Chapter 1
LAPD Community Police Team Officer Joe Scarbino stared at his computer screen. Statistics from crime analysis for the neighborhood were on it but he wasn’t looking at the dull data.
His mind was elsewhere.
Joe imagined several scenarios in his mind.
‘Hi, Mom…Dad…this is my husband-to-be.’
‘You can’t marry him! He’s a man!’
‘Uh…Dad? I know he’s a man.’
“They know he’s a man.”
“Huh?” Officer Starling Abuda asked. She was sitting near him at her own computer.
Joe snapped into the present and rubbed his face. “I’m just stressing over my parents meeting Jeremy.”
“They’ll be fine.” Star waved at him dismissively. She was a trans-individual, and had made the transition late in her life, so Star was sort of manly.
She, and his two supervisors were invited to his and Jeremy’s wedding this weekend. But, his sergeant and lieutenant weren’t coming. Star was, with a guest.
The wedding venue was in Paradise, California, at Mark Antonious Richfield’s estate. The guests coming from Los Angeles had help with the commercial airline tickets.
Jeremy’s parents were footing the bill for the celebration along with Jeremy himself.
“Are you sure you don’t mind staying at a hotel?”
“Why should I mind?” Star asked.
“Fuck, I’m nervous.” Joe shook off his arms at the shoulders, trying to calm down.
“Cold feet?”
“No. Nervous stomach.” Joe rubbed his belly under his Kevlar vest.
“Want an antacid tablet?” Starling opened her desk drawer and offered one.
“Yes. No.” Joe didn’t know.
Star chuckled at him and kept working.
Joe patted his pockets for his phone and sent his fiancé a text, ‘I’m dyin.’
‘why you dyin?’
Joe made a face to himself and said, “Gaaak!”
~
Jeremy read his phone while he and his mother, Margaret Runner, went over menu details with his and his parents’ chef. Hazel cooked for him and Joe, and Lee prepared meals for Margaret and Bernie, his folks. Both cooks were coming to the estate to help Mark’s chef, Sierra.
Margaret, sitting at her kitchen table with them, pointed to a menu. “I assume these can be prepared ahead of time…”
“Yes,” Lee said.
Jeremy stood from the table and made his way to his parents’ living room. They had a beautiful home in Westwood, and the interior was modern, light, jazzy- with local abstract art on the walls.
He called Joe.
“Hey,” Joe answered.
“Are you okay?” Jeremy knew Joe was anxious about his family.
“I got agita.”
Jeremy smiled. “Okay…”
“What if…”
“What if?” Jeremy walked closer to the front window. Topiary plants in pots lined the pathway to the front door. His silver Audi was parked in the driveway.
“Uhhh…we’re flying there when?”
“Today is Thursday…” Jeremy spoke slowly, “So we’re flying to Paradise tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow…tomorrow.”
“Joe? Take a deep breath.”
He heard Joe inhale. He waited. “Joe? Exhale!”
Joe blew out a breath and coughed.
Jeremy pictured him in his mind; his handsome face, dark hair and eyes and coarse five o’clock shadow. “Babe? What’s going on? Things will be just fine. Calm down.”
“I can’t breathe.”
“Why don’t you take the rest of the day off? Huh? Come to mom’s place. We’re just going over a few minor details with Lee and Hazel.”
“Okay.”
Jeremy glanced back at the kitchen.
“No. Maybe I should stay for the day.”
Jeremy chuckled as Joe waffled.
“No…I’ll come by. I mean. I’m getting married this weekend. My sergeant knows…I mean, we invited him. I wonder why he’s not going?”
“Joe?” Jeremy tried not to laugh, because he knew his goofy man was anxious. “You do what you need to do. They’ll get it.”
“Jeremy?”
“Yeah?”
“What do I need to do?”
Jeremy cracked up laughing and sat on the couch. “Why don’t you come here?”
“Yes. I’ll come there.”
