Adventures in Summoning

Chapter 5

By the time Friday rolled around, the news of Dee coming over to my house had spread like wildfire. Evidently someone had seen her car pulling into the gate with me, and then things snowballed when she and I both passed on a party invitation at Greg's house on Saturday night. If anything, we had inadvertently provided much more cover for her false love life than we had intended, but neither of us minded. The entire day we were surrounded by groups of people asking about the relationship, it was like an actor being hounded by paparazzi, and I didn't understand the interest.

"Come on dude," Greg almost shouted at lunch, "Neither of you have ever dated in the last few years, so of course this is big news. "There isn't a guy in school that didn't want to be with Dee, and all the girls and some of the guys wanted you as well. This is huge!"

Dee just blushed and hung her head. She had joined us at our table, since there were too many jealous girls shooting glares at her over at the normal table she sat at.

"It will all die down, don't sweat it," I assured her.

"I doubt it," Greg kept motoring on. "This is like a royal wedding for a high school."

"You're not helping," I told him. "But either way, we'll have a good time this weekend."

"Oh yeah you will!" Greg catcalled.

"Seriously Greg? We're just hanging out," I was getting frustrated, this was supposed to be a safe table for Dee, not a place for her to be thought of like that.

"Right. Hanging out, on your birthday, alone in a giant mansion. Nothing to see here folks!" Greg smirked.

"Greg, shut the fuck up," I said coldly.

"Hey, sorry! Just saying." He just couldn't keep his mouth closed.

Dee didn't seem to mind though, she kept smiling and was relaxed about the whole situation. For me, it was just nice to think about having someone I could talk to and know they could be trusted other than my grandmother. I texted her the gate code to get into the driveway, so the plan was for her to just get in and come on up so we could watch some movies. I even left the front door unlocked so she could just come up to my room without my parents interrogating her when she arrived. But first, I had to get through a birthday dinner with the new and loving family. It had been a tense week, with dinners often being filled with the same awkward silence, but I guess any real progress would take time.

Not surprisingly, dinner was takeout again. None of the three could cook, and while I was handy in the kitchen, I wasn't going to cook for them until they had shown more growth. Aunt Karen had already shown that she wasn't changing so I was in no hurry to do more than be friendly. So, they had gotten a variety of pasta dishes from a nice Italian restaurant in town, and we were all eating that. It was good, I had to give them that.

"Thanks for dinner, this was nice," I said, honestly complimenting them.

"Well, it isn't like we cooked," my mother admitted. "But it is delicious, you're right about that."

"So, is the cinema going to be ready soon?" I asked, wondering if the movie marathon would be on for the weekend still.

"Yep, I think you'll spend all weekend there," Aunt Karen giggled, while my parents glared at her. She might have had an extra glass of wine or two.

"That sounds great. You have any movie recommendations?" I asked, wondering what movies they might even know about, let alone have seen.

"It's your birthday, you get to decide," my father stated.