I do, and he doesn’t. He keeps puttering around his mom’s house, fixing things, straightening up, delivering my clothes in a neatly folded pile. The shadows are different each time I open my eyes. My body is soft and still buzzing when he comes in and gently touches my cheek, his hands smelling like basil.
“Dinner’s on, baby.”
I push myself up to a sit and the covers fall away. I’m groggy and shocked. “You cooked.”
He’s quiet while I rub my eyes. When I finally focus on him, he’s on one knee beside the bed. He leans forward, forward, forward, and plants his forehead against my heart. “I’m so in love with you,” he whispers.
“That’s just the sex chemicals talking,” I say happily, hugging his head with both arms.
“Sure,” he agrees easily, lifting his face to mine. “But that doesn’t make it less true.”
They’re waiting for me on the back porch, dinner in a spread. Ramona is “just commenting” on Raff’s new mullet-ish haircut. (“It’s a fashion mullet, Ma.”) (“Just saying the wordfashiondoesn’t make it fashion, sweetie.”)
We eat pasta with just-picked tomatoes, basil, and mozzarella so milky fresh we have to close our eyes to chew it.
Raff is unusually quiet, but that might be because he ate an entire bag of mushrooms last night and probably hasn’t fully recovered.
The mosquitoes come out, so Ramona lights a hundred candles. She brings out a pound cake with fresh peaches and more basil.
“What is this, a wedding?” Raff asks.
“Apparently we don’t have weddings in this family,” Ramona replies, so ice cold that both of her boys just gripe, “Ma!” (For different reasons, of course.)
The three of them watch the sky deepen while I scour the kitchen clean. Seriously. I even use her preferred white vinegar solution on the stovetop. I’m guilt-cleaning, partially because I was supposed to make dinner but slept through it and partially because me and her son just did some very dirty things under this roof.
Ramona goes to bed first with a lot of very detailed instructions re: the candles. Vin, who is used to Raff and me burning the midnight oil, throws in the towel next. But before he goes, he slides one hand to the back of my neck, tips my head up, leans down, and kisses me softly, deeply, lingeringly. And then two more for good measure.
I expect a friendly jab from Raff, some comment on me as a wife or person with a private life or as a lady who kisses,but…he waits for Vin to close the sliding door behind him…and then he bursts into wrenching, ugly tears.
“Raff!” I jump into Ramona’s chair, where I can reach him, and throw my arms around his shoulders. “Raff, what is it?”
He twists and puts his arms around me. The shoulder of his short-sleeve flannel (don’t ask) is soft as butter under my cheek and he smells like incense. “You—” He gasps. “Have—” Another gasp. “A hickey!”
“Oh! Shit!” I forgot about that. I unhinge from the hug and put my hand over it. “Oh, Jesus. Do you think your mom saw?”
He’s laughing through tears at my horror and discomfort. “Of course she did! It’s, like, bright as a stop sign.”
“Oh, Jesus.”
“This is a good thing, Roz.This is such a good thing.” And then he’s weeping again, his face in his hands and his elbows on his knees.
“Raff,” I say again, unhanding my hickey to lay a palm on his back, make big, sweeping circles.
“I thought,” he says, trying to take a deep breath and failing. “I thought you might be splitting up or something…I thought…I thought I’d fucked everything up for you two. And I was all ready to…never forgive myself.”
“Raff!” He’s back in the circle of my arms again because he can’t stop crying. It occurs to me that he sounds just like Vin right now. Only, the pauses between Raff’s words are filled with bursts of tears. Isn’t it the same thing, though? A pause for a swell of emotion that forces the words to one side or the other? “You’ve been feeling this way all along?”
“Well, neither of you weresaying anything.Which made me think it was a secret or something. That I wasn’t supposed to know. So I just…pretended not to know…but that pretty much meant I watched in silence while you guys split up.”
“Raff, first things first,we are not splitting up.We’ve had a lot of trouble this year. But we love each other. We’re getting back on track.”
“I wanted to move out so bad, Roz,” he’s saying into his hands. “I could tell that it was a strain for you two. But…the thought of being alone. Of ever being alone…It took me too long to move out. I know. You weren’t sleeping together anymore, barely even talking. And still, I stayed. It took too fucking long. I know it. I am such a fucking coward.”
“Raff!” And now I’ve said his name in pretty much every inflection one can use. This time I’m angry. “You were terribly injured. Just like we were. Fine, you stayed a little too long, but what do you think it would have done to me and Vin if you’d left too early? You think that would have been the magical answer? No way, me and Vin have to find our way through this together, no matter if you’re there or not. And you are not a coward for not wanting to be alone.” A thought occurs to me. “Even though you’re alone now and seem to be doing pretty fucking well.”
He’s glaring at me because he wants to be glaring at himself. “I’m having random sex with random people and wishing—” He cuts himself off. “This is not the point. The point is that you and Vin are sleeping together again. And I’m so happy.”
“I don’t think most people are this involved in their siblings’ sex lives.”
