“Ruth!” I said jokingly. “Language! Where’s your swear jar?”
She snorted. “If the two of you think I give a rat’s patootie about Bundles of Joy, you’re wrong. I’ve watched you both fall away from each other since Sunny turned eighteen, and I can’t stand the thought of it any longer. You’re all each other has left.”
“We have you,” I told her and let my head rest on her shoulder.
“Not forever,” she countered.
The thought gave me a sour taste in my mouth.
She continued. “And I can’t leave this earth knowing that two of my favorite people aren’t there for each other.”
Charlie held her hand up and kissed her knuckle. “I know,” he said softly, and then looked at me. “We know.”
“I don’t know how we’re going to come to an agreement on the direction of the company,” I said. For as much as Charlie made me irate, I did want to find a way for us to move forward. I could tell myself it was just for Ruth, but I knew better.
“You could join us for Christmas Eve lunch,” Charlie said to me, and I couldn’t tell if the hesitation in his voice was born ofshyness or reluctance. “I’m here with the family. When I told Jenna that Ruth and I were heading to Vermont, she insisted we make a family trip of it and spend the holiday.”
“You’ve got to see Gretta,” Ruth said. “She’s huge and even more of a tyrant than you were.”
“Sounds like you have your work cut out for you, Charlie,” I said. Embarrassingly, I’d only met my niece a few times. Forget about the company. That fact would actually kill my parents all over again.
“She asks about you,” he said. “She remembers you and always points you out in photos.”
Whether or not it was true, Charlie going for the jugular with the mention of my niece did the trick. I hated not knowing her, and I couldn’t let a business disagreement between me and Charlie be the reason I didn’t at least try. Anything less was just me choosing the safest version of myself. Just like Isaac.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll come up to the lodge for lunch.”
Ruth held both our arms up like she was declaring victory. “The Get Along shirt strikes again!”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” Charlie said as he demolished the rest of his Capri-Sun. “We better get going. I promised Gretta we’d hit the bunny slopes.”
He stood up and Ruth turned to me, holding my cheeks in her hands. “My girl,” she said. “My beautiful girl. Christmas Eve with the both of you. What a dream come true.”
“Let’s get through lunch tomorrow and then you can let me know if it’s more of a nightmare than a dream. I might need to take a pot gummy first.”
“Bring one for me,” Charlie muttered.
“But have either of you tried marijuana-infused tea?” Ruth asked as she hugged me goodbye.
Charlie and I both stared at her, jaws slack.
“What?” she said. “I’ve really let my hair down in Arizona.”
I walked them to the front and waved as they drove off in their rental SUV.
Lunch. Tomorrow. With my brother. Those were not the Christmas Eve plans I was expecting to make, but as I heard floorboards creaking on the second floor, I was at least thankful for a reason to steer clear of the hottest boy in Sad Town tomorrow.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Isaac
At some point, I lay on the floor. I didn’t deserve a mattress, and I didn’t deserve blankets. I just wanted to push my face against my century-old area rug and listen to my eyelashes scrape against the fibers, and then I wanted all the wrongness humming through my bones to stop, juststop.
But how could it? When I’d forgotten the one day that mattered most? When I’d forgotten about the one person who mattered most? Brooklyn had died, and I couldn’t even give her a single, lousy day of my time to remember her? Even now, my thoughts weren’t only on her, as I replayed that fight with Sunny over and over again. The things I’d said. The look on her face, like she’d been kicked in the chest.
Misery twisted in my stomach until I was sick with it.
Around the house, bells rang—the loud, cheery sound that meant someone had actually rung the doorbell and it wasn’t just the wind or the ghosts or whatever—but I didn’t hear any answering footsteps in the hall. Maybe Sunny wasn’t going to answer it.
