My phone lights up with a text from my mom.
Mom
Hi darling.Dad wants to start earljer tonight, so cam ypu be by at 5pm?
Thank, love.Xxx
Looks like she’s lost her glasses again.I let her know I’ll be there, finish my lunch, and swipe the crumbs off my seat and onto the road.
Finally, the sun breaks through the clouds, and I slip on my sunglasses so I don’t have to make eye contact with anyone who’s pissed me off today.Then, I head back out to set things straight with young Ned and put him out of his misery.
The “For Sale”sign in my parents’ front lawn feels like it’s been hammered through my chest.It’s not just the thought of saying goodbye to the house my brothers and I grew up in that sets me off-kilter.Whoever set the real estate sign couldn’t even get the damn thing straight.I head over to give it a few kicks with my boot until it’s properly angled.
Who the hell came up with the slogan:Let’s hit another HOME run?
Awful.Doesn’t even make sense.What does baseball have to do with selling houses?
I head up the path and push my spare key into the lock.The door pops open without me turning the key, and my frown deepens.
“Who is it?”Mom sings from the kitchen as I step into the hallway and lock the door behind me.
“A drug dealer high on meth who’s come to rob you,” I say as I walk over to her.
She catches my waist with both arms and presses her head into my chest.“Poor drug dealer won’t get much out of me.”With a smile, she lets me go.
Dad strides into the room wearing his “uniform”—blue jeans, a grunge-band T-shirt tucked into a nylon belt, and bright white sneakers.My old man is firmly stuck in the 90s.
While I catch up with them about my busy week, Mom finishes arranging a platter of cheddar cubes, peppered salami slices, and crackers.When she’s done, I carry it into the living room, where Dad’s projector is already aimed at the pull-down screen—his favorite toy aside from his CD burner.
“We doing old family movies again tonight?”I ask, flopping onto the brown leather couch.No one loves nostalgic home movies more than Old Man Davis.
“Nope,” Dad replies with a smirk, then offers me a beer.
I twist open the cap while Mom sits beside me and glances at her watch.“Grayson should be here soon, so I’ll let Wyatt know to expect our call,” she says, squinting at her phone as she taps out a message to my youngest brother.He’s somewhere out west, I think—Wyatt’s impossible to keep track of, no matter how hard I try.
I assumed this was just a casual catch-up, not a family meeting.“What’s going on?”
The rattling of the front doorknob interrupts her response.Dad jumps up from his recliner.“That should be unlocked.”
“No, it really shouldn’t,” I say.Does no one in this house care about their own safety?
Dad strides over to the hallway, stepping back in with Gray still in his veterinary scrubs.My younger brother brushes rain droplets off his messy caramel hair.
“Sorry I’m late,” he says, bending to give Mom a hug before plonking down beside me.“I had to put down a cat with renal failure.”
“Aww, poor thing,” Mom replies over the tone of a ringing video call.“Everyone say hi to Wyatt!”She holds up her phone.I lift up my beer to my little brother’s smiling face, his scruffy hair stuffed under a baseball cap.Looks like he’s in a bar, leaning against a stack of speakers.
“Are you gonna tell us why we’re all here?”I ask Mom and Dad.Gray elbows me, and I elbow him back.There’s no sense beating around the bush.If there’s something wrong, we need to know what it is.
Dad points his remote at the projector.“Your mother and I want to show you something.”
Mom lets out a little squeal as she faces her phone to the screen so Wyatt can see.
“Sweet ceiling fan, Mom.Is that new?”Wyatt quips, and Mom lowers her phone.Gray doesn’t even notice that his beer has left a ring of condensation on the table.I lean forward to wipe it clean with a napkin.For a guy in his field, you’d think he’d be a bit more careful.
Dad clicks on the projector, and the vinyl screen fills with an image of a weather-beaten old house resting on high stilts built behind a grassy sand dune.The outdoor staircase leading down to the beach is half-collapsed.The wooden siding might have been a light blue color, but it’s so worn and faded that it’s hard to tell.
“What is this?”Gray asks, his mouth open with a confused smile.“You booked a vacation home?”
