I’m not exactly sure what to do here. Mawmaw Barb’s not like my mother, but her directness is as unnerving as my mother’s inappropriate rambling. I catch Marco’s eye as he peeks from behind his great-grandmother. He sticks his tongue out at me to drive her point home.

“I’m Cat,” I say a little too loudly. “I work with Daniel.”

She shoots Daniel the side eye. “Do you now? Well, come on in and get comfortable. I hope you’re hungry ’cause we got more food than a rooster has tail feathers.”

Daniel winks at me—another famous Mathis family saying.

“Yes, ma’am. I’m starved.” The lemon meringue at lunch has put my blood sugar in a nosedive, and I can smell a dozen fragrant dishes emanating from the kitchen behind her.

Daniel and I help carry several dishes of food out to the table where Brittni is waiting with her phone glued to one ear. “No, I said a date. You know what? Let me call you back.”

She tucks her phone into the back pocket of her impossibly skinny jeans and glares at Daniel. “Why didn’t you text me back yesterday?”

“I was working.”

She looks at me. “Cute new girl at the café and suddenly you’re too good for your cousin? Is that it?”

For the first time, I see Daniel blush. “And y’all wonder why I don’t bring anyone home for dinner.”

“I’m just playing. I did need that ride though.”

I feel bad as it dawns on me that Daniel was ignoring a text from a family member in need because he was listening to me spill my guts over all this weirdness with my mom. “I’m sorry,” I pipe up. “I think that was my fault.”

She smiles at me, and I can feel the sun in it. “Don’t worry about it. I just like to give him a hard time. Carlo picked me up.”

“You know I don’t like you seeing him,” Daniel says under his breath.

“You should answer your phone then,” she shoots back.

Before he can respond, the women from the kitchen all file into the dining room. Mawmaw Barb stands at the head of the table. “Everyone take hands for the Our Father.”

Even Uncle Charlie and Victor shuffle over for that, and she blesses the food. “Amen.” She drops the twins’ hands and takes a seat. “Eat up now. There’s a second wave coming in an hour or so.”

“Second wave?” I look at Daniel.

“More people,” he says. “Probably my cousins Bernard and Andy, Little Steph, and Emily. And my aunt Wanda and uncle Beau. And who knows who else.”

“How many aunties do you have?” I ask, trying to keep it all straight.