Mike crossed his arms and responded, “I’m sorry, would someone like to explain what the big surprise is?”
Everyone was staring at him like an idiot, and he was twisting in the wind. After a few awkward seconds, I told him, “Fine, come on in and help me if you feel like it.”
“Brilliant!” he responded. I hadn’t expected such enthusiasm. He came into the kitchen just as I realized I had no idea what we were going to cook. The one thing that occurred to me was a roast chicken with vegetables. I told Mike to wash his hands as I got the ingredients out of the fridge. He seemed incredibly chipper, much more than the prospect of an afternoon spent in front of the stove would justify.
Naya tried to get Will to go for a walk with her again, and Sue asked if she could join them. “As much as I love hanging out here when Mike’s around, I think I could use a little fresh air.”
Will laughed and told her, “Fine, the more the merrier. Let’s go.”
As they left, Mike turned, rubbed his hands together, and said, “I’m ready! What’s my job?”
“You can, um…cut the potatoes, I said.” He nodded and I told him in the meantime, I’d be preheating the oven and mixing the seasonings. Then I heard the words, “I want to do something,” and turned to find Jack standing there. His eyes were narrow, and before I knew it, he’d snatched Mike’s knife away and pushed him to the side.
“What the hell!” Mike said. “That was my job!”
“Now it’s mine,” Jack replied.
“Jenna, tell my brother to piss off,” Mike protested.
“There’s work for everyone,” I shouted, grabbing Mike’s arm and pulling him over. As he went on whining about how he wanted to slice the potatoes, I ordered him to help me rub down the chicken and stop acting like a baby. That only made Jack angrier, and after the third or fourth time he scowled, Mike turned to him and stuck out his tongue. Sue had been right to leave. They were acting like a couple of six-year-olds.
I gave up on trying to impose peace and let them do as they wished. Every time I needed something, they vied with each other to help, and whoever was left out threw a fit. When I asked someone to cut the last batch of vegetables, they both started shoving each other and knocked over a jar of sauce, breaking it. Then they froze and stood there staring at it like idiots.
“See what you did?” Jack shouted, throwing a rag in his face. “Now clean it up.”
“You’re the one who shoved me, asshole, you should clean it,” Mike responded, hurling it back at him.
“I shoved you because you’re always in the fucking way!”
They went back and forth like this, the rag flying back and forth, as they chased each other around the kitchen. They were out of control, and it shouldn’t have surprised me that just as I was slicing into a carrot, one of them bumped me hard.Ouch.
The pain radiated through my hand, and I looked at my palm, which had a nasty cut running across it. The sight of blood made me weak in the knees, and I dropped the knife on the counter. Jack jerked Mike out of his way and asked, “Shit, Jen, are you OK?”
Since an image is worth a thousand words, I showed him the cut. After a panicky second, Jack dug through a drawer, finding a clean cloth to press into it.
His eyes were wide, and he kept saying, “It’s fine, it’s nothing, You’re OK.” I think those words were more for him than me.
“It’s just a cut,” I told him, but he wasn’t paying attention.
“You’re such a dumbass,” he told Mike. “If you’d just stayed there zoning out to the TV like you always do, this would never have happened.”
“I was here first, Ross. And who are you to talk to me about zoning out? You look like an actual freaking zombie today, you’re the one who should have stayed in the living room.”
They continued arguing, with Jack telling Mike he never knew when he wasn’t wanted and Mike countering that everyone in the house liked him best. “Guys,” I kept shouting, “Guys!” But it was as if I wasn’t there. Finally, I exploded and said, “Can you stop acting like children? I don’t know if you noticed, but I’m practically bleeding to death over here!”
The cloth was soaked and dripping. “It’s really bad,” Jack remarked. “Why won’t it stop?”
Mike started to panic and shouted, “You don’t think she’ll bleed to death, do you? I can’t handle having a person’s death on my conscience.”
“Jack, I won’t die, will I?” I asked, suddenly afraid.
“No! Of course not! It’s just a little cut,” Jack replied. “And you, shut up,” he went on, turning to his brother.
“But what if, like, the knife’s infected? With salmonella or something?” Mike asked.
“I said, shut up,” his brother repeated.
Now I was getting scared. What if Jack was playing calm for my sake but knew the situation was critical? That question started to torture me when he recommended we go to the hospital.
