Our flight left Chicago at 4:00 PM on Friday, but Brady insisted on going to work for a half day. I told Diana I would work from home then spent the day shopping, waxing, and packing. Brady told me he would meet me at the airport so I had Carly drop me off.

I sat around the terminal for almost an hour waiting for Brady to show up. When it was almost boarding time I started getting worried and texted him, “Hurry or I’m going to go without you.”

He replied, “Doubt it. I’m almost there.”

Luckily, he came rushing in ten minutes later and we just barely made the plane. Ugh.

“You shouldn’t have even gone to work. You knew it was going to be hard to break yourself away,” I said once we settled in our seats.

“It’s fine. I made it so that’s all that matters,” Brady said.

We landed in Boston at around 7:00 PM and it was already dark. As we were waiting for our luggage, Brady told me that his parents sent a car to pick us up. Fancy! My parents would have just come to pick us up themselves (like normal American parents).

A sleek black Towncar was waiting outside our terminal and the driver took our luggage and held the doors open for us. All of it was actually kind of dramatic. The drive to his parents house was about an hour and a half. Brady told me cute childhood stories on the way and told me about all the little towns we were passing. I couldn’t see anything because it was dark, but I still appreciated his little tour.

We finally pulled into a long driveway that led down to a huge multistory Tudor style house. When the driver opened my door I stepped out and assessed the property. There was nothing but land and trees as far as I could see and it looked like there was some sort of guest house or barn behind the main house.

“This is cute,” I said nonchalantly as if the whole estate wasn’t spectacular.

“Mmhm,” Brady said as he gathered our stuff. He let us into the beautiful, grand two story foyer that was all cherry wood and brick with a leather seating area, piano, and expertly styled console table. The interior designer in me was instantly impressed.

“Brady?” I heard his mom call from another room. “We’re back here.”

We dropped our stuff in the foyer and followed his mom’s voice and met her in the hallway. She welcomed us with stiff hugs and took our coats. She let us know that Hunter and his wife had also just arrived. 

We found them in the kitchen and Hunter said, “Hey Reese. Nice to see you again.” And then he gave me this eyebrow wag that I’m not sure what was supposed to mean.

He was standing next to a tiny little lighter skinned black girl who had black, pink and purple dreadlocks down to her ass. She had on mustard colored tights, a tweed dress that was clearly thrifted or taken out of the garbage and an amazing knee length suede trench coat. I think it was Michael Kors. She had a hoop through her nostril and I suddenly wanted a nose ring.

“I’m Dom,” she said to Brady first and then me.

“Reese,” I said, shaking her hand. I’m only like 5’4, but Dom made me feel like a giant. She had perfect teeth and this amazing plum colored lipstick that I wanted to steal. She was actually strikingly beautiful, not that I would expect any less from Hunter. But they both looked a little bit out of place in the sparkling marble kitchen though.

“Are you guys hungry?” Brady’s mom asked us.

We said no then we all stood around exchanging awkward pleasantries for a few minutes until Brady’s dad came home. He greeted us then we migrated to the living room and all sat around the fireplace/bookshelf situation. I noticed that Dom still had her coat on like she was ready to bolt out of there any minute.

“So!” Brady’s mom said after we all got settled, clearly ready to address the elephant in the room. “You guys are married.”

“We are!” Dom gushed, grabbing Hunter’s hand. “We’re so happy.”

“What made you guys decided not to tell anyone?” Brady’s dad asked, sounding genuinely curious, not condescending.

“We wanted our wedding and our marriage to be about the two of us, not our families or anyone else,” Dom explained.

“What does your family think about this?” Brady’s mom asked.

“I don’t really have family. My dad has been in prison practically my whole life and my mom hasn’t been around in two years.”

“Why is your father in prison?” Brady’s mom asked and it actually offended me. She didn’t say “if you don’t mind me asking,” or anything, she just flat out asked as if it was her business.

“Murder,” Dom said, almost proudly. “And drugs. He was a pretty high profile drug dealer back in the day.”

Silence.

I thought maybe she was making it up just to be ridiculous, but after looking at Hunter’s face I could tell that she was serious.

“What do you do for a living?” Brady’s dad asked, a little too loudly.

“I volunteer full time for a non-profit equal rights campaign.”

More silence. We all knew what “volunteer” meant. You know how most houses have some sort of sound to them? Like at my parent’s house you’ll always hear a TV on or my mom gossiping on the phone or something? This house was eerily quiet. I could almost hear his parents judging. 

“Did you go to college?” Brady’s mom asked.

“Nope. I think college is one huge Ponzi scheme designed to convince society that if they don’t go to college then they won’t be successful. I completely disagree with the whole business model,” Dom said, matter of factly.

I looked around and Brady and Hunter were looking down while the parents looked at each other incredulously.

“Do you think Hunter would have been able to get his wonderful job if he didn’t go to college?” Brady’s mom asked.

“Absolutely not. But only because society is conditioned to think that college makes you smarter, a quicker learner, a harder worker…”

“Well, it does,” Brady’s dad said.

“And blue collar workers can’t be hard workers?” Dom challenged.

“Of course they can, Dominique,” he said like she is five years old and I swear I saw her nostrils flare. “But only because they have to be. If they’d gone to college and got good grades like they were supposed to, they wouldn’t have to be blue collar workers.”

“Like they’re ‘supposed to,'” Dom snorted.

I looked around, appalled at the direction this conversation was going. Why wasn’t anyone else saying anything? Couldn’t Hunter at least defend his wife?

Luckily though, Brady’s mom said to Brady, “So how have you been, son?”

“Um, well,” Brady said with a start. We all waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t.

“Does anyone want tea?” Brady’s mom asked, standing up.

Hunter stood up too. “No thanks. Actually, we were going to go to the bar. Do you guys want to come?” He looked at Brady and me.

Brady looked to me for an answer and I nodded my head slightly so his parents didn’t know I was dying to get out of there.

“We’ll go,” Brady said.

Thank God. We all stood up and grabbed our coats and stuff in record time. We told the parents we would be back in a few hours and climbed into Hunter’s rental car and he started toward the bar.

“Your parents are so much worse than you described,” Dom said from the front seat.

“I’m sorry about that, baby,” Hunter replied.

“The only good thing about them is that they’ll leave you with a ton of money when they die.”

Have you guys ever seen that show Snapped? It’s a guilty pleasure of mine. They have a spin off series about killer couples and what Dom said reminded me of that show. I could totally see her talking Hunter into murdering his parents so they could collect the inheritance. I mean, she does have the murder gene from her dad.

We got to civilization and went to a practically empty divey bar, but I didn’t care. I just needed to drink. We ordered our drinks and sat down at a high top table. Brady and Hunter began having some sort of discussion, leaving me and Dom to sit there quietly. I wanted to break the silence, but I’m pretty sure she and I have absolutely nothing in common so I wasn’t sure what to say.

“Soo,” I started. “Let me see your ring!”

I figured since she had just gotten married and she was a girl, she would be dying to show it off. But she gave me a strange look.

“Hunter and I didn’t do rings.”

I wasn’t even going to ask why, but Dom kept going.

“Do you have any idea what it takes to get diamonds? Are you familiar with the diamond trade in Africa? Blood diamonds?”

I didn’t say anything.

“Do you know what people have to do to get diamonds? Children are mining diamonds to fund wars. People want diamonds because they think it shows status, but in actuality, they are just like any other rock. They aren’t worth anything.”

Ooookay.

“Hunter and I got matching tattoos. That’s more permanent and a thug can’t steal it.”

Alrighty then.

“Let me guess,” Dom said, scowling at me. “You want a huge diamond engagement ring that costs three of his monthly pay checks. You just look like that type.”

I don’t know how she got the impression that I’m some high maintenance priss when I was still in my travel attire: leggings, a Wildfox thermal and boots. 

“I’m not really that concerned about a ring,” I lied.

Dom rolled her eyes and didn’t say anything.

“So what kind of organization do you volunteer for?” I asked.

“We fight violations to human rights. Discrimination, prejudice, gender inequality, racism, sexism, trafficking… Not that you would know anything about that,” Dom said.

I know I probably should have stayed quiet, but I couldn’t. “Aren’t you kind of prejudging me right now? Isn’t that what you’re supposed to be fighting?”

“If this is the biggest violation to your rights then no, this is not what I’m supposed to be fighting.”

“Um, okay. Don’t you think it’s a little unfair to rank some people’s ‘violations’ ahead of others?”

Dom looked at me wildly. “No I don’t. People are being killed, raped, fired, harassed. Any of that happen to you?”

“No,” I said.

“That’s what I thought.”

She was actually really fucking rude so I turned my attention to Brady and didn’t talk to her again for the rest of the night.

Hunter and Dom dropped us off back at the house, but said they’d gotten a hotel. That was probably a good idea. When we got inside, Brady’s mom was surprisingly still up. She told us that she’d put our bags in our respective rooms so clearly we weren’t allowed to sleep together. Brady’s old bedroom was on the main floor in the center of the house right next to his parents’ room. It was exactly what you would expect from teenage Brady: solid colored linens, immaculate dresser/nightstand, and no art on the walls. Literally so boring.

Brady’s mom put my stuff in a guest bedroom with an attached bathroom in the basement. We all said goodnight and I took a long shower and got in bed. Since I was in the basement, I got absolutely no cell phone reception and I immediately got pissed at Brady’s mom because I know she did it on purpose. I laid there trying to fall asleep, but it was hard because I couldn’t surf Facebook or anything to pass the time. I started looking through all my pictures for a while, but I just couldn’t seem to doze off. I finally decided I would sneak to Brady’s room for a secret late night romp.

I crept upstairs in my ruffle shorts and cami, trying to be as stealthy as possible. The house was even more creepy at night when it was completely dark except the random sconces throughout. I thought I found Brady’s room, but suddenly I couldn’t remember which door was his and which one was his parents. They were literally right next to each other.

Finally I decided to just open the one I thought was his and hope for the best. Thank God I opened the right door. Can you imagine how I would have explained to his parents why I was trying to sneak in their room in the middle of the night?

Brady was tucked into bed looking all adorable, but sat up when I slid in.

“Hey. What’s up?” he said softly.

“I missed you,” I said, crawling into the bed with him. “And I wanted to send you a naughty picture, but your mom put me in a room with no reception. Rude.”

Brady smiled, pulling me close by my waist. “Mmhm. That’s the worst.”

We kissed for a minute and then I crawled on top of him. He was just wearing boxers which was perfect.

“I don’t think we should-” Brady started just as I leaned down to take him into my mouth. He obviously didn’t object anymore.

After I got him excited, I got back up and we had the quietest sex ever. Then I quietly crept out and went back down to the dungeon and passed out.

-I’ll post tomorrow about how the party went, I didn’t have time today. Bye!