“It won’t taste like home,” a male voice chimes in. “But I’ll take it over pork fried rice.”
My brother Gianni, aka Noah, walks in with grease-stained hands. The never changing scent of motor oil and cold metal wafts through the air and swirls around with the smell of soy sauce.
Despite everything, I find myself smiling.
“Hey, G.” I stand up to plant a kiss on his dirty cheek. “How was work? Also, are you growing a beard?”
“He can’t grow a beard,” Bella says, picking the cabbage out of the lo mein. “He’s a man-baby.”
“At least I’m not acrybaby and I eat all my veggies.” He grins and sticks his tongue out at her. She flips him off. It only makes him grin harder.
I move the mail aside and we open all the little boxes, eating straight from them. One, I don’t want to do dishes, and two, it’s more fun this way, passing around the egg rolls and fighting over the biggest pieces of orange chicken.
“Work was fine,” Gianni says. “It’s a lot of old Ford engines and winter tire changes, but it’s work.”
“You mean there’s no race cars in the boonies?” Bella fake-gasps. “Shocking.”
He tosses a piece of cabbage at her.
“No race talk at the table,” I remind them.
Since moving to Montana, I set a couple of new rules. Number one: we don’t talk about racing. We also don’t talk about El Paso, Apex, or tell anyone our real names. As far as everyone is concerned, we moved from New Jersey when “our dad died” and wanted to start over fresh.
But the biggest, most important rule of all?
Never mention the names Rozanov or Chadovich.
“Well, I for one had a great day at work,” Eliza starts in. I gotta hand it to her. For a hairstylist who went from working at a cliquish salon in NYC to a little shop literally called The Salon—courtesy of it being the only salon in town—she sure is upbeat.
“Why do you like working there so much?” Bella asks, finally taking a bite of food. “Isn’t it just a bunch of gossiping old ladies?”
“Yes!” Eliza exclaims. “Listen. Small town gossip beats—” she stops herself before breaking one of the aforementioned rules. “Well. Everything, really. Old ladies go to the salon for perms and sets. It’s their weekly getaway where they spend their retired husbands’ money, so the tips are great. Better if you engage in their stories. It beats coloring hair for stingy girls who get mad because they can’t go bleach blonde in one sitting after putting black box color on their hair for two years. And they never leave bad reviews on Yelp.”
“I doubt they even know what Yelp is,” Bella mutters.
“Exactly!” Eliza points a chopstick at her. “So, Bella, have you made any friends at school yet?”
I nearly choke on my sweet and sour chicken. Eliza looks confused, and Bella is less than amused.
“This conversation is deceased. I’m eating in my room.”
With that, she snags the rest of the lo mein and walks off. I sigh, Eliza smiles apologetically, and Gianni shakes his head with a laugh. Then he shovels some more rice in his mouth before standing up.
“I hate to follow suit, but the sun is going to be gone in a few and I really want to get that water pump installed.”
He’s referring to the engine of his new project car. He sold his old one when we moved. It was a sad day, but we had to leave behind anythingtheycould trace.
“Thanks for the dinner, sis,” he says to Eliza. Then he calls out down the hall. “Thanks for the lovely conversation, Bella! Always a pleasure!”
None of us have to see her to know she’s flipping him off through her closed door.
I sigh again, sipping on my glass of water. Eliza smiles over at me.
“How are you doing?” she asks.
“I’m the oldest. I’m supposed to be asking you that,” I remind her.
“You matter too,” she reminds me. “You’ve put in a lot of hours at the dentist’s office lately. I worry about you.”
