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The Bulls had marked the day with a ride to the cemetery and a somber gathering after. Sage and the kids were meant to have been there—they were meant to have been honored there.
“We’re okay,” was all she said now.
“Why weren’t you with us?”
“Because we didn’t want to be.”
Eight tensed at once. “That’s your family, Sage.”
“I know, Eight. Of course I know that. But …” Sugar bayed, and they both looked in the direction the dog had run off to. She stood beneath the big oak near the kids’ playhouse, her front paws in the tire swing, and howled up at the branches. A squirrel, no doubt. The Becker place was probably a scary story squirrel parents told their babies. Beck and Sage had cleaned up dozens of furry corpses over the four years of Sugar’s life.
“I’m claiming a point of privilege here,” Sage finally continued, still watching her beagle’s frenetic attempt at the next case of serial rodent murder. “I’m the widow, my kids are the orphans, and we get to spend this day the way we want. What we don’t want is to perform our grief for an audience, okay?”
“It’s not an audience. It’s family.”
Eight felt odd saying that. And actually, he got her point. The scene at the cemetery today had been strange and uncomfortable, everybody standing around a grey stone as if a graveyard was the only place Becker’s—or Terry’s, or D.C.’s, or any other Bull they’d lost over the years—presence could still be found.
He didn’t understand why people went to cemeteries to talk to the loved ones they’d lost. Nothing was in the ground but a box of bones. Becker was all through all their lives, really. Eight didn’t need to stand in a cemetery to feel him, or the loss of him.
For most of his life, Eight had felt pretty cynical about family, including the family that had allowed him into the Bulls. That was how he’d always thought of it—allowed, not welcomed, or accepted. He’d always been on the edges, because that was where he’d wanted to be, not really trusting any bonds of friendship or brotherhood, always understanding there was a limit to how much people could tolerate him.
Except Beck. And Mo Delaney, who’d been the first Bulls’ queen and was still the nearest thing Eight had had to a mother since before he was old enough to remember. Those two people had always taken him as he was and loved him anyway. Nobody else.
It was his fault, he knew. The road behind him was littered with relationships of all kinds he’d taken a hatchet to for one reason or another.
He’d mellowed a lot in the dozen years since he’d gotten out of the joint—prison had a way of redefining who a man was—and he’d been unanimously voted president, so he supposed he wasn’t on the edges anymore. Unless the top was an edge.
Sage looked back at him. “I don’t need a lesson about family, Eight. Not from you—or anybody. I always promised Beck we’d be okay if anything happened to him. I told him I’d make sure our kids were okay. Well, it happened, and we’re okay. I’m keeping my promise. But part of that is taking time to hunker down when we need to. Today, the children Beck and I made are hunkering with me in the quiet. We don’t need to stand around his grave with a couple dozen people to feel sad. We’re managing that just fine on our own, thanks.”
“Sage …” Eight started, but couldn’t have guessed what words his mouth had planned on making, so he let her name fade out.
“Go on, Eight. I love you, the kids love you. We’re not pulling away from family. But today we need to be our own tiny, incomplete unit.”
It hurt, to be turned away. Eight hadn’t ever considered this house his, but it was Beck’s. He’d spent a huge chunk of the past twelve years here, helping him build most of these outbuildings, tilling up whole acres for Sage’s next garden project, painting, repairing, setting up that pool and the deck—and hanging out here, swimming, drinking, smoking, laughing. It wasn’t his house, but this was his family. More even than the one at the clubhouse. Becker had had what Eight never would, and he’d felt calm in the refracted glow of his friend’s good life.
He looked back at the spider web in the window. “Pretty sure that’s a black widow web. You don’t want to fuck around with widows.”
Sage laughed a little, a soft sound with only a hint of humor, and Eight replayed what he’d said.
He smiled, hoping to pull up a little bit of good feeling. “Well, I meant the spider, but yeah, nobody’s gonna fuck with you, either.”
She met his eyes, and his smile. Eight saw that she really was okay. Not great, especially not today, but okay. Strong.
“I’ll send the prospects out to fumigate. I can have them clean up in there, too, if you want.”
Without moving, Sage considered the closed garage door. “No. I’m not ready to change things from the way he left them. I’ll let you know when I am. But yeah, the boys can come out and do something about the spiders.”
“We could fix up that car for the girls, you know. Everybody’d help out and get it done fast.”
He was pushing too hard, and he could see her patience end. “Their daddy was rebuilding that car for them, Eight. I don’t think they want it if he can’t give it to them. Just leave it be. Just leave it all be.”
“Okay. Sorry.”
She nodded. “I’m going back in. We’re okay, Eight. Promise.”
“Alright. I’m sorry to bug you.”
Her smile was tense, but when he leaned down to kiss her cheek, she tipped her head to accept it.
