Heatherly Bell - Breaking Emily's Rules

“I don’t have anything against it. I have something against starting a relationship right now. I have to work on myself.”

“Who said anything about a relationship?” Molly drew the last word out, emphasizing every syllable. “Why does everything have to be a big deal to you? Can’t you just have fun?”

Of course she couldn’t have fun. She had plans to make, and they didn’t involve a man. Emily opened her mouth to answer, but Grammy walked back in the kitchen and spoke first.

“What you need to do is learn from your big sister, young lady. Sometimes a lady needs to take a good long look at her life to find out where she’s going. It wouldn’t hurt you to do the same.” Grammy reached for a mug and poured some coffee in it.

Molly rolled her eyes. “Sorry. I forgot Little Miss Perfect does everything right.”

Emily winced at the moniker, but what was so wrong with setting goals and controlling one’s future? For so long, she’d been the only one with any good sense in this family. Dad out in Texas playing cowboy, Molly pretending she hadn’t screwed up the best thing in her life and Grammy planning her own funeral.

Either way, it was time for Plan B, since none of her best-laid plans had worked out.

Like real estate. She’d bought the course on the late-night infomercial, but nothing was like the book said it would be. Her attempt at writing a historical romance hadn’t done any better. And if it wasn’t for the stage fright that kept her from returning to the stage, maybe she could get that country music career off the ground.

Either way, she had to figure something out, because she was running out of time.

Molly had struck a nerve when she talked about ticking clocks. It wasn’t that Emily wanted a baby—she’d given up that dream—but reminders of how little she’d accomplished in her twenty-eight years weren’t welcome. She’d recently read in one of her college alumni newsletters that a former classmate had founded her own clothing company and another was running for a congressional seat in her district.

Emily needed something like that. Something big.

Grammy patted Emily’s back. “Nothing wrong with being a good girl, right, dear?”

Good Girl. Yeah, that was her. Another name might be Doormat. “Never said I was perfect.”

“Don’t forget tomorrow is our monthly meeting with the Pink Ladies. I know you won’t want to miss it, Emily.” Grammy sat across from Emily.

“Why are you encouraging her?” Molly slammed her coffee mug on the table. “That’s exactly what Emily needs. Hanging out with a bunch of geriatric women. That should do it.”

“Your sister has a hobby, and maybe you can find one, too,” Grammy said with a scowl.

“I have a hobby. It’s called dancing. Meanwhile you waste your time talking about dead people that can’t do a thing for you anymore.” Molly took a gulp from her mug and gave Emily a pointed look.

Emily shook her head. “I love when you both talk about me like I’m not here. What if I’m interested in our family history? What’s wrong with trying to find out all about my namesake?”

“That Emily Parker isn’t going to help you. Because there’s a little problem. She’s dead.”

“Listen, young lady. Never speak ill of the dead. Someday I’ll be one of them.” Grammy reached over and swatted Molly’s hand.

Molly walked over to the sink with her mug. “Someday we’ll all be one of them. But before that, let’s have a little bit of damn fun before we all die, why don’t we?”

Grammy laughed at Molly’s back as she walked out of the kitchen. “Oh, Molly, dear, you are so dramatic. Learn to be a little bit more like your sister. Level-headed. Grounded.”

Emily almost choked on her coffee. Was that what she was? Level-headed? Grounded? Why did that sound boring?

Emily had spent the past year in a kind of self-imposed hibernation with little interest in anything other than eating, sleeping and watching reruns of the first three seasons of Homeland.

But then a few months ago Grammy had come to her with some genealogy research. She wanted to find out whether her family had come from Ireland or Scotland. One of Grammy’s Historical Society friends had traced her ancestors back to the Revolutionary War. Naturally, Grammy was convinced they could do better than that. They only needed to trace the family lineage back far enough and the truth of the spunky and steady Parker spirit would be revealed. It had all started out simply, with a bit of online searches, and before Emily knew it, she’d been spending most of her spare time with Grammy’s friends.

Then Molly had come back home. Suddenly genealogy research was a hobby for the geriatric crowd.

“I’ll quit when I find out what happened to the first Emily Parker.” Time to reevaluate, perhaps, the amount of time she spent on this hobby. A little diversity couldn’t hurt. Getting out from under this “good girl” image couldn’t hurt, either.

* * *

MOLLY TRUDGED UP the steps to her bedroom, and threw herself on the trundle bed. Everyone in her family was officially bonkers, fascinated with the past and dead people when there was so much living to be done right now. Emily was too young to hang out with all those old women, but Molly couldn’t seem to get through to her. Yet.

She’d get Emily back out on the dance floor, or her nickname wasn’t Trouble.

She reached under the mattress and pulled out the photo of Sierra at six months old. She’d just learned to sit up and wore a bib that read Daddy’s Girl as she smiled her toothless grin. Molly traced the angle of her baby face. Oh, how she remembered that smile. It was the last picture Molly took of Sierra before she left town. Dylan had been working long hours and left her alone with Sierra night and day. They could have all lived at the Parker family home and Molly would have had help from both Grammy and Emily, but Dylan had insisted they live on their own. Raise Sierra on their own. Insisted he’d support his own family, and that meant they were stuck in a studio apartment.

That same studio apartment had felt more like a Love Shack when they’d first been married, right after they’d learned of her pregnancy, and made love every night. But once Sierra arrived, everything changed. Dylan had been too tired to do anything but collapse in a heap at the end of the day.

Emily had offered to help but Molly was so ashamed of her mess. Ashamed that she couldn’t stop crying some days. She couldn’t figure out how to take a shower and at the same time take care of her baby. And after every time Emily had come over, Dylan had nothing but praises for her big sister. Emily sure knows how to clean a house. Or, Did you fold and put away all this laundry, or did Em? On and on he’d go about her wonderful big sister and how Molly could learn a lot from her.

Emily wasn’t a spoiled Daddy’s girl like Molly, Dylan would say. And now that she was a mother, she had to give up on being Daddy’s girl. But Daddy seemed to be the only one who realized when Molly was way in over her head. Which, according to him, was pretty much always.

Molly swallowed the sob in her throat and picked up her cell phone. She dialed her father, who was out at their Texas cattle ranch instead of at home where he belonged.

“Daddy?” Molly whispered into the phone.

“What’s wrong, baby?” Daddy answered with the Texas twang that grated on her nerves.

But leave it to her daddy to always realize when something was wrong. “I’m bored here. When are you coming home?

“I’ll come home next week, for sure.”

“I’ve been back home two months and seen you once.”

“The ranch out here keeps me busy. Doesn’t Emily keep you company?”