by C. L. Stacey
Regret grips my heart when I hear Jane burst into tears. “Oh, I missed you so much!”
“I missed you, too, Ma. I’m sorry…” I smile at Carl when he approaches me, then my eyes catch the steel shining from his hand. “Pop, blade!” I hold up a hand to stop him.
Completely forgetting that he had it with him, Carl holds up his blade-wielding hand and barks with laughter. “That would’ve made for an interesting homecoming, huh?” He sets it down on the hallway table before pulling me in for a hard hug, smacking an open hand against my back. “You’ve gotten bigger,” he states. “I can barely get my arms around you, boy!”
I laugh, squeezing him harder to me. “What are you guys cooking? Smells good in here.”
“Mushroom risotto,” Jane answers just as Ari returns with Ayli. “I made plenty. Would you like to stay for dinner?”
“We just came from Moreno’s, Mom.”
“No, I would love some,” I say, earning a look of surprise from Ari. “I haven’t had her mushroom risotto in a while. I want to stay.”
“Wonderful!” Jane gushes, hurrying back to the kitchen with Carl.
Ari walks over to me, wide-eyed. “How are you going to take a bite of anything right now? Aren’t you stuffed?”
“I haven’t been to visit for a while. Rejecting your mother’s offer to feed me anything is not first on my list, Ari.” I smile down at Ayli when she fusses softly in Ari’s arms. “Come keep me company.” I drape my arm over her shoulders and lead us into the dining room.
When I first heard that Runway Models was holding a casting call for Lena Durev’s brand new line, I went out and got an updated comp card made. I acted spontaneously. I may be a ton of things, but spontaneous, I am not. Especially not these days. But, as I sit here at our family dining table, watching my mother’s face light up with her smile, and my father laughing harder than I’ve heard in a long while, I’m glad I made the decision to go.
It’s been a little over five years since I modeled anything, so I was really only relying on my connection to Caleb to pull me through the audition.
Abuse of power, yes, but at the time, I really needed Aryn to come around, to understand how serious I am about him being here for Ayli.
Without mentioning Caleb’s or the company’s name, I told Aryn that I was going to find a way to take a small part of my life back, and that he better start helping out because I couldn’t stand to do it all alone anymore.
Then my plan backfired.
We’re all upset about losing Kayli, and we all hurt for Aryn, but an innocent child should not have to suffer for it.
It’s been over three months since we welcomed her into the world, but Aryn keeps coming up with excuses to walk away. He isn’t openly cruel to her or anything like that, and I don’t think it’s about him blaming her for Kayli’s death, but I’m worried that if he doesn’t make a connection soon, he may miss out on the chance to altogether. I read that it’s important to establish one early on.
Ayli will go the rest of her life without knowing who her mother was. Who better to keep the memory of Kayli alive than Aryn himself? Ayli is the final gift Kayli left behind, a blessing. When will he get that?
Despite all that he’s done to make me feel otherwise, I have faith in my brother. He’ll come around… he has to.
A strong hand comes over the nape of my neck, squeezing gently.
Caleb winks down at me when I look up at him, and I respond with a smile I’ve learned to perfect over these past couple months. “You okay?” he asks, his tone laced with concern.
“I’m fine.” I turn to find my parents’ seats empty. “Where’d they go?”
“They went to get dessert,” he answers before steering the conversation back. “You look upset. What’s going on?”
I look down at Ayli and shrug.
Caleb squeezes the back of my neck again, prompting me to look back up. “Let me in.”
“I’m just thinking about Aryn,” I admit, placing a finger in my niece’s tiny hand.
Caleb releases me, draping his arm across the back of my seat with a sigh. He doesn’t say anything right away, just stares emptily across the room. “He’s been gone a while. I’ve been here a little over a week now. When’s he getting back?”
“Not sure. Should be any day now.”
Caleb frowns at how unclear my answer is. “He doesn’t give you an exact timeline before he leaves his daughter with you?”
I sense the slight irritation in his tone, so I immediately go into recovery mode. “It’s not too bad, he works really hard to provide for Ayli.”
“So hard that he never sees her,” he quips.
“Caleb!” I fix him with a look of surprise, then I look toward the kitchen to make sure my parents didn’t overhear.
“You’re nineteen, Ari. He’s dumping his responsibilities on you. You’re just a kid.”
“Almost twenty,” I correct him. “I am not a kid. Stop calling me that!” I spit.
Some of the tension in his eyes lifts. “That’s beside the point,” he says, gentling his voice. “You can’t put your life on hold because your brother’s too afraid to face his reality.”
Tears prick the back of my eyes, and I look away before Caleb can see them. “I’m not putting my life—”
“Then why’d you turn the job down?” Caleb cuts me short.
I pick Ayli up and prop her against my shoulder. “Take me home.”
“Ari, I’m—” he begins to apologize.
I stand from my seat and glare down at him. “Now.”
Lying to Jane before leaving so abruptly was extremely awkward. I don’t think I’ve ever lied to her before, so I’m sure she sensed that something was wrong. Also, it didn’t exactly help when Ari stormed out of the house without really saying anything at all.
Now, there’s an awkward silence in the car, and I want to say something, but I don’t want to risk Ari yelling and scaring the baby.
In the quietest, calmest tone I can manage, I start off easy. “Kid…”
Silence.
Stubborn as hell silent.
I flick my gaze in her direction and see her sitting with her legs and arms crossed, staring out the window like she’s pissed at the fucking world.
“Seriously?”
Nothing. The little shit.
“Ari,” I call to her again.
When she doesn’t answer, I reach out and grip the spot above her knee, where I know she’s ticklish.
Ari yelps softly, jumping at the sudden contact, and then she takes an open hand and smacks me as hard as she can against the chest. “Don’t fucking touch me!” she snaps.
A rough noise, something between a groan and a growl, rolls up my throat when the spot starts to sting, then I turn a look of warning her way. “A – Watch your mouth when you’re talking to me, B – Watch your mouth around Ayli.”
My warnings tip her over the edge, and she fixes me with a much angrier look. “A – Fuck you, don’t tell me what to do. B – Don’t tell me how to parent my niece. I whispered it, she can’t hear me.”
“What did you just say to me?”
“You heard me.”
“Yes, I did, but I’m giving you a chance to take it back.”
Ari responds with a snort. “Or what? You’ll pull over? Do it.” She gestures out the window. “I’d happily walk to the subway from here.”
I keep my eyes on the road and grip down against the steering wheel.
It’s hard for me to apologize to anyone for anything, ever. Especially when I have no idea what the hell I did wrong. I know that she got mad at me at some point during the talk we had at the dinner table. I just don’t know why.
“What did I do, Ari?”
With her gaze still aimed out the window, Ari scoffs. “Nothing, Caleb.”
I will never understand why women find the need to do this. They get pissed, and they want the men to participate in their guessing games until they get it right. But we rarely ever do, and then they get mad a
ll over again.
I’ve pissed off a ton of women in my time, but I never care this much. Ari isn’t women; she’s family. I care a whole fucking lot, even though I really don’t want to right now with the way she continues to test me with that mouth.
We have roughly ten minutes left before we reach the tower. How the hell do I fix this in ten minutes? More importantly, how do I get through this without losing it myself?
When I roll the car to a stop at a red light, my eyes fall to a soft close as I breathe out through my nose. Be cool, don’t yell, I coach myself. “Well, I obviously did something, just tell me what that is. Please don’t make me guess. We could be here all night.”
The light turns green, and I still have no answer.
“Come on, kid, what’d I do?”
Two red lights later, Ari finally decides to speak. “How long have you been gone?”
The question makes me frown. “Excuse me?”
“From our lives, Caleb…” she clarifies. “How long have you been gone?”
I have no idea where she’s going with this, but if she means to guilt trip me, she’s succeeding. “Three years.”
“Right.” Ari finally turns to face me again, but I keep my eyes forward.
“The phone works both ways,” I say in my defense. “I didn’t get any calls from the either of you. Your parents tried, but—”
“I’m not finished!” she cuts me off.
Lord, this woman. I breathe out through my nose, a frustrated growl rolling up from the back of my throat.
“This isn’t about blaming you for being gone, don’t make it about you. We understand you have a busy life, and we didn’t want to burden you with calls that’d only end up lasting a good ten seconds to talk about a bunch of nothing. Plus, I had school, and Aryn had Kayli. People grow apart, it happens every day.”
“But, in those three years, I got to watch my brother fall deeper in love with his wife. I was there when they made their pregnancy announcement to our family. I was at the hospital when Kayli went into labor.” The guilt consumes me when I hear Ari’s tears take over her ability to speak the next sentence clearly. “I was there when the doctors told us that Kayli was gone.”
I stop at another red light and run my hands roughly down my face. “Ari…”
“Not only did my brother lose a wife that day, but I lost a sister. You know how much I’ve always wanted a sister. I was devastated, Caleb.”
So, this is why women always insist we guess…
They want us to admit to ourselves out loud how fucking dumb we are.
“I’m so sorry…” I shake my head. “I didn’t mean to offend anyone, I was just looking out for you—”
“You don’t get to do that!” she fights to keep her voice under a shout. “You don’t know who I am, not anymore. You don’t know what we’ve all been through. You don’t have to understand my reasons for staying behind to take care of Ayli. I don’t owe you an explanation for why I turned down that job.”
“Ari, can I please just say something—”
“Do you know what love is? Do you know what it means? Do you know how it feels?” she asks, and I blank. “I don’t either. I can’t even begin to imagine… to love someone as much as Aryn loves Kayli, and then to not be able to see them ever again…” She shakes her head. “That is why I never, and will never, judge my brother for the way he chooses to cope. You don’t get to judge him when you can’t even begin to comprehend the extent of his pain, and you certainly do not get to judge me. Not ever. I love my brother, and he has me for as long as he needs me!”
We reach the tower too soon. I’m nowhere near done talking about this.
I park in front of the valet stand, and Ari’s hand moves toward the handle.
“Ari,” I stop her before she can push her door open. “Let me walk you up.”
“Don’t bother, I got it.” She shoves her door open, and I get out, too.
I round the car to help her, but Ari already has Ayli’s car seat in her hand by the time I get to her. “Let me fix this,” I plead. “I’m not in town for that much longer, I don’t want to spend the rest of our time fight—”
Ari hoists the seat up, hanging the bar over the crook of her arm. “Did you stay to convince me to take this job?”
Guilty. Again.
I scratch the back of my head and look around the busy street before returning a less confident stare back to Ari. “Yes,” I move to block Ari when she turns away from me, “but that’s only part of the reason—”
“Go home, Caleb,” she says, sidestepping me.
The line rings twice before Jackson picks up. “Caleb,” he greets.
I skip the greetings and get right to the point of my call. “I have a name.”
“What is it?”
“Aryn Andrews.”
“I’ll get my guy on it.”
“Thanks, Jackson.”
“My favors don’t come free, Carlisle.”
Never thought they did.
“What do you need?” I ask.
“Not yet. I’ll get back to you.”
“Great, can’t wait,” I deadpan.
The call drops.
“Asshole,” I mutter.
Just as I thought, Jackson worked fast. He delivered me the information I needed, complete with Aryn’s flight itinerary, by the time I returned to my hotel room from what’s-her-face’s place.
Aryn’s scheduled to return from Dallas tomorrow.
I will never forget the day Caleb Carlisle first walked through the door of my childhood home.
It’s been months since the last time I saw my big brother. I was surprised when my parents told me earlier that he wouldn’t be coming home alone. I always assumed that the other students would return to their own homes to be with their own families during break periods.
Maybe it’s a girl? Is he getting married? But he’s only eighteen…
Regardless, the thought of having a sister makes me giddy.
The three of us are in the kitchen, prepping dinner together as a family. It’s tradition. Cooking and cleaning responsibilities do not fall to just the women in this home. Team effort all the way!
“Is it a girlfriend?” I ask my mother. “Did Aryn get someone pregnant?!”
The knife in my Dad’s hand clatters against the island countertop, and his head whips in my mother’s direction. “Did I miss something here?”
My mother laughs. “I warned your brother of what would happen if he ever had a child out of wedlock, Ari.” She shakes her head, laughing once more at my father, who sighs in relief. “Aryn’s bringing home a boy, a friend from school.”
“A boy?” I repeat.
“A boy,” my mother confirms.
“So my brother’s gay?” I ask, confused.
This time, my father’s the one to laugh. Loudly. “I’d love my boy no matter what, but I highly doubt your brother is gay, monkey,” he says.
“They’re on the football team together. Aryn said that the boy’s parents are out of town, so he asked if he could bring him here for break,” my mother explains.
“Oh…”
“The more the merrier,” she sings.
“What’s his name?”
“Caleb,” she answers.
“How old is he?”
“No idea.” She shrugs.
“Where is he from?”
“No clue.” She shrugs again.
“Mother, you invited a complete stranger into our home! What if this Caleb is a crazy person?” I freak.
“Then I got my shotgun,” my father provides me with what he sells as a simple solution.
My mother sets the vegetables down next to my father and playfully smacks his shoulder. “What kind of crazy person would send me those?” she says to me, pointing toward the beautiful, massive flower arrangement in the living room.
“Lots of crazy people gift flowers. It’s how they lure you into their trap, and then they chop you up into little pieces!” I scold
.
“I’m pretty sure that’s candy,” my father chimes back in.
More laughter fills the kitchen.
They laugh, but if Caleb turns out to be a raging psycho, I get to use them as a human shield. They’re my parents. It’s their duty to protect me.
But, like any other pre-teen girl my age, I find myself wondering if this stranger will be hot or hideous. I hope he’s hot.
Don’t judge me. What the hell were you thinking about when you were only thirteen?
As soon as I hear the front door open, I drop everything I’m doing and rush out of the kitchen.
“Hey, you little shit,” Aryn greets me with open arms as I come barreling through the living room to get to him, squealing like a little girl on Christmas morning. He laughs when I leap into his arms, pretending to be knocked a few steps back by my enthusiasm.
“I missed you!” I squeeze him until I’m sure I’m cutting off his air supply.
Aryn squeezes me back, patting an open hand against my back. “I missed you, too, squirt.”
When Aryn sets me down, I jog excitedly in place. “What’d you bring me, what’d you bring me?”
Before he left for New Haven, my brother promised me that he would never come home empty-handed. Last month, when Aryn came home for Thanksgiving, he brought me an iPod. This time, I’m hoping for an iPad.
Aryn reaches behind him, and my heart skips. Then I’m filled with disappointment when he drops a navy-blue ball cap over my head.
“You bought me a hat?” I whine.
“Go, Bulldogs!” Aryn chants with his fist pumping high in the air.
“You bought me a hat from your own school?” I reword my question. “Really, Aryn, a college team? Couldn’t spring for the Yankees?”
“Well, I could just take it back.” He tugs on the bill of the cap.
“No!” I smack his away. “If it comes from you, I love it. However crappy the gift.”
“Yea… thought so,” Aryn laughs, swinging an arm over my shoulders to squeeze me into another one of my favorite big brother hugs. “Not to worry, though. Your actual gift is in my bag.”
I’ve missed this.
