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“I mean, she named all of us after poets. She can’t be that mad.”
“Walt Whitman didn’t drink hard alcohol,” Walt said as he turned her hand, sliding a second needle into her palm. “Neither did Langston Hughes, I think.”
There was a collective grimace. Watching a needle sliding into a hand was disturbing.
“Oscar Wilde,” Sylvia said triumphantly, “did all the drugs.”
“Well, Mama had four kids, named us all after gay poets, and ended up with one poet, a doctor, and two engineers, all of us straight,” Langston pointed out.
“I’m not that straight,” Sylvia grumbled.
“Shouldn’t Valium make her sleepy?” Oscar demanded. “I do not want to hear about her girl-on-girl antics.”
“It depends. It doesn’t do that for everyone. I’m almost done with the local anesthetic.” Walt inserted the final needle into the pinkie edge of her palm.
“Not girl on girl. I had a ménage. With them!” Sylvia pointed at first Hugo, then Lancelot.
The three brothers went still.
“Merde,” Hugo whispered.
Walt glanced at his open kit, as if considering what he would use to stab Hugo, who couldn’t do much to defend himself with one arm wrapped around Sylvia, his other hand on her forearm.
Langston straightened and turned to Lancelot, pursing his lips in consideration.
Oscar once more folded his arms. “We’re going to have a long conversation, you and I.”
Lancelot still held the knife. Smiling slightly, he flipped it into the air, catching it without looking, then did it again, casually playing with the blade.
“I will go full Indiana Jones on you,” Oscar snapped.
“What?” Lancelot demanded.
“He’ll bring a gun to a sword fight,” Sylvia said cheerfully. “And no fighting. It was my idea. I seduced them.”
All three brothers winced as if in pain.
“There are some things a big brother doesn’t need to hear about his baby sister,” Langston complained.
Walt bent over her, his broad back hiding Sylvia’s hand from view. His arms and shoulders flexed and Sylvia blinked, her face going pale.
“I felt that,” she said.
“Did it hurt?” Walt asked immediately. “Did you feel pain, or just me manipulating your hand?”
“I can feel you moving my bones.”
“Gross,” Langston said fervently. “Lean back, Walt, I can’t see.”
“It is gross, it feels…wrong.” Sylvia swallowed. “I think I’m going to close my eyes now.”
Walt was working quickly, manipulating her hand. Langston had scooted closer, Oscar had backed away, his own fingers shoved into his pockets. Out of morbid curiosity, Lancelot edged closer, watching as Walt grabbed her ring finger, holding it just above and below the middle knuckle, and started to pull and wiggle.
There was a visible shift—her swollen finger suddenly relaxing into a natural curl when the bones were aligned.
“Fook,” Lancelot said. He wasn’t someone who was scared off by gore, but dammit, that was gross. Somehow watching or feeling a bone dislocate in the middle of a fight or torture wasn’t as disturbing as watching it being set in this elegant parlor.
Walt finished and then grabbed several metal finger splints. He placed one on the underside of each of her four fingers, taping them in place so each finger was held immobile. Then he formed a longer piece of foam-backed metal to her palm and wrist, and held that in place with an Ace bandage.
