Chapter 37 Sawyer
SAWYER
In the morning, we wake up in a big pile together. I’ve got that warm feeling in my bones that only comes from having a very good night, and I stretch, grinning at the ceiling at the memory.
Violet stirs next to me, and she whimpers softly when she stretches.
“Sore?” Lennox asks from her other side.
“Oh yeah,” she replies, but she’s smiling. “In a whole new way than I’m used to.”
“We didn’t go too hard, did we?” I ask her, looking over in concern. I reach up and brush hair back from her face, pleased when she nuzzles into the touch.
“No, not too hard. I loved it.”
“Good,” Rhett says.
Violet snuggles down between us all, seeming to relax and enjoy the slow morning. Her hair is a mess, and she’s littered with evidence of how last night went. Something hot and possessive flares up inside me at the sight of it, but I tamp it down for now.
My brothers have the same looks on their faces, so I know they’re on the same page as I am when it comes to the fact that we would do a repeat of last night in a heartbeat.
Violet’s stomach growls a little while later, breaking the quiet. She giggles a bit, making a face. “I’m starving all of a sudden. Or maybe my body is just finally making sure I know about it.”
“You worked up an appetite last night,” I say, grinning at her. “It’s not surprising.”
Her face colors in a blush, and I reach over and touch the warmth of her cheeks. It’s one of my favorite looks on her, when she’s flushed lightly and just a little shy. Not hiding from us, but showing that the things we say have an effect on her. Beautiful.
“I could eat too,” Lennox says, stretching.
“Yeah, same,” Rhett agrees.
“Should we go out for breakfast?” Violet asks. “We haven’t all been out to eat in a while, and I haven’t had any leftover pastries from the bakery because things have been selling so fast.”
“Yeah,” I say. “Let’s go. We could do Porter’s or somewhere else.”
“There’s a cute diner in downtown Cartersville,” Violet tells us. “It’s only like twenty minutes from here.”
“Done,” Lennox declares. He gets up and goes to rummage through his clothes for something to wear. “Up, you lazy bums,” he says, snapping at us. “Breakfast waits for no one.”
Violet laughs and gets out of the cuddle pile. “Sir, yes sir,” she teases, giving him a salute.
Rhett and I exchange amused glances, but we get up too, and the room becomes a flurry of finding clothes and getting in them. Really, we should all shower after last night, but none of us want to deal with the wait of four people needing to take turns in one shower.
I pull a shirt over my head and grab my leather jacket, and then I see Lennox, glaring down at his own shirt. His hand is trembling, and it’s clear he’s having trouble doing up the buttons.
I already know that helping Lennox when he doesn’t want it means I’ll get my head bitten off, but it’s not fun to watch my brother struggle either.
He’s always been so damned prideful, refusing to accept help, let alone ask for it.
Then he just gets more frustrated when things fall or break or he can’t do his buttons.
I weigh the options of making a comment about just putting on a sweater. We’re all in a good mood this morning, and I don’t want to ruin that. Dealing with Lennox’s moods has always been a balancing act, and it’s been even worse since we had our falling out.
But to my surprise, Violet makes the decision easy. She steps in with a smile and takes over doing up Lennox’s buttons.
I wait, assuming he’s going to snap at her or tell her he can do it and isn’t a child, and there is a tiny moment where his shoulders go tense. But just as quickly, the tension bleeds out of him, and he doesn’t say anything.
Violet smiles up at him when she’s done, patting his chest. She doesn’t say anything either, just leans up to kiss his cheek before moving away.
“Has anyone seen my hairbrush?” she asks, glancing around the room.
“Kitchen,” Rhett says.
Violet frowns. “Why is it in the kitchen? I don’t brush my hair in the kitchen.”
“You did the other morning because you ran in to make sure you weren’t out of butter in the fridge. And I told you that you brought an entire three pounds home from the bakery, so there was no way you were out. But you needed to see for yourself.”
She blinks at him, lips parted. “I vaguely remember that.”
Rhett just shakes his head, a smile pulling at his lips. “Come here, Tink. I’ll show you.” The two of them step into the kitchen, and I glance over at Lennox again.
He’s moved on to finger combing his hair, and I notice that even though his bad hand still isn’t all that steady, he’s not avoiding using it like it’s the plague anymore. The sight of Violet helping him, and Lennox letting it happen rocks me to my core.
It’s progress, and something in me wants to give us a little more.
“Hey,” I say to him.
“Hi?” He tips his head to one side. “What’s up?”
“I just, uh, wanted to say something. To you.”
Lennox’s eyebrows lift to his hairline, but he waits for me to get my words out. Sincerity has never been a big thing in our family. We were always the ones who didn’t need words because we knew each other so well.
That definitely didn’t make things easier when our relationship fell apart because we didn’t even know how to talk to each other about what the problems were, and I’m realizing now that we all just sort of assumed the others would figure out how we felt and then got angry when it didn’t work like that.
But someone has to say something. Violet has done so much of the heavy lifting for us already, and it’s up to us to keep fixing things.
“Here’s the thing,” I say, just getting right to it. “You’re the older brother, right? We’ve always looked to you to know what to do because you always did know what to do. But I think maybe that wasn’t fair to you.”
“What?” Lennox’s brow furrows. “What do you mean?”
“You said—when we were talking to Violet about everything that went down with the company and Mom—you said that you felt like you had to make the right decision. But it shouldn’t have been all on you. We were grown, we could have spoken up, you know?”
“Yeah,” he says slowly. “Yeah, I guess you could have. And… I could have asked what you guys thought was the right thing to do. I didn’t have to take it all on myself.
I just felt like that was my role. Dad always let us do what we wanted, and I guess I felt like someone had to be there to make sure you didn’t get in trouble and Rhett didn’t isolate himself, and then Mom died, and it was like that feeling multiplied. ”
“We should have checked in with you more,” I admit. “I think we were all so buried in our own grief and anger and… whatever the fuck else. And you were just trying to keep things afloat on your own.”
Lennox looks down at the floor, but then back up at me, and when his eyes meet mine, I can see all the emotions there that we haven’t talked about. “Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I was.”
“I got… really fucking angry when you said you wanted to sell the company. It felt like you were giving up without even thinking about it or asking us what we wanted to do. I know that’s not fair now. I know you were just trying to protect us because if the company had failed on top of losing Mom…”
“It would have destroyed us,” he says quietly.
“Yeah.” I take a breath and let it out in a rush. “It would have felt like we’d lost everything.”
“I was just trying to keep that from happening. I didn’t think we could handle more loss, more pain.
More disappointment. I thought if we sold the company, at least we would have the money as a safety net.
No matter what else happened, we’d have that, and that would be enough to make sure we stayed together.
” He snorts, and there’s bitterness in it. “So much for that, right?”
“I’m sorry. For my part in it. For not asking your reasoning and just flying off the handle about it. And for letting it go this long and this far without ever trying to see things from your perspective.”
“I’m sorry too,” Lennox murmurs back. “I should have explained all that and not let the pressure get to me. Some of it was definitely self-imposed, and then I tried to blame you two for the way I was feeling. That wasn’t fair. But thank you, Sawyer, for saying something now.”
“Sure,” I reply. “It seemed like a good time, since you were in a good mood and all. I think you’re finally learning that you don’t have to hold everything together for everyone all the time.
You’re even letting people help you without being mad about it.
” I waggle my eyebrows at him, and he laughs, rolling his eyes.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes you do. Violet’s been a good influence on you. It’s nice to see, if I’m being honest.”
Instead of arguing or denying it, Lennox just smiles. It’s the warmest look I’ve seen on his face in a while. “I’d say she’s been a good influence on you too. You haven’t looked like you wanted to run away since we got here.”
He doesn’t say it all barbed, the way he and Rhett usually bring up my habits, and nothing about it sets my hackles up.
Before I can respond though, Rhett and Violet come back into the room.
“Are you two ready?” Violet asks, setting her hands on her hips. “I’m wasting away over here.”
“We can’t have that,” I tease, scooping her up in my arms.
“Sawyer!” she screeches, laughing and putting her arms around my neck. “I can walk!”
“Oh, but we didn’t go easy on you last night, Peaches. And you’re so hungry now. I wouldn’t want you to faint on the way to the car.”
She laughs and clings to me, and my brothers bring up the rear as we head outside to pile into Rhett’s jeep.
The drive to the diner is quick, and I have to admit that it’s nice being with my brothers when we’re not all tense and ready to snap at a moment’s notice.
Things have been thawing between us since we all finally got everything we wanted to say to each other off our chests, but there’s still work to do.
At least it feels like it won’t be thankless or impossible to do that work. My conversation with Lennox proves that.
We park downtown and get out of the car, stepping over piles of slushy, dirty snow.
“I’ll be so glad when winter is over,” Violet says with a sigh. “I love the holidays, but the dirty snow everywhere really puts a damper on things.”
“We’ll get you some French toast, and that will lift your spirits,” Lennox replies.
She brightens at the prospect, making the rest of us laugh.
As we head from the parking lot across the street, there’s the sound of screeching tires from just up ahead. My head snaps up just in time to see someone in a bright blue car losing control and skidding on a patch of black ice in the road.
We try to hurry out of the way, but the car is barreling straight toward us. My heart lurches in my chest at the sight, and my mouth opens to shout at everyone to move, but before I do anything, Rhett is moving in front of all of us.
He shoves Violet to the side, pushing her up onto the snow-covered grass on the other side of the road. Lennox and I are too big to move like that, and not close enough on top of that, but he stays in front of us.
The car doesn’t stop, and it crashes right into Rhett.