Chapter 4 #2
It’s a normal question, especially in a group like this where I’m the lone guy spending the holidays with a big family.
“I don’t,” I say. “Only child.”
“Does your family celebrate Thanksgiving?” Kaelyn asks in the most tactful way to ask the question.
If my parents are dead, or assholes, I can simply say, “No” and that explains why I’m here.
But because this family is so open and warm and nice to be around, I find myself explaining further.
“I was mostly raised by my grandparents, who are both deceased now. My mother and father never married. I grew up in L.A. My mother is an actress, and my father is a movie director and producer. They had a fling, my mother tried to tie my dad down with a pregnancy, which pissed him off, so he took me away from her. They’ve been in and out of each other’s lives, and mine, for nearly thirty years now.
They both exhaust me, and since I’m not interested in the movie business, we’ve mostly parted ways.
I don’t know what they each do for the holidays.
It’s been nearly fifteen years since I saw either of them around this time of the year.
It’s been ten years since I saw my father at all—he does email and text occasionally—and at least ten months since I saw my mother.
She also texts sporadically. Neither of them know or care at all about green energy, but they are quite happy that I make a lot of money, and never mention their names in any interviews or articles. ”
There is a long silence at the table as they all stare at me.
Graham knows most of this and he’s just shaking his head with a smile that says, I can’t believe you spilled that.
I meet Ginny’s eyes.
She lifts her glass. “Well, damn, Everett, Jefferson thought he was going to be the most interesting guy here today with his big State Championship football win. Way to take the wind out of his sails.”
I laugh softly. “Sorry,” I say to Jefferson.
He shakes his head. “No worries.”
Harlow leans in. “Can I ask who your mom is?”
I expected that. “Gwen Winters.”
They all gasp.
“Your mom is Gwen Winters?” Harlow asks.
“Yes.”
“I didn’t know Gwen Winters had children,” Adrianne says.
“Exactly,” I say. “My dad’s legal team was really good.”
“Wow.”
“Who’s your dad?” Carver asks. “If you can say.”
“Abraham Clark.”
Again, they gasp.
“Wow, he’s huge,” Carver says.
I nod.
“He’s a lot older than Gwen, right?” Kaelyn asks.
“Yes.” That was part of the situation as well. My father never should have been sleeping with a woman twenty years younger than him.
“Well, wow,” Carver says again.
I just smile and lift my wine glass. It probably is interesting if you weren’t living it. But Abraham Clark and Gwen Winters are my parents, and all of my interactions with them have been a lot of things, but interesting is not a word I would use.
“So what did you dress up as, Harry?” Carver asks Ginny.
And just like that, they move on. No further questions.
I appreciate these people a lot.
“Yesterday?” Ginny asks casually, taking a bite of stuffing as if she doesn’t know what he’s asking about.
He grins. “For Halloween, when you met Everett.”
“Oh, that. Wonder Woman,” she says, taking another bite of stuffing.
“Wonder Woman?” Jefferson asks. “Why?”
She meets her brother’s gaze directly. “’Cuz I looked really hot in it.” She takes a sip of wine. “And it’s sparkly.”
I also take a big bite of stuffing to keep from commenting. And agreeing with her.
Jefferson rolls his eyes.
“Poison Ivy is more your style, isn’t she?” Carver asks.
“Who’s Poison Ivy?” Ginny asks.
I sit up a little straighter before I can catch myself.
She looks over with a smirk. “Guessing a comic book hero?”
“Villainess,” I say.
Damn, can I be in love with a woman who doesn’t know a hero from a villainess in the DC universe?
“Ooh, villainess, tell me more,” she says, leaning closer.
“A botanist who hates humans and wants to protect nature,” I say. “Gorgeous redhead.”
“I thought you said she was a villain,” Ginny says. “That sounds like a perfectly reasonable stance to me.”
I smile and nod. “There’s debate about that. She’s an anti-hero, at times. Though the murder and kidnappings probably land her on the naughty list.”
Ginny nods, still smiling. “Does she wear a sexy outfit?”
“Very.”
She holds my gaze for a few seconds, then looks back at her brothers. “On the list for next year. Thanks, Carver.”
“I didn’t name her because of her outfit,” Carver says.
Ginny shrugs and takes another bite of stuffing.
“Oompa Loompa,” Jefferson says.
“Excuse me?” Ginny asks.
“That’s what you should go as next year.”
“Every year,” Carver says.
“Or like that one year she went as Cookie Monster. She could do that again,” Graham says. “That costume was definitely not form fitting. And blue and fuzzy totally works.”
“I was four!” Ginny says.
“It was so cute,” Adrianne says.
“It really was cute,” Harlow says. “I remember that one.”
“I remember that it was hot as hell,” Ginny says. “Of course, that year it was like eighty on Halloween.”
“I thought you wanted a hot costume,” Jefferson says, then grins as if he finds himself hilarious.
Harlow shakes her head. “It’s a good thing you’re cute,” she tells her fiancé. Then she kisses him.
“I like the botanist who hates humanity myself,” Mason says.
Ginny grins at him. “Thanks, Dad.”
“I’ll show you the outfit,” Carver says. “You’ll change your mind.”
“You’re so sweet and protective of your baby sister,” Kaelyn says, patting Carver’s arm. Then she rolls her eyes at Ginny.
Ginny snorts.
“You think I’ve never seen a movie?” Mason asks.
“You’ve seen a movie with Poison Ivy in it?” Carver asks, skeptically.
“I swear you kids think I live under a rock,” Mason says.
Which, I note, isn’t actually an answer to the question.
I catch Ginny’s eye. She gives me a wink that makes my dick twitch.
I’m going to guess that means that Mason has not, actually, seen a movie with Poison Ivy, or possibly any other comic book character, in it. But he’s backing up his daughter. I like Mason.
Hell, I like them all.
“You could totally pull off Poison Ivy,” Jefferson says to Harlow.
“Sure, I could. I look great in green and can for sure pull off righteous anger bordering on murderous insanity.”
Jefferson nods. “Like I said.”
Harlow laughs. “But I’d rather be Catwoman.”
Jefferson leans closer to her. “Yes. That is a great costume.”
Harlow gives him a smile that seems borderline inappropriate for the family dinner table.
“I don’t remember you doing sexy costumes like that in high school or college,” Ginny comments.
“Nope. My dad wouldn’t have it. He hates Halloween,” Harlow says.
Everyone nods as if this is common knowledge.
“Why’s that?” I have to ask.
“My dad’s the town cop. He hates most holidays because most of them involve liquor and people are off work and feeling festive, i.e.
, willing to do stupid things, but he always says when you add in costumes, people feel even more invincible, and it’s a nightmare.
” She laughs. “But whenever he says that around my mom, she says something about one Halloween he really liked a lot, and we have to beg them not to continue in front of us.” She pauses.
“Come to think of it, they seem to have a story like that for a lot of holidays. My mom has a special knack for handling my dad.”
Everyone laughs again, and Adrianne just nods and pats Mason’s arm.
“I do remember you dressing up as a very creepy clown one year,” Ginny says to Harlow.
Jefferson shudders. “I remember that too.”
Harlow runs her hand up his arm. “Oh, do you? You remember my Halloween costumes?”
“I do. You now know that I noticed you a lot in high school.”
“Well, I wore that creepy clown costume for you,” she says, with a sweet smile.
“I hate clowns,” Jefferson tells her.
“I know. And you’d been a total ass to me and Graham the weekend before. I knew you were going to a party at the river and I intended to creep through the trees and freak you out.”
Jefferson frowns. “I remember the costume at school, but not at the party.”
She sighs. “I know. We fell asleep watching movies and never made it to the party.”
Graham, Ginny, and Margot laugh.
“Oh, God, I remember that!” Margot says. “My mom came in to wake us all up in the dark living room, and your costume freaked her out.”
They all laugh, and I find myself smiling with them.
“You’ve all known each other a long time,” I comment. “You know each other really well, don’t you?”
“Too well sometimes,” Harlow says. “We’re all like siblings.” She gives Jefferson another not-dinner-table-appropriate look. “Well, not all of us are like siblings.”
“It’s lovely,” Adrianne interjects, smiling at them all. “I’ve always loved your friend group.”
“Yeah, it’s how we do things here,” Ginny says, giving me a look.
“Just look at them all. Jefferson and Harlow knew each other for years before getting together. Carver and Kaelyn have been together since they could walk. Graham and Margot were friends forever before it became something more. No insta-love or falling fast around here.”
Ah, yes, point made. She thinks I’m crazy to be insisting that what we shared in Denver actually meant something real.
“Well, that’s true for them, maybe, but not how we did it,” Mason says.
I look at him in surprise. “Oh?”
He gives his wife a rare smile. “Knew the moment I saw her that she was special and I had to have her.”
I glance at Ginny. She sighs heavily. But doesn’t argue.
The rest of the people at the table are smiling, and it seems this is a well-known story.
“So you fell in love quickly?” I ask Mason.
Adrianne is the one who answers, though. “In just a weekend,” she says. She reaches for Mason’s hand, and he turns it palm up, intertwining their fingers. “It was fast and crazy, but…here we are.”
“I knew immediately you were the one,” he says. He looks around the table. “I guess I was just smart enough to know without needing years to see it. I mean, I am a genius.”
Everyone laughs as if this is also a commonly heard phrase.
“Well, Carver knew as a toddler,” Kaelyn says, giving her husband a dazzling smile. “He must be the smartest of all.”
Harlow snorts and looks at her fiancé. “Yeah, it tracks that it took you a while, huh?”
“Me?” Jefferson says. “I knew way before you figured it out. Who’s the smarter of the two of us then?”
Margot and Graham just look at each other and shrug, then laugh.
I look across the table at Ginny. She looks from her parents to me, her soft smile fading into a look of trepidation.
I mouth, I’m a genius too.
Her smile dies, and she sighs.