38 Meeting the Family

When they finally arrived, Emily was surprised how quickly the time had passed as they laughed and talked about random things. Justin's sense of humor was actually really similar to hers. How had she never noticed that before?

She supposed she should have guessed after he teased her with that Pepe le Pew shirt last Christmas. That kind of gift could only come from someone with an odd sense of humor.

"My mom can be a little exuberant," he warned as they got out of the car. "Don't let her scare you."

Scare her? It would take a lot to scare her. She was about to say so when the door swung open and a petite redheaded woman grabbed Justin, who was almost two full heads taller than her, and practically lifted him off the ground in a hug.

"Oh, my baby! It's so good to see you! Are you eating okay? You look so thin!"

Emily stifled a laugh when she heard Justin referred to as 'baby' and saw how completely mortified he looked. A little exuberant indeed.

"Moooooom," he protested.

The woman released him after mussing his hair and her whole face lit up when she turned to the stranger on the doorstep. Justin desperately tried to fix what she had messed up behind her back.

"You must be Emily! It's so nice to meet you!" Emily was surprised when she hugged her nearly as tightly as she hugged her son. "Come in, come in! Everyone's been waiting for you two!"

"Justiiiiiiiiin!" Two blurs launched themselves at him, knocking him to the ground as she looked on in shock.

"Hey, guys," he grunted under the combined weight of his younger cousins. "Can you get off me please?"

"No," they said in tandem, grinning at him.

The laugh Emily had been holding back bubbled out. In that moment those two seemed exactly like Samantha.

Speak of the devil. "Hi, Emily!"

Emily turned and saw the girl she assumed was Justin's girlfriend leaning against the door frame. "Hey, Samantha."

"Sam, please," the girl insisted. "My whole family calls me Sam so it'd be weird if you didn't since you're here for Thanksgiving."

Sam was how Justin referred to her. That wouldn't be a problem.

"Sam it is."

Sam walked over to Justin, who was still prone on the floor. "Get up, loser. We're going to give her the grand tour."

"Yes, ma'am," Justin saluted before brushing himself off and standing up. He grabbed the girls who had knocked him to the floor around the shoulders so he was like the middle of a sandwich. "You two have gotten a lot taller, you know that? You weren't able to knock me over last time."

"I've been drinking lots of milk," the smaller one, who was probably Kaitlyn, said proudly.

Sam took the lead, showing Emily the living room, dining room, and everyone's bedrooms. Lily and Kaitlyn shared a room but Lily confided that as soon as Sam went to college she would be taking over her sister's room. In response to this Sam only rolled her eyes.

Once the tour was done Emily was introduced to Justin's dad, who had run to the store for some last minute items needed for the feast the next day, and his aunt, who had been at work. They were very friendly and welcoming. She felt a lot more at ease spending the holiday with a bunch of strangers than she had before coming.

Rhonda asked Justin to drive Lily to the pool for her evening swim practice and Emily got up to go with them but Sam held her back. "Stay and hang out with me! I want to get to know you better since we didn't hang out much this summer."

Emily shot pleading eyes at Justin to save her but was ignored because he was too preoccupied with making sure Lily grabbed her drier swimsuit (she had multiple practices a day). So the only person she really knew left without her. Sam linked arms with her and steered her towards her room. Sitting cross-legged on the bed, she began her interrogation.

"So I assume you broke up with that jerk."

"How did you—"

"You wouldn't be here if you hadn't," Sam said simply. "Your plans were originally with him, right? Justin never would have asked you here if he wasn't trying to cheer you up. He's too passive."

Emily eyed her skeptically. "You're very perceptive."

"I know," the other girl cheerfully replied. "So…what do you think of good old Justin? Did you guys even talk on the way up here? He's not exactly a chatterbox."

What did she think of Justin? She was definitely surprised at how much he had come out of his shell around her since he found her on the stairs and took care of her until she felt better.

"He's the nicest person I've ever met," she said truthfully. "And we actually talked almost the whole time. He's surprisingly hilarious."

"My cousin? Hilarious?" Sam was appalled. "Are you sure you haven't been talking to an alien that looks like him?"

She shook her head with a smile. "I'm serious. I recently discovered that his sense of humor is almost exactly the same as mine. We spent part of the drive talking about old memes we loved that died off and we liked a lot of the same ones."

"Justin…knows memes? But he never understands the ones I send!" Sam pouted. "Not fair."

"There is a bit of a generational difference," Emily explained. "I have a sister about your age and I have no idea which memes she's on about most of the time. I've become an old person who doesn't know high schooler slang anymore."

"Alright, I see your point. But as far as I know Justin was never all that into pop culture. Bands, TV shows, popular movies…whenever I quote something at him he has no one what I'm talking about. The boy's head is nothing but code."

Emily's brow furrowed. She might have believed that before they had started talking more but the Justin she was coming to know was at least partly pop culture literate.

He and Sam were close. Did he just not watch the same things as his cousin? Or had he only gotten into it recently?

No, that couldn't be right…they had been talking about popular memes that were up to five years old. That must have been before Sam was old enough to be versed in internet culture.