5. ashton
five
ashton
. . .
Dandelion - Ella Langley
From what I hear, both my brother and Jody were a little worse for wear this morning after our night out.
Brooks called me around eleven, hooting and hollering, and probably hoping I was also in the hangover trenches.
Luckily for me, I can hold my liquor pretty well, and we both enjoyed a little schadenfreude.
I don’t know about Jody, but Ev seems pretty okay now for our Sunday family dinner.
“Do you like Taylor Swift?” Ruth has me cornered. Boxed in as I’m scooping a heaping pile of potato salad onto my plate. On one side of me is the wall of the house, and on my other, Ruth is waiting for access to the food with a hopeful smile on her face.
“I’m more of a Shania, Trisha, Dolly kind of girl, but I can get behind a little Taylor from time to time. Why?”
Ruth bounces on the balls of her feet. “I couldn’t get tickets for London; it sold out in less than thirty seconds.
But I managed to get three on resale for the Houston show in a few weeks.
It’s at the big football stadium. Ev said he’d come with me if I want him to, but…
Taylor’s shows are girls’ nights. It’s the rules. And I don’t really have my girls here.”
“So what you’re saying is you want me to get gussied up in glitter and clean boots and drive you to Houston? Be your girls for the night?”
Ruth looks at me with wide eyes and a hopeful smile. “I do have a third ticket. I was thinking of asking—wait, do you know Talia? From the dress shop?”
Oh, I do know Talia. Maybe a little too well.
But in spite of our history, and in spite of her being much closer to Ruth’s age than mine, there’s never been any bad blood between us.
She’s gorgeous, and a total sweetheart too.
There are plenty worse people to spend an evening with.
A night out with Ruth and Tal might be exactly what I need.
Holding back the sigh that threatens to escape, I nod.
“Sure. Let’s make a night of it,” I decide. “Maybe I can borrow Dad’s truck or something. S’a little more roomy than Mom’s old car.”
“Yay!” If Ruth’s hands weren’t full, I think she’d be clapping with excitement. I glance over to catch my brother watching us, and as Ruth catches his eye, a bright, beaming smile on her face, a matching one blooms on his. He’s so done for with this woman.
She steps aside to give me space to leave, and I make my way back to the table.
It’s a lot more full than it used to be.
Brooks and his parents are with us, of course.
His older sister, Harriet, has brought her husband, Dean, along with Emmy and their two golden retrievers, Flo and Dougie, who are pacing under the table, hoping for scraps.
This time next year, they’ll have another baby to join us at the table, too.
And of course, Ruth is here with Everett.
From time to time, the Fisher family joins us, too.
Ms. Angie and Mick come over with Jody, and when Reston, their youngest son, is in town, he’s usually persuaded to come over, too.
But Reston is in Nashville chasing his dreams, and the Fishers aren’t here today.
I paste a smile on my face and slide back into my seat between Brooks and my brother.
I like Ruth. I’m honored that she invited me to join her. But my head and my heart feel torn and tangled right now, and for as much as I love my family, today is one of those days where even simply existing around other people feels like a chore.
“She corner you about Taylor Swift?” Everett asks quietly. “You don’t gotta do it, if you don’t want. I said I’d go, and I meant it.”
“It’s fine, Ev,” I say. I find myself surprised at how true the words are. Surprised how excited I am for the trip already. I’m already mentally cataloging my wardrobe, trying to choose an outfit. Maybe I’ll buy myself something sparkly and ridiculous. “I’ll go. I want to. It’ll be fun.”
“Just—do me a favor, huh? Take some pictures of you guys? I know she misses her girlfriends like crazy. Having pictures to look at, having people here, too… it might help. You know?”
“You got it, Evvy. She said she got a third ticket, anyway, so she’s asking Talia to join us.”
“Good lord. Don’t let those two near the merch, please?”
Ruth chooses that exact moment to slip into her seat on Everett’s other side, and he turns away from me to offer her a brilliant smile.
“You and Tali gonna bankrupt me buying your tour outfits, huh?”
“I will spend my own money, I promise.”
“You will not,” Everett scoffs. “If I can’t buy my wife a pretty dress to wear for a night out…”
I tune out their conversation, instead turning to Brooks, who is debating baby names with his sister.
“Why wouldn’t you want to name him Brooks?”
“Because one of you is plenty,” Harriet says with a long-suffering sigh and a hint of a smile. “Emmy Bug, eat your carrots please, baby.”
“I hear Silas is a good name.” Mr. Hart leans over to clean some potato salad residue from his granddaughter’s face with a smile as he joins the conversation.
His kind smile always fills me with ease.
He’s as close to me as my own father—growing up, he was always out working on the ranch or in our kitchen with his wife and my own parents—but he’s always been Mr. Hart to me.
Harriet huffs. Her husband rolls his eyes with a smile as he reaches over to spear a tomato from her plate, popping it into his own mouth.
“We’ll see,” she says. “Still got four and a half months to think about it.” She rubs the small bump and leans back in her seat. Her husband grins at her, almost as lovesick as my brother and his wife, and a pang of sadness hits me out of nowhere.
I miss looking at someone like that. Having someone smile at me that way, like I am the sun.
Watching Brooks interact with his family—our family—it hits me.
I’ve missed him. I’ve missed this. The way he loves his family out loud, without any hesitation or embarrassment.
My family has always been the most important thing in the world to me, and I couldn’t imagine ever turning my back on them the way Declan and Jessa did theirs.
Neither Declan nor Jessa ever spoke nicely of their own families, and while they loved each other, the tiny community of two—three, including me—I once admired now seems awfully lonely in comparison.
And the community I’ve always imagined myself in, the one I’ve always wanted… it’s what I’ve had all along. It’s always been here. Coming home was exactly the reminder I needed.
Conversation fills the air, everyone at the table lively, and a few moments after her first attempt to convince Emmy to eat her vegetables, Harriet repeats herself.
“No tank you Mommy.” It certainly looks like her firm-but-fair parenting is working, with Emmy’s polite response, all smiles, eliciting quiet chuckles from around the table.
I bite back a smirk as Harriet closes her eyes and inhales deeply, desperate to remain calm.
What she says next has the hair on my arms standing on end.
There’s nothing more terrifying than a Mom Voice.
Even when you’re twenty-three. Even when she’s not your mom.
“Emmy, you need to eat a carrot please.”
“No!” Emmy smiles wide. Dean’s lip twitches, but he remains straight-faced.
There’s a beat of quiet, and then Brooks speaks up to distract his niece. “Hey, Em. Bet I can eat my carrot faster’n you. Wanna race me?”
He winks at his sister as he speaks and she smiles tiredly, mouthing the words thank you as his mom rubs his shoulder.
I offer him the pile of baby carrots sitting on my plate and he takes one, taking his time to pop it in his mouth whilst Emmy snatches one from her plate, puffing out her cheeks as she works to chew it.
“I win!” she cheers. She opens her mouth wide to show us the remnants of carrot, whilst Brooks is still slowly chewing. I cheer for her. Brooks swallows and joins in.
“Good job, EJ! Wanna race me for a piece of celery next?”
Emmy reaches for the lone piece of celery on her plate and Brooks does the same.
“You’re on your own with this one,” I whisper to him. If celery has no haters left, I must be dead. Not even little Emmy Jean Forbes, as sweet and delightful as she is, could convince me to go near that green abomination.
Emmy wins the race again, and Mr. Hart and my dad both join in when my mom challenges a race with a stick of bell pepper. After a fourth race with a cherry tomato, which Emmy rejects tearfully mid-chew, Dean drops a small white chocolate chunk cookie on her plate and a kiss to her hair.
“Good job, Bug,” he whispers.
“It’s okay, Bug,” Mr. Hart says. Emmy looks up as her grandpa leans down with a conspiratorial wink. He uses another napkin to clean Emmy’s face, even as she bites into the cookie, tomato tears already forgotten. “Grandpa doesn’t like tomatoes, either.”
I see Ruth smiling sadly as she watches Emmy’s vegetable antics.
Everett is holding her hand, resting them on the table between them, and the muscles in his forearms flex as he squeezes.
He leans in to whisper something that has Ruth’s smile growing, her eyes closing, and she tips her head to lean it on his shoulder.
It feels like a moment I shouldn’t intrude on.
Mom has mentioned before that Ruth can’t have babies, but neither she nor Everett have said anything to me.
If they want me to know, I’m sure they’ll tell me about it themselves, and until then, it’s not my place to ask.
Still, my heart aches for them. I know Ruth has a goddaughter a little older than Emmy, and that she adores the little girl.
And my brother has always loved kids. He was so excited when Emmy was born.
He’s always wanted a big family of his own, the same way that I have.
The way family has always been modeled to us by our parents.
The way that, after everything that happened in New York, I’m afraid I might never have. I might never have the capacity to achieve that, and the thought wrecks me.
I’m quiet for the rest of the evening, despite Brooks’s incessant goading and Ruth’s effort to involve me in conversation.
Even Mom is suspicious, but when I lie and claim a headache, and duck out early back to my cabin, she just smiles sadly at me, presses a kiss to both cheeks, squeezes my hand and lets me go.
And when I reach my bedroom, I strip out of my shorts and tank, slip into an oversized tee—one I think I stole from my brother several years ago—and fall asleep on my bed without even pulling back the covers.