Page 25 of Omega's Faith
She clicks away on her heels. I look around at the fake forest. The elaborate set is being deconstructed piece by piece. At least, this particular lie is being taken down. I’m going to get stuck with the marriage.
6. Jonah
My knife moves steadily against the cutting board as I chop even slices of carrot like Mom taught me when I was eight and more likely to lose a finger than help with dinner.
The familiar rhythm of prep work should be soothing. Mom is working on the roast and I’m handling vegetables, sunlight streaming through windows.
It's not soothing. I feel like I’m counting down to my execution.
"Pass me the salt, sweetheart." Mom's voice carries the same warmth as always, but there's tension underneath. She knows how miserable I am. Of course she knows. Twenty-one years of being her son and I can't hide anything from her.
Children's artwork covers the refrigerator—my nieces' crayon masterpieces next to nephew's handprint turkeys from last Thanksgiving. There are family photos papering every available surface. Mom and Dad's wedding day. My siblings as babies. Baptisms and graduations and all the milestones that mark a normal, happy life.
The life I'm about to leave behind.
Car doors slam in the driveway. Then another set. The sound makes my chest tighten.
"They're here," Mom says unnecessarily, already moving toward the front door.
My siblings arrive like a force of nature. Corinne bustlesin first, wrestling three kids out of their car seats while simultaneously directing her husband to grab the dessert. Robert follows, everyone talking at once in the comfortable chaos of family.
"Uncle Jonah!" My little niece launches herself at my legs. “Have you seen my dress for the wedding?”
“I did and it’s beautiful.” It is. It’s this pale pink chiffon thing that she’s going to get sticky in about three seconds flat. But she’ll be beautiful along with her stickiness.
"And you. You’re going to be beautiful too," she says. She climbs onto a chair beside me, grabbing a carrot slice. "Like Belle when she marries the Beast."
Out of the mouths of babes.
The kitchen fills with bodies and noise. My brother James arguing with Michael about football. Corinne directing traffic while trying to keep her youngest from climbing the refrigerator.
Sometimes the noise of my family drives me crazy and I need a little quiet time, now all I can think is how much I am going to miss it.
"Need help?" Robert appears at my elbow, already reaching for another knife.
"I got it."
But he starts chopping onions anyway. Always looking out for his baby brother. Even when his baby brother is about to marry into a fortune and doesn't need looking after.
Except I do need it. I need someone to tell me that I don't have to go through with it. That there's another way.
"You okay?" Robert's voice is quiet, pitched under the family noise.
"Fine."
He doesn't believe me. I can see it in the way his jaw tightens, the protective alpha instincts he can't turn off even though I'm twenty-one and supposedly capable of making myown decisions.
Supposedly.
We crowd around the dining room table like we have every Sunday for as long as I can remember. Dad at the head, Mom to his right, all of us scattered in the familiar constellation of family. Usually I love this—the noise, the teasing, the way we all fit together like puzzle pieces but tonight I watch my siblings with their mates and feel my chest hollow out.
I watch them. Robert and Sarah sharing a look over the twins' heads when one of them tries to feed mashed potatoes to the dog. James reaching over to wipe sauce from his wife's chin without thinking about it. Corinne and David's hands linking automatically when they're not cutting food for their kids.
That's what marriage should look like.
Not whatever Alexander Colborne is going to put me through.
"So, Jonah." Robert grins across the table. "Are you ready? I still can’t believe they’re pulling a wedding together at such short notice. We’ve got the invites but I’ve barely had time to get my suit dry cleaned."