“Hellooooo!” I exclaim. “Wow, what a drive. What was that, like, fourteen hours in the car? You’re right, I look good for someone who’s been traveling for so long.”

“Who’s that?” Dad jerks his chin toward Hall, who has acquired sunglasses. He’s swaggering up behind me, profile swung toward the dying sun in a way that shows off his bone structure. He’s doing that frowny-squinty thing that men do on red carpets, where they’re trying to look Serious but actually look Constipated.

“That’s my date,” I purr.

“Your date?” Athena repeats incredulously, cutting between our parents to emerge on the porch. “You brought a date to Christmas?”

“Well, why wouldn’t I?” I huff. Then I stare at Mom, whose face has colored, fingertips pressing against her mouth. “What?”

“It’s just . . .” She drops her hands, and her eyes are filled with tears. It’s because she’s so happy to see me. And so proud. Then a hysterical laugh bobs out of her throat. “Honey, what are you wearing?”

“It’s wearing her, more like,” Felix observes from somewhere behind Dad. They’re trickling out onto the porch, gawking at us. There is good gawking and bad gawking, which I should know.

“It’s a Halloween costume,” Dad guesses, which clinches this as bad gawking. It’s bullshit, if you ask me. I’m wearing a queen’s dress! An actual queen! And I’ve got twenty-first-century hair and makeup, which means I’m pulling off this look. Bloody Mary could never. “Where’d you two meet?”

“Baseball,” I say, as Hall replies, “Whole Foods.” We both groan. Dad’s confused, but he isn’t a big talker so he drops it.

“Did you take a limo all the way from LAX after you flew in from Hawaii?” Kaia asks casually.

“That’d cost a fortune in gas,” Athena’s husband murmurs.

“Money is no object,” I begin, but Grandma’s verdict catches my ear:

“Limousines are tacky.”

Beside me, Hall deflates. I mean that literally. He goes all flat, and I can hear the air whizz out of him like a punctured bouncy castle. He keels over onto his back in the dead December grass, thoroughly two-dimensional. My family screams and screams and screams.

*

“No matter what she says,” I warn Hall as we descend in our hot-air balloon, “don’t make yourself flat again. They didn’t much care for that. And remember: we met when our pedal boats bumped into each other on Echo Park Lake. You were instantly smitten. I had other boyfriends on the back burner, but you won me over on our first date by hiring Gordon Ramsay to cook me a personal pan pizza.”

We’ve spun back the clock again and, this time around, we’re in matching tuxedoes that glitter like disco balls. We’re also in top hats, which I’ve decided to bring back in style. A scarlet birdcage veil wafts from the brim of mine, studded with tiny crystals.

“Hello, relatives!” I boom through a megaphone as the hot air balloon makes contact with the front yard. Mom, Dad, Grandma, Grandpa, Kaia, Felix, Athena, their spouses, and however many nieces and nephews I have (after five, one stops keeping track) gather on the lawn to gape at me.