”
Erin looked at the two of them before nodding. “Fine.” She tells her daughter as she put on a smile for Tricia. “Pleasure to meet you…”
Tricia smirked, but tried to keep the sarcasm at a minimum, “Tricia.” She finally supplied to the woman that, if things go down the pathway that the seemed to be going, would one day be a part of her chosen family.
“Call me Erin.” Nicky’s mom tells Tricia with a forced smile that, if Tricia didn’t know Nicky as well as she does, probably wouldn’t have noticed the fakeness. Nicky has a few too many tells to be a convincing liar.
Tricia keeps her smile in place. “Erin.” The two younger women glances at each other, and Tricia half shrugs. It seems to be going alright, so far.
Nicky follows behind her mother, and with an eye roll Tricia follows behind Nicky. To her, she was getting the better view. Also, she’s not above using her girlfriend as a shield between herself and her family. This should go alright. Nobody could have a worse reaction than Tricia’s family would.
She hadn’t been joking when she told Nicky that her family, bar her brother, thought that she was just going through a phase for wanting to be with women.
Well, one specific woman now.
Everyone else is there, and as she warned Nicky earlier, she can’t remember who each person is based on her descriptions. Erin goes ahead and takes a seat, but Nicky keeps standing and so does Tricia. This is Nicky’s family, and so she’ll follow her lead. If they went to hers? Yeah, she’s not bringing Nicky home any time soon. Probably best to not potentially make her girlfriend be an accessory after the fact of some deal that’s more shaded than a forest at noon.
Tricia does mentally make guesses at who each person is. The old guy, well, oldest assumed male relative most likely is Nicky’s great-grandfather Henry. The man sitting at the other end of the table was the relative from earlier, Nicky’s grandfather Frank. Two other males, though one was sitting next to a female that had two boys (maybe closer to teens, Tricia guesses). The one next to the woman probably Uncle Danny, the woman being Aunt Linda, and the two boys being Jack and Sean. Considering order of names given, Jack was the eldest boy. That would make the other male Nicky’s Uncle Jamie, the one that Nicky says that she’d call up first if she happened to be in trouble.
Uncle Danny would be the one she’d call if it was anything too criminal.
“This is Tricia.” Nicky tells her family after the silence had grown a bit to the point of being just a tad awkward. Tricia looks at Nicky, giving her a smile that she hopes is reassuring. Nicky doesn’t have to do this. It wouldn’t be the first time that Tricia was someone’s dirty little secret. “She’s my girlfriend.”