Thanksgiving
LILA
We’re at Rosemont by nine a.m and ready to be put to work by Daryl.
It’s funny how similar and yet different Rosemont is to the house I grew up at. Both rambling estates than have held generations of the same family, and yet they couldn’t be less alike.
I grew up surrounded by portraits of stern ancestors looking down their noses at me; here there are family photos crowding the walls, plaques and medals dating back to the Rhodes kids’ high school days, Jonah’s drawings everywhere, all given the same consideration and importance as the fine art hanging beside it.
My childhood home was all cold marble and surfaces that gleamed to a mirror-shine, never besmirched by fingerprints or evidence of use; here there are worn wood floors, walls with nicks and scratches from kids bouncing off them, a stone fireplace crackling with the wood that Slade and his brothers split themselves—I know, because I’ve watched them do it on cold mornings with their sleeves rolled up and their breath coming in clouds.
At my family home, the kitchen staff spent the day in the service kitchen, preparing food that would barely be touched while out of sight, out of mind.
In the air at Rosemont there’s the smell of butter and sage rolling out of the kitchen where Daryl has had the turkey in the oven since before we woke up. The kitchen is already operating at full capacity.
Sadie is making her—our—mother-in-law’s sweet potato casserole from a recipe card so old it’s barely legible.
Jonah is underfoot stealing marshmallows from the bowl in between doing a puzzle with Slade.
Walker is peeling potatoes. The twins are in the living room in their bouncy seats, Mari already trying to escape hers.
Slade multitasks, alternating between the puzzle with Jonah and entertaining the twin girls with fuzzy books and wood egg rattlers.
I have a sudden, vivid picture of him as a father, and something inside me lurches painfully.
I can’t torture myself with dreams like that, tempting as they are.
Tanner arrives late, hair still damp from a shower, bearing a 24-pack of beer. “Rhodes fam,” he declares. “Let’s get this party started.”
“One day,” Walker says, “you’re gonna have to bring something more than beer to Thanksgiving.”
Sadie gives Tanner a mischievous look. “Like a wife.”
“Working on it,” he says.
Her eyebrow shoot up. “Oh really? Who’s the lucky girl?”
For some reason, Walker is staring at Tanner with a knowing look on his face. For the first time ever, I see Tanner’s cheeks flush a little.
Tanner offers, “Let’s just say that I know the woman I’m going to marry. She just doesn’t know yet that she’s going to marry me.”
Sadie’s eyes go wide. Walker looks deeply skeptical.
After putting the beer in the fridge, Tanner distributes hugs to everyone, including me, as he comes to investigate what I’m doing at the counter. At the moment, it’s carefully pressing small pastry leaves onto the top of the pecan pie.
Tanner watches me for a moment. “Damn, Lila. You’re like Martha Stewart.” He steals a pecan from the bowl. “Too bad it’s all wasted on your husband.”
“Lila is a great baker,” Slade says, from somewhere behind me.
His hand finds my waist and he presses a kiss to my cheek, warm and unhurried, like we’re alone in our kitchen and not standing in the middle of his entire family.
Tanner pops another pecan in his mouth and chews, watching us with bright eyes. “Sure. But Slade hates sugar.”
Tanner’s eyes widen, cutting to Slade over my shoulder, like he’s just realized what he said.
I spin around in the silence that’s fallen over the kitchen. Slade is glaring at his brother.
Slade hates sugar.
I’m obviously the last in this room to know that fact about my husband.
I’ve been baking for him for months. He’s eaten every bite.
“You hate sugar?” I say, my voice soft, clearly wounded.
“Lila—”
“All those cookies. The brownies. Dessert every night.” I stare at him. “Slade, I made you cinnamon muffins every week for two months. Were you just eating them to be polite?”
“No.” He steps forward and takes my face in his hands. “Baby. I love everything you make. That’s the truth.” His thumbs brush my cheekbones. “It’s true, I never used to have a sweet tooth. But you changed that.”
Slade doesn’t say things he doesn’t mean. I’ve learned that about him: if he says it, it’s true. Full stop. No performance, no softening, no pretense. He wouldn’t change that for me.
His arms wrap around me and I lean my cheek against his chest as he embraces me.
Then I notice the kitchen.
Every single Rhodes has stopped what they were doing. Daryl with his basting brush. Walker mid-potato-peel. Sadie with a wooden spoon. Tanner with his mouth full of pecans. All of them staring.
Slade doesn’t look at any of them. Just keeps his arms around me, his chin resting on top of my head, looking out the kitchen window at the November sky, like they’re not even there.
Jonah plants himself on a counter stool and gives us an assessing look. “Are you guys gonna have a baby?”
Apparently, there are levels of silence we have not yet discovered. I thought the quiet was awkward before. This is excruciating, pin-drop silence.
“I... um… what?” I offer, very eloquently.
“Because,” Jonah continues, very reasonably, “that’s how Dad hugs Mom. And then Mom got my baby sisters in her tummy.” He considers Slade very seriously, pushing his glasses up his nose like a world-weary old man who’s seen too much. “Two at a time, Uncle Slade. I warned them it could happen.”
Tanner makes a strangled sound and turns to face the wall.
Walker very carefully sets down his potato peeler, shoulders shaking with silent laughter, while Daryl presses his lips together as he stirs something at the stove.
Sadie is the first to break, her giggles tumbling out into big, helpless laughter. I feel my face go scarlet but can’t help but laugh too. Everyone else except for Slade follows in that laughter too, while Jonah looks on, still clearly expecting an answer to his question. Are you having a baby?
Slade’s arms tighten around me.
“We’ll see, bud,” he says.
Not no.
We’ll see.
I press my face into his chest so nobody can see my expression, but pull away just in time to see the kitchen door to the porch swing open.
Josie slips inside.
My sister-in-law looks the same as she did at our wedding, every bit as effortlessly beautiful in a simple cotton shirt and jeans as she was in that silk bridesmaid’s dress.
She’s got a travel bag over her shoulder. She winks at us with a finger raised to her lips, signaling all of us to be quiet.
Then she creeps up behind Jonah at the counter and covers his eyes with both hands. “Fee fi fo fum,” she growls in a low theatrical voice, “I smell the blood of an Englishman.”
Jonah screams with pure delight. “Josie!”
He spins and launches himself at her and she catches him, laughing, swinging him around. In the living room, both babies spot her simultaneously and their arms start flapping, identical toothless grins and happy squeals materializing, radiating the joy babies reserve for faces they love.
“You came!” Jonah is clinging to her neck. “You said you couldn’t come!”
“Surprise,” she says, pressing a kiss to his forehead.
Then the whole family descends on her. Tanner pulls her into a proper bear hug.
Walker and Slade follow, their giant frames swallowing up their baby sister instantly.
Daryl is laughing as he kisses her cheek.
Sadie throws her arms around her and the two of them immediately start excitedly talking over each other.
I hang back, not wanting to crowd, but Josie spots me and opens her arms. “Lila, get over here. I need all my sisters.”
And that’s how I get pulled into a three-way girls’ hug. Two sisters-in-law, both of whom have been kinder to me than my own flesh-and-blood sister.
It’s going to be really hard to say goodbye to them too.
The room is still buzzing around Josie when Rafe comes in from outside, shrugging off his jacket.
The second he sees Josie, he freezes. Just for a second. Then his expression goes neutral.
But those coal-black eyes are burning.
He crosses to her without hurry. His hug is brief, arms around her for about two seconds before he steps back.
It’s a proper, respectful hug. Nothing like the man I saw with his hand low on her hip in that kitchen doorway on my wedding night.
She returns it the same way. Brief, perfectly proper. As if she’d never pressed her whole body against his and stayed there.
“Josephine,” he says quietly, almost formal.
“Rafe.” Her voice is different when she says his name, just as formal. But there’s a teasing glimmer in her eyes.
He nods once and moves away to wash up at the sink, his back to the room.
I look at Josie. She’s already turned back to Jonah, laughing at something he’s saying as she scoops up Mari and Anne in her arms, but there’s color on her cheeks that wasn’t there a moment ago.
By noon Rosemont is filling up. I can hear Linda, Sadie’s mom, talking with Daryl in the kitchen. Cassidy and her parents and brother arrived and are inside helping set the table with Sadie.
Tanner appears at my side on the back porch with an armful of cold beers.
“Rhodes family Thanksgiving tradition,” he announces, handing one to me, one to Slade, one to Rafe. “We’re running a little late.”
“It’s noon,” I say.
“Practically late afternoon for a rancher. We shotgun ‘em.” He demonstrates on his own can as he keys a hole in the side, tilts his head back, and cracks the tab.
Josie doesn’t wait for further instruction. She keys the hole in the side of her can before Tanner has even lowered his. She expertly cracks the tab and drains the entire thing in one long, clean pull without spilling a single drop.
Lowering the empty can, she wipes her mouth with the back of her hand and looks around at all of us.
“What?” she says. “I grew up with three older brothers. This is what you get.”
Slade stares at her. “Exactly how hard did you party, living down there in Florida?”
She wags a finger at him. “Don’t ask questions you don’t want the answer to.”
Tanner’s eyes narrow. “Somebody being a bad influence on my baby sister? Do I need to fly to Key West and fight a guy in flip flops and a Jimmy Buffett shirt for corrupting you?”
She rolls her eyes. “We’re not in high school anymore, T. You can cut the overprotective brother bullshit.”
Rafe cracks his own beer and drinks it the regular way, silently observing her over the rim of the can.
Josie watches him right back. “No shotgun for you, Rafe?”
“Got responsibilities to attend to after dinner.”
“You can take a day off,” she says. “You used to do that. Take breaks.”
“That was a long time ago,” he says.
Josie’s throat moves as she swallows. Her green eyes rest on him for one more second, then she looks away at the mountains. “I’m gonna go see what else Dad needs help with.”
Her elbow brushes against Rafe’s sleeve as she passes. His eyes follow her all the way inside, but his face gives nothing away.
The two of them are good at whatever game they’re playing, I’ll give them that. Tanner and Slade seem oblivious to whatever’s going on there. And I might not suspect anything between Rafe and Josie either, if I hadn’t already seen that little moment between them at our wedding.
Then again, maybe I’m reading into things. Living inside my own complicated situation has me seeing hidden feelings everywhere I look. Hoping for something to be more than it is.
Tanner loudly crushes his empty can, and the moment breaks.
“All right,” he declares, “time for our Yankee heiress here to partake in ye olde shotgunning.”
I hold out my can to Slade. “Show me how to do this thing before I lose my nerve.”
Taking the can from me, he keys the hole with practiced ease before handing it back to me
“Tilt your head back,” he says. “When you’re ready, pull the tab and drink as fast as you can.”
How hard can it be?
I tilt my head back and pull the tab.
It’s a lot harder than it looks.
The beer comes faster than I expect, cold and fizzing everywhere, down my throat, down my chin, dribbling down the front of my sweater, and I’m laughing which makes it worse, and Tanner is whooping, and Rafe is looking vaguely amused.
I come up gasping and laughing, beer dripping off my chin.
Slade is already there. He wipes his thumb slowly across my chin, catching the drip. His eyes are dark and warm and completely focused on me.
Then he kisses me. Right there on the back porch of Rosemont, in front of his brothers, in front of whoever is watching through the kitchen window. Long and unhurried and completely unbothered.
Next thing I know, the door bursts open and Cassidy comes out. She pulls up short, looking at all of us.
Tanner immediately springs into action, holding out a can to her. “C’mon, Freckles. You know what time it is.”
She rolls her eyes, but her lips twitch. “I’m not in college anymore.”
“Exactly,” Tanner says. “You work hard. Now it’s time to play hard.”
Her cheeks turn pink. “I don’t know…”
“Here, Doc.” He steps in, close enough that she goes slightly still. His hands cover hers on the can, patient and unhurried. “Remember? Key the side first. Then tilt. Then tab.”
She follows his instructions.
The beer goes everywhere as she presses her lips to the can.
She comes up laughing and Tanner is grinning as he nudges an elbow against her arm. “Out of practice, huh?”
Her phone starts ringing.
She glances at the screen and something in her face shifts. It’s subtle, like a light going slightly dimmer. It reminds me of what happens to me when my family calls. But Cassidy’s parents are lovely, so who is this on the other end?
“Sorry,” she says, already stepping back. “I have to—”
She turns away, wiping beer off her chin.
“Hi,” she says into the phone, then coughs. “Sorry, I just shotgunned a beer. It’s—no, it’s fine. Yes, I know what time it is.” A pause. “Derek, it’s just a harmless little tradition.” Another pause, longer. “Okay. Give me a minute.”
She moves around the corner of the porch, out of earshot.
Tanner watches her go. The smile is still on his face but his eyes are doing something different, something unhappy and complicated.
“Doctor fucking Dickface,” he mutters.