23. Reva #2
Steady. Deep. Less performative than Nash, less playful than Shiloh, which somehow makes it worse. His mouth says good morning in a way that makes my spine soften and my fingers curl against the edge of the stool.
Behind us, Cal makes a sound like a man being spiritually sandblasted.
“My eyes,” he says.
Ever pulls back just enough to look at him. “Morning.”
Cal points the spatula at all of us. “I raised one child. One. I am not prepared for a committee.”
Shiloh leans against the counter. “We prefer coalition.”
“No one prefers that,” Cal says.
I press a hand to my face, but I am smiling despite myself. “Can we please not make this worse?”
Nash’s voice is calm. “We should make it clear.”
Cal turns down the burner and faces us. The humor thins.
I don’t like it, but I understand. This was always coming. Maybe not over pancakes. Maybe not with me still tasting Ever on my mouth and Cal holding a spatula like a defensive weapon. But it’s been coming for a while now.
Shiloh sets a mug in front of me. “We don’t need to make it a thing. Reva is with us.”
Cal looks at him, then Nash, then Ever, then me.
“With all of you.”
I lift my chin and take a breath. “Yes.”
He absorbs that.
To his credit, he does not yell. He does not make a crude comment. He doesn’t ask if I have lost my mind, though his expression suggests the question is very close to the surface.
Finally, he says, “Does this make you happy?”
The simplicity of it knocks something loose in me.
I expected judgment. A warning. A lecture about danger, control, men who want too much. I expected him to reach for the old authority and tell me this is reckless.
He doesn’t do any of that.
I look down at my coffee.
“I don’t know if happy is the word. It’s hard to be happy right now when all this other stuff is hanging over me.”
Cal nods slowly. “Fair enough.”
“But I chose it,” I say. “I’m choosing them.”
His eyes stay on my face. “All of it?”
Heat creeps up my neck. “I’m not discussing logistics with you.”
Shiloh makes a strangled sound. Nash looks amused. Ever doesn’t do either, because Ever has the survival instincts of a man who would like to keep all his teeth in his head.
Cal turns back to the stove. “Good. Because if anyone says logistics again, they’re eating breakfast in the yard.”
“Thank God,” I mutter.
He flips the pancakes. “I don’t have to understand everything today. I just have to know you’re not being pushed or coerced or manipulated.”
“I’m not.”
“Managed?”
I glance at Nash. He meets my look without apology.
“Well, there was some attempt at that,” I say. “It did not go well.”
Cal snorts.
Shiloh beams. “She is resistant to governance.”
“I noticed that around age three,” Cal says.
The room eases. The pancakes help. They are perfect, which annoys me. Golden edges, blueberries bursting in the middle, butter melting over the stack. Cal puts a plate in front of me without asking how many I want. Three pancakes. Extra blueberries. Light syrup because I hate when they get soggy.
My throat tightens again. I stab the top pancake with my fork before my face can do anything embarrassing.
“Thanks.”
He nods and sits across from me with his own plate.
For a while, we eat. Shiloh talks enough for everyone, mostly about a restaurant in the Quarter that once refused him service until the owner realized he owned the building.
Ever drinks coffee and watches the windows.
Nash answers one text and gets glared at by all of us until he turns the phone over again.
It is almost normal.
Then Cal says, “What did you and Delia have words over last night?”
My fork stops halfway to my mouth. The kitchen changes. The shift isn’t loud. The air simply tightens around the subject and waits to see who bleeds first.
I put the bite in my mouth because I refuse to let a perfectly good pancake die for Delia. It tastes like childhood, which is rude under the circumstances.
Cal watches me as I chew.
Swallow.
“We had more than words.”
“I saw.”
“Then why ask about it?”
“Because I want to know what started it.”
“I don’t want to talk about it.”
Ever sets his mug down. Shiloh goes quiet. Nash’s eyes sharpen.
Cal’s voice stays gentle. “You two have a lot of hurt between you.”
My laugh comes out flat. “That is a very soft way to describe her telling me I should have stayed dead.”
Cal’s face tightens. Good. Let him sit with that.
“She didn’t mean that,” he says.
“You don’t know what she meant.”
“No. I just know what it sounds like when somebody is terrified and stupid with it.”
My chair scrapes back an inch.
Shiloh says my name softly. I ignore him.
“As far as I’m concerned, she has her wish,” I say. “I have no sister.”
Cal’s shoulders drop, the smallest surrender. “Aw, now don’t be like that.”
The phrase hits me wrong. Too familiar. Too fatherly. Too easy for him to say when he is not the one who stood on a patio looking at the girl he mourned and then heard her choose the grave over him.
I set my fork down carefully. The plate clinks too loud.
“Just giving her what she wants.”
“Reva—”
“She can stay dead to me, and I’ll stay dead to her.”
Cal looks like I slapped him.
I stand before anyone can stop me, before Nash can order me to sit, before Ever can steady, or Shiloh can soften the edges. The kitchen blurs at the corners, but I keep my chin up. I will not cry over Delia. Not in front of pancakes. Not in front of Cal.
Homer appears in the doorway, tiny and orange and uselessly hopeful.
I step around him and walk out. Behind me, no one follows right away. For once, they let me leave with the last word.
I hate how little it feels like winning.