Childproofing—check.
Plenty of beer and wine in the fridge—check.
German chocolate cake cooling—check.
A few minutes after I finished making the coconut icing for our dessert, the front door flew open and the sounds of yelling and running engulfed thehouse.
“Wesley, Brad! What did I tell you about jumping on the couch!” Jennie shrilled as she came to my side, already pulling a bottle of chardonnay out of her purse. “Please, for the love of all things holy, tell me you have a bottle already chilledandopen.”
Taking the warm bottle out of her hand, I opened the wine cooler to grab her a bottle I’d opened right when I got to the house a few hours before. “Come on, do you think I would everforget?”
I poured her a glass and she gripped it in her hands like I had just handed her the last cup of wine on the planet. “Blessyou.”
Jennie was my favorite out of my brothers’ wives. She had been around since forever and was the most like me out of the three. She and my brother, Noah, were high school sweethearts, and she was as much a part of the family as my brothers and I were. Even though Jennie was six years older than me, she never treated me like a kid. It was nice having her around especially when I was in high school since my good-for-nothing mother ran out when I was still indiapers.
“Any sight of Janet?” I asked under my breath as I poured myself a glassofwine.
She nodded, her eyes wide. She pointed straight into the living room where the ice queen herself sat with her arms folded and a perfect look of disgust plastered onherface.
I slunk down onto the stool next to Jennie. “This is going to be an interestingevening.”
Carey, Jacob and Janet’s youngest daughter, waddled in wearing nothing but her diaper, screaming her head off. I jumped down, kneeling in front of my little niece. “What’s wrong,sweetheart?”
“Brad stole my lolli!” Tears streamed downherface.
Jennie heaved up from her seat. “He did what?” She marched over to her son, grabbed him by his arm, and dragged him right over to his cousin. “Apologize and give her thecandyback.”
“But Mom, it’s mine now.” The six-year-old was the hellion of the family, but he did have a little heart of gold when all was saidanddone.
“I don’t care if you think the world is yours, you do not steal from your baby cousin. Give it back or so help me. Do you want me to get your fatherinvolved?”
“No! Here!” He shoved the sucker into the crying baby’s hand and ran off to dive into his next inevitable bout ofterror.
After getting all six of my nieces and nephews settled at the kids table, it was finally time fordinner.
“To family.” My dad raised his beer can high in the air and we all clanked our beverages together—well, all of us except Janet, who wasn’t paying any attention to the group. Her eyes were glued to God-knows-what on herphone.
“Janet, is that a new lipstick? The color is just gorgeous with your complexion.” Alice tried her hardest to engage Janet, but her compliment fell ondeafears.
I glared at Jacob from across the table and he just tensed his shoulders before looking over to our father and asking, “How’s workgoing,Pop?”
“Same old shit, different day. I’m just looking forward to summer when the lawn business can crankbackup.”
Dad owned four businesses and countless rental properties all over New York. He’d planned on each of us taking one of them over eventually, but we had all gone our separate ways. Being the investment banker that he was, Jacob was chomping at the bit for the day Dad was ready to start selling off his companies. All that guy cared about was dollar signs, which was clearly the only thing he had in common with his gold digger of a wife, who was sitting next to him and still ignoring the rest of the family. I just didn’t get it. Janet was exactly like our mother was—or at least from what I had been told. How did he not see the signs? What a wonderful case for Freud tooveranalyze.
Liam cleared his throat. “Alice and I have some exciting news.” We all turned to him as he took hiswife’shand.
Alice looked at her husband then looked right at my dad. “We’re expecting another baby. I’m just about ten weekspregnant.”
Finally, Janet looked up from her phone long enough to mutter, “Another Bates baby,lovely.”
I couldn’t tell if she was being condescending or if she really just had no emotion at all in her entireemaciatedbody.
We all congratulated my brother and sister-in-law.
“I think this calls for champagne.” I pushed away from the table and made my way into the solace of the kitchen. It wasn’t that I wasn’t thrilled to be having another niece or nephew to dote over, I was just a little jealous. All of my brothers had incredible careers and growing families, and I couldn’t help but be a little salty about it. We all were drifting. If it wasn’t for the Sunday tradition, we wouldn’t talk to see each other except for holidays. Other than Dad and Jennie, I didn’t feel close with any of them. It made me sad at times, but I figured it was normal. People grow up and get consumed with their own shit,right?
Jennie popped her head in as I stood at the sink, staring out into the back yard through the tiny window. “Hey Jordan, you good?” She started grabbing the champagne flutes down from thecabinet.