Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
HARPER
Sunday dinner was a tradition I’d been dodging.
At this point, I’d exhausted every viable excuse and I could practically hear my mother’s voice ringing in my ears, daring me to skip out one more time. So I did the only thing I could do—pulled myself together and drove to the sprawling two-story home on Oakmont Drive.
I was the last to show, so I parked at the curb since the driveway was clogged with cars. Aaron’s black SUV, Alicia’s silver sedan, and Naomi’s battered Civic with the political sticker she refused to remove were all jammed in end-to-end.
I grabbed the bottles of wine I’d promised to bring, hip-checking the car door shut behind me. My phone went into my purse, but not before I checked it. Again.
Cole hadn’t reached out. I hadn’t heard from him since that kiss Friday night, then he had to rush off to the ER.
And that was fine, right? It was a kiss, not a commitment, not a grand gesture, not a promise. We didn’t owe each other anything. I was a grown woman with a career and a life, not some teenager waiting by the phone for a boy to call.
Except I’d been keeping an eye on my inbox since Friday night for a message that never came.
Before I could knock, the door swung open and my mother stood there in a flowy caftan, her hair pulled back with a scarf, gold hoops catching the afternoon light.
“There she is!” My mother, Noelle, swept me into one of her hugs that smelled like shea butter and perfume. Her arms were strong around my shoulders, a hug that said ‘I love you’ and ‘where the hell have you been’ in equal measure. “We were starting to think you forgot where we live.”
“Sorry, Mom. Work’s been a lot lately.”
She pulled back, hands squeezing my shoulders, brown eyes identical to mine scanning my face. “Mmhmm. Work. Is that all that’s keeping you occupied?”
I smirked, catching the hint. “Yes, Mom. Just work.”
“Mmmhmmm.” She stepped aside, making room for me to pass. “Come on in. The gang’s all here.”
The house looked the same as it always did, but warmer if possible.
Hardwood floors buffed to a shine, family photos from decades past covering every wall, furniture from 2002 that had been reupholstered twice but never replaced because my father said it was in perfectly good condition.
Music thumped from a speaker on the back patio, where most of the family was gathered.
Except for my father, who was posted up where he always was on Sunday afternoons—in his brown leather recliner, feet up, watching a game with the sound muted because my mother didn’t allow hootin’ and hollerin’ in her house on the Lord’s Day.
He had been retired for more than a decade but still wore the diamond-crusted watch he’d earned for twenty-five years of service with the city’s public works department.
His hair had faded to white and his waistline was softer now, despite my mother trying to get him to walk around the block with her every evening.
He looked up when I walked in. As always, his face lit up with a bright, wide smile. “Heeey! It’s my firstborn baby girl. How you doin’?”
I bent down, pressing my lips against his cheek. “Hey, Daddy. How have you been?”
“Can’t complain. I went to the doctor on Thursday. That high blood pressure med my doctor got me on is finally workin’. Your mama’s happy about that.”
“I’m happy too. That means you’ll live forever.”
“Not hardly, but since my daughter works at a hospital, I know where I can go when I’m close.” He patted my hand, calluses rough against my skin from decades of manual work. “Ain’t seen you in a while. You still working too hard?”
I shook my head. “It’s almost like I got my work ethic from Byron Sutton.”
“A chip off the ole block.” He picked up the remote, turned the volume up half a notch when my mother wasn’t looking. “Go on out there before them kids come in here looking for you, making all that noise.”
Aaron was in the kitchen leaning against the refrigerator, phone in one hand, beer in the other. He worked in IT for a logistics company, and had been divorced for three years from a woman most of us disliked. We were thankful we got to see his daughter, Mia, regularly.
“What’s up, A-A-Ron?”
“Sup, Harpy,” Aaron said, not even looking up from his phone.
“You look tired. Having a preteen is putting you through it, huh?”
“Mia’s fine. It’s work that’s kicking my ass.” He finally glanced up, giving me the once-over. “You do something to your hair?”
“No,” I said, suddenly self-conscious.
Mia, who was nine and mostly legs and adolescent attitude, was hunched over her phone at the breakfast bar, thumbs moving across her phone screen.
“Aunt Harper!” she squealed, sliding off the bar stool to wrap her arms around my waist. Her face lighting up made my chest tight and my smile wide. “You’re here!”
“Of course I’m here.” I hugged her, smelling the coconut oil Aaron put in her hair. “You think I’d miss seeing you?”
“You missed two Sundays.”
“I know.” I pouted. “I’m sorry. Being an adult sucks. How’s being a kid lately?”
“It’s okay. I got a hundred on my spelling test.” She grinned, showing off her braces.
“Okay, genius! Your dad says you have a dance coming up and we’re going shopping soon. Do you, uh…have any idea what you want to wear?”
“She does,” Aaron butted in, “and she’s mad at me because I won’t let her buy the tiniest dress in the store. That’s why we need you.”
“Nooo-uuhhh!” She stomped a foot, her eyes growing wide. “Aunt Harper, please tell my dad the kids don’t wear dresses that go past their knees anymore!”
I held up my hands in mock surrender. “Whoa, I’m Switzerland here. Not taking sides.” To cut off the whining I was sure would follow, I made sure to add, “But we’ll find something you love and Dad can live with. Deal?”
“Deal!” Mia bounced on her toes, then immediately ran from the room before Aaron could argue.
Alicia came in from the patio, arms open. As she got closer, though, her aim narrowed toward the wine I’d brought. She peered at me over her thick-rimmed glasses as she took the bottles from me.
Alicia could read me better than anyone. That’s why I avoided her.
“About time you showed up.”
“Hi, Harper. How are you, Harper? Good to see you, Harper.”
Alicia rolled her eyes, folding me into a hug. “Hi, Harper. What’s…what’s going on with you?” she asked, pulling back. “You look different.”
I squinted. “I look the same as I always do.”
“Mmmm…you definitely look different.”
She turned, heading back outside where a large table was in the process of being set for dinner on a closed-in patio. My parents were so proud of their outdoor dining space with heat lamps and a ceiling fan that my father had installed himself.
Naomi was setting the table, mumbling after Alicia yelled at her about how she’d placed the forks.
She caught my eye, then abandoned the table to pull me into a hug.
Her hair was in long honey blonde goddess locs that fell past her waist, and she wore a vintage Prince t-shirt I was fairly sure she stole from Aaron’s closet ages ago.
“You look good,” she said, pulling back to study my face. “Like…good.”
“I must normally look like I live in a garbage can.”
“You’re kinda glowing.”
“I’m not glowing, Naomi.”
“You are glowing.” Naomi grinned wider. “Who is he? You can tell me.”
“He who? I’m not—”
“Liar.”
“Nay, I swear—”
“Your face says you’re dating. Fucking, even.” She looked past me to Alicia. “She looks dewy and shit. Right?”
Alicia didn’t even turn around. “Oh, she’s definitely getting dicked down.”
Aaron looked up from his phone, beer paused halfway to his mouth. “Wait, what? Harper’s dating? Since when?”
“Since never. I’m not dating, and will you three shut up before Mom comes in here? We are in our childhood home.”
“This is the most interesting thing that’s happened in this family since Aaron’s divorce,” said Naomi.
“Hey!” Aaron protested.
“It’s true.” Naomi perched on the edge of the table, clearly settling in. “Okay, so…what’s his name? Does he know you’re a workaholic who hasn’t been on a real date in forever?”
My jaw dropped open. “Excuse you? I date.”
“You don’t,” Naomi said, shaking her head. “You know guys that take you out. You don’t have any boo thangs. No boyfriend material. When’s the last real romantic date you went on?”
I opened my mouth. Closed it. Tried to remember the last time I’d gone somewhere with a man that wasn’t a convenient conduit to sex.
Well…Friday night. With Cole.
But that wasn’t a date. That was dinner. Between colleagues.
Colleagues who’d kissed in a parking lot.
Colleagues who’d kissed like they were trying to breathe each other in.
A colleague I hadn’t heard from in two days.
My mother’s voice cut through the noise from the doorway. “Alright, everybody. Come and help carry this food to the table so we can eat!”
We gathered around the table with my parents at either end and the rest of us—Alicia and her partner Devon, Aaron and Mia, Naomi, her boyfriend, and me—squeezed in between.
The table was loaded. Pot roast in the center, juice from the slow cooker pooling around tender chunks of beef, carrots, and potatoes.
A casserole dish of macaroni and cheese, the top golden and crispy.
Cornbread in a cast iron skillet. Sweet tea in a pitcher, already sweating condensation onto the tablecloth.
My father said grace, then the sound of serving spoons hitting plates, forks scraping, and voices overlapping in requests to pass the salt or the butter or the hot sauce that Naomi always drowned her food in filled the room.
This was the rhythm I’d grown up with, the background noise of my childhood.
Comfortable and overwhelming at the same time.
I felt silly for skipping weeks at a time—these people were annoying, but I loved them.
They loved me. And I loved this weekly ritual to reconnect with my siblings, my folks, to narrow my life down to what really mattered.
Most of the time.