Chapter 14
Chapter Fourteen
Dove
The table was practically full to bursting at Sunday Funday Fondue Day, growing year upon year along with our family. Lark and Logan sat watching from a laptop at one end of the table, having their morning coffee in New Zealand while we ate our decadently cheesy dinner. Finch and Frankie canoodled beside the laptop while Hawk, Hannah, and I sat on one side of the long rectangular table, Heron, Crane, and Wren across from us.
“It's decided,” Mom announced, lifting her glass to cheers the air. “I need to buy a bigger dining table.”
“We might need to knock down that wall if this gets any bigger,” Crane said, sizing up the wall that divided the dining and living rooms in our centuries-old house.
Our family home had been built by my great-grandfather during the establishment of Prickle Island Zoo. He probably never thought that not only would Prickle Island Zoo still be running a century later, but also that his descendants would be so plentiful that we’d need a bigger house.
“We need space for a highchair,” Mom added, nodding to Hannah, who was four days away from her due date and looking like she wanted to murder someone.
Hawk already had their hospital bags packed and hotel room booked, ready for the baby’s imminent arrival. This was our last night together. They were officially on baby leave as of tomorrow and would be off island until my nephew’s arrival.
Wren scooted her chair over toward Heron and waved at the spot between her and Mom. “We can fit a highchair here.”
“But what about all the other future kids and spouses,” Mom insisted.
“We can worry about that when the time comes,” Finch called from the other end of the table.
“Yeah, Mom,” I added. “I don't think we'll need to be setting more spaces at this table for a long time.”
Right as I proclaimed that ill-fated statement, I was jinxed by a knock on the door.
Confused, we all looked over as Hannah popped up—which was a feat in her current state—and shouted, “I invited him!” as if she were confessing to a crime.
My stomach plummeted. “Him? Him who?” I had a terrible feeling I already knew.
Hannah slid me an apologetic glance as she moved around the table toward the front door.
“No.” I groaned. “Please, dear God, no.”
“I'm sorry,” she whined. “I'm going to be up to my eyeballs in diapers for the foreseeable future and it was a push present to myself to have dinner with Deacon freaking Harrow, okay?”
“How dare you use my nephew to make me not shout at you!” I whisper-hissed at her as she pouted and rubbed her belly, knowing full well that it would work.
Curse my best friend and her adorable, sad, pregnant face!
Hannah waddled the rest of the way and opened the door. Meanwhile, Mom quickly whisked a chair out from her office and set another place at the table between her and Wren. Of course he has to sit directly across from me. By the time Deacon rounded the corner, it appeared a place had been set for him all along.
“Hello, Lachlan clan.” Deacon greeted us with a wave. “Thanks for the invite.”
He breezed into the room holding a bottle of wine that was probably absurdly expensive and completely wasted on my feral family. He wore a cashmere sweater and gray slacks, looking like he was the face of a Ralph Lauren campaign . . . which he might’ve been actually. I couldn't remember.
His deep blue eyes landed on me and his stubbled cheeks dimpled. “Good to see you all again,” he said to the room but kept staring directly at me.
Hannah erupted into a fit of giggles like he'd just said something hysterical, and Hawk came around to gently steer her back to her seat. “Come on, Hazard,” he whispered affectionately.
Deacon took a seat, beaming, like this was his favorite place on Earth. “I missed Sunday Funday Fondue Day. I don’t think I’ve had fondue since.”
“You never missed one the entire time you lived here,” Mom mused as she gave his muscled arm a playful swat.
“Do you still play ‘It’s feces but what species?’” he asked, and the table erupted into laughter.
Jeez, none of my family could keep themselves from flirting with him. Crane seemed to forget he was a reptile keeper who was two seats away from a species killer. When had Deacon weaseled his way back into Crane’s good graces?
Finch whipped out her phone and showed Deacon a photo of what was clearly kangaroo poo. “Go on, Deacon, it’s feces but what species?”
Even Finch is entertaining him. Finch! My one hope. But Deacon was like a magical unicorn level of attractive. We were all powerless against it. He totally knew what he was doing too. His eager talk of animal poop was a perfect strategy to con my family into accepting him again. But I spotted his scheming from a mile away.
“Uhhh.” Deacon inspected the brown, little circles on Finch’s phone.
He shot me a sideways glance and I shook my head. “You know I’m not going to help you.”
Wren put two fingers on the table and hopped them across her plate in a quick jumping motion.
“Kangaroo!” Deacon proclaimed, and the group cheered as I gave my littlest sister a death stare.
“ Et tu, Brute ?” I mouthed at her.
With an innocent little smile, Wren just shrugged at me.
“So,” Deacon said, rubbing his hands together before grabbing a fondue skewer. “What have you all been up to the last fifteen years?”
The whole table laughed again, so easily charmed by him as he swirled a piece of bread in the fondue and ate it, slotting right back in like the little kid who used to constantly be at our house.
Everyone started catching him up on all the latest news. He was ever the politician, even taking time to talk to Lark and Logan on the laptop.
“I'd ask you what you've been up to,” Mom said. “But I think we've seen it all splashed around the news.”
Deacon chuckled. “Don't believe everything you read.”
“I loved you in Violent Nova ,” Mom added. “Dove used to be obsessed with the books and games.”
“Oh really?” Deacon turned his smug gaze on me.
I swore to God, if Mom told him I used to have the Violent Nova movie poster on my wall, I was moving to the most remote jungles of Brazil and never returning.
“Do you think you'll ever do more Lucky Role songs?” Hannah asked, saving me from my runaway thoughts. “I always loved your music.”
Hawk cleared his throat and leaned a little closer to his very pregnant fiancée.
“Never say never,” Deacon hedged. “But I don't think my team wants me pursuing new music right now.”
I could hear the tinge of disappointment in his voice, as if he didn’t get to decide what he did with his career.
Deacon had been “discovered” by a model scout at thirteen, and he and his mom had moved to New York to follow his dreams, splitting the family in two until he was old enough to live there on his own. He’d modeled for a few years before launching a music career under the name Lucky Role. While he’d been doing the whole rock-star thing, he’d started popping up in supporting roles in films, and I’d always figured the acting bug had gotten him.
Now, it was hard to even remember his singing career. He was an action star through and through. His latest role as a monster-killing elf in a Netflix fantasy series was plastered over every billboard. I could begrudgingly admit he was a good actor, but he was an even better singer and I kind of wished he were still making music.
“How's your sister?” I asked. The question came out before I could think better of it.
Deacon looked at me, grateful for the spotlight being shifted off career questions. “Faith’s good, still touring with Rusty Sky Reverie,” he said with a smile. “Still adamant that we are never mentioned in the same sentence online.” He laughed and shook his head. “She always wanted to make her own name for herself and she has.”
“I saw they won a Grammy,” Mom exclaimed. “Please tell her congratulations from all of us.”
“And your brother?”
“Still an electrician,” Deacon replied with a grin. “He's not in the least bit drawn in by the flashing lights of Hollywood.”
I nodded in approval.
“And Tom and Sheila?” Mom asked. Of course she remembered the names of one of her kids’ best friend's parents from fifteen years ago.
“Good.” Deacon’s smile seemed to widen in acknowledgement that Mom had remembered. “They still live in a beat-up little farmhouse in Vermont. I keep offering to pay someone to fix it up for them, but they refuse.”
“They're good people,” Mom said. “It would be lovely to see them again. If they're ever in the area, you tell them to give me a ring.”
“I’m sure they’d love that,” Deacon replied.
Hawk rubbed circles down Hannah’s back as he said, “Good to have down-to-earth family to keep you grounded.”
I snorted. “You think he’s grounded?”
Mom kicked me under the table, and I plastered on a fake smile to appease her.
“You know.” Mom gestured between Deacon and me. “I always thought the two of you would end up together.”
My fork clattered onto my plate. “Mom!”
Deacon laughed a little too hard. “Dove and me? Never.”
Damn.
That shouldn't have hurt nearly as much as it did. Never .
Even if the twenty-seven-year-old Dove agreed with him, the twelve-year-old Dove was devastated. He'd been my first crush, my first kiss. We’d had no idea what we’d been doing and had practically knocked each other's teeth out, but it had been a memory I’d held onto for a long time.
“Never,” I echoed, trying to sound indifferent even as a million thoughts whirled in my mind. “Especially not after you cheated on me,” I added, and a few of my siblings audibly gasped.
“Whoa!” Deacon leaned into the table. “I did not cheat on you.”
“You cheated on me in Medovier,” I countered.
“That was my rogue assassin character that cheated on you, and that campaign ended fifteen years ago!”
“Still, it started a habit of cheating, didn’t it?” I countered.
“Oh my god, you guys are such nerds,” Crane said with a laugh.
“It’s seriously adorkable,” Heron jeered. “You’re fighting over a board game.”
“It’s not a board game!” Deacon and I said at once, which only incensed me further.
The rest of my family clearly didn’t understand what a slight it had been. They always acted like I was getting upset over losing Monopoly. But at the time, Deacon and I had told each other everything, and even though it was “just a game,” it had still hurt. And it had hurt even more when he’d gotten his character killed off to go start a fun new life in New York that I’d known I wouldn’t get to be a part of. I’d lost my best friend that day, and he probably hadn’t even thought twice about it.
“You know, it's getting late,” Deacon said with a sigh, rising from the table.
“Deacon, don't go,” Mom pleaded. “Really. Dove’s just being, uh . . . Dove.”
“Thanks, Mom,” I muttered.
Deacon waved to the table. “Thank you for the lovely meal, Mrs. Lachlan.”
“I hope you'll come back again,” Mom offered.
“Thank you,” he replied noncommittally. “It’s been a nice walk down memory lane,” he added, giving me one last look before he left.