The noise of the family in the other room surrounding them like a warm current. Your mother, Vivien said finally. What about her? She asked me if I understood that Jaden comes first. I heard, Malcolm said.
I told her yes. That I understood it not just as a rule, but as a fact, that a man who prioritized his son the way you do was part of why I was standing in this kitchen in the first place," Malcolm kept drying. "What did she say to that?" She said, "Good, because any woman who resents a child for being loved isn't a woman worth keeping." Viven paused, and then she gave me a second piece of pie.
High honor, Malcolm said. "I gathered that." He set down the dish he was drying, turned to face her. She turned to Vivien, he said. Malcolm, I need to ask you something.
She looked at him steadily. Okay. Not as a client, not as a business partner, not even as he stopped, searched for the right framing. I need to ask you as the woman who has been showing up in my life for the past 3 months in every way that matters without being asked to and without making a show of it. She waited.
Are you in? He asked. Not in for the careful version. Not in for the slow and cautious and let's see what happens version. Are you in for the real version?
The one where this is a real relationship in the open where my family knows and my son knows and your people know and where we deal with whatever that means together. The kitchen was very quiet. Viven looked at him for a long moment. He saw the thing happen in her face that he'd seen the first time on the beach. The composure shifting, something underneath coming up and through.
I've been in, she said quietly. I've been in since the beach. I've been waiting for you to be ready to say it out loud. I'm saying it out loud. He said, "Yes," she said.
"You are you?" He reached out and took her hand properly. Not the poolside moment, not the careful professional distance, not any of the in between things, just her hand in his in his kitchen on Thanksgiving night in the full knowledge of what it meant. Okay, he said. Okay, she said back from the other room.
Jaden's voice. Dad, Marcus is cheating. Can you come verify? In a minute, Malcolm called. He looked at Viven.
She was smiling. The real one, eyes and all. You should go referee, she said. I should. He didn't move immediately.