Family Ties

It was the fourth Tuesday of November, and, impossibly, there wasn’t another car to be seen. We sped down the highway at full throttle, screaming youthfully, carelessly. Happy in the way I had once thought I never could be. The speakers blared out a blend of sickeningly sweet, infectious pop music, and we were currently in the process of butchering both the songs and our voices to them. Even Mandy was finally letting loose, showing off an impressive set of pipes that no one could have guessed lay hidden inside that tiny, modest exterior.

Back when we first left Michigan, she could barely find the courage to murmur yes or no when we asked her a question; only with us at all because Hayley had taken pity on her staying in dorms alone whilst everyone else went home or, in our case, on the road. But somehow in the space of just five days with her, Hayley and I had managed to smash her quiet exterior wide open, and pull out someone much more fun from the wreckage. “Jess, check this out.” She tapped my arm to get my attention. She had tied her hair up like Ariana Grande and began attempting to mimic the singer’s nasally, over-the-top vocals that had just started playing.

“Oh my god! You should do children’s parties as her,” I said.

We both collapsed into fits of laughter. I looked over to Hayley, expecting her to be laughing too, but she wasn’t even looking at us. A second later she changed the song to something else.

I was about to ask her what was wrong, but then I saw the sign flash by our right side. Nashville – 30 miles. I shut my mouth, and instead reached over to give her shoulder a gentle squeeze.

As we got closer and closer to our destination, it was Hayley that was becoming the withdrawn one. Nerves had spread through her over the course of the week, creeping up and seizing hold like ivy over a house. We’d been fighting back of course, all of us, and karaoke especially had proved to be an effective set of shears. Her old self had been present a few minutes ago, seconds even, but now we were losing her again. Nashville – 30 miles. A rapid accelerant. Sunlight choked away. She would sing with me when she knew I was looking at her, smiling and doing her best to placate me, acting like nothing was on her mind. But the second she thought I wasn’t paying attention to her, her voice would trail off and she would space out as she lost herself to a thousand imaginary futures once again, the happiness in the car shimmering away like a mirage.

The previous night, after we had checked into that night’s trash motel and wolfed down another round of tired-looking, highway fast-food, grimmer by the day, I decided to ask her.

“What do you think he’s like?” I said, once the three of us had all squeezed ourselves into the same cramped, three-quarter-sized bed.

After a long beat, Hayley rolled over to face me. “I don’t know.” The quiet resignation in her voice told me exactly how long she had been wondering that herself.

“I think he has a giant moustache,” I said.

She laughed for about half a second before remembering she was supposed to be moody and depressed. “Jess, stop,” she said sullenly.

“Come on” I said, thrilled at the brief resurrection of my best friend I had just managed. “I bet he has a walking stick too.” I nudged her, trying to get her to play along.

She groaned in frustration that my cheer-up efforts were working. “Fine,” she said, defiant even in surrender. But slowly as she too started to think of things, I saw a small smile forcing its way onto her face. “I bet he has pants that go halfway up his chest.”

“Ooh,” I gasped. “Because he wears suspenders, or because his gut is so big that it can just support them on its own?”

“Neither,” she laughed. “They just magically stay up because of his granddad powers.”

“I bet he carries around candies in his pocket and hands them out when people are sad.”

“Oh my god, I would die if he did that. Like, I don’t think I could cope.”

We both lay there laughing at each other for a while, thinking of all the friendly old person stereotypes either of us had ever heard of but never experienced, and just wishing against all odds that at least one of them might turn out to be true.

After we had sufficiently calmed down, I looked seriously at Hayley, directly into her eyes and said, “I bet the second he sees you he’ll start crying, and he’ll run over and hug you, and tell you how unbelievably sorry he is that he didn’t find you sooner.”

The smile slipped off her face as her imagination reached its elastic limit, this latest folly too much of a stretch for it to handle. It snapped her right back to reality and the tears began to fill her eyes. “I bet I hate him,” she whispered.

“Hey,” I gripped her arm in reassurance. “No you won’t.” I tried to sound convincing, but I knew exactly where her mind was at.

“It’s just … why did he take so long?” her voice, barely audible, wobbled softly as she spoke, betraying how close she already was to losing it. “He had 10 years to make himself known, 10 fucking years! And yet he somehow only appears once no one could force him to take care of me.”

I tried to stay positive. “We don’t know that he didn’t…” I began.

“I do,” her eyes shone, cut glass. “You know it too.”

“I…” I wanted to lie. I tried to, but the right words just didn’t exist, at least not that I could find. Instead, I just pulled her close and hugged her as tight as I could, letting the silence speak for me, and the dam finally broke. Huge, aching sobs that had been building for days burst from within her. A tidal wave of pain crashing against my levies. I could feel the way the heave of each breath shook her as her body struggled to keep up with the force of her grief, and I couldn’t help but break too.

We stayed like that for a long time, her crying and me crying just as hard for her, the way I knew she would, and had many times before, for me. Years ago, I used to pretend we were long-lost sisters, miraculously reunited through our respective tragedies, but that kind of bond didn’t require imagining anymore. Regardless of how tomorrow went, neither of us were without family in this world.

“Do you still want to see him?” I asked when the time was right.

“Yeah, I want to see him,” Hayley sniffed. “I’m going to walk in and I’m going to tell him I’m doing just fine without him, and then I’m going to walk out, and you and me and Mandy are going to enjoy the rest of our vacation on our own, the way we planned before any of this ever happened.”

Mandy, who had somehow slept through all of this, rolled over as if in vague, subconscious agreement.

Part of me wanted nothing more than that, to have Hayley all to myself the way it had always been, each of us all the family the other would ever need. But the part of me living in the real world knew she shouldn’t be so quick to throw this away. “If that’s what you want,” I chose my words carefully. “But if I still had a granddad or whatever, I would want to at least give them a chance, you know?”

Now as we turned off the highway and began the final stretch of our journey, I could see the weight of those words resting on Hayley’s brow. The music had long since turned sickly, treacle in our ears, and eventually Mandy took the hint and turned it off. We trudged on through endless, seemingly identical backroads, the scenery itself doing its best to drag out our drive for us. But despite all our secret wishes to the contrary, our destination crept closer and closer until at last we found ourselves standing timidly before it.

The entrance sported an ornate gateway that elegantly stretched itself over the road, twisting through intricate patterns as it went, before joining the latticework of formidable, black bars that were currently split on either side of the drive, deigning, at least for now, to let us pass between them.

The restaurant itself lay further back, at the end of a driveway flanked by spotless, green lawns on either side of it. The drive formed a circle before the building, as if it were designed to accommodate the turning of a horse and carriage. The restaurant itself wasn’t huge, but it had an imposing presence to it, an essence of grandeur. Perfect white walls stood against a vast backdrop of fields stretching far into the distance. Four impressive columns stood supporting the front of the house, shining white sentinels silently passing judgement on all that passed between them. I could feel their gaze on us as we ascended the steps and crossed the threshold of the establishment.

The décor inside was equally, repulsively opulent. Delicate, crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, and old, baroque art was displayed proudly on the walls. The walls of the reception were lined with wooden coat stands that lead up to a front desk that would shame any hotelier.

All around us stood groups of people waiting patiently to be seated, but upon our arrival at the front desk, before we’d even said a word, we were told the rest of our party was already here and escorted straight through to the seating area.

A young, blonde waitress led us through the room, past long, varnished tables with handcrafted chairs lining their sides, past sparkling silverware and delicate china, past elaborate hearths with log fires and mounted game hung above them, to a table tucked in the far corner, where he was sat waiting for us to arrive.

His hair was completely white, but there was still plenty of it, and not just on his head either. A full moustache and goatee, cartoonish in their perfection, stood brilliantly to attention on his face. He wore a full suit and tie too, bright white, elaborately stitched, too formal and too pristine for even the décor surrounding him. That was of course, save for the badge pinned to his lapel. Giant and blue, the size of a hockey puck, it displayed on it in big, bold, white letters, the words “Trust Jesus, Jesus ONLY!”.

I didn’t quite know what to make of what I was seeing. He was somehow exactly like we had imagined, and nothing like it at all. All the right things were there, but amped up to a point where it ceased to be endearing. He was old, sure, but this guy didn’t look like anybody’s grandfather. That friendly, amenable attitude, that loving smile that every granddad had reserved for his favourite granddaughter was nowhere to be found. At no point did he start crying, or run over to Hayley and hug her, or tell her how sorry he was he didn’t find her sooner. Instead he just sat there wearing a kind of self-satisfied smirk, as though managing to make us come here proved something innately impressive about him.

“Thank you so much, gorgeous,” he said to the waitress with a flash of his teeth. “Now be a dear and fetch us a bottle of white and…” he counted the people around the table quickly “…four glasses. Five if you’d care to join us, of course.”

She laughed like a hyena. “Oh Davis, I’m working!” her voice was filled with too much energy to possibly be natural. “I can’t just sit down for a drink whenever I want!” Her hand was placed on her heart as if the very suggestion had given her an arrhythmia.

“Of course you can darlin’,” said Davis. “Get Bill out here, I’ll talk to him for you.”

She laughed again. “I’d love to, Davis, I would, but I can’t! I’ve got tables need waiting, not just yours!”

“Nonsense! I want you to stay and meet my granddaughter!” He gestured to the three of us in general, and I realised that he didn’t even know which one of us was Hayley yet. “This is a special day, they can wait.”

“Granddaughter?!” she peered at the three of us equally indiscriminately, her grin threatening to split her face open. “Later!” she promised. “I’ll come by later for sure.”

“Okay, later.” He seemed satisfied enough with that. “Four glasses then.”

“Um…” I spoke up. “We’re all 20, is that a problem?”

The waitress stopped and turned back to face us, but Davis just held up four fingers and mouthed “four glasses” again, and she nodded and went on her way.

“So Hayley,” he said. This time he placed his gaze somewhere between her and I, apparently now having figured out it probably wasn’t Mandy on account of her being Chinese and all. “How has my beautiful granddaughter been all these years?”

You left her to rot in a fucking orphanage. I sat stone faced, completely neutral. That stuff was hers to say, should she choose to.

“Um, I’ve been okay,” Hayley spoke quietly and slowly, clearly trying her best to quash the wobble in her voice. “Jess and I worked really, really hard to get into college. We get scholarships and stuff, and we get to stay in dorms all year, so…”

“Oh you’re an orphan too, I take it?” he said, looking at me.

I knew that she was going through a lot in this particular moment, and that she hadn’t explicitly meant to do it, but I couldn’t help but feel a pinch of anger at Hayley for dragging my history into this. Surely, she had enough of her own to worry about right now.

Gritting my teeth, I looked back and said “Yep! Two dead parents, just like her!” I made sure to up the ante on the flippant way he had asked the question. After I said it I pinched Hayley hard under the table. She shot me back a look of desperate apology and I could see the panic in her eyes, she was on the verge of freaking out. Reluctantly, I relented and squeezed her hand in reassurance. It’s okay, you’ll be okay.

“Gotcha,” Davis looked distinctly uncomfortable. “Well Jessie, it seems like you’ve been a good friend to my granddaughter, so … thank you.”

“You’re welcome. And it’s Jess, by the way.” I said, but he’d already turned his attention to his next guest.

“What about you, sweetheart?” he spoke loud and slow. “WHAT’S     YOUR     NAME?”

“I’m Mandy.” She smiled politely, a practiced patience in her tone. “Pleased to meet you.”

“Mandy?” Davis looked confused. “Huh. Is that like Manh Di, or something?”

“No,” she said, smile tightening. “It’s just Mandy.”

 “Huh.” He scratched his bearded chin. “Well, pleased to meet you Mandy.” He put his hands together and inclined his head. “Konichiwa!” he said, laughing, not only as if that joke was actually funny, but as if anyone but him had been the one telling it.

“Um,” she looked distinctly displeased. “That’s actually Japanese. I’m Chinese.” She corrected him, but if he heard her say it, he showed zero inclination that he had done so.

He fixed his gaze back on his granddaughter. “You know, it’s so good to finally meet you I can scarcely believe the day has come.”

Hayley didn’t know where to look. Davis was sat directly against the wall, one side of the table to himself, the three of us sat in a row on the other, nowhere to turn away.

“You know you look so much like your mother,” he continued, taking her hand in his. “I bet you’re a firecracker just like she was.”

“…A firecracker?” Her eyes narrowed in confusion.

“Oh yeah, I was forever having to knock sense into that girl, but she never let that stop her doing the next thing.”

Hayley’s mom had always been strict in all of the stories I’d ever heard of when she was alive. I sat back in my chair, eyeing Davis with suspicion.

“I remember this one time, her and this boy she was seeing stole this bottle of scotch I had been saving. Oh man when I caught them…” he trailed off, his smile fading. “Well it’s a wonder she didn’t run away sooner, honestly.”

We sat there in silence as he paused to wipe an invisible tear from his eye. “I don’t blame her you know. In retrospect, I wasn’t always the best father.”

“Or grandfather,” I said.

Hayley and Mandy’s eyes both widened in shock, mine too. It had barely been a murmur, I hadn’t even meant to say it out loud, not really. It was just that for the briefest moment, I had forgotten that this wasn’t some bizzaro movie Hayley and I were watching together.

His eyed me with sudden, surprised distaste, a shit stain discovered on the sole of his shoe. He swallowed and fixed a grin to his face. “Well, the second one I’ve still got time to change.” He squeezed Hayley’s hand and made a show of being sincere, but the lingering anger in his voice was ill-disguised.

Fortunately, the awkward silence only lasted a few seconds before a waitress, different to the last, came over with the wine and poured us each a glass. At this point, I was glad the letter of the law hadn’t been entirely upheld. I picked up my glass and gulped heartily. Out of the corner of my eye I saw the waitress from earlier now in the opposite corner of the restaurant. She was laughing at something a customer said, but this time she wasn’t laughing like a hyena, and her smile wasn’t threatening to tear her skin. All waitresses have to be at least passable actresses, but in the case of ours, it seemed she had only been capable of performing for the back row. The real thing looked much different, more relaxed. As she cast a quick glance around the restaurant, she caught me looking at her and our eyes locked for a second. Her gaze briefly flitted to Davis, and she shook her head before running off back to the kitchen.

When I looked back, our new waitress was busy taking our order, or rather Davis’ order for us. “We’ll have four Southern Gentleman’s, please,” Davis said, showing off his apparently clairvoyant knowledge of what we would and wouldn’t enjoy.

I tried raising my hand in protest, but the waitress had already gone.

 “You know, I’m glad you seem to have friends, but I was expecting a little family reunion today.” Davis peered at Hayley in a way that he no doubt thought was agreeable. “Just me and my granddaughter, making up for some lost time.”

Hayley smiled. “Sometime soon perhaps.”

His eyes lit up at that, clearly thrilled. “You must be really special for your friends to have come all this way,” he said.

“Oh no, it’s not that,” she said. “Before you got in touch, we were all planning this road trip for Thanksgiving break, because none of us have anywhere to go for a week whilst everyone else goes back home. So we just figured we’d add this to our list of stops.”

“Is that right?” he turned to Mandy. “You don’t go back home for Thanksgiving, darlin’?”

She looked at him uncertainly, unsure what to say. “Um, no. Not really.” Apparently dissuaded after her last attempt at cultural enlightenment, she didn’t even bother to explain that American Thanksgiving isn’t usually celebrated in China.

“Well, if you don’t have plans for Thanksgiving Day, I would love to take you on my yacht down the Mississippi.”

“We did, yeah.” Hayley looked at Mandy and I. “But they weren’t anything special. I’m sure we could discuss a change if you guys like the sound of that.”

“Oh no, I am sorry,” Davis caught my eye as he spoke. “The boat only has room for the two of us.”

“…Oh.” Hayley’s mouth flapped as she struggled to think of something to say. “I’ll … discuss it with the girls,” she said after a moment.

I realised that she was being serious. We haven’t spent thanksgiving apart since we met. Ten years now and we've always been together. A time honoured ritual of junk food and cutesy family movies to bawl our eyes out to. Of all things, how was this guy going to be the thing that jeopardised that? I picked up my glass and drained the rest of it in one, long gulp, before announcing, “I think I need the bathroom.” I pinched Hayley hard under the table and stood up, striding away from the table as fast as I could move.

I think if Hayley hadn’t gotten the hint I would have started crying there and then, but mercifully it was only a few seconds before I found her standing in the bathroom with me.

“What the fuck?” I had just finished checking no one was in the stalls.

“What?” she did her best to seem confused.

“Oh, come on!” I wasn’t buying it. “Tell me you’re not thinking of going!”

“Well … yeah,” she said. “I’m considering it.”

“With him?” I spluttered. “Have you lost your fucking mind?”

“Why?” she said, her eyes downcast, sheepish. Already I could see that she was struggling not to cry. “What’s wrong with him?”

I snorted with laughter. “Hayley, just don’t alright? I know you see it. He’s a total ass. Tell me I’m wrong.”

“I…” she floundered for a defence. “…no, he’s just…” The first tear fell.

“Look, I’m sorry,” I said, stepping closer and pulling her in. “I really am so sorry. But man, even our waitress switched tables to get away from him. Literally, she just took off and never…”

“Stop it, Jess! Fuck! Shut up!” she shoved me away. “Why are you doing this?”

I stopped. “Me? Hayley, I’m not the one being a total, fucking dickhead.”

“He wasn’t!” She angrily wiped her cheeks.

“Oh, come on! Did you even see how he was with Mandy?” I shouted.

“What? You mean judgemental? Ignorant?” She snarled. “Oh, please don’t invite Mandy. Seriously, does she even speak English? She’ll just sit there being silent all the time and ruin the trip. Yeah, I’ve seen that before. You get used to it.”

“I … that’s not … that’s not …” My jaw flapped, mind racing for a comeback that didn’t exist – a wheel spinning without purchase, overheating. Burning in my cheeks, in my eyes.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. You do this with every person we meet. How about, just once, you give someone a chance for longer than five seconds? Yes, I know he’s not perfect, I am in the fucking room with you, remember? But can we at least make it through dinner before we just write him off like you do everyone else?”

She looked at me expecting an answer, or even some vague sense of agreement, and I swear if she’d only waited the seconds, minutes, or hours necessary, she would have gotten one.

She shook her head as she made for the door. “Seriously, I swear to god Jess.”

“…shouldn’t that be Jesus?” I shouted after her. “Jesus Only?!” But she was already gone.

                “…no, it’s a symbol of…” Mandy was talking to Davis when I got back to the table. Hayley had just sat back down, and was pulling her chair in.

                “I get the idea sweetie,” Davis cut her off. “I’m just saying it don’t make a lick of sense, that’s all. Years are numbers, everybody knows that. Ain’t no way that a year can be a monkey.”

                “It’s the year of the…”

                “Here you are folks!” waitress 2.0 stepped into view with an armful of plates and began to lay them out in front of us. “Four Southern Gentlemans, as ordered!”

                I’d managed to come back at the perfect moment. If you’d asked me a moment earlier, I wouldn’t have said there was anything in this world capable of pleasing all of us right now, but here we were. A distraction, a nice, edible one, was exactly what was needed. Desperate relief on everyone’s faces, Hayley’s not least of all.

With limited previous experience in the matter, it was now that the genius of the thanksgiving meal hit me for the first time. What do you do when you want to see your family, but you can’t stand talking to them? A compromise in the form of turkey, or in this case, an unnecessary amount of fried chicken. We all tucked in heartily, savouring every morsel of delicious silence as we went.     

The food itself was fine. Typical southern shit, albeit classed up for the establishment, or at least as much as it could be. Mashed potatoes, biscuits and gravy, and all the usual trimmings to go along with the fried chicken, plus a tall sweet tea to wash it down. The KFC menu, but for $50 a head.

Still, looking at Davis, you would have thought the stuff was pure ambrosia. Every few seconds, another ecstatic expression, another exclamation of delight. He peered over his fork at his granddaughter. “Hayley, these green beans are just gorgeous, don’t you think?” he said.

“Oh yes,” she said, nodding enthusiastically. “So nice.”

He looked over to me, concern in his brows. “Jessie darlin’, you haven’t eaten many of yours yet.”

“It’s Jess,” I forcefully met his gaze. “And…” I caught Hayley in the corner of my eye and paused, a collection of ill thoughts suddenly halted on the tip of my tongue. A bus braking suddenly, passengers slammed together at the front. “…I just haven’t gotten around to them yet.” I lamely completed, instead channelling the energy I had summoned into stabbing a forkful of green beans and wolfing them down, a violent parody of enjoyment, repeating the motion again and again until the offending item was gone from sight.

I didn’t slow my pace much after that either, working quickly so as to limit Davis’ opportunity for any further micromanagement of my meal. I cleared my plate in minutes, making sure to leave nothing behind.

                Mandy, unfortunately, was not capable of performing the same feat, and it didn’t take him long to notice. “What’s the matter there, sweetie?” he gestured to her plate. “You haven’t even touched your chicken.”

She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. “I’m a vegetarian,” she said apologetically.

“Huh,” he narrowed his eyes, face darkening. “What, you just eat beans and shoots then?” He lingered on her in a kind of frustrated confusion, like she was a difficult math problem, before unexpectedly cracking a smile. “Like a panda!” he chortled. “They’re Asian!” He laughed and laughed until it turned to wheezing, our blank faces seeming only to fuel his mirth.

I grit my teeth and looked away for anything else to focus on. My eyes fell over Mandy’s leftover food and I automatically picked up her plate for Hayley and I to divide between us. An old, stupid, shared habit that only made me madder at everything.

 “You know,” Davis finally calmed down. “If god didn’t want us to eat meat, why did he make it so delicious? You ever think about that?”

I couldn’t stand this anymore. I'd been biting my tongue for so long I was sick of the taste, and I felt much the same way about the southern gentleman. “You know, I noticed you were religious when we came in Davis,” I pointed to his Jesus pin. “I’m just wondering, and maybe you could help me with this, what the Bible says about abandoning your orphaned granddaughter until you no longer have any kind of legal obligation to take care of her.”

“Jess!” Hayley cried. I only felt the barest twinge of guilt.

“No it’s okay sweetness,” he waved away her outrage with a lazy hand. “Jessie may have been rude, but she’s right. You deserve to know about that, about the family, your mom, all of it.” He reached over and grabbed her hand. “When we go out on the yacht, I’ll tell you all about it, I promise.”

“Why?” I snapped. “Do you need some time to make up a story?”

He laughed at that. “Oh darling, you could piss off the pope I bet. I can tell I ain’t never gonna satisfy you, and that gets my goat sure as sunshine. But I respect the hell out of the way you look out for her, I’ll say that.”

Out of habit, I almost began searching for something nice to say in return. The unexpected kindness made me falter, shaking my tirade loose in my mind so that I had to spend a moment finding my place again. A moment too long, as it happened.

“Elanor!” Davis called across the room. “Ellie, gorgeous! I thought you were going to stop by?” The three of us followed his gaze over a family of four, to the waitress behind them waiting patiently to take their order. Our waitress, our original one.

“Elanor!”

She leant in over the shoulders of the parents, notebook and pen out and ready as if she hadn’t heard a thing, but was hastily brushed off, the parents still trying to squash their youngest into a cheap, plastic, supermarket-bought high chair that blended with its surroundings like oil on water. Supposed family dining meets an actual family. We’re not ready yet, said the hand gestures, and then from the father, I think someone over there is calling you. Elanor suppressed a grimace as she followed his outstretched finger towards our table, a bright and beautiful smile firmly in its place by the time eye contact was made. “Davis!” she exclaimed. “Oh lord, I am so sorry. I just haven’t had a second to breathe this afternoon.” She made her way over to our table. “You said one of these girls was your granddaughter?”

“That’s right!” his expression of pride undercut just a little by the way his hand clamped itself to the girl’s lower back as she approached, as though she would fall were it not there to support her. “This is my granddaughter, Hayley!” he pointed to her. “Isn’t she cute as a button? Goes to college too, lord knows where that came from.”

Hayley was unsure how to react. Being shown off an as yet unfamiliar experience, she was somewhere between waving to Elanor and burying her face in embarrassment.

The waitress did the legwork for her. “Pleased to meet you Hayley,” she reached out and shook her hand.

“You too, Elanor,” Hayley smiled.

“And who exactly are these two?” she enquired.

He pointed to me first. “Well this little firecracker is Jessie,” He said.

Elanor extended a hand and an exuberant smile. “Hi Jessie!” she beamed.

“Watch out!” Davis exclaimed as I got close to her. “She’ll rip your head off if you’re not careful.” He chuckled at himself. “I’m thinkin’ she needs a man in her life, calm her down a ways. Know any boys could tame her, Elanor?” He nudged the girl’s side in jest. She jolted uncomfortably, trying to decide whether that was a question she was actually supposed to answer or not. Were she not here to get caught in the crossfire, I’d already be back on the attack.

“And this is Mandy, their exotic friend!” he grinned. “I guess having one is just the fashion these days, because they don’t seem to have her there for talking to, that’s for sure.”

“Okay,” I said. “I can almost tolerate you trashing me, but if you think I’m going to let that go…”

“Darlin’,” he laughed. “I’m just…”

“Like, are you trying to piss us off, or is this just who you are? I really can’t tell which is worse.”

 A chair squeaked to the side of me. I looked to see Mandy stood up. She didn’t say a word, she just turned and left the table.

“Mandy, wait!” I called after her, rising from my seat too. Hayley joined me in calling for her too, but she kept walking.

Davis threw down his napkin and made a show of grumbling before adding his voice to ours. “Sweetie, I was just joking! Hell, don’t they have jokes where you’re from?”

That stopped her. She turned, her face twisted up. “You’re a joke!” she said. “A terrible one! I’m glad I’m not Hayley, because I’d rather be an orphan than have you for a family!” She headed straight for the exit.

Normally a remark like that might offend me a little, but I think in this instance a pass was deserved. “I’ll get her,” I said. I started walking out, but only made it about ten feet from the table before stopping and looking over my shoulder.
Ten Thanksgivings. Even with Davis’ most recent performance, the fear for number eleven was very much still there. How well could he recover in my absence? How many bits of family trivia would it take? Two? Three?

Hayley saw me and sighed knowingly, shaking her head. “Jess, I’m right behind you.” She got out of her seat and came over to me. “Go after her, I’ll meet you outside, okay?”

Relief washed over me. “Really?!” I breathed, then lowered my voice. “What about all that stuff though? About your mom, and…?”

The M-word caused some consternation. “I … I don’t … Listen, I’m going to try and talk to him about that now, okay? Maybe if we’re alone, it’ll be…”

“I’m not sure that’s such a good…”

Her expression soured. “Just go, Jess! I’ll be out in five, fuck’s sake.” She marched back to her seat, leaving me with little choice but to comply.

Outside, the sky had darkened significantly, and the hedges around the grounds now cast long shadows that stretched far across the grounds. I didn’t need my watch to tell me it had gotten late, but that wasn’t why I checked it. Five minutes.

I headed down the steps and into the neat rows of saloons and pickups laid out on the gravel. Hooded ornaments snarled as I passed them. Convertible tops snapped in the wind. Our little car cowered somewhere near the back, and I found Mandy leaning against its hood, face in hands.

“Hey exotic one,” I called as I approached.

She looked up, her face red and puffy. “Hey Jessie,” she countered.

I squared up against her in a mock standoff, and we stared each other down for the second and a half either of us could keep a straight face before bursting into rueful laughter. I swept her into a hug, squeezing tight. “If you’re going to abandon me like that in future, you’ve got to give me a bit more warning, okay? I have issues.” I said when we pulled apart.

She laughed again, wiping a fresh tear out of her eye. “Okay.”

I leant back next to her and our eyes collectively drifted over to the house. The pillars gleamed white, gazes cool, unmoveable. The laughter dried up. I checked my watch again.

“If I’d have known it was going to be like that…” she said, letting the thought hang unfinished.

“Yeah,” I sighed. “I’m sorry you got dragged into all this.”

“It’s not your fault,” she said. “The rest of the trip was nice.”

“Yeah, it was.” We lapsed into silence again. My wrist began drifting towards my face again and I snatched back it down.

“It’s just … you guys have all this crazy history. Sometimes I feel like I’m intruding, like maybe it would be better to leave you to it.”

“Hey, maybe we need someone without so much crazy history. Balance things out, you know?” I nodded back to the restaurant. “Besides, you’re still more family than that creep is.”

“Do you think Hayley would say the same?”

“She better,” I said. “I mean, how could she not now, right?”

“Hmm.” Mandy’s eyes dropped to her shoes. We both let out long sighs. The parking lot lay in darkness save for the glow of the restaurant. There hadn’t been much natural light when I’d left, but now there was none. I hadn’t even noticed it disappear.

“Is she coming out, or should we just go?” Mandy eventually spoke up.

“She shouldn’t be long now,” I said, staring ahead at the light. The pillars smirked at me with derision. A knowing wink, four black swathes of shadow reaching across the lot. “No, she just wanted five minutes,” I said back to them, trying to stem the flow of the uncertainty I felt. “Five minutes, that’s all.” How long had it been now? I kept my wrist clamped firmly by my side.

The door was stuck half open, light spilling from within, the bustle of the restaurant faintly audible from where we were. I stared at the empty space that hung between the frame, waiting for everything to return to normal. Any second now.