July 2025 #2
The Fourth of July was odd this year, and not just because of Hannah and Jake.
Dane invited us over to his place, which was good, so we could watch the fireworks, but it was a very subdued affair.
I suspect that the state of the world at the moment leaves little room for celebration, but we have to find our joy in the midst of this chaos.
Regardless, all my friends were there, but none of my kids.
Jake remained out of town. Hannah had been to an event the night before and just wanted to sleep away her three-day weekend at home.
She was there babysitting Dobby and Chilly.
Usually, we were all together, for any reason, but not this year.
On the following Friday, we had all the kids at our house except Jake.
He was still in Wisconsin, which was the longest he’d ever been there.
I was starting to get worried. When Hannah went upstairs to change for yet another event, Wick immediately got up, moved around the table, and took a seat beside Finn.
“Oh? Really?” Harper snapped at him.
“I get why he’s mad. I’d be mad too,” Wick told him. “But just icing her out, not answering a call or a text? That’s some petty-ass bullshit.” After a moment, he turned to Sam. “Begging your pardon, sir.”
“No, no, that’s okay,” Sam said, glancing at me.
I cleared my throat, and all eyes were on me. “What happened exactly?”
Only Hannah and Jake knew what precisely had been said, and thus far, she had not been ready to tell us. But maybe she, or Jake, had told their roommates.
“After the engagement party where—wait. Sorry, Mr. Harcourt, but I have a question for Finn first. Man, what was up with your father and your brothers?” Wick asked, turning in his seat to Finn.
“Because I’m this close to saying they can’t come over anymore if they’re going to keep looking at me and Harper like we’re wrong. ”
“No, it’s not you guys—it’s me.”
“It’s me, actually,” Kola grumbled, getting up to go to the refrigerator.
“No—God. You’re reading it wrong,” Finn said, and then his voice got loud as he got up and charged over to the sink, arms crossed, scowling. “And you know better than to say something so stupid. They’re crazy about you.”
“Yes,” Kola agreed, coming out of the fridge with some shredded chicken I’d made the night before. “I agree. They like me fine. Alone. Separate from you, just not with you.”
“So what?” Harper apprised him. “It only matters if Finn likes you, and he does. You have to get over that. I’m doing it with Wick’s grandparents.”
Wick turned sharply in his chair to regard Harper. “What did you say?”
Harper rolled his eyes. “Your grandfather nearly passed out when you brought your boyfriend into your mother’s family’s mansion on the Upper East Side.”
“That’s not––”
Harper turned to me and Sam at the end of the table, Sam at the head where he always sat, and me to his right.
“Wick’s mother is originally from New York, which is where I went over spring break, with him and the rest of his family.
His mom and dad met here, in Chicago, for work, and ended up staying. ”
“Nice,” I said.
“Wick’s father’s family,” he went on, “is from Georgia, and they don’t like guys who love other guys…like me.”
“I’ll have you know I have a lot of family in Georgia, and they are not homo––”
“Oh, I’m not blaming Georgia as a state,” Harper rushed out, glaring at Wick. “I’m calling out your grandfather and your father’s brothers, who, much like Finn’s brothers, have a problem with Kola being a guy––”
“Thank you,” Kola muttered.
“––and have an issue with me being the same.”
“No. You’re wrong. That’s not––”
“I was there at the family reunion,” Harper reminded Wick. “I am not blind, and I can determine when I’m not wanted.”
“You––”
“Your mother’s family—all great. They wanted to hear about school, about me getting my master’s, about where I wanted to work…all that. Your cousins—even the one doing a bit too much cocaine if you ask me––”
“Nigel is just––”
“––could not have cared less about me being gay.”
“Harper, you––”
“But your paternal grandfather and your grandmother, your father’s brothers, as well as their wives, were not happy I was there.
Your sister tried to tell me that I was misreading the situation, but when I asked her where Tariq, her boyfriend—who’s studying to be an aerospace engineer, by the way—was, she told me he was visiting with some of his family instead. ”
“Sloane was trying to tell you that––”
“At first I thought something really horrible,” he said, meeting Wick’s gaze. “I thought, I’m Black and Tariq is Black, but both of the horrible brothers’ wives are too, so that ain’t it.”
“Har––”
“So really, all it can be is the gay, and Tariq knows it and didn’t want to see me treated like crap, so he bailed.”
“It’s not what you––”
“It must be awful for your grandparents that you turned out to be gay. They must be terribly disappointed and––”
“No, you’re not lis––”
“It’s fine,” Harper assured him. “I won’t be visiting them at their manor in Milton anytime soon or asking to ride their horses or––”
“It’s not like that!” Wick yelled. “My family doesn’t care about me being––”
“But if we ever get married, we’re really going to have to think about who’s making the guest list, because I will not have my parents, my sisters, or anyone I love seeing me treated the way I was when I was standing in that great room having cocktails.”
Wick’s face crumpled, and Harper exhaled sharply before turning to me. “I’m sorry. Apparently, I’ve been holding that in.”
“Don’t be sorry, love,” I soothed him.
He nodded and then looked at Kola. “Are you heating that so we can have tacos or not?”
“I am,” Kola replied quickly. “Come cut the tomatoes and the jalapenos.”
Harper was out of his chair quickly.
I took hold of Sam’s hand, and he looked around the table at all the unhappy faces.
“Oh,” Wick said suddenly, and we both looked at him. “You were asking about Hannah, and I didn’t––”
“It’s fine,” I said softly.
It was quiet in the room, Harper washing vegetables, Kola heating up the chicken, the rest of us sitting in silence.
There was a knock on the back door then, and Dobby went nuts barking and ran to where George Hunt was, waving in at us.
“Come in,” Sam called to him, and George opened the door, scooping up Dobby as he came in, the dog whimpering and wiggling in delight.
Striding over, George kept hold of the dog as he glanced around the room. “What happened? You all look terrible.”
“Things are happening with all the boys—men—and Hannah and Jake.”
He nodded. “Well, I did some digging after Hannah explained everything to me on the phone last night. It took a bit, since she was crying again, but once I got the particulars, I am now up to speed on things.”
It was a George thing; he really did have to know everything.
“Now, Harper, after speaking to Hannah, I did some digging into Wick’s family, and Hannah is under the impression that you think there’s some hate there over you being gay, but there’s not. They’re snobs, not homophobes.”
Harper was staring at George, his eyes wide, paused in mid-cut of a Roma tomato.
“They don’t care about you being gay, or Black, in case you were wondered about that, they only care about you not coming from a family with generational wealth.”
Harper looked over at Wick, who shrugged. “Is that what you were trying to tell me?”
“Yeah. They’re snobs. I came out to my family when I was ten, and everyone was, like, yeah, fine, whatever. You be you. They all loved my last boyfriend—Percy Quantrell Bledsoe the Third. He was from St. Simons.”
“Percy?”
“I wouldn’t start, Finnegan,” Harper snapped at him.
“Finnegan is way better’n Percy,” Kola said defensively.
“They’re snobs,” Wick told Harper. “They don’t give a crap that you’re gay.”
“Yep,” George concluded. “That’s what I got as well.”
All eyes were on him.
“Hannah said your father and brothers don’t like Kola being your choice to marry,” George said to Finn. “But they’ll come around. If I was your father, I’d worry more about the choices of his two older sons in the love department, yeah? I mean, that ain’t going so great.”
Finn groaned, and Kola smiled.
“Also, I’ve decided that tomorrow when you have your protection duty with Kip Benning, I will go along on that one, as he’s a bit of a partier.”
Finn made a noise like he was dying. “I get it. I do. And you’re my boss, but I’m off the clock, so I have to tell you that this babysitting is getting so old.”
“Hmmm,” George rumbled. “When you’re a grown-up, we call it supervision, not babysitting, and perhaps if one made good choices, on a continual basis, then one could be entrusted not to need said supervision.”
“I have learned my lesson, I swear to God.”
“Then whether I’m there or not hardly matters. You should conduct yourself in your capacity as an elite bodyguard while on the clock, without any concerns.”
“You make me nervous, and then I mess up.”
“So your argument is that if I wasn’t there, then you wouldn’t mess up?”
Finn just looked at him.
“Gimme a break,” George said with a grin that told Finn how stupid he sounded.
Finn leaned, his head in hand, and George turned to us.
“Did Hannah tell you about her and Jake?” I asked George.
“Unfortunately yes. She always feels the need to overshare.”
I nodded. “What did she say?”
“Apparently Jake informed Hannah that he will no longer be taken for granted. She makes decisions and he’s expected to go along. It’s not fair, and he’s done with it.”
“That’s pretty much exactly what he told me,” Kola imparted.