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1
MITCHELL
"You did what?"
A silence crackled down the line before my older brother's voice came through the cell phone I had on speaker, resting carefully on my chest.
"I entered you into a radio contest giveaway, Mitchell," he explained matter-of-factly, as if it wasn't the most embarrassing, sad, and pathetic thing that had ever happened to me.
I wiggled on the sofa to sit up a little. It wasn't easy, considering I was balancing both my cell phone and a half-eaten tub of strawberry cheesecake Häagen-Dazs on my belly—and keeping said ice cream within the required scooping belly-to-mouth range. Oh, and also simultaneously trying to reduce the volume on the remote control that dangled just a tiny bit too far for my toes to reach on the coffee table in front of me.
And they say men can't multi-task.
I had to contend with all of this while trying to process the latest crazy shenanigan my older brother had gotten into.
Except unlike his spur-of-the-moment, last-minute skydiving vacation to New Zealand or his super-clichéd party weekend in Vegas—where, yes, he got drunk, married a stranger and woke up naked with said stranger in Cabo having absolutely zero recollection of how they had gotten there—this off-the-wall adventure hit a lot closer to home.
It involved me.
And the thing that I sucked the most at in the world.
Relationships.
"Mitch, you're my baby brother. You know how much I love you. It kills me to see the shitty luck you have with men. So…"
I scooped up a generously heaped spoon of ice cream and brought the cold, creamy goodness to my mouth as my calamity of a dating life flashed before my eyes. I took a bite and closed my eyes.
Aah, ice cream really does cure all ails.
The sugar rush helped me mentally brace for whatever the next words to spill out of Jed's mouth would be. With him, conversations would very often splinter into a million different, almost always completely unforeseen, directions. Meanwhile, I continued wiggling my foot, inching it closer to the volume button on the remote.
"So, I was driving back from the plant this afternoon…" That would be our family's cowbell manufacturing plant. We were the largest producer of cowbells and other bovine-related products in the country...but that's a story for another time. "And I was listening to '90s hour on KRLX92 because you know how much I love my '90s jams, man."
I smiled. I did. Jed was a total '90s music and pop culture nerd.
Right at that moment, my persistence finally paid off with my big toe successfully landing on the volume button. I was able to turn the sound down enough to still hear a little of what was happening on my favorite show in the background, while keeping my ears pricked and standing at attention as Jed continued rambling, taking the scenic route on our way to What The Fuck Have You Done-sville.
"So, as you can imagine, I was on a bit of a high comin’ off a stellar early '90s mellow RnB triple combo of Toni Braxton, Salt-n-Pepa, and Janet."
No last name needed. He was a Janet Jackson-head, big time.
"Jed." I inhaled another heaped mouthful of Euro-heavenly ice cream. "Your point. Please." I tried to inject some venom, a bit of bite into my tone, but yeah, it only drew a snicker from him.
He knew it.
I knew it.
I didn’t have a mean or menacing bone in my body.
"Before they cut to commercial, they mentioned a giveaway the station was doing."
I listened intently.
Well, as intently as I could considering the heartbreak unfolding on the screen in front of me, albeit now at a much lower volume. But you didn’t need sound to see the anguish the woman was going through, the heartache flushed across her red cheeks and tear-soaked eyes.
Her husband pensively wrapped his arm around her, but it was a classic I’m only doing this because we’re on TV, and I don’t want to appear to be the cold-blooded asshole that I actually am in real life move. He didn’t really love her. Behind them, their living room was filled to the brim with books and boxes, every last nook and cranny filled with something, anything.
"Mitchell."
