Enough Space
CARL
He didn’t watch her leave.
He made no attempt to chase her down and make her tell him what he didn’t want to hear.
Why he pushed her to say it in the hallway was beyond him.
He didn’t want to hear her say it.
To tell him that she didn’t love him and that they needed to move on.
Though if she had, maybe he’d finally be able to let his heart stop hoping.
Because living without her was really only half a life.
But he couldn’t do it.
If that’s what she’d been hoping for, she would never get it.
He knocked on the door to the red bus and waited.
They hadn’t made it very far when the snowstorm had gotten so bad they’d had to pull off the road for a bit.
The door opened and Sway stepped aside to let Carl in.
The red bus housed the babies—Sway, Harrison, and Blake. Luke, Mike and their assistant Lenny were on the blue bus. Carl road with the rest of the crew.
“How are things in here? Any thing you’re running out of?” he asked.
Blake glanced up from the floor where he was lying on his back in his underwear and picking a guitar. “Nah, I think we’re good.”
“How long are we gonna be stopped?” Sway asked, opening a bottle of water and sitting on one of the long couches.
“Could be a day or more, depending on when they reopen the interstate.”
“But we’ll be home in time for Christmas, right?” Harrison asked, from the chair pulled close to the television set and his gaming console.
“Easily. We just have to get to Chicago, then you’ll fly into Logan with days to spare.”
“You’re flying with us this time, right?” Sway asked, scrolling through his phone.
“Yep.” Carl sighed and rubbed his chin.
“Hey Carl?” Blake asked curiously. “What are your plans for the holidays?”
“You mean besides the bottle of Jim and the cheeseball I have every year?” Carl sat down on the couch opposite Sway and stretched out his legs. “I don’t know. I’ll probably sleep, honestly.”
Harrison grunted thoughtfully.
“You should come over to our house.”
“The O’Neil Family compound? Ha, no thanks.” Carl chuckled.
“Why not? You don’t have anything else going on.” Sway studied him carefully. “Unless you’re going to see your girlfriend or something.”
“Carl? You have a girlfriend?” Blake asked in surprise.
“No,” Carl corrected with an eyeroll. “How would I have time for a girlfriend when I have sole custody of my five illegitimate sons?”
“Rude,” Sway deadpanned.
“And if we’re illegitimate, that’s on you,” Blake added.
Carl chuckled.
“Miranda just called me a little bit ago,” Harrison spoke up.
The mention of Miranda had Carl’s ears straining for the next word.
“She was saying how much she hoped you’d be there this year.”
The silence that followed that sentence was deafening.
Carl remained perfectly still as the words rolled round and round inside his mind.
“Huh.” Sway looked at Carl thoughtfully. “Well, that’s interesting. Don’t you find that interesting, Blake?”
“I find that pretty damn interesting, Sway.”
These idiots.
This was clearly planned. It had moron written all over it.
“She should have mentioned it to me while she was here.” Carl stood, deciding to see if the blue bus had anything less ridiculous happening.
***
HARRISON
The door closed behind Carl and Harrison rolled his lips inward.
That could’ve gone better.
“Are you sure you saw what you think you saw?” Sway asked. “Because I feel like if I’d gotten caught in a dark hallway in the middle of a snog with the very delectable Miranda O’Neil, I’d be more receptive to her wanting to see me again.”
Harrison blew out an exasperated breath. “Please, for the love of Ewan McGregor’s Obi Wan, don’t ever refer to my sister as delectable again.” He paused his video game. “And yes. I know what I saw.”
He rubbed the back of his neck, trying to think of a reason why that hadn’t worked.
Carl loved Miranda.
Miranda loved Carl.
That’s how it had always been and forever would be.
But for some stupid reason they kept pretending like they couldn’t care less about one another. Except for those rare occasions like the one in the hallway when it was so freaking obvious.
He’d been positive this would be it. Miranda had asked for tickets for Iris’s birthday. She’d be there, Carl would see her, and heart arrows should have shot directly into both of their asses.
“Okay, Plan A didn’t work.” Blake sat up and set the guitar on the couch where Carl had been sitting. “And based on the few minutes I just witnessed, Plan B didn’t work either. Do we have a Plan C?”
Sway scrubbed a hand over his face and sat forward. “We have to lie.”
“We already lied,” Harrison reminded him. “Miranda hasn’t called me. He didn’t fall for it.”
Sway was already nodding. “We have to lie bigger.”
Blake snapped his fingers and pursed his lips, pointing at Sway. “Yes.”
“I’m afraid to even ask,” Harrison said.
“We send him an email from a fake account, say it’s Miranda, ask him to come to Christmas.”
Harrison’s stomach pitched.
Oh no.
That was devious.
“And what do we do when he shows up and thanks her for the invite?”
Sway shrugged. “It won’t matter. They’ll both be so happy to see each other, throw in some romantic music, soft lights, and mistletoe—love will take its course.”
Harrison exchanged a look with Blake who arched an eyebrow.
“That might work,” Blake said.
“It won’t work,” Harrison said at the same time.
“It will work. It will.” Sway was adamant.
“What choice do we even have?” Blake asked after a minute. He stood up and grabbed his laptop from the storage compartment.
“What are you doing?” Harrison asked, standing as well.
“We’re doing this right now. Before we lose anymore time.” Blake sat at the small table in the kitchenette and opened the laptop. “We’ve been watching those two play musical idiots for too long. They need to either shit or get off the pot. Neither one is getting any younger.” He spun the laptop around and showed Sway and Harrison the email account host. “Pick a name Miranda would use.”
Sway clapped his hands together. “Nothing fancy. Don’t get cute. She’s an educated woman.”
Harrison wiggled his fingers and typed something in.
Sway looked over his shoulder.
“That’ll work.”
Blake spun the laptop around and typed a few things, then spun it back.
“How do you know Carl’s email?” Sway asked.
“Don’t worry about it.”
Harrison typed a few things he thought Miranda might say.
“No, let me.” Sway bumped him out of the way and started typing.
Harrison read aloud over his shoulder.
“Hey Carl. Sorry we didn’t get a chance to talk more at the show. It was really great to see you. I know this is going to seem a little out of the blue, but I should have said something to you before you left. I would like to talk to you in person about reconciling. If that’s something you’re interested in. Please come to the family Christmas. Love, Miranda.”
Sway stood back and admired his work.
Harrison looked at Blake who just shrugged.
“I don’t know. Does it sound a little desperate?” Harrison asked.
“It needs to if Carl is going to take the bait
.”
“I feel like this is something we could go to jail for,” Harrison said warily. “Also, Miranda will kill all of us. I don’t know which of those would be worse.”
Blake nodded in agreement. “If we do this, we vow to never speak of it again.”
All three exchanged solemn nods of agreement.
Harrison took a deep breath. “Send it.”
***
The interstate was still closed in the morning so Lenny had gotten them into a hotel for the weekend while they waited out the strong midwestern storm.
Everyone was assigned to their separate rooms but shortly after check-in they had all found their way down to the common area in the hotel.
Harrison sidled up to Blake who was ordering at the small coffee bar off the main lobby.
“Did you get a reply?” he asked under his breath.
Blake cleared his throat and casually looked around the open area seating.
Harrison followed suit.
Carl was sitting with Luke and Mike near the fireplace. Going over the itinerary for the overseas leg of the tour in a few weeks.
Sway was chatting up the server at the hotel cafe.
“I have not,” Blake finally said. He took his coffee and slipped a five in the tip jar on the counter.
Harrison ordered a plain coffee and paid.
“What are we supposed to do now? That was the last idea we had.” It made no sense to him. It was so freaking obvious that Carl was stupid in love with Miranda. It was even more obvious than their lead singer Luke being head over tea kettle for Lenny.
And that was to say, a lot obvious. Like a neon sign lit up above both their heads when they looked at each other that said, “Love Sick Idiots.”
“What are we whispering about?”
Harrison jumped when Lenny appeared at his shoulder on the other side.
“Nothing,” he answered too quickly and she narrowed her eyes at him.
“We were talking about the geopolitical ramifications of what would happen when, uh, if overly sex-crazed mink were let loose on a retirement community predominantly populated by war veterans.” Blake lifted his eyebrows and sucked on the straw of his iced coffee.
Lenny’s eyes narrowed further. “Right.”
“It’s been an ongoing discussion,” Harrison explained, picking up on Blake’s idea.
Harrison had been raised with sisters. One older, one younger.
But when Blake had shown up in the band, he had been basically homeless.
Stella, Harrison’s mom, wouldn’t stand for that. So Blake had been moved into the guest house out back post haste.
And then Harrison had a brother.
In addition to the rest of the band of course.
He and Blake actually lived in the same house, though.
Anyway, getting back to the point, Blake’s reference to the old argument had Harrison’s idea wheels spinning again. At top speed.
The sex-crazed minks had been originally brought up by Carl. When he and Miranda had dated in college, he would come up with the most ridiculous things to try to start a debate with her to get her out of her head and interact with the world around her.
It had been hilarious for the rest of them.
But that one argument in particular had never quite died. It kept surfacing at the strangest moments in their lives. But always with the utmost of timing.
Like now.
Harrison ordered another coffee and turned to Lenny. “Hey will you take this one over to Carl. He looks extra tired today.”
Lenny glanced at Carl and frowned. “You’d think sleeping in a real bed would have the opposite effect,” she remarked.
“He’s had a big tour. I’m sure he’s just hoping we all get home without any more incidents. Our job may be done on this leg. But he won’t rest until he gets home.”
Lenny took the coffee handed to her and hesitated.
The three stepped away from the coffee kiosk and walked slowly toward the opposite end of the common area near the windows.
Wind had packed snow into the corners of the picture windows. Drifts piled in waves in the near empty parking lot.
The lobby had been decorated for the upcoming holiday travelers and lights twinkled merrily despite the howling winds outside.
“Does Carl have family?” Lenny asked, finally having decided on what she wanted to say.
“Not really,” Blake said with a shrug. “His pop died a while back and his ma got sick shortly after and then she passed too.”
“So what does he do during break?”
“He used to come to my family’s house for Christmas.” Harrison sighed like he didn’t know why Carl had stopped. And he almost felt bad for misleading Lenny. Almost.
Lenny chewed on the inside of her cheek as her expression turned thoughtful.
“Sure wish he’d come this year.” Blake drew a heart in the fog on the corner of the window. “It would be nice to have the family all together again.”
Lenny patted Blake’s shoulder but didn’t say anything. Then she took the coffee over to Carl.
“We’re evil,” Harrison murmured.
Blake drew another heart around the first one. “No. We’re family.
***
CARL
Sitting at the table with everyone that night as they had dinner sure felt nice.
They’d received word that the roads would open in the morning and they would be able to get back with time to spare.
Lenny had made it a priority to set dinner up that night. Everyone was there. The band, the crew, the bus drivers.
One last family meal, she had said. To celebrate a successful first leg.
Because of the weather, the hotel wasn’t busy, so they had the entire restaurant to themselves. Which was good because as a group they could get a little rowdy.
“Thank you for this,” Carl said to Lenny in a moment of rare poignancy.
She beamed at him. “Of course. Family is important. Especially this time of year.”
He pressed his lips together to keep from agreeing out loud with her. It was a sentiment she’d expressed earlier in the day when she’d approached him with her idea.
At the time he’d waved away the impact of it as her being influenced by the weather and the decorations.
But as the thoughts tumbled around in his head the rest of the day, he’d come to realize the truth in her simple idea.
Going with his gut, as was his wont, he opened the email app on his phone and typed out a simple and succinct reply.
“I’ll see you there.”
Chapter 4
I Want You for Christmas
MIRANDA
Miranda dumped her bags on the floor after closing the door and then collapsed face first on the sofa.
She hated shopping.
She especially hated shopping during the holidays.
People were the actual worst.
It was as if the entire reason for the season had been beaten up and left to die beside a dumpster in a back alley.
Case in point, today she had seen a woman literally punch another woman over a scarf. A scarf!
Thankfully, she was done with her shopping.
Normally she had all her shopping done long before December. But because she’d been living in KC for half the year, she didn’t want to have to ship more items home when it was time to go.
Also, she was going to end up having to do more shopping once she found out that the boys were back in town.
And, as usual for the past week, the thought of the boys naturally led to thoughts of Carl.
And his scowl.
And his eyes.
And his mouth.
And his mouth almost being on her mouth.
And then she screamed into the couch cushions because there was nothing to be done about it.
Her phone rang and she slipped it from her back pocket as she sat up and pushed her hair out of her face.
“Hello?”
“Miranda
, Miranda,” Blake sang into the phone to the tune of “Rosanna” by Toto.
It kind of sucked that there were no rock songs about women named Miranda. But maybe that was a hidden blessing. The guys easily manipulated lyrics to fit their purposes anyway.
She snickered into the receiver. “My favorite punker. What’s up, babe?”
“Are you home and do you have tape?”
Crap. Tape!
“I am home,” she said, getting up struggling to remove her coat. “But I don’t know if I have tape.”
“What if I told you I have may too much tape and would be happy to share my bounty?”
She snorted, picturing what that must look like.
“Is this just your way of trying to peek at your presents before their wrapped?”
“You got me presents?” Blake tried to sound appropriately shocked.
“How much tape do you have?” she asked.
“Well…” Blake sighed. “So Harrison found this app where you can buy things in bulk, right? To save money.”
Miranda closed her eyes because she knew where this was going. “How many?”
“I think there’s a hundred in this box.”
“How many boxes?”
“Hmm… five. But in full disclosure, I haven’t opened all the boxes yet. So it might just be the one with tape.”
She listened to him wrestle with carboard in the background.
“Okay, yeah. Two boxes are tape.”
“And the other three?”
More tearing and grunting.
Blake sighed heavily into the phone. “I don’t want to tell you.”
Miranda stopped and stared at the sculpture on her bookshelf she used as a book end. It was a replica in a much smaller scale of the Venus de Milo. Of one of her favorites.
What had given her pause was Blake’s resistance. There wasn’t much Blake wouldn’t say. So his desire to remain silent was curious.
“They’re vacuumed packed hoagie rolls, Ran!” he declared loudly.
Miranda doubled over in laughter.
“The man has a serious sandwich problem!” Blake began to rant. “There’s gotta be fifty rolls here! And why would he order tape and bread? Who does that? I’ll tell you who! Your brother, Harrison.” He huffed and she could tell he was trying to calm down.
Matter of Fact Page 4
