—23— Wyatt #2
Anything at all to give my sister something else to focus on other than how devastated she is by a day in my life.
“I’m coming at you a bit much, huh?”
I blink out of my thoughts. “What? No.”
“Don’t lie. I’ve been all over you since the second I came in.” She lets out a laugh that collapses into a sigh. “I’m just the worst, aren’t I? I ain’t even given you a proper—Hey, c’mere.”
Then she’s on me. Her arms around me.
Squeezing until I can’t breathe.
“You’re doing your best, right? Mom and Dad would be proud. Don’t listen to a dang thing I said. You’re just fine.” She goes back to her luggage. “But, y’know, if you do listen to some stuff, I’m just sayin’ I won’t be mad about it. I do give good advice.”
I put on a smile. “Thanks, sis.”
“Don’t mention it.”
She didn’t even ask. She took over the main bedroom.
The last time she visited, two years ago right after Mom and Dad left, I let her stay in the main bedroom while I took the guestroom.
Now the guestroom is full of … stuff, we’ll say …
and it’d be quite a chore to clear it out for her. So I don’t bother.
Besides, I just proved sleeping on the couch isn’t so bad two nights ago, didn’t I?
When I slept with my head on Diego’s lap.
Curled up and perfectly happy.
Did he pet my hair, or am I imagining that part?
“Bro!” she cries out suddenly, facing me. “It’s Saturday night! What are your friends doing? Let’s do one of your movie nights!”
Oh, god, no. “Everyone’s … I’m pretty sure everyone’s kind of … Tomorrow morning’s church, and …”
“Stop squirmin’ out of my brilliant idea and call them up.
Billy and Tanner. Mindy and Joel. Oh, Lance!
Lance is such a hoot. We don’t gotta go all out.
I’ll run to the store and get some snacks, and you can call them up and get them here!
I only got so many days in town, Wy-Wy, let’s not let them go to waste! ”
“Connie …”
She storms past me in a happy rush, the keys to her rental in hand.
“I’ll be back! An hour oughta be enough time.
Get them here in an hour. It’s all you gotta do.
I won’t even task you with making that killer guacamole you know I love.
” The door opens, the door shuts, and a ringing silence fills the air until I hear her car engine.
Just throw a bucket on me already and let me melt.
An hour later, I’m reminded of my sister’s definition of “we don’t gotta go all out”: my table is filled with a buffet of chicken wings, chips, six dips, three bowls of candy, flavored popcorn, and a cheeseboard full of toothpick-stabbed blocks of mozzarella, ham, and four different types of crackers.
Lining the counter are bottles of wine, including three brands of sparkling rosé.
I only call up Lance, Tanner (because Billy didn’t pick up), and Joel (because Mindy didn’t pick up), figuring a few regulars will be enough to satisfy my sister’s thirst for the social spotlight.
Yet somehow, Malcolm and Samuel also get roped in, I guess due to Tanner saying something when Malcolm was at the house waiting to talk to his boss Nadine.
Then Bridger and Anthony hear about it through Samuel, who had called to give Anthony an update about a dog or something.
Then Cole and Noah hear about it through Malcolm, who already thought the two were invited.
They accept Malcolm’s invitation to come despite turning me down the last three times I invited them, always something to do with paper deadlines.
Ethan shows up, too, looking wounded that I didn’t invite him initially (honest oversight), but forgets it the next second when Mindy and Joel arrive with a carrot cake.
“Can’t guarantee one of my monsters didn’t stick a finger in the frosting,” groans Mindy, setting it down on the counter.
Anthony’s already helping himself to a piece, wearing a t-shirt with his family’s pest control company logo on it.
“But at least they’re Carrie’s problem tonight. ”
Carrie is Joel’s mom. And I don’t envy her looking after their two monsters. But she’s probably used to it.
The movie never gets started, because my dear sister decides to turn movie night into game night.
First up: charades. “Oh, you bet we’re splitting into teams!
You and you, with you and you. And all you boys just—Hey, don’t give me that look!
—just sit together on the couch. Ethan, darling, go with them.
Mindy, no, you’re not gonna wriggle outta this one, I’m gettin’ you back for last time! ”
Last time was literally years ago. My sister recalls the sting of defeat like it was Tuesday.
Soon, my living room is exploding with laughter as Connie attempts to act out a walrus, and every single guess of Hoyt’s and Harrison’s gets worse.
(Wait, when did those two show up? Hoyt is in his Fitness Zone work polo—looking fit in it too—with his all-smiles-and-muscles boyfriend Harrison next to him, arm around his back, the stitches in his stretched tank top clinging on for dear life.
The two are former football players, like Tanner.
Did they get the invite from him?) Anthony is keeling over laughing, grasping onto his stoic military vet fiancé Bridger, who just shakes his head and strokes his five o’clock shadow coming in.
Lance’s boyfriend Chad is up next, his clue is Homer Simpson, and I don’t even know what he’s doing, but it has Lance and Billy crying, giving up on the game completely, as Connie rapid fires her guesses like a million dollar prize is on the line. She’s wrong every time.
When the game sort of falls apart and no one really cares who won, Connie launches into story hour after Lance asks what in the hell happened to her not-so-fabulous fiancé.
Being the shiny new gem of the hour, she tells the whole story to her captive audience of literally everyone, which leaves me crunched up on the end of the couch praying she’s not boring everyone to tears.
But a survey of the faces of my friends says otherwise.
They’re all completely engrossed in her story.
Even the often-aloof Ethan, curled into his favorite armchair that used to be my dad’s favorite, is glued to my sister’s every word.
Mindy, too, who sips her third glass of rosé and can’t seem to wipe the look off her face of “wow, your fiancé was a total jerk”.