Chapter 31 #2
“And,” Gramps continued, again in Robbie’s voice.
“‘Jenny can outride any man I know.’ And ‘She’s a better shot than I am. Too bad women aren’t allowed to fight.
If Jen showed up over here, the Vietcong wouldn’t stand a chance.
’” Gramps threw his hands up. “A beautiful woman who can cook, ride, and shoot? Really, what did he expect?”
“He expected you to keep your hands off his girl,” Dad said in a disapproving tone.
Holden fought back a laugh. “So you’re saying you disagree with our existence, Si?”
“No,” Dad snapped. “I’m saying…” He tugged at his hair. “I don’t know what I’m saying.”
“Gramps,” I interrupted. “What happened next?” I needed to hear the end of this story.
Gramps shrugged. “I’d spent a year tangling with the VC, and then Uncle Sam said I was done. So I came home. By then, Robert was already gone. In the last letter I got from him before I left for basic training, he asked me to please take care of his girl until he got back.”
Ford laughed. “You took care of her all right.”
Then Gramps did something I’d never seen him do in my entire life. He rolled his eyes. “Look,” he said to all of us. “I’m not going to be ashamed of something that God clearly meant to be.”
“You’re sure God had something to do with it?” Dad asked.
“Yes,” Gramps said, eyes blazing like don’t sass me, boy. “Falling in love with Jenny was the most spiritual experience of my life and I can’t be ashamed of that.” He lifted his chin defiantly. “I won’t.”
“But, like, how did it happen?” I asked.
“Simple.” He shrugged. “I got off the train expecting to see my parents and Troy, but instead Jenny was waiting for me. I recognized her immediately from all the pictures Robert had mailed. She said Mom wanted her to pass along a message: My family had the measles, and I was to stay with Jenny’s family until Mom sent word.
I knew before we even got back to Jenny’s house that I was going to marry her.
And she felt the same. Said she knew what she’d felt for Robert was nothing compared to what she was going to feel for me.
” He shrugged again, a bookend to the quick love story of Bowen and Jenny Dupree.
I didn’t realize I’d shoved my hands into my hair. “So you poached your brother’s girlfriend while he was off at war? That’s savage.”
Gramps didn’t deny it.
A snort escaped my nose. “Oh my gosh, wait till the others hear—”
“Nope,” Holden said firmly. “It stays in this room.”
“What?” I nearly shouted. “Why? This is epic. Gramps is the Mac Daddy of all Mac Daddies.”
Dad cocked an eyebrow at the group. “Y’all should’ve made him swear before you told him.”
“Whatever,” Ashton said. “Bowen’s good for it. Aren’t you Bowen?” There was a touch of threat in the question.
“Yeah. Of course. But why not? It happened forever ago?”
Gramps pushed off from the wall. “Because your grandmother agonized over breaking Robert’s heart for decades.
She didn’t make peace with it until five years ago.
Before that, she lived her life terrified of making a mistake in case we were wrong and this wasn’t what God wanted.
She thought if she or any of us stepped out of line, we wouldn’t make it into heaven. ”
“Oh, man. This explains so much.” Like, why the grandmother I knew as a little boy was so different from the grandmother I knew now. Granny of my boyhood had been rigid and judgmental. Granny now was happy, carefree, patient, and forgiving.
“Right?” Ford agreed.
Gramps’s chest rose and fell before he continued. “When Robbie never came home—”
“He was killed in action?” I blurted.
“No.” Gramps shook his head. “He just never came home after the war. He was so angry and hurt, that when he got back to the U.S., he hopped another flight to Alaska and never looked back.”
“Dang,” I said. “Does he still live there?”
“Yeah.” Gramps’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “In Juno, with his wife and two adult daughters. Who are both married and have kids.”
“And you haven’t spoken to him in all that time? He never came home to visit in all those years?” I asked again, trying to picture it.
But all I could picture was Griff.
“No,” Gramps said quietly. “I tried, but he cut off any effort I made. The reason Jen finally relaxed was that Robbie’s wife, Loraine, started sending a Christmas card about six years ago.
It’s the only communication we get. But there’s always a handwritten letter, a picture of their family, and a PS that kindly asks us not to respond.
” The last line sounded like it physically hurt him to admit.
“If your granny found out any of her grandkids knew, it would gut her.” He nodded outside where Granny was now loving on Cate, Charlie’s two-year-old sister.
“She’s happy and we’re going to keep it that way. ”
I glanced at my uncles, Dad, and Blue. “Do the women know?”
“Of course, the women know,” Ashton said. “We don’t keep secrets from our wives.”
Ashton was right; I was indeed rocked. “And you all thought I needed to know this, why?”
“Because, Bowen,” Ashton answered. “Love has potholes. It just does. None of us had an easy ride at the beginning.”
“Here, here,” Holden said.
Ashton leveled me with a look. “But that doesn’t mean it’s not right. Or it’s not worth fighting for.”
“And because we know there’s a lot of pressure on you all in the younger generation,” Ford said.
Blue spoke next. “Y’all have to constantly be thinking about what your actions might look like to the public. And we’re here to tell you, it’s okay if you don’t do everything perfectly. I certainly haven’t.”
Dad sighed. “And because we’re all worried about you. Instead of living your life, you’re hiding. Afraid you’ll mess up again. Afraid to show your face in public or date or do any of the things we know you want to do.”
“I’m not hiding,” I said.
“You skipped my last concert, even though the rest of the family came,” Ford said.
Fine, I was hiding. And I had been since I was a junior in high school.
“But mostly,” Gramps said. “We’re telling you because if it’s the right love, the sacrifice is worth it.”
It took me a beat to realize what they were actually saying.
They were giving me permission to pursue Magnolia.
The realization sparked warm and wild in my chest. I pushed back in the rolling chair, scanning each of their faces.
From Holden to Ash to Ford to Blue, ending on Gramps—they all seemed in agreement.
I’d been telling myself no for so long that the sudden shift made the room tilt sideways.
I gripped the armrests for support. “Let me get this straight. You all think I should go for it with Magnolia, even if I lose Griff for good?” They said nothing, giving me a minute to get used to the idea.
“We would…lose him for good. You know that, right?”
“Not necessarily,” Gramps said. “Give him a little credit.”
Ford lifted one shoulder. “We’re hoping he’ll come around.”
“You and Maggie.” A smile quirked at the edge of Ashton’s lips. “You have insane chemistry. We’ve all felt it.”
“T-today?” I sputtered, heat rushing to my face. I hadn’t even spoken to her.
“Yes.” Holden nodded. “Just the way you’re constantly giving each other sideways glances when you think no one’s looking.”
“The want in both of your eyes…” Blue flicked his hand like he’d been burned.
“But before, too,” Holden said. “Your chemistry was intense, even back then. We saw that train wreck coming long before it happened.”
My mouth fell open. “You did?”
Dad shoved both hands in his hair. “I didn’t.”
“You must’ve been blind then,” Ashton said.
“Or you didn’t want to see,” Blue said. “But it was clear as day to the rest of us.”
Which only proved I really was a terrible actor.
Ford aimed himself at me, lips puffed in annoyance. I knew that look. He was about to channel his sassy, strong-willed wife and cut through the crap. “You’re holding back for a brother that treats you like—”
“Ford,” Holden snapped. He tipped his head toward my dad, who was currently pacing the floor, about to tear his hair out.
“I can’t be here for this part.” Dad held his hands up as if abdicating himself from the discussion.
He walked to the door—but then he paused and turned back to me.
“For what it’s worth, they’re not wrong.
” His voice was thick with guilt, like he was a traitor to even admit that much.
“The way you look at Maggie, and the way she looks at you? It reminds me of your mom and me.” He reached for the door handle.
“Does Mom think I belong with Magnolia?” I blurted.
He paused, shoulders rising and falling like he didn’t want to answer. “I think you already know the answer to that.”
I thought I did too. Mom would never verbally encourage me to do something that would push Griff away, but if she thought Magnolia would make me happy, she wouldn’t encourage me to hold back either.
He escaped into the hall.
My hands were on the top of my head, still reeling. But then I realized something. I looked at Holden. “Why are you pushing me to go after Magnolia when Liam’s out there doing his best to make her his next girlfriend?”
“Pshaw.” Holden laughed. “He’s just trying to piss off Griff.
Probably hoping Griff’ll hop on a plane and fly home to fight him in person.
You know he’s been hurt ever since he left.
” I did. They’d been best friends their whole lives.
Cash too, until he ‘ditched’ them for Charlie.
Liam’s words, not mine. So when Griff left him behind, Liam felt abandoned.
“Well,” I huffed. “Magnolia seems just fine, all cozied up to your boy.”
Ford snorted. “Stop being a ding-dong and think with your head.”
Blue grinned. “She jumped on the Liam train as soon as Nova showed up.”
Ashton pushed to a stand. “She’s trying to wound you, the same way you wounded her when you went on Breaking Curfew.” He pulled a Granny and popped me in the back of the head. “That was a sucker move, noob.”
I rubbed my skull. “Ouch.”
“Ford’s right. Use your head, Bowen.” He glowered. “No breaking her heart again.”
“’Cause she’s not giving you another chance after this,” Holden said. Then he stood too.
“Facts,” Ford added, rising to his feet.
The four of them exited the room, leaving me alone with Gramps, who was now over by the window, watching Granny fly Cate in the air like a plane.
I ambled over to join him. Gramps looked exhausted.
Like it had sapped all his energy to discuss his estranged brother.
What a burden he and Granny had carried for so, so long.
From this angle, we could see all the way down to the lake. Dad was talking to Mom, and from the serious expression on his face, he was probably telling her to be prepared for the possibility that I might pursue Magnolia.
“Was it worth it?” I asked Gramps. “Losing your brother for the woman you love?”
Gramps tapped on the glass. “Look out there. What do you see?”
I looked at Granny. At my mom and Dad. My uncles and Blue, who’d just walked off the back deck and were heading down the hill.
By the lake, on the white sand beach, my aunts and Anna sat in camp chairs, talking.
James and Sage were in the shade, under a couple of oaks, napping in a hammock.
The majority of my cousins were on the water trampoline, having a seat war.
The rest were probably in the front yard, playing cornhole or bouncing in the castle.
“I see Duprees,” I said. “Lots and lots of Duprees.”
Gramps glanced at me, love burning in his eyes. “Exactly.”
My breath caught in my lungs, understanding his meaning. We were all descendants of Bo and Jenny Dupree. I was a descendant of Bo and Jenny Dupree. This was what their love had made. A big, beautiful family. Why would Gramps regret that?
“I don’t know why I didn’t meet Jen first,” he said. “There are a lot of things in life I don’t understand. But there are a few things I know I got right, and making a life with her is one of them.” I could tell it still hurt though—what he’d had to give up.
I put my arm around his shoulder. “I’m sorry about your brother.”
His smile didn’t reach his eyes like usual.
“I’m sorry too. But if I had to make the choice again, I’d choose her.
In every dimension, no matter the cost.” He looked me in the eye.
“If you choose Maggie, you have to choose her over anyone else.” Meaning Griffin.
“No floundering. No second-guessing. That’s the only way it will work. ”
“I’ve never actually dated Magnolia. What if we try and it’s terrible and I lose Griff and her too?”
“You want to know if she’s the one before you even take the chance to find out,” he said with a grunt.
“You can’t be faithless, Bowen.” Ouch. “You have to take chances.” His head tilted, studying me.
“Maybe you haven’t dated but you’ve known her a long time.
How does Maggie make you feel in here?” He tapped right over my heart.
It was the right question. “Peaceful.” Even thinking about her brought peace. Like it did right then. “And happy. When I’m not self-sabotaging or telling myself I don’t deserve her.”
Gramps nodded. “You have good instincts. You always have. Trust that feeling.”
Then he left to join the others.