Straight 'A' Student

Chapter 49

In the time leading up to Thanksgiving, the couples were mostly working, throwing in a few hangouts here and there to break up the monotony. As far as any traveling was concerned, only Josie and Shawn's families were coming out for the holiday since their engagement party was only two days after. Back in Texas, Joshua and Eleanor were hosting their families and Taylor and Jared were hosting their families at Jared's home.

Avery looked up from her phone as Wayne returned from the bathroom then got in bed beside her.

"I should go soon, my mom and sister's flight land in a couple hours" she said as he pulled her closer and kissed her neck.

"Great, so you have time. Whatever happened to them coming a week ago?"

"My sister had something come up so they decided to just come for a couple days before Thanksgiving".

"Your dad didn't come?"

"He's not my biggest fan right now".

"I'm sorry, I'm sure it sucks".

"It's whatever, I don't really want to talk about it. I'm gonna shower before I leave" she said then rolled out of bed to do just that.

By the time she got back to the house, no one was home. She spent the time cleaning and preparing for Deloris and Michelle to stay for a couple days.
The last couple of weeks have been rough. A few grueling mediation sessions with Darren and their lawyers. Almost everything she threw out, he denied and disagreed with. By the end of it, the only thing about the proposal he was willing to change was that she could keep her car, although it made the settlement go up to 8K since he paid the deposit to get it in the first place. She knew she wouldn't get anywhere arguing and she needed the car so she agreed. Since then, they haven't spoken and were just waiting to hear that the divorce had been made official by the state.

"Hi, honey" Deloris said as she wrapped Avery up in a warm hug.

"Hi, mom. Thank you for coming, both of you" she said as she hugged Michelle as well.

"Yea, glad we could make it".

"Um anyone hungry, I was thinking we could stop for lunch".

"Sounds great. Let's go" Deloris agreed with Avery's suggestion. They made it to a burger place and found a table after placing their orders at the register.
"How've you been?" Her mom asked.

"You know. Just work and home, well Summer's".

"Still haven't heard from Darren?"

"No and I don't think I will".

"What about his family?" Michelle asked.

"Amy is trashing me online. His mother sent a very angry text basically calling me a whore and saying I was never good enough for him".

"That's terrible. I'm so sorry, honey".

"I don't blame them" Avery shrugged "I'm just ready to move my life along instead of just beating myself up. I know I should've handled it so much differently, but I didn't and there's nothing I can do now".

"That's true. You've been doing okay with apartment searching?"

"Yea. I have a few places lined up for tomorrow".

"Good. That'll be a good first step" Deloris reached across the table to squeeze her hand and added an endearing smile.

///

Connor and Summer were spending the day together. It was her reset day, so new nails, hair appointment, waxing and eyebrows and Connor decided to just tag along. He sat in the waiting room of the salon, she was getting her eyebrows done now then they were getting food to end the day. He was scrolling through reels until his screen was interrupted with a call from Taylor.