Chapter 5
The next morning, Evie has to leave a little before ten because she’s going shopping with Eddie and his mom. We say goodbye
at the front door, and then I make my way into the kitchen. Which, I quickly realize, is not empty.
“Nicky!” I go to hug my brother. “What are you doing home?”
He’s standing at the kitchen counter eating what looks like an entire box of Cinnamon Toast Crunch out of a mixing bowl. He’s
dressed head to toe in UConn football sweats, and his hair is all messed up, as though he took a shower and didn’t bother
to brush it afterward.
He puts his spoon down and grins, reaching out to hug me back. “Hey, Gus,” he says. “Missed you, too.”
When we pull away, I say, “But seriously, what are you doing here? Don’t you have a game? Or practice?”
“Nope. We’re on a bye this weekend. I only have practice tomorrow, so I thought I’d come back for a night. Plus, I have like
six hundred pounds of laundry to do.”
“You mean that you’re going to make Mom do,” I correct him.
“Hey, she offers,” he says, taking another huge bite of cereal. “Do you have plans today? Wanna do our thing?”
I look meaningfully at his bowl of cereal. “Now? Will you still have room?”
“After this?” he says. “Please. This is an appetizer.”
I get changed quickly so we can head out to do “our thing”: a pancake breakfast at the diner on Mason Street, followed by
a few hours at the hokey, old-fashioned arcade in Westbury. It’s been a tradition ever since we moved here. We haven’t done
it since he left for college in August.
The diner has been aggressively decked out for autumn, with foliage and pumpkin decals covering every inch of the wide front
windows. I’m tempted by the apple crisp baked oatmeal, but Nicky is offended I would even consider going against tradition,
so I don’t.
When our pancakes arrive, we drown them in maple syrup and talk about everything: school, his roommate who never sleeps and
listens to show tunes full blast, my anxieties about college applications and financial aid.
“So, Nick.” Our waitress has stopped by to refill our coffees, even though neither of us has an empty mug. “How’s college?
You still playing football?”
I recognize her; she’s a fellow senior at Glenridge, but I don’t know her name. I don’t think she knows mine, either, but
she sure knows Nicky’s.
Nicky’s nose has a whisper of my old one, but on his face it belongs.
He got Mom’s coloring and Dad’s blue eyes.
And unlike me, he didn’t have to spend a minute in the orthodontist’s chair.
Even I can admit Nicky is handsome, which has mostly been weird to deal with ever since we moved to Connecticut and he became the star of the family instead of me. The role suits him better, anyway.
“It’s good. And yeah, I am.” He doesn’t give her his typical flirtatious grin, which is unlike him, because she’s pretty.
When she leaves, he says to me, “When I was driving by this morning, I noticed they were setting up a casting call in Ciuccoli
Park. I looked it up. They’re filming the Westbury murder book here?”
“Yes,” I say cautiously.
“And I’m assuming you already know that Luke is starring in it? Your Luke? Were you going to mention this to me at any point?”
“Can you lower your voice? And yeah. He is. But he’s not my Luke.”
“If I’m remembering correctly, you two had, like, world-ending crushes on each other. So yeah, I think ‘your’ Luke is appropriate.”
I drag a piece of pancake through a pool of syrup. “Him being here has nothing to do with me.”
Nicky doesn’t bite. “Right. Sure. So has he called you yet?”
“Called me? No.” I scoff. “I doubt he’s thought about me in years. Things weren’t that great between us when we stopped talking.”
“Weren’t you the one who cut off contact with him? And the rest of the cast, too?”
“I was barely thirteen when Bricks ended! I didn’t ‘cut off contact.’ You don’t make decisions like that when you’re thirteen. I was just embarrassed about what happened with Dad.”
“‘What happened with Dad’?” Nicky repeats. “No. Try again. I think you meant to say, all the exploitative and abusive shit that man put you through.”
Nicky doesn’t speak to Dad anymore. He only remembers the bad stuff. He doesn’t think of his silly streak, his pitch-perfect
Jack Black impersonation, the way he always bought breakfast and coffee for the security guards at the studio, his funny obsession
with Bugs Bunny. Even if it all went bad in the end, Dad was there with me—for me—on set, constantly. He hustled for me.
“Fine, sure,” I relent. “Call it whatever you want, but at the end of the day, I didn’t want to talk about it. Not that it
matters anymore. And for the record,” I add, “it wasn’t a two-way street. I was the one with the crush on him. But it wasn’t
world-ending.”
Nicky pauses just long enough that I go on.
“I mean, did I have a huge crush on him? Yes. But we were kids. And it ended badly.”
“Wasn’t he your first kiss?” Nicky asks.
I’m this close to shoving his sticky plate of pancakes onto his lap. Nicky always has to be right, even if that means dredging up the details of his little sister’s first kiss. “It wasn’t real. Don’t you
remember? It was a dare.”
“Did you ever confirm that with him?”
“Can you please stop?” I say.
“Did you?”
“I didn’t have to. All the confirmation I needed was right there in the mirror.”
“Oh, please,” Nicky says. “Were you awkward and skinny with a terrible haircut? Yes. But you’ve always been pretty.”
I squint at him. “Thanks, I guess?”
“My pleasure,” Nicky says, grinning.
“Now can we talk about something else? Anything else?”
Nicky shrugs. “Sure.”
And to his credit, he doesn’t mention the movie, Luke, or Dad again.
When I come back from the bathroom, I see that he’s already paid with money he made from his student job refereeing club soccer
games. “Thanks, big bro.” I also see that our waitress didn’t charge us for Nicky’s meal. I tap the check. “Is that her phone
number?”
“Oh. Yeah. I guess it is.” He stands to leave without grabbing the receipt. “Ready?”
“You’re not going to take it?”
“Nah.”
Interesting. I haven’t heard any mention of a new girlfriend, but with Nicky, you never know.
At the arcade, we play all the classics—Pac-Man, MotoGP, the works. As we play, I already miss doing this with him. I have an aching feeling that as time goes on, we’ll do this less and less. It already feels like
a memory.
We’re in the car on the way back home when both my and Nicky’s phone ping at the same time. It’s a text from Mom, letting us know Todd will be joining us for dinner.
“Maybe I’ll head back to school early,” Nicky says.
“Please don’t,” I beg.
“Hmm,” Nicky says. “I don’t know. . . .”
“Nicky!” I reach out to pinch his arm, but he swats me away. “If you do, I’ll throw away all your stuff and move into your
room.”
“You and Mom will have to fight over it,” he mutters. “She’s turned my desk into headquarters for Nina’s Catering.”
But, thankfully, he stays.
After we get back to the house, I take a shower while Nicky helps Mom unload groceries and prep dinner. Mom is just as happy
as I am that Nicky is back this weekend. Maybe even happier. When I come back downstairs, I stop for a minute in the entryway.
Pots clank, music is on, and they’re laughing together. I know I could easily slide onto one of the counter stools and join
their conversation, and they’d be glad to include me. But it’s like there’s a layer of invisible plastic wrap that keeps me
from doing it, from fully being a part of their easy back-and-forth.
I guess things haven’t changed for Mom and Nicky as much as they have for me.
Todd arrives fifteen minutes early with a bottle of red wine.
It’s Saturday, but he’s still dressed like he’s going to the office: khaki slacks and a Patagonia fleece vest over a button-down shirt.
He lives in Stamford, close to his hedge fund job, which is about forty-five minutes from here.
I don’t know how he does it, because even on days with heavy traffic, he’s always early.
“I’ve never seen Glenridge so busy,” Todd says once we’re all seated. “Did any of you know a movie is being filmed here?”
I catch eyes with Nicky. Not this again.
Todd continues without waiting for anyone to respond. “I stopped by that wine store we love, Nina, to get this Cab—it’s good,
right, hon? It cost a fortune, so it better be—and it took me ten minutes to find a spot to park.”
What a sad little story, I think, spearing a green bean.
“Mmm. It is great,” Mom agrees. “Pairs nicely with the chicken.”
“It does. Which is sublime, sweetie.” Todd takes another bite. “What’s in the sauce?”
“Just jus, butter, and herbs.”
“Well, it’s incredible,” Todd says.
Mom glances between Nicky and me before taking a sip of her wine and smiling at Todd. “Thanks, hon.”
Even after more than a year of dating, she still watches us like she’s showing us her favorite movie and is waiting to see
if we’ll hate it.
“Anyway,” Todd says. “I heard it’s the movie version of that book, the one about the teacher who got offed by her student.”
“Oh, about that, I forgot to mention, we got the—” Mom says, right as Todd starts talking again, too. Todd stops and motions for Mom to continue.
“No, no, you go,” Mom says.
“So I looked it up on my phone,” Todd says. “And you know who’s starring in it? The kid from that sitcom. What’s his name . . .
Lucas Cordova?”
I freeze, my fork in midair.
Nicky looks over at me.
“He’s in it?” Mom says, like she’s truly surprised.
“Yeah,” Todd says. “Remember that show he was on? House of Bricks?”
Of course Todd would remember Luke for that. Not the recent blockbuster or the HBO series that made Luke an actual star. No,
he thinks of the cheesy network sitcom that ended half a decade ago.
“Huh.” Mom pretends to think for a minute. “Sure. Kind of.”
“My niece loved that show. I always knew that boy was going to be a big star. The poor girl on it, though. Remember her? The
odd little neighbor kid who the internet got obsessed with? I read some Vice piece about how her father stole all the money she made from the show.” Todd takes a long sip of wine. “Child stars, man.
I feel for them. Can’t be easy. No wonder they all go off the rails and get into drugs. I bet that’s what happened to her.”
Both Nicky and Mom are frozen. I can tell they have no idea what to say.
This is the first time we’ve ever come so close to someone just .
. . stumbling on the truth. I force myself to put my fork down and lean forward, giving Todd my most winning smile.
The smile that cost me three years in the orthodontist’s chair.
“So, Todd. How’s work? Didn’t you say you were closing a big new investment last time I saw you? ”
And that’s all it takes. He’s off on a work tangent, which is boring, but it does the job.
Todd’s not my favorite, but in fairness he wouldn’t have said any of that if he knew he was talking about me. Which means
Mom still hasn’t told him about me. About us. Which also means maybe, just maybe, she isn’t one hundred percent serious about him.
I’m sorry, Mom mouths from across the table. I smile and shake my head to let her know it’s fine, even though it’s not, not really.
Todd turns to Nicky and punches him on the shoulder. “So, Nick, whatever happened to Cassie?”
Nicky’s jaw is still tense. “Oh. Nothing. We were just hanging out.”
Todd puts on a conspiratorial tone. “I know it’s not PC for me to say in this day and age, but man, she was a cutie.”
“Todd.” Mom’s smile is too big and her eyes are too bright, like she’s apologizing for him.
“Wasn’t she a model?” Todd asks.
“Only on Instagram,” Nicky mutters, focused on something in his lap.
“No texting at the dinner table,” Mom says.
“I’m not,” Nicky says, pulling his hands out from under the table. “See?”
“Don’t hassle him, Nina,” Todd says. “I bet he’s texting one of his ladies.”
Todd loves Nicky, probably because—between how good he is at football and the kinds of girls he dates—Nicky is exactly what
every “red-blooded American man” thinks a nineteen-year-old guy should be. He even offered Nicky an internship at his hedge
fund this past summer, even though Nicky hates math and I’m the one in AP econ.
In my pocket, my phone buzzes. I check it slyly.
It’s from Nicky. A finger emoji points to his right, where Todd’s sitting, and then it says, World’s biggest douche.
I spend the rest of dinner trying not to laugh.