RIGHT?
5
Prudence : Do you need me to stop somewhere for groceries?
Jack : No, it’s all good. Except if you need anything special?
Prudence : Not really…
Prudence : Are you sure you don’t need anything?
Prudence : Did the house come with a full fridge?
Jack : lol
Jack : It did not.
Jack : Would have loved to see that though.
Prudence : Jack, we can’t live off takeaway and deliveries…
Prudence : And you know I need my coffee in the morning or I’ll become a Gremlin.
Jack : I took care of it. Just come home, alright? I’ve put your key in the succulent pot next to the door.
PRUDENCE
Home . It’s not home . He didn’t even visit the damn place before reaching out to rent it. I know that if he didn’t wheel away screaming the moment he arrived it probably means the house is up to his—ridiculously high—standards, but still. We should have done this together, right ? The right way.
He could have rented a 2 bedroom shitty apartment in an ugly neighborhood, I wouldn’t have cared. My home is where he is. I don’t need a place like this. He is my home. The sun in my gloomy life.
When I park in front of the house, my jaw drops.
This.
Is.
Fucking ridiculous.
He is a bestselling author, yes. But this is a house we see in movies. The type of house owned by famous people. He can’t possibly be in his right mind renting a place like this.
Two story white house, a huge black framed glass front door, large windows everywhere. We could put another house between this one and the fourth one and I can see the ocean above the white wooden fence between them.
With my bags, I walk to the door gritting my teeth. He’s got to be kidding. There’s only the two of us, we don’t need such a house! We usually make do with a three or four bedroom house. A room for him, one for me, an office so he can write in peace and a guest room that I usually use to draw because, let’s face it, we don’t have a lot of guests coming over. Except when Nuri comes to visit, which she hasn’t done in a while. But she lives in San Francisco, so maybe she could come by soon, if she manages to escape her responsibilities as a mother for a few days.
I grab the silver key from the succulent pot and open the door carefully. A fucking glass door… What a stupid idea. What if someone slams it? What if burglars break it and break-in? There’s no way we can defend ourselves! Jack is in a wheelchair with no muscular strength and what would I do? Throw pencils and balls of paper at them while yelling like a lunatic?
I step inside cautiously and I’m surprised by the simplicity of every piece of furniture I see. Okay, I was totally expecting something ridiculously fancy. Not… That.
It’s kind of cute. The living area is large with cream couches and armchairs, a big soft white rug, and a lot of plants. There is a lot of space for Jack to roam freely in his chair. The open kitchen is in shades of rough gray stones and white polished countertops, with modern appliances. A round clear wooden dinner table with six gray chairs around it sits in the middle of the space. It’s cute, but when will we ever be hosting so many people at once?
The inside of the house is not what I expected when I looked at it from outside. It’s beautiful and comfortable.
But it’s still completely lifeless. It has no soul. It’s just a house. Not a home.
And how could it be? It’s obviously an incredibly expensive vacation rental. It’s not meant to live in. Not long term. It’s just supposed to be used when rich families want to spend a few weeks in a quiet beach house.
I check the rest of the first floor. There is a bathroom near the front door, and three bedrooms accessible from a corridor on the right. Two smaller ones on the street side and a large one with its own walk-in bathroom and own little deck overlooking the sea on the beach side. I see Jack’s suitcases scattered around this room, so he probably claimed it for himself. I would have claimed this one too out of the three if I were him.
But my brother is nowhere in sight.
Has he gone for a… I can’t even say walk, can I? For a… Drive? For fresh air, that seems better… I saw a park on the other side of the road… Maybe he’s there?
He answers his phone after three rings.
“Oh. My. God, Prue! Guess where I am!”
I frown. “I don’t know, but obviously not inside this ridiculous house.”
“Oh, come on… The house is great, you have to admit it.”
“Whatever,” I grit out. “Where are you? Do you need me to pick you up somewhere?”
“No, but you can join me! I’m on the beach.”
My frown deepens. On the beach? He can’t be on the beach… The wheelchair would get stuck with all the sand, and even though the water is not too far, there is no way he could have walked there. Between his dead muscles and his lack of balance, walking on the sand is completely impossible for him…
“But, how…”
“Evie and Ikram helped me get there. They are the absolute sweetest, you have to come and meet them.”
“Evie and Ikram? Did you already meet people here or…”
“Come on, Prue!” He sighs dramatically. “Come join us, I’ll introduce you.”
I roll my eyes. After driving this long I just want to sit on the couch and do nothing for a couple of hours.
But Jack is outside. Actually outside. Without me. It hasn’t happened in about three years, and now I’m worried, and curious at the same time. Who are these people? Are they going to help him come back to the house when he wants to leave? What if they just leave him there?
“Alright. Let me change quickly and I’ll join you.”
I can almost hear him smile on the phone when he answers. “Yes! Can’t wait. Bring a swimsuit!” And he hangs up before I can say anything else.
A swimsuit? I don’t have a fucking swimsuit…
I go upstairs with my little suitcase and find two other bedrooms with their personal bathrooms. Both as large as the one Jack chose, and both mostly similar to each other. Obviously, my choice lands on the one overlooking the sea, because, helloooo , the view is kind of amazing.
I put the bag on the bed and look out the window, spotting Jack sitting on the sand, his hands playing with it, two people sitting with him, both next to each other on his right side. They are all facing the ocean and when the water rises, it reaches their bare feet.
Jack. Sitting on the sand. Floor level. Oh my god, I’m both really happy and incredibly worried. I can’t lift him up from ground level! I run and work out to stay in shape and help him as much as I can, but from ground level? No, I might hurt him and hurt myself if I try to lift him back up.
I trade my leggings for an old pair of denim shorts, my white tee for an oversized black one that I crop with a knot on the side and head back downstairs, tucking my phone in my back pocket.
I take the stairs that lead from the deck to the sand and walk slowly towards where my brother and his new friends are sitting. When I’m close enough to hear them, my heart constricts a little.
He’s laughing.
All the ones I’ve heard the past years now seem forced to me.
He’s laughing every time the water touches his toes. But it’s not his usual laugh. This laugh feels real. This laugh feels like before, when we were kids and he was not—not in that much pain.
“Hey there,” I say softly and they all turn to greet me with smiles.
Jack’s long blond hair is tied in a messy bun and he beams at me, the smile reaching his deep green eyes, and my chest tightens a little more.
When people don’t know about our family situation, they usually stare at us for a while, trying to look for resemblance. It was even worse before, with our other siblings. Five children, all adopted, not a single one blood related to another.
Jack is fair skinned, with beautiful bright green eyes and blond hair. Freckles dot his face and arms, and he says his beard makes him itchy so he shaves every day. His nose is slightly crooked since he broke it as a preteen—sneezing into a table is apparently really painful—but he has the kind of delicate face that makes people sometimes mistake him for a girl.
Our oldest brother, Tham, 37 years old, is Vietnamese. Then, there is Amy, 35, with really pale skin and ginger hair, and finally Naveen, 34, adopted from Sri Lanka.
Jack was adopted fourth and is now 31, and they waited a little longer before adopting me last. As the youngest, it was always hard for me to connect with all of them—especially Tham, ten years my senior, who basically ignored me for most of my childhood.
They all look so unique that I’ve always felt a little left out. Bland. Dull. I don’t have Tham’s beautiful Asian eye shape, or Amy’s beautiful thick ginger hair, or Naveen’s hypnotizing dark skin and bright smile. I’m just my old boring self. Brown hair that never knows whether to be wavy or straight, muddy brown eyes that always betray my thoughts and feelings, olive skin that can as easily tan or burn. I’m an old bookcase. I don’t stand out so people don’t notice me, but when they do, they always have something to complain about. Too tall or too short—the curse of the average—, too chubby—what can I do if my waist is tiny but my hips and stupid ass need a size up?—, too loud, too quiet… I’m just always too much or not enough. Like an old bookcase. You don’t see it until you have a problem with it, because it takes too much space and you need to change it for something smaller because you don’t even read anymore, or it’s too small and you need to upgrade it with a bigger and better one.
And I don’t care, really. I’ve always been fine with it. Because not being seen means I can watch and see people. I can’t see them as well when they see me.
Like Jack, for example. He’s always seen me, and I can’t see him. He hides everything from my watchful eyes, and now, seeing him laughing like this when he was not seeing me, I can’t shake the feeling that I’ve been blind for a while. Blind to his pain. Blind to his loneliness. I wish he could tell me all those things he hides. I could help him more, be the support he actually needs.
I hate feeling this useless.
“Prue! I’m glad you made it!” He lifts his hand to grab my wrist and pulls me down to sit on the sand with them. “So, this is Evie,” he points to her and she gives me a kind smile. Her skin is the color of milk chocolate, her eyes a beautiful hazel and her long curly dark hair is tied up in a bun on top of her hair. “And this is Ikram,” he looks a little more reserved but his dark eyes are soft. He has an obvious Arabic heritage and he’s starkly handsome. He’s kind of Jack’s type, actually.
“Hi,” I smile back at them. “I’m Prudence, Jack’s sister.”
“We know! It must have been a long drive from Seattle.”
“It was fine. The hotel I stayed in last night was amazing, so when I took the road again this morning, I was as relaxed as a kitten.”
“So, you used the spa?” Jack wiggles his eyebrows at me with a smirk. “Was there any full-body massages involved?”
My eyes go wide as I throw quick glances towards Evie and Ikram, who are, I realize, not running away screaming at that inappropriate comment.
“What?” I cringe. “No, there was not! I just used the hot tub and got my feet rubbed by an old woman.”
“Oh. You mean that what happens in porn is not real?” he gasps dramatically.
“Jack!” I slam my hands on my face. “For fuck sakes…”
Evie lets out a chuckle while Ikram shakes his head and rolls his eyes.
“Don’t worry sweetheart,” Evie says with a wink. “Our friend warned us about your brother.”
“Warned you?” Jack scoffs. “About my amazing personality? My hysterical sense of humor? My incredibly good looks?”
“Yeah… All of the above,” Evie laughs again.
Warned them? Who is their friend? And why would he warn them? Does he know Jack? Wait…
“Uh… Hm, I’m sorry if I’m being rude or something, but… Who are you?”
Evie is still laughing, but it doesn’t look like she’s mocking me or offended.
“We’re personal care workers,” Ikram says softly while Evie plays with the sand, a soft smile on her face. From the corner of my eye, I see Jack tensing slightly. “We started this morning and we will be taking care of everything Jack needs and can’t do. Either some shopping, meal prep, if he needs assistance for a shower or a bath, or even like now, if he wants to go to the beach but his wheelchair can’t take him.”
Personal care workers . He never said he wanted to hire personal care workers before. I’m usually handling the shopping and meal prep and taking him to appointments… Does he not want my help anymore? Did I overstep when I told him that maybe we shouldn’t move and listen to the doctor’s advice? Oh my god, is he…
“Stop overthinking all this,” he plays with a strand of my hair distractedly. “I just want to be your big brother. I’m tired of being a burden.”
“Jack, you’re not,” I say firmly.
He sighs. “I am, Sunshine. You almost never do anything for yourself. You used to love working with the police and you stopped because you didn’t want to take the ferry in case something happened to me. You never go out and make friends, and I’m sure Hot Grumpy Guy was the first man you had sex with in about five years.”
I cast a quick glance towards Evie and Ikram, talking with each other, giving us what looks like privacy.
“I don’t care about all that,” I grit my teeth. “I care about you, and making sure you’re okay and as well as possible.”
“Well you don’t need to anymore,” he shrugs with a little smile. “Now, you can have your own life, and when we spend time together, it can be like it used to. Evie and Ikram will be with me every weekday from 9 to 5, and then there will be someone on call for the week-ends and during the night. So if I fall, or if I’m stuck at 3 in the morning, someone will come help me out.”
I blink slowly, my throat closing up. “ You know that’s the only reason mom and dad adopted you, right? What good are you if you can’t even help him anymore? ” Tham had hated me for a long time, but this particular day still stings a little. I know now that he had just said that because he was upset and he knew it would hurt me. I broke my arm and the responsibility of helping Jack had fallen on Tham. Later when I left for college, he apologized about the way he had treated me. After all, our parents never should have asked him or me to “take care” of Jack for them. But since they were not as helpful to him as they should have been, I took it upon myself.
He’s my brother. The only sibling who’s actually ever cared about me.
And now, he doesn’t need me anymore.
What if this changes things? Now that I won’t be helpful, what if he…
No. No, Jack’s not like that. He cares .
“Oh. Are you… are you sure? I don’t…”
“I’m sure Sunshine.” He slides his hand in my hair to ruffle it with a grin. “Let’s just be normal siblings for once. I want you to do whatever you want to do, and come home and tell me all about it without worrying about medical stuff, or me.”
I wonder what changed. If when he talked alone with the Doctor in Seattle, something happened, and now he wants me out of the medical issues.
Is he getting worse and doesn’t want me to find out?
“But what if…”
“Prue,” he interrupts more firmly. “That’s what I want. Don’t overthink this.”
I frown and nod, holding back more protests.
What am I going to do now? If he doesn’t want me to take care of him at all, should I go back to work with the police? No more part-time boring jobs in shitholes? I could never just stay home and do nothing, even though we don’t really need the money.
Maybe I will. Or maybe I’ll take some time to myself. Travel? No. I’m done traveling for a while, even though it would be really different if I were doing this alone just for myself.
No, I want to settle down a little. See what this place has to offer. Maybe I’ll make friends for once. I can totally spend my days busy without worrying for my brother, right?