24. Jay
Chapter twenty-four
Jay
I n the picture Henry texted, his mom half-sat, half-lay back on stacked pillows in the garden room, the one with the wall of windows that got all the sunlight. No sunlight in the picture, ’cause that was after dinnertime last night. She had a real nice robe on, white with flowers, and a quilt thrown over her lap. Hard to tell if she was pale, even when Jay pinched in as far as the zoom would go. She was smiling, though, and Henry had written Mother sends her love to you both. I wish I’d had more time with you today, but I’m confident I’ll be seeing you again soon.
Their messages of love back sat at the end of the thread. Christmas was only ten days away. Soon had to mean before then, for sure. “How soon do you think—”
“Now, I think.”
“Now?” Had he missed a message? Jerking his head up, Jay followed Alice’s pointing finger toward an SUV rolling up to the curb at the bus station on the north end of Nashua.
“Yeah, isn’t that your brother?”
“Yup, that’s him.” He dropped his phone in his coat pocket and grabbed the knotted rope at the top of the Santa sack by his feet. The thing came halfway up his thigh, and he had two bags with the gifts for all the kids. Alice had put on Christmas music while they wrapped everything after Henry left. Well, after the first hour, anyway. That hour had been all about sitting side by side on the couch, holding hands until their fists felt like bruises, staring into the dark fireplace. “Hope Kev’s gonna have room for all the presents. You don’t think I overbought, do you?”
Alice tucked his hair inside his knit cap and kissed his cheek. “I think you love your nieces and nephews very much, and you want them to know that, even when…” Pursing her lips, she wiggled them side to side a couple of times. “When it’s healthier and wiser for you to not be there to give the gifts in person.”
He leaned into her, her little red hat fuzzy and soft against his face. “I hope we’re gonna be in person with Henry’s mom. I just don’t wanna end up—”
“Hey, you folks need a ride?” Laughing, Kevin hopped out of his car and walked around back. “I swear you look just like my brother and his wife.” He popped the hatch, his deep brown barn coat unbuttoned and swinging. “Need a hand with those?”
“Naw, nothing heavy.” Jay grabbed both bags and slung them into the back before giving Kevin a quick hug. “Thanks for playing Santa Claus.”
Kevin shoved the hatch back into place. “My last chance for that, I expect.”
“You’re not going home for Christmas anymore either?” Shit, if he’d started a trend—no, pause, Danny would say that was panic-blame grabbing the handlebars. “Why’s it your last chance?”
“At that age, huh?” Alice slipped up beside him and wrapped her arm around his back, curling her finger through the belt loop on his jeans with a gentle tug.
“Hey, Alice, welcome.” Kevin leaned forward, his arms out. “Good to see you.”
“Glad we could find a time.” She didn’t budge from Jay’s side, resting her chin against his shoulder. With her free hand, she caught Kev’s fingers and gave them a London Bridge swing hello. “I remember how hard that was as a kid—proud that I knew the secret, frustrated that I had to watch everything I said around my little sister.”
“Exactly.” Dropping the greeting, which had sure seemed like it was gonna be a hug before it wasn’t, Kev puffed his cheeks and blew out a breath. Too warm for frost today, which had made the wait nicer. “Evan doesn’t believe anymore, and Dylan’s skeptical. Asking us all the technical questions about how the reindeer fly, and how Santa can get to every house. The magic is gone for them.” Jerking his head toward the car, Kevin disappeared around the driver’s side. “Hop in. Almost makes me want another one”—the car doors opened and closed, Alice scooting into the back seat before Jay could offer her the front—“but then I think about the diaper changes and the sleepless nights and my aching back. Forty-five is not thirtysomething energy. It takes a nosedive.” Kevin lightly punched Jay’s shoulder as Jay fastened his seat belt up front. “You’ll see.”
Really? He had more energy in a day than he knew what to do with. He poured it into pedaling and serving and sex, and sometimes it still buzzed through him like a live wire downed in a storm, skipping and sparking on the asphalt. “Won’t know till I get there, I guess.”
Kevin pulled out of the pickup lane. “Your friend H—I mean, your husband probably knows. You hit forty, and man, some days you just lift your head off the pillow wrong and your back is wrecked for a week.”
Henry was only thirty-nine, but maybe he did know. Had he been slowing down? Were late nights and long drives rougher on him now? Jay hadn’t asked. He’d had the sense not to ask if Henry had looked at his wish book yesterday, but it still stung this morning when he’d found the book untouched on the dresser in the playroom, the agreed-upon location for signaling he’d finished his homework, with no new assignment for the week ahead. Henry had nothing he wanted Jay to focus on, because he didn’t have time to focus on Jay. A warning note twanged in his head, a grinding tooth before the chain slipped the gear. Let the maintenance go too long, and he’d have a wreck on his hands, too.
Kev spun the wheel, gliding into sparse traffic on the main road. “Sorry he couldn’t make it for lunch. You said his mom’s sick? Like ours, or…”
“Heart trouble,” Alice called from the back seat. “But she’s recovering.” Her voice rolled past his ear; she’d sat right behind him, and he couldn’t see her without turning his head like an owl. “Henry’s handling her care setup, and Jay and I will be going up this week to help out and bring the holiday cheer.”
Her confidence almost sent him digging for his phone, because none of that was in the messages Henry had sent or what he’d said yesterday when they’d crammed in as many hugs as possible before he got in his car. A soft touch brushed the outside of Jay’s thigh on the door side. Took a second before his brain caught up and he squeezed Alice’s fingers. She squeezed his, too, and rubbed his knuckles before taking her hand back.
But Kevin, after his good, good reply, dropped the whole subject and told them about the party coming up for the boys’ hockey teams. Alice must’ve said what he’d wanted to hear. Ten minutes later, they were pulling into Kev’s driveway, his butter-yellow suburbs house surrounded by patches of trees. The engine cut off in front of the garage. “Lot shorter drive to the bus station. Preciate that.”
“Thank Alice for that one.” Jay had almost always taken the train to the end of the line, and Kev had driven three times the distance to get him. When he’d told Alice yesterday morning, she’d made her frowny face and mumbled something about friction points and found a better solution in under ten minutes. Like Henry, she made his life run smoother. But he’d been smart enough to marry them both, and that was a win in the Jay column.
“You picked a great wife, no doubt.” Kevin cracked his door as their seat belts zipped back into the holders. “C’mon in. Char’s got Sunday supper going in the kitchen, and the boys are hungry for new adults to inflict their video game addiction on. Hope you like hearing minute details about virtual battles with villains you’ve never heard of.”
Alice laughed, taking Jay’s hand the second their feet hit the asphalt. “Oh, I’d bet half the guys I work with play the same games. Don’t worry about us; we can keep up. Right, sweetheart?”
“Right on, honey-o.” He cocked a finger gun in his other hand and blew imaginary smoke from the end. “My mad skills are the bomb.”
Kev snorted. “They’re gonna eat you alive.”
But the kids would have fun doing it, and that was what mattered. Not being the smartest in the room or the one who won all the games. When he entertained the kids at family gatherings—his favorite choice and also Peggy’s way of taking advantage of him, because Danny said the sneakiest patterns could be two things at once—his checklist for a great activity or adventure or whatever was: Did all the kids get to excel at something at least once? Did they all get to talk themselves hoarse about the coolest or raddest or most epic thing that nobody else listened about? Did they all have real smiles at the end? Then who cared whether they laughed at his old slang and groaned at his music.
He swept into the house like a storm, turning Dylan’s tackle-hug into an upside-down hang over his back, with his hands tight around his nephew’s ankles. “Where’d he go?” He spun carefully, avoiding the fancy knickknacks Kevin’s wife had decorating the entryway. “Alice, do you see him?”
“Uncle Jay, Uncle Jay!” Giggling, Dylan smacked his calves. His coat crunched under the flailing at his back. “I’m here, Uncle Jay.”
Alice shook her head, her eyes comically wide. “I thought I did, but now it’s just his shoes. Did he teleport? What magical powers does he have, do you know?”
“I thought I heard him—hang on, let’s follow that voice.” He tromped back to the kitchen and bobbed his head at his sister-in-law. Futuristic whirrs and zaps rumbled from the family room; Evan sat in a gaming chair on the floor in front of the TV. “Charlotte, I’m so sorry, I think we’ve lost Dylan. I’m gonna sit on the couch and try to figure out where he could be.”
He crouched in front of the seat while Dylan scrabbled upward. “No, don’t sit! I’m here, Uncle Jay. Don’t squish me.”
“Whoops!” In a deep squat, he released Dylan’s ankles and smacked his own ass down on the carpet. “Missed the seat.” He tipped his head back. “Dylan! Hey, there you are. How’d you get there?”
As Dylan insisted Jay had carried him there, Alice chatted with Charlotte in the kitchen. She joined him a few minutes later, with drinks that he nabbed a pair of coasters for.
“Pot roast and baked beans.” She set the glasses down in front of them and sat beside him, on the actual couch cushion this time, her thigh pressed along his. “Nothing we can assist with, I’m told.”
He lifted a glass and stared at the sweet tea with ice, fighting to keep his face completely serious. “You’re sure there’s baked beans in here?”
“You.” Mouth twisting, she shook her head and raised his hand, stealing a sip of his tea. She’d dumped her coat and hat somewhere, and her hair tumbled across her shoulders. “I love every minute with you, you know that?”
If he hadn’t before, he did now. Sure felt good relearning it every time. Repetition fixed things in a person’s brain until they knew them without having to ask. Danny said repetition would help him learn that he deserved love but that it was always, always okay to ask when he needed to hear it again. “I know. But you can tell me anytime you want.”
“I’ll make a habit of it,” she whispered, before the boys clamored for attention.
The time rushed past like wind on a downhill coast. Video gaming, admiring the boys’ play-by-play recap of their highlights on the ice, complimenting his sister-in-law’s supper, which was tasty even if Henry would’ve done it better. Char moved them into the frou-frou living room for company after they ate, sending the boys back to the family room with orders to keep the noise down. She set out a tray of store-bought cookies—not a single one missing, so the boys must not’ve seen them yet—and offered tea and coffee.
Sitting around with the grownups wasn’t a skill he had a ton of practice at. But Alice, man, she asked all the right questions and made the sympathetic chipmunk noises girls did like she cared about his sister-in-law’s gossip about the other hockey moms. Plus, she crowded up beside him on the little couch, the kind Henry would call a settee, with its skinny cushions and wood frame, and she draped her hand over his knee like she owned him. Which she did. He tucked his arm around her back, and she wriggled her hip right into his hand. It was the best afternoon he’d spent with his relatives in—ever.
“And of course congratulations; the rings are gorgeous. So unusual.” Charlotte waved toward them, and Alice flexed her hand over his kneecap. “Kevin told me you got married—Alice had us all fooled, saying you hadn’t been thinking about that sort of thing yet. Well, I think it’s wonderful.” Char glided over the tops of the cookies, not touching, her fingers vibrating like a dowsing rod before she chose a peppermint pinwheel. “So expensive, weddings. I’m glad we won’t have to think about that for the boys for a long while yet. I’m still basking in the joy of not depending on hockey scholarships for their college education now.”
“Yes, aren’t we.” Kevin gave his wife a one-armed hug, tipping her toward him with a tug at her upper arm. He cleared his throat, the same sound he’d used to quiet the boys at the dinner table. “Jay’s been incredibly generous. It’s great that your business is doing so well, Jay. We’re all proud of how you’ve, uh, how you—”
“How you’ve settled down.” Charlotte beamed at him. “So much maturity in such a short—”
A blaring phone sent them all jumping, although only Alice recovered fast enough to paw through her purse at the same time.
“So sorry, let me just—huh. Um.” She raised her butt off the couch, levering up with her hand on his knee. “I—I have to take this.” The ring sounded again, and she froze with her eyes fixed on him and her phone clenched in her hand. “I’ll only be a minute.”
A chill flushed down his face and through his chest. “Henry?”
She shook her head, bringing the phone to her ear as she slipped out the pocket door into the hallway. “This is Alice.” She slid the door shut behind her.
Charlotte settled upright again, shaking off Kevin’s hug, her hands folded in her lap, her eyes expectant. “I mean the business, the marriage, a new house—those are such big steps for you, Jay. I’m sure we’ll all miss you at Christmas, but of course you and Alice will be wanting to start your own traditions. Kevin and I talked about that after Evan was born, you know, but ultimately we decided family was more important. You and Alice will find what suits you, though, and that’s just how it will be.”
The sweets turned sour in his stomach. “And Henry.”
“Hmm?”
She could’ve been completely innocent. Nothing in her face said Henry isn’t welcome here . But sweat hit him, all fever-chilly, and his heart ka-thumped like he’d skidded to a stop right before sailing off a cliff.
“Me and Alice and Henry. We’re starting our own traditions, the three of us.” He pinned a teeth-together smile to his face. Maybe he’d made a mistake. Everyone had been nice at the farm, too, when it was just him and Alice. Him and his normal girlfriend in a normal relationship the way a normal family would like. “We put up the tree at the beginning of the month, and we went to see the lights—”
Which had been just him and Alice, shit, and what if Henry had left so fast yesterday because Jay taking Alice to lunch with Kevin’s family made him feel unwelcome. Angry. Like Jay had broken their marriage vows. “And we’ve—” His voice shook. He tensed his legs, pushing his feet into the carpet, hunting for the calming grounding stuff Danny said was supposed to help. “We’ve been making treats in the kitchen, trying to give every day a taste of Christmas.”
“Oh, of course. How sweet.” Charlotte spun toward Kev and clung to his arm. “I’ve been trying to get this one to string the lights up outside—it’s so festive—but he keeps putting it off. And now Christmas is nearly on top of us. You could get the job done faster with Jay’s help, couldn’t you, honey?”
Kevin pressed his lips thin, his face tight and stretched. “I said I’d get to it, and I will. Jay’s here to visit with us, not play handyman.”
“Of course not, but—”
Alice slipped back into the room, and Jay shot to his feet. “Everything okay? Should we go?”
“Oh, it’s—” She stopped stroking the edge of her phone and looked at him, really looked, the whole walk over, gears spinning in her eyes. A big sigh gusted out of her, and her shoulders drooped. Wrapping her arm around him, she turned to Kevin. “Would it be too much trouble? I know it’s a little earlier than we’d planned, but”—she rattled the phone—“duty calls. Nobody respects the weekend.”
“Not at all.” Kevin bounced up, leaving Charlotte the only one still sitting. “Let’s get coats, bathroom breaks—” Glancing from Jay to Alice, he shook his head. “Sorry, so used to getting the kids ready to leave. Do what you need, and I’ll get the car warmed up.”
Jay handed Alice into the passenger seat this time, so he could sit behind her and see her hair and sometimes her cheek when she talked to Kevin. And so he could bounce his knees without anyone asking what was making him anxious or telling him to stop fidgeting. The call had upset Alice, even if she’d hidden it well. If not Henry, then Ollie. But she would’ve texted, probably, not called. A call about Ollie but not from Ollie would be scary as hell. The work thing was just a cover, and he loved her so much for reading his cues and getting them out-out-out before his panic got real panicky. And now he’d stuck her in the front seat with Kevin, who was planting his flag on the work hill.
“—went into finance, for the banker’s hours.” Kevin chuckled over the Christmas music on the radio. “Nobody told me twenty years later I’d have to keep up with overseas exchanges on their schedule, too.”
“It’s like that sometimes,” Alice agreed, as they pulled up to the station. “You think you’ve signed on for one thing, and then the extra jobs come crawling out of the woodwork. Everybody asking for just a little help until all you’re doing is handling other people’s problems for them.”
Kevin smoothed his palm along the curve of the steering wheel. “Yeah. Yeah, that’s—” With the car in park, he twisted and thrust his arm through the gap between the seats. Jay shoved his own forward, and Kevin clasped his forearm. “I’m sorry about Char, Jay. I’m working on it, I swear. And it really was great to have you over.”
His eyes, deep and dark, didn’t lie.
“We’ll do it again.” He shook on it, a pact, before they finished their goodbyes and he and Alice waved from the curb as Kev pulled away.
“So who was—”
“What did his wife say to you?” Alice brushed his coat all over like he’d been hanging in a closet and needed dusting, her hands brisk and sometimes squeezy. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Promise.” He captured her hands over his heart and held them there, tucked under his. “She…” Wispy clouds floated past the trees around the parking lot. It’s my fault Henry rushed out the door yesterday would be too much, maybe not true. “I got queasy. She kinda acted like Henry didn’t exist until I reminded her. And then she and Kevin got…” Not in a fight, not really. “Reeeally polite with each other like people do when they’re mad.”
Alice curled her fingers around his, stepped closer, and kissed the backs of his hands. “Okay. Thank you for letting me know you wanted to get out of there. I don’t ever want to put you in a situation where you’re not comfortable.”
“I know.” He’d meant to be reassuring, but her eyes started watering, and she swallowed hard, staring down at their hands. “Alice? Are you okay? Who was on the phone? Was it about Ollie?”
“What? No—oh, sweetheart, no, I’m sorry, I should’ve figured you’d be wondering. No, it really was work.” She tucked in closer, pressing their hands between them, even though the day was in the forties and the air calm, no chilly wind. “It’s just—I…”
“Layoffs?” They’d be idiots to can her, but companies did stupid shit all the time, and they never seemed to care about the timing. Or that Alice had her sister depending on her, and asking Henry to cover those expenses would make her embarrassed or ashamed or something. She got prickly about money. “They aren’t making you tell your team tomorrow, are they?”
“No.” She kissed his throat, right at the bottom where the bones came together and the skin was soft and ticklish. Her lips gave him a shiver.
“Jay, I have to leave in the morning.” She tipped her head back, making tiny sidewinder curves with her mouth. “For a work trip. I don’t know how many days.”
First Henry, now Alice. Her leaving probably wasn’t a punishment from on high for missing Henry’s visit yesterday and letting Kevin’s wife pretend he didn’t exist today. But an uncomfortably loud voice in his head insisted it was. His chest hollowed out, a gaping void deep enough to swallow every dream he had left for the year.
Potholes .