Just when I thought this was any regular clothing store, I am proven wrong when Luan walks us up to the register. His smile brightens even more.
“LUAN!” the woman behind the register shrieks excitedly, then makes her way around the counter to greet him.
He lets go off my hand to hug her, and I’m not going to lie, the loss of his hand is like a knife to my heart.What the fuck is happening?
“Happy birthday, honey.” It looks like her grip on him might as well be so tight, she’s close to squeezing him to death.
“Thanks, Ma,” Luan chuckles, patting a hand onMa’sback.
On.Ma’s. Back.
That woman is hismother?!
I was prepared for literally anything today. Yes, even going shopping with Luan. What I wasn’t prepared for was meeting his parents. I don’t think I ever even thought about meeting his mother. And I meanever. Parents don’t like me.
When they pull away from the hug, Luan’s mother looks at me with wide eyes but a smile on her face, nonetheless.
Luan doesn’t have a lot of features in common with his mother. She’s got brown eyes, his are green. She has a rounder face, Luan’s isn’t. His features are more defined. Her skin is a little darker than his, her hair, too. But he got the curls from her.
“Now, who do we have here?” she asks, making her way over to me. Mrs. Hayes looks pleasantly surprised to see me, and not in a bad way at all. She smiles at me and looks at me all kindly. And if her son is anything like her, she might as well be a blink away from pulling me in for a hug.
“Remember that guy I told you about?” Luan says, looking at me now. “That’s him.”
His mother chuckles. “I see.” She holds out her hand and I take it. “Grey, is it?” I nod. “God, it’s nice to finally meet you. Luan has been talking about you nonstop. He calls home every day, and usually I listen to him talk about soccer or how his days went, but recently all he talks about is how amazing you are.”
How he can picture me as being amazing, I do not know because I’m far from it. “It’s nice to meet you, too, Mrs. Hayes.”
“Armina, please.”
Yeah, because that’s not scary at all. I have never first named anyone’s parents. Not even Miles’s father when he was still alive, and Mr. Desrosiers did tell me to call him by his first name at least a million times.
“Yeah, you two can chat after we’ve gotten married, Ma. I need a favor.”
Ah, after ourwedding. Good to know we’re getting married. I get the feeling Luan loves to decide things before asking me. Like us getting married someday.Majorthings that I should probably have a say in.
“So, you remember those hoodies you sold years ago? The yellow ones that saidSmile?”
I don’t like where this is going. At all.
Armina gasps and immediately shakes her head. “Luan. You cannot put this poor guy in ayellowshirt.”
“Exactly.” Maybe meeting his mother wasn’t so bad after all. “Yellow isn’t my color.”
Luan waves us both off. “You’re getting the other one,” he tells me. “You can still print them, right? Also, you need to do me another favor…” He walks closer to his mother, pulling her away from me so they can talk without me hearing it. NowthatI like even less than thinking about having to wear something…yellow.
???
It saysFrown.
The hoodie I am forced to wear saysFrownright on the front for everyone to see. At least the hoodie’s dark gray, I guess.
Luan’s wearing a matching one but in yellow and it saysSmileinstead. It suits him, actually, and it matches his shoes perfectly. They’re also yellow. He even switched into white sweatpants just to match my black cargo pants a little better.
But that isn’t even the worst bit yet.
Each side of our sleeves has an initial embroidered. G for me and L for Luan. That wouldn’t be all too bad if mine didn’t have the L on it and his the G. And a heart right next to the letter as well.
At this point, I’m far deeper into a relationship with Luan Hayes than I thought I am. Or consented to being. Maybe I skipped that part or something, I don’t know.