He slid out of the booth and stood to face the two newcomers. He extended his hand to shake each of theirs in turn. “Hi, there. I’m Jet.”
“Hi, Jet. I’m Ginny, and this here is Dax.”
Jet indicated the booth bench he’d just vacated. “Please, join us.”
“I don’t want to interrupt a family lunch.”
“No! Seriously! You have to! I mean, it would be the awesomest. Like, ever!” Mila piped in.
Jet laughed and slid into the booth seat next to his sister. “I hear no objections. Please join us.”
“Well, all right, then. Thank you.”
“How do you know my name?” Mila asked, before the two had even gotten completely settled in their seats.
Ginny laughed. “Well, you jumped straight to it. Okay. To make a long story short, I found out about your family when I was doing genealogy research. I wanted to find out more about where I came from, and this is where I landed.”
Jet’s eyes widened. “Wait a second. Are you saying that every time I’ve denied the two of us were related, I was lying to the interviewer?”
She shrugged, a twinkle in her eye. “Guess you should’ve prefaced it with, ‘to the best of my knowledge.’”
“Oh my gosh. I can’t believe we’re really related!”
Ginny turned to Mila. “Well, it’s distantly, sweetie. Our great-great grandfathers were brothers. I wish it was closer. You seem like a real doll. But, yes, we’re related.”
Mila’s eyes shot open wide and she clasped her hands together. “Oh my gosh. You have to come over for dinner. You have to meet my other brothers!” She turned to Jet. “And we can invite Ella and Gen, too.”
“Their girlfriends,” Jet explained to Ginny, then turned to Mila. “But, slow down, kid. You don’t even know how long they’re in town.”
“We do have to get on the road tomorrow, unfortunately,” Ginny said. “But if it can happen tonight, we’ll be there.” She and Dax intertwined their fingers on the tabletop.
“Oh, it can happen tonight,” Mila stated, conviction providing a steel structure for her words. “Believe me, I will make it happen tonight.”
Ginny laughed. “I like this girl,” she said, a wide grin splitting her face.
“Oh, man,” Mila said, “I just realized– Grandmother Valentine is out of town. I know she would’ve loved to meet you. She’s really into finding out more about our family, too.”
“Well,” Ginny said. “Funny you should mention that. She and I have actually been exchanging messages on Ancestry.com. She was the one who suggested that Dax and I swing through town when we had a chance.”
Jet shook his head. “I don’t know why it surprises me that she’s been talking to you, or that she never mentioned it. Neither one of those things should come as a shock at all.”
Ginny grinned. “She’s a real pistol, that one.”
Jet laughed. “You don’t know the half of it.”
Mila jumped in. “So, it’s set, though? The dinner? Tonight?”
Jet nodded. “It’s set, kid.”
Ginny said, “I can’t wait to meet everybody. It’s going to be a real treat.” She opened her menu and perused the choices. “Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, I’m starving. Let’s eat!”