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“About what?” Erick asked. “Clover told us off. She didn’t shoot at us. Has no one ever told you all off before? If not, might I recommend acquiring a teenage daughter? You can borrow mine. Do you think we should put the turkey away first? Nah. It’ll be fine.”
“I, for one, am happy to hear you aren’t her real boyfriend,” Val said. “I cannot believe my own daughter lied to me about dating you.”
“She lied about dating me. I mean, she lied about not dating me. She is dating me. Or was,” Erick corrected. “She might have just dumped me. Hoping she’ll change her mind about that. But yes, until five minutes ago I was her real boyfriend. On Sunday she asked me to pretend to be her boyfriend but things got serious fast. I’m crazy about her. Even more crazy about her now.” He stopped and laughed. “Man, this has been a wild week. Can’t wait to tell Ruthie about it.”
“A horrible week,” Kelly said, finally speaking again.
“Buck up, little soldier,” Erick said as draped kitchen towels over the food to keep any flies away. “You all got off easy from what I saw.”
“Easy?” Kelly asked, staring at him wide-eyed. “You call that easy?”
“Every last one of you has been horrible to Clover since walking in the front door. Snide, judgmental, passive-aggressive and mean. I don’t know why or where this is coming from, but I’ve known Clover for about a year and I know this—she doesn’t deserve that kind of treatment. Nobody does. What does it say that your own sister asked a man to pretend to be her boyfriend just so she wouldn’t have to put up with nosy questions about her personal life today? I think it says she doesn’t like or trust her own family. She obviously loves you all, otherwise she wouldn’t take your insults so personally. But she doesn’t like you. I don’t like you all, either.”
“The feeling is entirely mutual,” Val said.
“Fine.” Erick shrugged again. “I think I’ll survive. Coats are in the office. Let’s get out of here.”
“No way,” Hunter said. “No way in hell am I leaving this house until my sister apologizes.”
“You are leaving this house,” Erick said as he pulled on his jacket. “And you’re leaving it right now. First of all, Clover told you to leave. Second, she has nothing to apologize for. You all started this fight. Don’t get pissed because she finished what you all started. Third, we really did fuck right where you’re sitting.”
“This is disgraceful,” Val said.
“I didn’t start any fight.” Hunter did stand up but he didn’t make any move to put on his coat and leave. Erick shook his head and willed himself not to put Hunter out of his misery. Men. “And I am not leaving.”
“You said to your sister’s face, ‘I had no idea your business was worth anything.’ Those are fighting words to me,” Erick said. “You want me to walk into your office and say, ‘So you actually have a real job, huh? Didn’t think you’d amount to anything, Hunter.’ You’d punch me right in the face if I said that to you, and you’d have every right to.”
“I didn’t...I didn’t mean it like that.”
“You said to your sister that you thought her business was worthless, and you were shocked when you found out it was valuable. Yes, you meant it. Yes, she was hurt by that. And yes, those were fighting words. If you make me throw you out of this house, I will do it.”
“I’d like to see you try, buddy,” Hunter said, pulling himself up to his full height.
“You might have been intimidating in high school,” Erick said. “You look like you were one of those guys who threw freshmen into lockers. But this isn’t high school. One of us has been working a desk job too long and the other one of us builds houses and decks for a living so... I know who I’d put my money on.”
“Man, you are asking for it, aren’t you?” Hunter demanded, his face getting redder.
“I am asking you to do what your sister said, and leave. I am not asking you to take a swing at me, but if you want to, go ahead. You’ll miss and I’ll have to hurt you. I don’t want to but I will. I’m a contractor. I can put you through that wall, patch the hole and put cedar shingle siding on after. This house would look great with cedar siding so...go ahead, give me a job to do.”
“Hunter, don’t you dare start a fight,” Lisa said, coming to stand between Hunter and Erick. “This is ridiculous. Erick is right. You all are rude to Clover. I’ve seen it with my own eyes more times than I can remember. You’re bitter and jealous and I don’t know why.”
“We are not jealous,” Kelly said. “Why would I be jealous of her?”
“No idea,” Lisa said. “But you called me and talked me into leaving the girls with my sister for the day because you were mad Clover doesn’t comment on all the pics you post of your children online. You said to me two days ago, ‘If she doesn’t care about our kids, why should we bring them to her house?’ I can’t believe I let you talk me into your petty little payback just because Clover’s too busy to spend all day on Facebook validating your life choices.”
“Oh, shit,” Erick said. “Where is Jerry Springer when we need him? If someone’s about to throw a chair, I want to record it. Where’s my phone?”
“This is all so easy for you to say,” Val said. “You’re not the one who spent fifty thousand dollars sending that girl to college only to watch her quit school in the last year to sell tulips for a living.”
“Now we’re getting somewhere,” Erick said. “You know college is a means to an end, right? The end being getting a good job. She got a good job without graduating and is now worth a lot of money. I get it.” Erick pointed at Val and shook his finger. “You’re mad because you thought she’d fail and go back to school, but she didn’t, which proves she didn’t need your help. Do you want your children to be dependent on you their entire lives? Is that why you’re mad?”
“Fifty thousand dollars and she flushed that education right down the toilet,” David said.
“Oh, yeah, poor Clover,” Erick said. “She’ll be worth five million dollars by Monday night, but yeah, I can see she really wasted her education.”
“I raised three children and went to school at night for eight
years to get my degree,” Val said. “We handed her a college education on a platter and she threw it in our faces.”
