9. West #2
“She is,” West agreed. “Hopefully, she’ll be back on her feet soon.”
“Sure,” Tripp said noncommittally.
“Boys, you beat me to it,” Dad called out to them from the porch. “Come have some hot apple cider.”
“ Yes ,” Tripp said with a grin.
West smiled. His dad sometimes heated up apple cider from a local farm, throwing in a cinnamon stick, an orange or two, and some nutmeg, cloves, and whatever other baking spices were handy. It was a family favorite.
“ Shoes ,” everyone called out from the kitchen as they came in the front door.
Tripp grinned and shook his head.
The family had started the tradition of yelling shoes when they heard the front door open because Tripp had always tended to just go sprinting in to find a snack, tracking mud and snow all the way down the center hall .
“There’s no place like home,” Dad reminded Tripp, patting his shoulder as he slipped out of his boots.
The house already smelled amazing. The spice of the cider blended perfectly with the fragrance of roasted chicken and potatoes.
Elizabeth would be in heaven. Drumsticks were her favorite food. He could just hear her talking happily now, though he couldn’t make out the words.
When West was a little boy, this had been his grandparents’ house and he remembered having the same feeling about it that Elizabeth did now—the certain knowledge that everyone here loved her and that something nice was going to be simmering on the stove.
Dad continued back to the kitchen, calling out that no one had better be fussing with his cider. West and Tripp stopped in the living room to deposit the wood in the storage cupboards on either side of the fireplace. When it was stacked neatly, Tripp looked to West.
“You ready to go see your girl?” he asked.
“She’s not my—” West began.
“Just keep an open mind,” Tripp said, cutting him off. “See how it feels to be here with her.”
“I don’t see you getting serious about any girls,” West said.
Tripp shrugged and suddenly West got the distinct feeling that his brother wasn’t as thrilled to be single as he used to be.
He was so surprised by the idea that he opened his mouth to ask about it, but Tripp was moving back toward the kitchen before he had a chance.
West followed, mulling it over. They were all getting older, Tripp included. But it was a little strange to think of his rebellious younger brother wanting to settle down.
“There you are, boys,” Mom said in a pleased way as they stepped into the kitchen and took turns washing their hands in the big kitchen sink.
Tripp scrambled over beside her as soon as he was done, and tried to swipe a chunk of potato off the steaming pan of roasted chicken and root vegetables she had just taken from the oven.
“That’s hotter than lava, Tripp,” she declared. “It’ll serve you right if you burn your tongue.”
But she was smiling, and Elizabeth giggled at her favorite uncle from her spot over at the table beside Dulcie.
Just keep an open mind, Tripp’s words echoed in West’s mind.
He let his eyes meet Dulcie’s and felt his heart throb helplessly when she smiled up at him with a look in her eyes that seemed to say she felt safe and happy now that he was in the room with her again.
Hold onto yourself, a voice in the back of his head warned him.
But he was pretty sure it was already too late.
Dulcie was sitting on the far side of the massive kitchen table, next to Elizabeth and across from West’s brother Tag and his wife, Charlotte, who had baby Alonso in a sling against her chest. Elizabeth was lolling on Dulcie’s shoulder, singing a little made-up song to herself about drumsticks.
“Hey, West,” Tag said gruffly .
West gave his brother a wave, honestly impressed with him for being so friendly.
Tag had lost his first wife when his kids were still so young, and he’d been kind of a grumpy mess until Charlotte came along two Christmases ago.
Charlotte was their little sister Allie’s best friend, and the plan had been for her to run the family’s ice cream shop while getting over the loss of her father followed by a terrible breakup.
Instead, she had revamped the whole shop, and refreshed Tag’s broken heart while she was at it, bringing a smile to his face and falling head over heels for his two kids.
West thought he’d never seen his brother as happy as he was on their wedding day. But that had nothing on the joy the whole family shared when they brought baby Alonso home from the hospital this fall.
Now the chubby, happy, baby boy, who was named for Charlotte’s father, seemed to instinctively know his role was to bring unexpected smiles to everyone’s faces.
Olivia and Chance, the baby’s big teenage sister and seven-year-old brother, normally doted on him.
But right now, they were curled up together on the easy chair in the corner with one of the picture books their grandparents kept in the house.
Chance was showing off his reading skills to his big sister.
The front door opened, and West heard his brother Zane’s twin boys talking animatedly in the hall.
“ Shoes,” he yelled out, along with the rest of the family as he took a seat on the other side of Elizabeth.
Dulcie eyed him curiously.
“When the house smells good and you’ve been working outside all day, it’s easy to forget to take your boots off,” he told her.
“Easier for some than others,” Tag remarked, glancing at Tripp.
“Guilty as charged,” Tripp said, laughing.
“At some point, we all just got in the habit of yelling shoes to help each other remember,” West said.
Dulcie smiled, looking charmed, even though West was pretty sure the story just made them all seem like a bunch of cavemen.
The boys darted in. They seemed to be getting taller by the minute. But they still looked exactly the same with their blond hair and long legs. If it weren’t for Nick’s glasses, it might have been hard for anyone outside of family to know which was which.
Within the family, of course they all knew that Cal was as quiet as West’s brother Zane, and Nick was more like his Uncle Tripp—wild and rambunctious.
“Hello, everyone,” Zane’s wife, Becca said in her cheerful, schoolteacher voice.
The back door banged, and the only one left for it to be was West’s little sister, Allie.
Elizabeth shot out of her seat to go see her cousins, opening up West’s view of Dulcie, who eyed him nervously.
Keep an open mind…