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“Listen, here’s what happened...”
I tell them everything, from what the ‘conference’ really entailed, our first night when we didn’t know who we were, Carter and Luna’s ice-skating invitation, dates, dinners, talking all night, and more.
“And lots of sex,” I finish. “Hence, the hook-up mentality. But it’s so much more than that.”
Luna jumps in, carefully explaining, “Samantha’s dad blindsided them, leaving them in a bad situation, and if that wasn’t enough, he was pretty awful about it. She doesn’t trust guys, at all. She dates and stuff...” Luna looks at me. “Or she did. But she keeps everyone at arm’s length so that when they leave, it doesn’t hurt as much, because it’s notifthey do, it’swhenthey do.”
I add on, “You ever see one of those movies where they’re trying to knock down a fortress wall with a battering ram?” When they nod, I go on, “Samantha’s like that. Her walls are fortified with steel, and I’ve got a teeny, tiny stick trying to get through to her heart. It’s gonna take time for her to trust me.”
Cole and Kyle are snickering, and Kyle holds up his pinkie finger. “You said you’ve got a little stick.”
“Really, assholes?” Kayla scolds them, and they shrug. I can’t fault them, it was a pretty easy pitch on my part.
Carter leans forward, his elbows on his knees as he pins me with eyes that are scarily similar to my own. “This is real? She’s one of us, not as Luna’s friend but as your...whateveryou’re calling it so she doesn’t bail?”
I nod. It feels good to admit it aloud, to tell someone because I can’t tell Samantha. Not yet.
“Okay, we’ve got your back, then,” he declares, as if she’s now part of the family, not just a de facto member of our gang of misfits.
As I look around the circle, everyone nods my way, on board with Carter’s words. This is the first time in a long time that we’ve all been on the same side of something. It feels good.
Maybe Samantha fixed my family more than she realized.
“On that note, you need to know what happened after you two left last night...” Kayla says.
“Shitshow circus,” Kyle blurts. He flashes a boyish grin, throwing me a thumbs-up. “Kinda awesome.”
Judging by everyone’s faces, he’s not wrong. At least about the shitshow part.
“Grandpa Chuck and Dad basically hate Samantha, said she was, and I quote because I don’t want you to think this is from me, ‘mouthy and outspoken’. Mom and Grandma Beth love her, for the same reason, basically,” Cameron explains. “Mom called her a breath of fresh air when Grandpa grumbled about a big family blow-up being bad for his heart at his age.”
I laugh, knowing Samantha would appreciate all of those descriptors, taking them as compliments regardless of how they were intended. And Grandpa Chuck’s heart is completely fine. The man brags about still doing five miles a day on his recumbent exercise bike. And now that he’s retired, he and Grandma Beth ride horses nearly every day and take care of them too. They have help, of course, because they can afford it, but he always says he likes getting his hands dirty now because he didn’t for so many years when he was sitting at a boardroom table.
But I can see that the brutal conversation with Aunt Vivian probably wasn’t something he was looking forward to.
“Okay, but I don’t care what Dad thinks. I haven’t in a long time,” I argue.
Kyle snorts. “Of course you care. We all care. He’s a shit father way too damn often, but he’s ours. It’s human nature to want his approval.”
Whoa. That’s the deepest admission Kyle’s ever expressed about our father. At least that I’ve heard. Usually, I think he gets a kick out of trying to drive Dad into the ground, but maybe there’s more to it.
Carter nods, agreeing with Kyle. He’s worked miracles, extracting himself from Dad’s clutches at Blue Lake to start his own firm, doing the work Dad taught him to do. They’re not competitors since Carter works for a singular client, but getting to the point where they can have business discussions about the market and joke about projections took a while. “I damn near killed myself, working twenty-five, eight, three-sixty-six, so he’d see me through that one’s bright-ass shine.” He points at Cameron, who is the first-born, and therefore, the automatic golden child. “But even now, deep down, I want to show him that I’m not just good, I’mgreatat what I do.”
Luna places her hand over Carter’s, smiling at him sweetly. “You are great.”
“Is nobody gonna tell him the best part?” Cole asks, drawing my attention.
There’s a ripple of laughter and, confused, I ask, “What?”
“Vivian came back,” Cole tells me.
My eyes widen as I scan his face, looking for any hint of a lie. “She did not.”
He holds his hand up like he’s testifying, “I swear. It was fucking hilarious.” He mimes her stomping out, whirling around, and wagging her finger. “And another thing! Blah-blah-blah.” Laughing hard, he says, “I swear she did it like three times, just ranting her ass off each time, making less and less sense. There was even something about her cat when she was a kid.”
“No way!” A little part of me wishes I’d seen that.
Cole holds his hands out, shrugging. “I guess Grandpa Chuck told her Muffalina died—legit, the cat’s name—but it actually ran away and he didn’t want to search the whole damn town to find the beast because it was a mean thing, always biting and scratching people. Vivian included. He thought it was a blessing in disguise then and still does now. She did not agree and was sobbing that he never cared about Muffalina or anyone else, and that maybe she should’ve gotten a tomcat so he would’ve looked for it. He apologized, but she said it was too little, too late, and stomped off again.”
