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Chapter One: June

One week until Christmas

“You think she’s gonna talk about us?” I whispered, leaning in close to my mother’s powder-and-rose-scented blowout and flicking my eyes in Magdalena Torrez’s direction.

“Oh, I’m positive. The minute one of us goes to the restroom.”

Right. Of course.

Around us, the air hung heavy with the scent of anise from the freshly pressed pizzelle, the lingering ambrosia of garlic sweat in olive oil, and about twelve different competing Versace perfumes.

Joanne Pagliucci’s seventh annual ceramics sale was going the same it did every year: The drinks were flowing, the bruschetta was being passed, and Magdalena was holding court, regaling a rapt audience of women in “Ugly Sweaters” (obviously, the kind only marketed as such—no one here had the courage to actually, materially be ugly) with hot, fresh gossip. Seated in a velvet wingback between Joanne’s signature silver Christmas tree and the display table of carefully painted snow globes, gravy boats, and candleholders, Magdalena looked as casual and self-assured as Tony Montana.

Meanwhile, we’d shoved ourselves into the farthest corner of the white leather Chesterfield, dodging her wandering gaze like bullets at a bank robbery.

My mother and I had given everyone in this Jersey Shore rancher the greatest Christmas gift of all—scandal. Juicy scandal. Juicy, multileveled, months-long scandal. Because for the first time in the history of ever, we were both divorcées.

Double single, no mingle.

First had come the “surprise” dissolution of my parents’ three-decade-long love story. Now that my dad had officially sold the pizza shop and moved out of town, we were constantly being cornered and gently massaged for information. No one wanted to be gauche, but what was going to happen to Genie’s Pizzeria? We couldn’t take away their beloved pizza. Just because we were suffering didn’t mean they had to too.

Six months after that, I’d found myself confronted with my own stack of papers. Even though I’d known they were coming, I’d still let myself fall apart like the earth had been ripped out from beneath my feet. Brian and I hadn’t been married for twenty-five years, and there hadn’t been children and a beagle and a KitchenAid mixer complicating everything. But we had enough history that when I realized what was happening, I’d begun to beg.

To bargain––desperate to save the twenty-five years I’d never see. Marriage is supposed to be hard, I’d said over and over. This is the hard part!

As if I knew anything.

No, my mom and I were not mingling, not even close. We were doing whatever the opposite of mingling is. Hostile solitude, maybe.

“What’s there to even talk about at this point?” I grouched, pinching at the skin between my eyes. “It’s been over a year.”

“They’ll never let it go, Junebug.” She gave my knee a gentle pat. “You just have to make peace with that.”

Why? I was so sick and tired of radically accepting, coming to terms with, and rising above. I was one bad interaction away from buying the front page of The Evergreen Rag to boldly speak my truth.

“BREAKING News! Local Woman Actually Didn’t Want to Be Cheated on By Her Kind of Lame Husband! Also: She Would Have Made It Work!”

I was way too hungover to find any of our misfortune entertaining. A huge personal loss, since this party and all the ensuing pettiness really were some of the best parts of spending the holidays in Evergreen—second only to the night before Thanksgiving when everyone showed up at The Billiards to get sloshed and scope out who had gotten hot while living someplace where the median age wasn’t sixty-five.

This was a gathering of the commare—an unofficial symposium of Italian American women and those who had married in thusly, who had formed a neural network, a telephone tree, a whisper network that would have given even the Soviet spies pause. These women were more than friends, not quite sisters, and potentially enemies.

As a commare’s guest (daughter of a commare, an honorless position), my purpose was purely decorative. I was just lucky enough to be in their presence.

“Junebug, you’ve barely touched your cheese,” my mom tutted, nudging me with her refreshed plate of miniature crab cakes and spinach artichoke dip.

I stared down at the cube of pecorino sweating on my plate. “I don’t think I can do it.”

“What the hell did you drink last night?”

“We made a pitcher of marga—” A dangerous burp gurgled up my throat. My mother’s blue eyes widened. “Ritas,” I finished, only when I knew we were both safe.

She handed me a napkin printed with a bunch of dead-eyed snowmen. “Bless you.”

Last night, Mimi, my roommate, and I had gotten too drunk while watching our new favorite reality dating show—Love on a Rock—and then spent five hours almost pissing our pants while stitching ridiculous men posting thirst traps on TikTok. It was the first true, real night of fun I’d had in months.

Our opus had been duetting a man who went by JoeyDaVegan, an alleged vegan chef who made authentic Italian dishes with no animal products—yeah, right—while wearing little more than a loincloth and an apron.

He was an Adonis, of course. Because they always were.

Broad and chiseled with curly black hair long and loose around his face, JoeyDaVegan’s bare pecs poked out of, above, and around his apron. No fabric could contain his bronzed and oiled muscularity. Through my phone screen, his espresso brown eyes dared us to keep watching.

If only he’d just stopped there! Stared into the camera and given us a thumbs-up.

No, instead JoeyDaVegan began fondling his ingredients. Fingering his tofu. Stroking his carrots. At one point he licked salt off his fingers, then inserted his wet fingers directly into a bowl of hummus.

Our duet was nothing more than the two of us soundlessly laughing so hard, tequila dribbled out of Mimi’s mouth while a snot bubble pulsated in and out of my left nostril. We watched with glee as our silly little video pulled in thousands and thousands of views and comment after comment saying something like friendship goals, me and who?, and besties can I join?

Then we’d passed out on the couch.

A pathetic evening for two of South Jersey’s most promising bachelorettes.

“Alright!” Joanne called our attention to her by clanging her acrylic nails against the side of her wine glass. “Alright, ladies! Get your paper and pens ready, our silent auction begins shortly!”

“Silent auction?”

Mom nodded gravely. “After last year’s bloodbath, Joanne reformatted the entire operation. I brought a pen for you too, sweetie. Don’t look so bereft.”

Before I could thank my mother, our conversation was cut short by a sudden commotion on the other side of Joanne’s living room, near the front door. It didn’t take much to make a group of Jersey-born boomers squawk—maybe someone had just revealed a big, fat engagement ring or perhaps a spider had dared to run across the floor.

The sudden surge in volume was followed by a gust of frigid, briny air and the scuttling of many pairs of wedged sneakers across the hardwood floors.

“Bernie’s here!” Joanne announced, eyes wide, hands flapping. She raced past us toward her front door. “Bernie’s here!”

“Bernie…?”

“Bernardita Pagano.” Mom delivered the familiar name with a sigh. “I think she brought one of her large sons.”

“Her son? This is a girls-only evening.”

She rolled her eyes, curled her lip. “They love to bring along their big baby boys and parade them around like show ponies.”

“Ew.” I recoiled back into the couch. “I swear, you all have a breeding kink.”

“Don’t lump me in with them!”

“Hey.” I smirked, knocking my shoulder against hers. “Imagine if you brought Vin around.”

“Oh, heaven’s above.” My brother Vin was the eldest of the Alfiero siblings—and by far the best looking of us. Mom squared her shoulders, preening with pride at the thought, sitting just a little bit taller. “They’d gobble him up in three bites.”

“Let me see who his competition is,” I teased, getting to my feet. As I stood, I felt the fabric of my sweater dress snag on my thighs, bunching and clinging in an unflattering lump around my ass. I yanked at it, but the fabric just didn’t want to come loose. Damn static electricity.

“What the heck,” I grumbled, pinching the material away from my body then letting it snap back against me. Finally, when I felt like my ass was covered, I lifted my eyes, ready to see what hunk of local douchebag had inspired such a flash of activity.

Magically, the group of women had parted and quieted. Bernadita—a tiny wisp of a woman with light brown skin and big cat-eye glasses—was surrounded by her girlfriends. And there, at her shoulder, clutching a bottle of wine in one hand and a tray of cookies in the other, was a man that looked so familiar. So placeable…

Maybe I’d gone to high school with him? Maybe he worked at the coffee shop where I worked sometimes? No, he was too handsome. Too striking. Muscular and large and—

Suddenly, it hit me.

I was staring at JoeyDaVegan.

In da flesh.

---

My cheeks immediately began to burn. He was staring back. Our gaze had connected. I was slightly taller than your average Italian grandmother. So, sure, it made sense that our eyes would connect over a sea of heads.

What didn’t make sense was how long I let his dark eyes warm me, how long I let them dance up and down the curve of my body.

I yanked my eyes away. “AnneMarie.” I flopped back into my seat and grabbed her by the elbow. “We need to leave now.”

“Ow!” She swatted me away. “You have those freaky little hands! Just like your father.”

“Mother, please. Finish your pretzels and grab your scarf. We need to go.”

“Why? What’s wrong?”

I cut my eyes in a vicious angle toward Bernie and Joey. Then, in a crisp whisper, I hissed: “I know that man.”

“Joseph Pagano?” She raised her brows at me, impressed. “What, didja sleep with him and never call him back?”

“God, no. I cyberbullied him.” I grabbed the last pretzel off her plate. “I’ll handle this one while you go grab our coats. Then you distract Joanne while I crawl out the back door and pull the car around. Ok? And break.”

She scrunched her nose in a look of mild disgust. “Crawl?”

There was no time to argue. Bernie and JoeyDaVegan had shed their parkas and were making their way into the living room, pointed at us like a missile. I silently cursed whichever Swede had propagated open concept design and shrunk backward, trying my best to make myself small. Like a Transformer jamming itself back into its car shape.

Joey’s curls were pulled back off his face, secured into a neat ponytail, the hard angles of his face on full display. His jaw was wide and strong, his mouth broad and pouty. The only part of his face with any sort of gentleness were his eyes. Dark, rich brown, flickering with an implacable, unmistakable happiness.

What did my eyes flicker with? Did they flicker at all, or were they just two pools of inky darkness, flat and unaffected?

I snapped out of my swirl of self-loathing. Bernie was coming for us, making little backward waves like an Italian baby. “Hi, girls!”

“Oh, brother,” Mom grumbled. “Give me an effin’ break.”

“I wish I was dead,” I croaked in response.

Joey followed close behind, depositing his cookie tray on the designated cookie table, then his wine on the appropriate wine table, all the while greeting every woman with a kiss or a hug like Mr. Pope himself. With his hands free, Joey began fiddling with the sleeves of his burgundy sweater, so tight it was essentially painted onto the well-honed contours of his chest. With each step, he filled the room a little more. He nearly took my breath away.

“AnneMarie, you remember my son Joseph, right? Little Joey?”

Mom snapped into character with alarming speed, grabbing my hand and yanking me to my feet beside her. No matter how she felt personally, we were going to be polite. That was nonnegotiable. She’d spent years behind the cash register at Genie’s, pretending she cared about a myriad of Little Joeys.

“Wow, not so little anymore!” She delivered this quip with a bright smile, placing a thin hand on my shoulder. “And you remember my Junebug, right?”

“Oh my goodness, June Rose! Aren’t you gorgeous?” Bernie smiled at me—a warm, heartfelt smile. “Are you still teaching math and science?”

“Hi!” I sung out, uncharacteristically loud. “No. I do, um, data analysis now. I work for a market research company building propensity models using consumer behavior data. It’s mostly user experience stuff but still extremely accurate—” Everyone’s eyes had glazed over. I cleared my throat. “Not teaching. Still doing nerd shit.”

Bernie let out an appreciative chuckle. “Good, sweetheart. This is my son, Joey. He’s a chef.”

I tucked my lips into my mouth, quickly diverting my eyes to the top of Joanne’s Christmas tree. Oh my fuck.

Had he seen the video? If he had, he’d know me right away. The two nose rings were a dead giveaway. I mean, how many chubby chicks with two nose rings were stitching his videos and laughing until they almost threw up?

“Ah, Ma, you’re too nice.”

Jesus. Joey hadn’t spoken in any of the videos I’d watched; part of me had held out hope he would have a squeaky little nasally voice. But sometimes god does give with both hands. Of course, his voice was a rich and smooth baritone, resonating right through my bones and directly into my uterus. It was the type of baritone built for selling American-made vehicles and extra creamy peanut butter. “I’m just a personal trainer.” I let his voice pull my eyes back to his. He was watching me, full lips pushed into a soft smile. “It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Personal trainer!” Like a sleeper cell, my mother was activated. “Junie, didn’t you want to lose five pounds!” This was not a question; it was a statement she sung with the vigor and vibrato of a church cantor. For as long as I could remember, my mother had been trying to trick me into losing five pounds.

I gritted my teeth and met JoeyDaVegan’s gaze full on. Fuck this shit. I slipped my hand into his and gave him my most professional, powerful handshake. “Hi, Joey. Pleasure is all mine. And actually, no. I’m really enjoying my current weight.”

Then I excused myself and marched blindly into the doorless kitchen.

“There’s no place to hide in this fucking house,” I whispered to Daxton, Joanne’s seventeen-year-old stepson—a recent acquisition by way of her marriage to a man ten years her junior.

“Bro.” The boy shook his head, floppy hair bouncing around his forehead. “You’re telling me. She literally only kept the walls that are, like, mandatory.”

He added a confounding number of extra syllables to mandatory.

I pressed my back against the door of the butler pantry, attempting to hide in the refrigerator’s shadow. “You have no idea what just happened to me out there, Daxton. I was hoisted by my own damn petard.”

He scrunched his nose at me. “What’s a dampetard?”

“No, petard—forget it. Do you see a really huge, sexy man anywhere? Is he coming toward us?”

“Um…” Daxton craned his neck and leaned backward, squinting into the living room. “Yes.”

Before I could react, Joey was rounding the corner of Joanne’s bowling-lane-length kitchen island, wine glass in hand. “Any idea where I can get some ice?”

Daxton’s eyes doubled, then he skedaddled out from between us and down the hallway.

I swallowed against the humiliation bubbling in my throat. “Uh, probably the freezer. Or the garage. That’s what people do in these big houses, right? Have a second fridge for bevvies.”

“Bevvies?” Joey’s mouth twitched into a smirk—dark, deep-set eyes slipping over me again. He really needed to stop doing that. “June, right? You look…familiar.” He was sizing me up, every detail of me, tracing my shape, lingering on my neck and then on my waist. Eating me slowly, one bite at a time. Holy shit. As certain as there was ice in the freezer, my cheeks were flushed bright red.

“I’m a fugitive.” I’d never been very good on my feet. “They’ve had me on billboards for years.”

“Nah, you look really…” He clicked his tongue against his back teeth. “Are you on a TV show or anything like that? Maybe a weather girl?”

That was a compliment, right? Weather girls are hot. Famously.

I swallowed quickly. “Grand theft auto. Grandissimo theft auto, actually. I’m wanted in four states.”

Joey pursed his lips to keep from laughing and cocked his head to the side. “Wait, you’re that girl. The one that stitched me last night? It has to be—yeah, it is you.”

“Well, I prefer woman,” I said, feigning incredulity. “And I’m not sure. I think there’s probably a chance that ’twas me. I do that sometimes. Make, um, silly little videos and post them. Free speech and all that, super important to me. And furthermore—”

“Furthermore?” Joey lifted an eyebrow at me.

“Furthermore, I have a twin sister. Identical twin. Down to the nose piercings.”

“Really?” He smirked, crossing his arms over his chest, the well-worked muscles in his forearms contracting with the movement. “Wow. Ain’t that something. Well, you can tell your twin sister that it’s all good. I’m used to people being assholes about what I do. I guess we can’t all be into data science—what did you call it?”

I flared my nostrils. “Nerd shit.”

Joey flashed me a satisfied smile, a smile that looked victorious. He tilted his head to the side. “Right, nerd shit.” Then he began backing away slowly. “See you around town, Junebug.”

---

Joey was on the hunt for ice. So, I needed to go somewhere that screamed No Ice.

If only Daxton had stuck around and made himself useful. He could have pointed me to the warmest room in the house.

Instead, I was left to my own piss-poor sense of intuition. I darted across the kitchen and down the hallway, familiar enough with the general layout of a midcentury Jersey Shore rancher to know that the bathroom was most likely the last door at the end of a long, dark hallway. I slipped past what had to be Daxton’s room—judging by the profound sock odor emanating from underneath the door—and what appeared to be a workout room. The hallway came to an abrupt end, and I was confronted with three more closed doors. Three. The most destabilizing number.

A normal person would have just picked one, but not me. I was a data scientist—I had to think about it. Weigh my options. Idiot.

“You ok, sweetheart?”

Suddenly, the hall light blinked to life and everything was illuminated by the dabbled too-hot, too-yellow light of a chandelier.

I turned toward the voice. Magdalena Torrez.

“Miss Torrez.” I forced myself to smile, eyes still adjusting to the sudden burst of light. “So good to see you!”

She gave me a curt smile, yanking at the lapels of her candy-apple red blazer. “You didn’t say hi to me earlier.”

“Oh, I was just—you know, head in the clouds.”

“How are you feeling, honey?” Oh no. Not this. “Holding up ok?”

“Holding up, holding on,” I chirped. “Feeling fabulous.” Why the fuck was I suddenly talking like Tim Gunn? I’d never said the word fabulous before in my life.

Magdalena tilted her head in the extremely familiar way older women had begun tilting their heads at me. It was just the right angle that said, you poor thing. “That’s great. You look wonderful.”

“Ah, thanks—any chance you know where the restroom is?”

Magdalena pointed at the door directly behind me. “June, before you go—I just have to tell you.” She laid a French-manicured hand on my forearm, a series of charm bracelets sliding out from her sleeve. “I heard something about Brian just now, from Colleen Gallagher.”

I fucking hated hearing his name. It was just the most benign two-syllable word on earth, and yet every time, it was immediate rug burn on my heart. “Oh?” I tried to keep my voice even, my expression neutral.

“He and that woman—the one from Pittsburgh—” That detail was a real sticking point for everyone in Evergreen who knew what had happened between Brian and me. My ex wasn’t from Evergreen, but he was from the area. He was supposed to know better—to know that nothing was greater than his allegiance to the state of New Jersey. Loving a woman from Pittsburgh was as good as getting I hate pizza and the beach tattooed across his chest.

I knew Magdalena was referring to the woman Brian had left me for by her hometown on purpose, to show that this was friendly fire.

“What about her?” I forced the question out, even though I could already feel my lips trembling, could feel hot, prickling sweat gathering in my armpits. I hated that I still reacted this way, all these months later.

The woman chewed at her lip for a moment, pulling away a patch of cheap lipstick. I wanted to reach out, shake her, and scream: WHAT ABOUT HER?

“Well…they’re having a baby, June. And I think they’ll be in town for the holidays. All three of them.”