I wish Victoria could be here. After a rocky start, she’d become the best friend and business partner I could have asked for. But she was downstate, officially introducing her unlikely boyfriend to her stuffy family.
As Grace slides the final pie onto the cooling rack, the side door swings open. I hear the loud footsteps of my brother, who finally took a filming break to come home for the holidays.
Kate follows right behind him and hands me my Christmas present — a handle of cheap whiskey, the brand I’d shared the first day I met her — but it only skims my hands before Mallory takes it, twists it open, and pours generously into her coffee. She makes more Irish coffees, and we move to the living room so Mal can day-drink and play ponies with Ruby: as she reports, two of her favorite activities combined!
Grace seems like the perfect hostess, perching on the arm of my chair, but she nervously looks out the window. I wrap my arm around her waist and slide her onto my lap, murmuring into her ear. “They’re on their way, don’t worry.” She relaxes slightly, but her gaze turns to Elijah.
A horn honks. Grace and Elijah both rush to the front porch, where Isaac’s minivan is pulling into our driveway. Grace’s breath hitches as a Buick pulls in behind it. In unison, she and her twin murmur, “Mama.”
After sneaking secret conversations with her children and missing time with her grandchildren, she finally told Grace’s father that she was coming to our house for Christmas, whether he liked it or not.
The twins leap down the steps, and the three of them wrap around each other like vines. Isaac enfolds his arms around the whole embrace, resting his chin on his sister’s head.
Nick steps onto the porch next to me and murmurs, “The prodigal family.” That’s what Grace longed for last year, to be forgiven and welcomed back into her family. But this is even better; Instead of going home contrite and asking forgiveness, Grace is the one extending solace.
Leah leaps out of the van then runs inside to find her cousin Ruby. Rachel hands me the baby carrier, and I unclip a sleeping Samuel out of his carseat and lift him against my chest, where he sniffles and snorts until he settles back to sleep.
When I go inside, Mom and Carol are taking Grace’s mom on a tour. Dad and Uncle Terry watch football. Nick is regaling Isaac and Elijah with tales from the set. Mallory and Kate are curled up on the couch gossiping with Rachel. Ruby and Leah playing with a nearby dollhouse as Jean knits and watches fondly.
I know exactly where to find Grace.
She stands at the head of the dining room table, where I installed all the leaves to seat all 17 of us. It’s official: my wife has more friends than Jesus.
“I don’t know what to say,” her grateful hazel eyes brim with tears, “when we pass the Peppermint Pig. How can I choose?”
“That’s the best part of being married to me, I’ll make sure you have it all,” I kiss her forehead. “Merry Christmas, darling.”
Victoria
Excerpt: All Twerk, No Play
“Am I hallucinating? Or did you just agree to move across the country and start a law firm with your ex-boyfriend?” Mallory Clarke sidled up on the ugly bungalow’s front porch, blonde hair glinting in the waning winter light.
My gaze drifted to my hand holding the thick business card that Alexander printed to pitch starting a law firm. The letters were etched in copperplate: Victoria S. Blackstone, Esq., Founding Partner: Blackstone & Clarke, Attorneys at Law.
“Yes, I did.” I confidently countered his sister Mallory’s skepticism, concealing my hesitation. She hadn’t been there for the infuriating realization that the law firm where we worked for a decade passed me over for the partnership I deserved, offering it instead to Alexander. Those stodgy old men wanted someone tall, dark and handsome: the innovative Don Draper to their aging Bert Cooper, the charismatic Harvey Specter to their seedy Daniel Hardman.
He fit their expectations for that role because I made him that way.
I’d spent a decade cultivating him into a corporate sex icon, his image complimentary to mine so that when we eventually ousted them to take over their firm, we’d look great on the cover of Forbes together with the headline ‘BigLaw’s First Couple.’
He would wear a flawlessly tailored suit with a cornflower tie to accentuate his eyes. My blue sheath dress would match perfectly, a striking contrast to my red hair, and of course, I’d wear my lucky Jimmy Choos. The article would cover how we met (law school) and what we’re known for (ruthless negotiations). It would mention who I’m wearing — probably Armani, but the stylist could talk me into Chanel to embody East Coast Jackie O vibes.
I’d scoff in the interview that it doesn’t matter what I wear.
I wish it didn’t, but it does.
Growing up, I’d done my homework in the executive suites of my family’s Lower Manhattan real estate headquarters, under the watchful auspices of mounted magazine covers featuring my grandfather, Richard Sinclair. His judgmental glare monitored my studies from Harvard Business Review, Bloomsburg, Forbes, Money, The Economist … he’d broken Fortune’s record by appearing six times.
Since I was 12, Richard — he hated being called Grandpa, insisting I call him by his given name to show the respect he deserves — planned for me to eventually take the helm as his successor, preparing me to see my face on all those magazine covers.
When I left the company at 22, I vowed to earn that success without Richard’s legacy. I researched the major business magazines and saw a trend: Almost exclusively white men in finance, law, real estate, or tech start-ups. Even when there was a push for diversity, like Fortune adding their annual Power 50 Women feature, women graced the cover less than half the time.
But there was a loophole.
The only cover on that wall without Richard’s face was The New Yorker, which featured my mom and dad with the title “The Future of New York Real Estate.” At only 35, Mom had been more accomplished than her father at the same age, but she’d had to share her cover.
Like my mom, women were more likely to get the nod if they were half of a power couple. Nobody knew Harvard-educated corporate lawyer Michelle Robinson, but when she married Barack? Everyone knew the Obamas.
So I decided to orchestrate a power couple, selecting Alexander for the honor of being my counterpart. When people named power couples, we’d be in the top tier: William and Kate, George and Amal, John and Jackie …
Alexander and Victoria.
Move over, Beckhams, there's a new Victoria in town.
But he seemed to have forgotten his role in our plans.
We broke up three years ago because we were both so committed to 80+ hour work weeks to earn our promotions that we didn’t have time for a silly thing like romance. But it was always implied that once we both had ‘Partner’ under our name, we’d reunite.
Now we both had the title … and he ruined it all by falling in love.
Mallory lifted her thumb to gesture behind us. “And you’re cool that he asked you to move to our hometown, where you know almost nobody … and now he’s making out with his new girlfriend?”
I looked through the window at Alexander’s arms wrapped around a beautiful woman’s slim waist and resisted my fist’s urge to clench.
When his father had a heart attack right before Christmas, he’d flown home to his quaint hometown of Saratoga Springs, about 200 miles north of New York City, and fallen in love with the hospital social worker.
Of course he had, the sentimental fool.
