Make Me Lose

by Leigh, Ember

  I knew something was wrong that morning when I snapped at Hazel the way I did. It wasn’t even part of our ongoing competition. It was strictly the Bad Mood Bears coming out to play. My footsteps scuff softly against the tiled floors as I make my way to the front row of the church, where the entire Daly clan is sitting. Mom’s in the center of the pew, flanked by Dominic to her left—of course—and then to her right, Dad, Weston, Maverick, and Connor.

  I stop at the end of the aisle, and all my relatives turn to look at me. Six sets of electric blue eyes. Mom is dabbing her nose with a tissue. Dad, a hulking man with salt and pepper hair, is stuffed into a black suit.

  “Move over,” I hiss at Dom.

  He furrows his brows, giving me a look that says, What the fuck?

  “I’m sitting next to Mom,” I clarify, starting to step past Connor. Dad clears his throat loudly.

  “We can scoot down, you know,” Connor gripes.

  “Gray, that’s my foot,” Maverick says. I try to step more carefully. Disapproving frowns form in the rows behind me.

  “You could get here on time,” Dominic says as he leans forward, sending me a stern look that almost pushes me over the fucking ledge. Like he’s my dad. Like he’s anybody’s dad.

  “You could shut your mouth,” I return, as the organ music crescendos. Muffled coughs echo through the vast church.

  Our actual dad sends me a glare. “Sit down.”

  “I’m trying,” I hiss.

  “Has your ass always been this big?” Weston asks.

  “Let me sit down,” I demand. “I’m the second oldest. I should be next to Mom.”

  “Oh, honey,” Mom says, her voice thick with emotion. Like she doesn’t have the energy for any of this. I wedge myself in between her and Dom. Dom gives me a death stare as he slides further down the pew to make way for the shift in people. All of us boys have spent our lives fighting over Mom. This is nothing new.

  “How are you doing, Mom?” I ask, wrapping my arm around her shoulders. She nods and pats my chest. Up on the chancel, the closed casket sits. My throat tightens and I jerk my gaze away, to anywhere else. To the stained glass windows towering above us, to the ornate columns spiraling up into the domed ceiling. The last time I was in this church, I was probably about thirteen—and with Grammy Ethel. Everything about this place reminds me of her.

  I knew this was going to be an unpleasant day. Emotions and all that. Honestly, it’s part of the reason why I wanted to start it off with Hazel. To keep my mind off things. To distract. It didn’t work terribly well—really, it might have made things worse.

  The service is short and sentimental. I’m a pall bearer, along with all of my brothers and our dad. We form a train of cars leading to the cemetery. I’m thankful for the space, because it gives me time to address the pressure building inside my chest. All I can feel is magma and discontent. It’s swirling and pushing at my ribs, like a shaken champagne bottle. But it has nothing to do with my grandma. That much, I can tell.

  I’m sad, and regret not spending more time with her before she passed. But this pressure inside my chest feels like muck that’s bubbled to the surface. Like a tar that’s been coating my insides and finally burbled free. My phone buzzes, and I snatch it up to look at it. This wild, unhinged part of me wants it to be Hazel. Even though there’s no reason for her to be texting. Even though she doesn’t have my number.

  Instead, it’s work. My assistant, Chad. His text message is concise: “Kratz wants a meeting with you Monday, what should I tell him?”

  That’s a week from now. I put in for a four-week vacation, fully intending on staying out of the city that long, if not longer. Rage is simmering in my gut now, a caustic, thick stew that’s been sitting there for too long.

  My chest gets so tight I almost can’t see for a second. I grip the steering wheel and when the processional slows, I slam on my brakes. The truth bubbles up to the surface.

  You’re fucking unhappy and need to quit.

  It’s not the first time this revelation has occurred to me. But each time it arrives, like an unwanted religious visitor at the front door, I’d rather wait it out in the shadows instead of confronting it.

  Backing down from the life I’ve created—the life I’ve fought to have—isn’t on the table. I have everything I need. Everything I thought I wanted. There’s no place for unhappiness in Brooklyn, in my sweet apartment, with a high-powered job and investment opportunities nearly drowning me with how plentiful they are. I mean, sure, everyone’s sort of unhappy in Brooklyn, but it’s a collective misery. The sort of we’re all in this crazy shit together impersonal camaraderie that you can see gleaming on the faces of my fellow scowling New Yorkers.

  It’s everything anybody should want.

  Besides, what are my options? Go to the already-popped tech bubble of San Francisco, relocate to Seattle and pay the same rent for an even smaller apartment, or…what? Move home to Bayshore like a resigned loser, tail between my legs?

  This feeling will pass.

  Except I’m not sure it’s ever truly passed, not really. When it comes up, it stains the air around me. Urging me to fix it. Do something. Even just acknowledge it.

  But I can’t. I don’t know where else to go. So it’s easier to ignore.

  Ignore and distract.

  It’s occurred to me, like the most inappropriate joke whispered in the middle of a quiet room, that getting my four-week vacation and planning to spend it in Bayshore was something of a test run. It’s not like I’ve ever seriously considered moving home. It’s a non-option. But the thought sometimes hangs there, bulky and uncomfortable, like a doctor sticking his finger up my asshole during a routine visit.

  And when that feeling persists, you do anything you can to ignore it. Numb it. Move on.

  The service at the burial site is emotional. Final. The priest drones on while I fight tears. My brothers and I linger near the plot, tossing roses on top of the lowered casket. Dad mentions that he’s already purchased his and Mom’s plots nearby.

  “And you didn’t get ours too?” Weston asks, trying to lighten the mood. We’d all just glower and stomp around, but Weston tries to pick up our spirits. He’s really the nicest one of us all. I’m not entirely sure how he came out so free-spirited and happy when the rest of us are generally assholes. Except Mom, of course. “Isn’t there a Groupon for stuff like that?”

  Dad grunts. “I don’t know what this Roopon stuff is.”

  “Groupon, Dad,” Maverick sighs.

  We head back to the house in a daze. I have my arm around Mom’s shoulders, but she’s stony-faced and silent.

  Grammy Ethel wasn’t only her mom; she’d been her best friend too. One of her rocks had departed this earth. Honestly, I’m glad I’m going to be around for another three and a half weeks. I need to make sure Mom is good before I go. Dad is a rock for her, but not in the way that her mom was. He’s more of a pension-holding sort of rock and less of an emotionally supportive rock.

  Back at Mom’s house, we fill the driveway and part of the street with our cars. I shut my door right as Connor and Kinsley step out of his rental.

  Connor looks legitimately distraught. Kinsley’s cheeks are pink and puffy, like she’s been crying. I’ll admit, I underestimated my brother’s relationship with the daughter of our rival family. I thought he’d done it just to piss Mom and Dad off.

  But Connor slides his arm around Kinsley’s waist as if he’s been doing it for years, and I realize that my brother has an entire life in California that I know nothing about.

  He’s the only Daly son with a girlfriend. Maybe I need to take lessons from my little brother.

  “You two okay?” I ask, mustering a smile. Kinsley nods and sniffs. Connor squeezes my shoulder, the sun catching his sandy blond hair. Slowly, we all weave our way into the house. Our childhood home.

  No matter how long I’ve been away, no matter what I think about Bayshore, the smell of home can bring me to my knees. It’s not that she
uses any special perfume or anything inside the house—no randomly spurting air fresheners. No, it’s the smell of our family, baked into the wood floors and the sunny corners and the familiar paths through the rooms. It’s the thirty-plus years of living in the house, mixed with children’s tears and adolescent rages and the inescapable grief and joy that accompanies any ounce of life.

  I wish it was a perfume, so I could bottle it and take it with me to New York. Take a sniff anytime I felt down. Even though I’d probably sniff the bottle away within a week’s time.

  We’re all loosening ties and kicking off shoes at the front door. Soon, my childhood home is full of chatter. Mom drifts toward the back windows and sighs while looking at the backyard, where my dad is puttering around the grill.

  “You should go get a massage this week,” I suggest as I stand beside her, trying to suss out what she’s staring at. Maybe it’s the cardinals at the feeder. Or maybe it’s the uneven edging along the back walkway, completed by yours truly because, hey, I’ve been living in a big city for a decade. I don’t utilize lawn equipment anymore. “I’ll pay. I can make the appointment for you.”

  She heaves a sigh, shaking her head. “You know what would be nice?”

  “What?”

  She turns to look at me, her eyes so clear and vibrant they’re practically icy. “If all my sons were home.”

  I tilt my head. “Mom. We are home. Right now.”

  “That’s not what I mean.” She sighs, wrapping her black shawl tighter around her arms. She breezes past me then, joining Kinsley in the kitchen.

  “Do you ever think about moving back to Bayshore?” she asks Kinsley.

  Kinsley blinks a few times, studying the countertop. “Well…actually, yes. Rent is ridiculous in California.”

  “I couldn’t move back,” I say, joining them in the kitchen. So do Dominic and Connor. “My job doesn’t exist in Bayshore.”

  “You act like you’re the royal shoe shiner or something,” Dominic chides.

  I narrow my eyes at him. “That’s not even—That doesn’t make sense.”

  “Tell you one thing I missed about home,” Connor says with a sigh, easing onto a stool facing the women in the kitchen. “The lake.”

  “See?” Mom’s smile glimmers hopefully. “I’ll just need to find my own way to lure each of you home.”

  “I live an hour away,” Dominic reminds her.

  “But she won’t be happy until you have the deed to a house in your hand with a Bayshore address,” Maverick says, joining the conversation. He’s got the darkest head of hair of all of us, and combined with his gaunt features, he looks a little angry almost all of the time. It’s like Resting Bitch Face, but for dudes. Let’s call it Resting Dick Face.

  “I wouldn’t say no to that,” Mom admits.

  Weston joins a moment later. He’s already changed into long linen pants and a soft tee that says PEACE. “Is everyone moving home? You mean I have to go find my own place?”

  “You should have your own place by now,” Dominic reminds him, and I suppress a smile. I’d been about to say the same thing.

  “It’s not worth it for me to rent.” Weston opens the fridge and stares inside. He’s twenty-four but looks every inch a teenager as he stares dully at the contents. “Besides, no landlord would rent to me for just a few months. You sign leases for a year at a time.”

  His response sounds practiced. Like he’s repeated it to Dad a million times. Weston is on the move a lot. I’m not really sure what he does or how he affords it.

  “Where did you go most recently?” I ask, as Dad comes lumbering through the sliding glass door to the deck.

  “Massachusetts,” he says, then shuts the fridge without taking anything out. “There was a con.”

  “Ah.” I shove my hands in my pockets, trying to locate anything relevant to this tidbit. I’ve got nothing. I really should know my family better. “What’s that again?”

  Dad snorts. They’ve probably had this exact conversation before.

  “A convention,” Weston says. “You know, like Comic-Con, Star Wars Con…”

  “So you go dressed up as Jabba the Hut?” Connor asks, grinning. At least I’m not the only one who doesn’t know what’s going on.

  “No. I mean, it’s not required.” Weston runs a hand through his light brown hair. Of the five of us, Connor got blessed with the blond tresses. I used to be so envious when I was little. But when I grew up, I realized the whole tall, dark, and handsome combo was as potent—if not more so—than the dinner, movie, and wine combo.

  “What do you do there?” I ask, unable to keep the question inside. It shows how little I know, but I suspect Dom and Connor are wondering the same.

  “I work.” Weston shrugs, looking at each one of us in turn. When silence settles over the kitchen, he asks, “What?”

  I can already sense Dominic’s fatherly disappointment, which grates the fuck out of me. Probably because Dad is standing right next to him, and they’ve both got their arms folded across their chests in the exact same way. And then I realize—I do too. It’s like we’re related. I love but also hate how similar we all are.

  I hurry to drop my arms and add, “Well, that’s cool. Drifting around to different cons.” I work my jaw back and forth, debating whether or not I want to say the next words. “Sometimes I’d give anything to drift away from my job.”

  “Office got ya down?” Dom asks.

  Fuck. Shouldn’t have said that in front of him. There’s the ammunition he’s been looking for. “Handling millions of dollars a day is stressful. Sometimes it would be nice to float, is all I’m saying. Like what you do—” I wave my hand in the air dismissively. Dom is a doctor at a hospital in Cleveland. “Sounds relaxing. Just need to see patients and be done with it.”

  Dom works his jaw back and forth, and I try to squash my grin. It’s fun to irritate my big brother.

  “People and paperwork, right? A breeze.” I tap my knuckles on the countertop.

  “I save people’s lives,” Dom clarifies, exactly the level of miffed I’d been aiming for. “When’s the last time you’ve performed an emergency surgery for someone hanging onto life by a thread?”

  “Boys,” Mom begins in that tone reserved exclusively for extinguishing fights before they’ve technically started. Dad heads to the fridge, and a second later a beer cracks open.

  “It’s important work,” I go on, satisfaction flickering inside me. Dad starts handing out beers. I’m not sure if it’s to quell the pending explosion or goad it into something larger. “I’m just talking more about the type of people we serve. You’re doing important work on the ground. I’m…a little higher up. The upper echelon.”

  Connor snorts while Dom glowers.

  “Yeah, wiping the ass cracks of petty billionaires sounds like a pretty great way to make a living,” Dom mutters.

  “I’m not wiping ass cracks,” I say, sipping at my beer, “but I’m sure cleaning up.”

  “Gray’s going to be the one footing the bill when we’re in the nursing home,” Dad cracks as he heads back to the patio. And somehow, that remark means a lot to me. Probably because Dad has always made it more than clear that he favored Dom’s profession simply because it was in the same industry: healthcare.

  Dad has worked as the CEO of the local hospital for the past thirty years, and Dom became his pride and joy once he announced his decision to attend medical school. Cue the ensuing years of disappointment as the rest of his sons took varied paths: investment banking, software engineering, drifting travels, and then the indecision of the youngest whose only real profession seemed to be getting drunk and fucking.

  “Could you toss a million my way?” Maverick asks.

  “Come work for me for a year, and then maybe I could.”

  He looks like he’s considering it.

  “You’re not going to Brooklyn too,” Mom warns. “I already lost one son to the Big Apple; you’re not making it two.”

  “Ehh, I don�
��t think I’m cut out for what Gray does,” Mav says with a sigh. “Whatever it is.”

  “Does nobody in this family know what the other does?” Connor asks. Kinsley snickers as she cuts up pieces of fancy cheese.

  It was meant as a joke, but it thuds through the room, leaving a sick taste in my mouth. He’s right, and for the first time in my adult life, it doesn’t feel good.

  It’s easy to forget about people when they aren’t in your circle every day. When they’re hundreds or thousands of miles away. It’s easy to forget why they matter. It’s easy to forget the past, the words and the people that formed you.

  But being back in Bayshore, with all four of my brothers around me for the first time in a decade? My mom smiling sweetly at all of us, while my dad lights up the grill outside? There’s something relieving here, even amidst the awkwardness and the emotion. If I close my eyes, it’s almost like I’m sixteen again, and little Mav is zipping around the kitchen with his toy truck, Dom is poring over college application paperwork, while West hangs from the treehouse in the backyard and Connor secretly whispers on the phone to his middle school girlfriend. It’s weird how much I still feel like that kid—that sixteen-year-old in the middle of all the noise and family.

  It’s weird how far away from that New York takes me.

  Even weirder is how good it feels to be back in it.

  Chapter 9

  GRAYSON

  I take a day to let my emotions harden back into the immobile glacier they used to be. But on Tuesday night, something’s hammering inside my chest I can’t fucking ignore anymore.

  This pressure pushes me down the street to the little quick mart by the beach around sunset. The lake and sky reflect goldenrod and crimson back and forth between them. I pause outside the store for a moment, lifting my sunglasses to behold the spectacle. Fuck, this place is gorgeous in the summer. I’ve been here less than a week, and my stress levels have plummeted. Lake life, and all that shit. Hitting the Jet Ski daily probably has something to do with it too.