61
Clay gave Sam the keys to his car so that we could have a minute. He and Violet rode with Tennyson and Savannah to the lunch instead. By the time we got back to the car after the reading, I must have looked—well, I probably just looked how I felt.
Sam and I went for a slow drive. We didn’t say much—Sam just drove. There’s not all that much to be said anymore anyway, I don’t think. By happenstance, he drove to the beach that we went to on that first day—Palmetto Dunes.
Our time in South Carolina is finally drawing to a close—we fly out tomorrow, and it doesn’t really feel real yet that Sam’s getting on the plane with me and we’re flying back to England together.
Kind of crazy to think how much has changed between the first time Sam and I were on this beach and now. How my whole life flipped, how so many lives flipped in that short span of time. I don’t like it here that much, but finding Sam in Okatie has given me a tenderness for my home city that I’ve never had before.
After we’ve been there for a half an hour, Sam gently tells me we should probably head to the lunch—and he’s right, we’re already well late at this point.
We walk into Skull Creek Boathouse twenty minutes later, and this time Sam and I are holding hands and it’s conscious and on purpose. He told me before we walked inside to not even think about letting go, that it’s his job to support me and my job to let him.
Strange how doing so feels like I’m inviting drama and chaos to lunch, and when Maryanne leans over to Oliver next to her and whispers something to him, and he whispers something back, Sam just squeezes my hand tighter.
Oliver gives us (me) a loaded smile. “Having some car sex again?”
Maryanne laughs quietly and Mom gives Oliver a bit of a look.
I don’t say anything, just sit in the chair that Sam pulls out for me, but Sam gives Oliver the glare of a lifetime, which shuts him up, at least for the time being.
I can tell how much it’s all wearing Sam’s patience thin. He’s usually the image of calm and grace—“cool as a cucumber.” That expression was invented to describe Sam in nearly every single scenario imaginable, except any scenario that pertains to me.
His frustration toward Oliver is mounting, no matter how much I tell him I don’t mind, no matter how much I insist that Oliver will come around. I can see it. Every jab grates him, and him rolling over on them hurts him, and I hate hurting him, but I don’t know what else to do.
Everyone’s ordered already, so we put in ours quickly, and while the waiter’s there, Maryanne asks for another two glasses of rosé.
I stare over at the glass in front of Oliver. There’s maybe half an ounce left in it? I wonder how many he’s had. Hopefully just the one, but then, that’s not really how addiction works.
“So,” Jase says, nudging Oliver in a way he—to the best of my knowledge—has never done before. “What are you going to do with all that money, man?”
Oliver laughs nervously as he shakes his head. “I don’t know.”
“If you need any advice…” Jase offers, eyebrows up.
“Yeah, I’m sure I will—I don’t know anything about money. I’m not that good at it,” Oliver says, and I wonder if I should just paint a big target sign on his back.
“You probably just want to invest it,” Clay says to him, quite wisely.
Maryanne leans in close to Oliver and playfully whispers, “Boring!” but it’s loud enough for all of us to hear.
And as I stare over at the absolute shitstorm combination that is Oliver and our older sister, I can’t help but think Maryanne must feel like she’s struck gold right now. She had coincidentally already aligned herself with Oliver before she knew he was the one Dad left all his money to.
“It was so good of Daddy, don’t y’all think?” Maryanne glances around the table, eyes rounded with a faux-sorriness. “After Grandpa didn’t leave Oli anything… That was so fucked up, by the way.” She says that last part to Oliver specifically before she whips her head around to Mom and flashes her an apologetic smile. “Sorry.”
Oliver stares over at me across the table, and I maybe spot a glint of tenderness in his eyes at the mention of that whole mess. I briefly wonder whether he knows our siblings and our cousins all declined to redivide the money our grandfather left us so that we all, Oliver included, received the same amount. I’d never tell him, and I doubt the others would either—it hardly paints them well. I wonder if he knows anyway.
“Dad left him a lot of money,” Maryanne tells technically the table, but really she’s just speaking to Oliver. “He should have some fun with it too.”
Oliver nods emphatically, eyes lighting up at the thought and the possibilities. That’s the magic word to someone who has ADHD. They’re absolute suckers for fun.
“Is there a car you’ve always wanted, or like, a holiday house somewhere?” Maryanne suggests in a completely non-self-serving way, I’m sure. “Or, I don’t know—like a shopping spree in Paris? We should go to Paris!”
I fold my arms over my chest and catch Oliver’s eye. “You realize you’re currently ineligible to receive the funds.” I nod toward the glass in front of him.
Oliver breathes out loudly.
“There are ways around that,” Jase says.
Tennyson pulls a face. “I don’t think there are…”
“Also,” I say to Jase, “you do remember that the only condition Dad made was that his alcoholic son maintained his sobriety—like, surely we as his family would want to encourage him down that path.”
Oliver squints at me. “Feels a little rich, you talking about how family should treat each other.”
“I’m not talking about how family should treat each other—our family infamously treats each other like shit. I’m talking about trying to keep you alive.”
“Ignore her, Oli,” Maryanne chimes in. “She’s just jealous—what with that weird little plot of land he left her? Like, what even—”
And they both start laughing quietly, but loud enough for the entire table to be privy to what’s going on.
“Oliver.” Vi shakes her head at him, stares at him like he’s a stranger. “What has gotten into you?”
“Alcohol,” I say softly to Violet specifically, but all right, fine—I’ll admit it was intentionally un-soft enough for Oliver to hear it, and so sue me for making an inflammatory comment. His eyes rolled so far back in his head, I’m sure it must have caused at least a bit of strain for his levator palpebrae superioris.
“Georgia, shut up,” Maryanne snaps, with Oliver backing it up with a “Yeah, Georgia, shut the fuck up.” They laugh again, and I’m literally counting down the hours till Sam and I get to leave tomorrow. And I do mean literally. It’s seventeen hours, eight minutes from this exact moment—and it’s because I’m doing that math in my mind that I miss the shift in Sam’s posture. I don’t catch it until he’s sitting up square in his chair, head tilted, jaw tight, nostrils a little flared—and if I wasn’t doing my leaving-math, I would have known what was coming next. He told me last night that it was inevitable, and I told him it didn’t have to be, and we’d figure it out, but he said he didn’t think he wanted to.
“Hey, listen man,” Sam says loudly as he catches Oliver’s eye over the table. “I can’t be your sponsor anymore.”
The whole table goes silent for probably a full four seconds.
“What?” Oliver whispers quietly.
Sam repeats himself. “I can’t be your sponsor anymore.”
Oliver sniffs this laugh that I think is meant to sound like it’s made out of disbelief, but there’s something in the exhale and the way his inner brow rises that tells me that actually, he’s kind of devastated. “You’re”—and then he does air quotes—“breaking up with me.”
Sam sighs, shaking his head as he tries his best to rein in his frustration. “Don’t call it that—”
“Why?” Oliver shrugs, and he’s just being plain petulant now.
“Because.” I do it unconsciously, but as best as I can in these chairs, I shift in front of Sam. “It’s not a breakup, Oliver, and you fucking know that. A breakup implies something that you never were.”
“Oh!” Maryanne lets out a dry laugh. “You’re going to tell him what his own relationships mean to him now, are you?”
I barely look at her as I say, “Relationships are a two-way street, and I know what theirs wasn’t.”
“Do you?” she says, crinkling her nose patronizingly.
I raise an eyebrow. “Do I know that my boyfriend was in neither a sexual nor a romantic relationship with my brother? Yeah.” I nod. “I do know that.”
“Is it because of her?” Oliver asks Sam without looking at me, with just his chin jutted in my direction.
“Yep.” Sam nods unapologetically.
And I hate the way Oliver’s face looks before he asks, “You’re picking her over me?”
It hurt him to ask it—I don’t know why he asked it. It makes me feel a bit sick how sad his eyes look.
Sam’s face strains—this is hard for him, and it wasn’t a choice he made lightly. “I wish so bad that I didn’t have to, mate, but yeah.”
Maryanne tilts her head at Sam and plasters a manufactured kind of concern on her face. “Isn’t that reckless and irresponsible to abandon him when he’s in such a precarious headspace?”
“Yeah.” Sam nods again, pretending to be impressed by her. “A very good and valid question, Maryanne, and while I don’t fully believe you actually give a shit, sure, I’ll bite.” Maryanne’s face drops. She’s not used to being spoken to like that by many people. Sam keeps going. “In some ways, it is undeniably reckless and irresponsible, and I feel terrible about that, but considering the unique set of circumstances and the position I’ve found myself in—”
“Georgia knows all about positions,” Maryanne whispers to Oliver, who sniggers, and Sam says nothing, just watches them quietly, waiting for them to stop speaking as though they’re like, these terrible, ill-mannered children, and eventually their laughter awkwardly subsides. It’s horrifyingly humbling and it’s not even happening to me.
“Considering the position I’ve found myself in,” Sam says again, and he gives them a look that basically says, “I fucking dare you to laugh,” and believe you me, they do not. “I no longer feel able or equipped to support Oliver in that same way.” Sam stares Maryanne down. “Unfortunately, it would be reckless and irresponsible to continue the other way too.”
Oliver’s face now, it’s wrought with emotion—I think he’s finally faced with the reality of everything he’s losing and choosing to lose—and he stares across the table at me, his usually bright eyes all dim, which is how they are when he goes like this. They stare at me, ragged and full of resentment. “God, you fuck everything up.”
“Oliver—” I start, but he cuts me off.
“I’m allowed to be fucking pissed about this!” Oliver yells.
Sam nods emphatically. “Yeah, mate, you are. But at me, not at her.”
Oliver rolls his eyes. “How do you figure?”
“Because she begged me not to do this,” Sam tells him as he points his thumb at me. I feel Oliver’s eyes on me, but I don’t want to meet them, so I just stare up at Sam, who keeps going.
“I told her I was going to break it to you last night, and she asked me not to, but I can’t be what you need me to be, man.” He shrugs like it’s a puzzle he can’t solve. I guess it is. “And I don’t know how to reconcile being what she deserves me to be for her and who you need me to be for you. I don’t think they can coexist.”
“Yes, they can!” Oliver says, his tone a bit urgent now.
“How?” Sam shrugs again. “You’ve been a fucking prick to her, bro. Since the second you saw us together… But just to her, not to me, and I did it too.” Sam pauses, thinking to himself. “Actually, I think I kissed her first.”
“You did,” Savannah and I both say in quiet unison.
Sam smiles and Tennyson swats one away.
“She’s been fucking tortured this entire time at the prospect of hurting you,” Sam tells Oliver, “and you’re out here taking a swing at her every chance you get.”
Oliver drops Sam’s eyes when he says that, as though he’s a bit ashamed. Sober Oliver would be, but he’s not here right now. Just flecks of him, at best.
“And while she doesn’t need anyone to do shit for her—she’s more capable than all of us combined at—fuck—like, everything?—she does deserve a partner who can tell her brother to fuck on off when he’s being an arsehole, and I can’t say that to you when I’m your sponsor. But I need to as her boyfriend, so something’s gotta give, Ol, and it’s never going to be her.”
Sam gives my brother an uncomfortable and sorry sort-of smile, and then I lean over and kiss Sam’s perfect cheek.
“I love you,” I tell him with this swelling feeling in my chest that’s a bit like when you’ve been lying on the sand at the beach on an overcast day, and the sun finally breaks through and the warmth of it drenches you to the bone.
“Yeah.” Sam kisses the tip of my nose. “I know.”
“Wow,” Maryanne pipes back up. “That is so sweet of you to flaunt your stupid love in front of our brokenhearted brother—”
And I take a big breath, ready for round two with Maryanne, but before I can say anything, my mother jumps in. “Maybe you should go, sweetheart.”
“Margaret,” Vi says in this sort of quiet, horrified voice. “Don’t—”
“No.” I catch my aunt’s eye. “It’s fine. I’m ready to go.”
I peer up at Sam, and ask him without asking him whether he’s ready to go too. He nods once, and that’s enough for me. I push back from the table and stand up.
Tennyson starts shaking his head. “But you don’t fly out till tomorrow.”
“We have flexible tickets,” I tell him. “There’s nothing direct from Charleston to London anyway.”
“Good,” my mother says, nodding to herself. I can tell she believes she’s doing the right thing by (sort of) sending me away (again), and I realize in that moment, I think it’ll always be easier for her if I’m the problem.
People who aren’t self-aware, people who haven’t lived their lives in the pursuit of truth, find that the truth is confronting if you don’t want to hear it. I think I represent to her a myriad of uncomfortable truths she just can’t afford to lean into, because her whole life depends so heavily on a false reality. People don’t tend to want those ruptured.
“I’ll take them,” Clay tells Vi, standing up.
“I’ll come too,” Violet says quickly. I think she’s eager to leave, and same.
I turn to Tennyson, whose eyes look heavy now. I pull him a little to the side.
“I don’t want you to go yet,” he tells me with a frown.
I try to make it light, shrugging playfully. “But just think how easy life will feel for you once I am…”
I can tell in the way his brows go he doesn’t believe that to be true, and then he pulls me in for this big bear bug, and when he lets me go, both of us are glassy-eyed, which makes me feel embarrassed in front of so many people, so I throw my arms around Savannah.
“Come visit us.” I glance between them. “Both of you.”
“We will.” She nods.
Tennyson offers Sam his hand. “Look after her.”
Sam flicks him a little smile. “On it.”
“This has been the weirdest fucking couple weeks,” Tennyson says, glancing between Sam and me, and I laugh. “And it should have just been shit,” he keeps going, “but I had so much fun with you. I’m sorry for—”
I swipe my hand through the air and hope it dismisses his worries.
“We’re good,” I tell him.
Tens lifts his eyebrows. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.” I smile. “So good.”
I turn to look at Maryanne, who’s still sitting at the table between Jason and Oliver, looking unimpressed for—whatever, I’ve lost track of why she’s pissed off now.
I take a big breath. “Maryanne.” She lifts an eyebrow, waiting. “God, please delete my number. Don’t contact me again.”
Her jaw drops open, but I don’t give her emotions even a second of airtime before I turn to Oliver. His eyes are flickering between Sam and I—angry, offended, hurt—at both of us now, at least.
Sam gives him a gentle, maybe even hopeful smile. “When you’re ready, Ol, I’d love to help you find a new sponsor…”
“Yeah—” Oliver shakes his head. “I’m good, thanks.”
“You really aren’t,” I tell him, and Sam flicks me a look. “Oliver.” I grab his eyes and don’t let them go. “I’m so sorry for how this all happened. Really, I am. I love you so much, and I’m so sorry I did something that hurt you. I wish it didn’t, but I know that it did. I can’t take it back. I wouldn’t take it back if I could though, because—I don’t know, at another point in our lives, you would have been so happy for me with Sam—”
“Stop talking,” Oliver says, looking away, arms crossed over his chest now, a physical barrier between us.
“No.” Now I shake my head. “I’m sorry I hurt you.”
“Oh, great,” he says sarcastically. “Now it’s all better.”
“If you need anything,” I offer quietly, and I mean it, but he turns away all stubborn.
“I won’t.”
“Call me.”
Oliver’s mouth tugs downward. “I won’t.”
“I love you,” I tell him anyway, and he just stares at me.
“Come on, I’ll walk you out,” my mother tells Sam and me, putting a guiding hand on my mid-back. It almost sounds maternal, except that she’s guiding me away. Away from her, away from her other children, away from the life she’s constructed and needs so badly to be real.
Clay and Vi go to pull up the car, and then it’s just Sam, my mom, and me standing there awkwardly on a street corner.
Mom glances at Sam, giving him an uneasy smile. “Thank you for all you’ve done for Oliver.”
Sam gives her an unsure look.
“I know he can be a handful,” she says with an apologetic shrug. “So can she.” She points at me with a laugh.
Sam smiles at her patiently, how he has this whole time with her. He gives her a kind wink. “I like handfuls.”
That charms her a little. “It was a pleasure to meet you.”
“You too.” Sam nods. “And again, I’m so sorry for your loss.”
She turns to me now and puts her hand just below my shoulder. “Goodbye, sweetheart,” she says as the car pulls up in front of us.
I try my best to smile at her. “Bye, Mom.”
She opens her arms, gingerly moving toward me for a hug, because I guess that’s what mothers do? I don’t know. But while we’re hugging, when her mouth is close to my ear, she pulls back a little and looks up at me with nervous eyes.
“What’s he like?” she whispers quietly.
And I’m completely caught off guard. I blink at her, our faces closer than they’ve ever been.
“What’s who like?” I whisper back.
“The man,” she says, “in New Orleans. Who saved your father.” Her eyebrows are very up. “Is he—what’s he like?”
“Um.” I blink six times before I say more—not my finest work. “He’s French. Sweet. Well read. He’s—kind?”
Something flickers over her face, but I’m too blindsided to really pick what. Surprise? Frustration? Why would she be frustrated?
“You liked him?” she asks.
And I’m thrown, because what the fuck? What if I’m misreading the subtext? Is she really asking me what I think she’s asking me? Could she be? And if she is, how do I answer?
With the truth, I guess. I don’t know; I don’t feel like giving her the comfort of lying about this or being dismissive of someone who’s already been so dismissed for so long.
I nod slowly, carefully. “Yes.”
She nods back and pulls away. It feels conscious and decisive and, actually, I’m really okay with it.
“Speak soon, sweetheart,” she says, and I climb into the car and say nothing back.
I don’t feel like lying for these people anymore.