Wyatt’s wifeBecca had made pot roast. The good kind, with the carrots soft enough to fall apart and the potatoes browned on top because she knew Wyatt liked them that way. Dawson sat at the table between Ethan and the empty chair where their mom usually sat. She and Dad were in Green Bay for the weekend, visiting their aunt.
Becca watched him push a potato around his plate. “You gonna eat that or just rearrange it?”
“I’m eating.”
“You’re not.” She pointed her fork at him. “Eat.”
Dawson put a forkful in his mouth and chewed while she watched. She nodded once, satisfied, and turned back to her own plate.
Ethan reached across Dawson for the salt. “Becca, this is better than Mom’s. Don’t tell her I said that.”
“Your mom’s pot roast is dry, and you all know it.” Becca tucked a napkin onto her lap. “I love her, but that woman overcooks everything.”
“She really does,” Dawson said.
Wyatt pointed his fork at all three of them. “Nobody’s telling her that.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Ethan said, already salting his plate for the second time.
Wyatt carved another slice of roast and passed it to Ethan without being asked. “So what happened with that girl? Lauren?”
“Lindsey.” Ethan took the roast. “Nothing happened.”
“Nothing happened, or you don’t want to talk about it?”
“Both.”
Becca caught Dawson’s eye across the table and raised her eyebrows. He almost smiled. Wyatt pressed for two more questions before Becca put her hand on his arm and said, “Leave him alone,” and Wyatt did because Wyatt always listened to Becca, even when he didn’t listen to anyone else.
The conversation moved to the shop. A trucking company out of Sheboygan wanted to contract their fleet maintenance, and Wyatt had been going back and forth on the numbers. Ethan thought the money was worth the headache. Wyatt thought they weren’t set up for it. They’d had this argument twice at the garage already. Dawson ate his pot roast and let them go.
“What do you think?” Wyatt asked.
Dawson looked up. Both brothers were watching him. “We’re not set up for semis. Not in the current shop.”
“So we expand,” Ethan said.
“Or we service on-site in Sheboygan. Less overhead.” Dawson shrugged. “Either way, Ethan’s not wrong about the money. But we can’t take it on as-is.”
Ethan threw a roll at him. Dawson caught it and took a bite.
After dinner, Becca tried to stand to clear the table, and all three of them said “Sit down” at the same time. She dropped back into her chair with her hands up. “Fine. But the leftovers go in the glass containers, not the plastic. Wyatt, I mean it.”
“I know.”
“You say that, and then I find pot roast in a Cool Whip tub.”
“There’s nothing wrong with reusing a perfectly good container.”
“There’s BPAs in the plastic, Wyatt. I sent you the article.”
“You sent me four articles.”
“And you didn’t read any of them.”
Dawson ran the water and started on the dishes. Ethan dried. Wyatt packed up the leftovers—in the glass containers—and wiped down the table. They moved around the kitchen without talking, the same way they moved around the garage, each one filling the gap the others left. Ethan flicked water at Dawson. Dawson shouldered him into the counter. Wyatt told them both to grow up while he wrapped the leftover rolls in foil.
Becca watched from the table with her feet up on the chair Dawson had been sitting in, hands resting on her belly. “I love you, idiots.”
