I roll my eyes but laugh.
“Blythe, get over here on the girls’ side and cheer for Alexander the Red with me. James is going down like a little bitch!” Estelle has on a red flippy mini skirt, white tank, and white sneakers, and she’s drawn a small megaphone outline on her cheek with what I presume is eyeliner. She’s let her black hair grow a bit longer than usual so that it covers her ears and hits the back of her neck. For the first time in ages, she’s left it solid black without any sort of neon streak running through it.
“You’re seriously racing lobsters?” I ask.
“It’s our last night in Maine. Seems fitting,” James answers for her before screaming at his lobster, “Moses! C’mon, dude! Stop walking in circles, you moron!”
My brother’s cheeks are flushed, and I’m not sure if it’s from the apparent excitement over this lobster race or because Estelle is jumping up and down, flashing her black lace panties at him.
I go to Estelle’s side and try to copy her rather elaborate cheerleader moves. Given how slowly these lobsters are moving, I think I might have time to perfect this routine.
“Estelle, one more blatant leg kick like that, and I’m going to disqualify you,” Chris warns her.
She sticks out her tongue at him. “Fuck you! All is fair in lobsters and war!” Then, she turns her back to James and bends over, briefly flipping up her skirt.
“Estelle! God!” Eric groans, covering his eyes.
I’m about to ask where Sabin is, but just then, a skateboard appears from under Chris’s chair, and Sabin pops out from behind him.
“I will conquer you all!” he roars, gesturing to the lobster atop the skateboard rolling across the tile.
His contestant easily passes the other two lobsters that have thus far done nothing but veer off course. Estelle and James scream in protest, but Sabin is already bounding after his lobster that has soared through the finish line and continued into the dining room.
“No way! Chris, tell him that’s cheating!” James demands.
Chris jumps down from the chair and throws up his hands. “Estelle said it. It seems, all is fair in lobsters and war. We never actually said skateboards weren’t allowed.” He walks toward Sabin and high-fives him, entwining their fingers, before giving him a hug and patting his back.
Sabin makes a crazy swoon face as he grabs Chris by the waist and lifts him up, causing the two of them to stumble across the floor. “Older brothers are the bestest ever,” he singsongs.
“No, older brothers suck!” Estelle stomps her foot and rescues her lobster from the potential Chris-Sabin stampede. “For failing me,” she informs Alexander, “you will be steamed and eaten by the enemy.” She turns to Sabin, offering him her losing contestant. “He’s all yours.”
“Gladly, my darling sister.” Sabin sets Chris back on the floor and makes lobster claws with his hands, pinching his way toward Estelle.
James strides to Estelle with Moses in one hand and the other beckoning her. “Come here, missy. I think Moses belongs to you then, tail meat and all.”
She crosses her arms but steps into him and takes the lobster. “Given that you are not one of my nasty brothers, I accept. Besides,” she says as she walks to the stove, “I always did like your tail.”
The rest of the boys let out a raucous, “Oh!” as James grabs Alexander and Sabin’s lobster and meets Estelle by the boiling pots.
Eric catches my eye, and I smile. There might be hope for James and Estelle after all.
As far as I know, they haven’t touched each other all summer. Not that I want lurid details, but I’ve been hoping that they’d find their way back together. I never thought Estelle would voluntarily retile a bathroom either, so stranger things have happened for sure.
I watch her and James for a moment, and I bite my lip when he slips an arm around her waist. I know that she went to therapy last year, but the conversation she and I had about it involved her narrowing her eyes and speaking in an Austrian accent.
“And how has your hideous childhood impacted your psychological and sexual functioning?”
That was followed by oversharing in a typical Estelle fashion.
“I haven’t had sex since I nailed your brother in the hammock last summer. So, how do you think I’m doing? I mean, I’m not getting rope burns in weird places, but I am buying stock in batteries, okay? An abstinent woman cannot have enough vibrators, right?”
I’m not sure how long the self-imposed abstinence will continue, but the truth is, it’s good for her. She spiraled into such a weird dysfunctional place with men and then started to pull my brother into it. It seems very unlike her not to be getting laid every chance she gets, but James seems willing to wait. I haven’t heard him mention any girls from college, so his tie to Estelle must run deeper than I know. For that, I’m glad.
“B, where’s my potato salad? And my coleslaw? And my corn on the cob?” Sabin’s voice booms through the kitchen as he exaggeratedly rubs his hands over his stomach. “Sabin be hungry! Sabin need eats!”
I grab his hand and drag him to the fridge. “Hold out your hands. You can carry the salads to the table, and I’ll wrap the corn in foil for the grill, okay?”
Sabin diligently takes the oversize containers and grunts. “Is good, Blythe. Sabin like woman feed me. More dead animal, less vegetable.”
