Page 19

19

Ben Stirling

Luca’s been with Amy and the boys for a few hours, and I’m at loose ends. I finally finished unpacking last week, and instead of working on a list of furniture and bits and bobs I need to buy to make the place feel like a home, I’ve been sitting on the porch swing waiting for something.

What that thing is isn’t immediately clear to me because Jeremiah has already been over for the day, and I’m not expecting Amy for a while. Liz’s mom and dad live across town, and I don’t know anyone else in Seattle.

I toy with the idea of calling around for a yard and pool service but manage to convince myself I’ll be in the right mood to do it tomorrow.

A flashy midnight-blue Aston pulls out of the driveway across the road. I shake my head at the personalized plates. Totally Pucked. Those goddamn plates. They have about as much to answer for as the goddamn kitchen tile does. I raise my hand and wave even though I’m not sure Decker and McGuire see me.

Then I wait. Only now, I know what I’m waiting for. Who I’m waiting for. Jeremiah Blake. I saw him leave a little more than an hour ago. He seemed in a rush because he didn’t so much as glance at the porch when he got into the car. He usually does.

Time ticks by slowly. So slowly that as I stare into the space under the arch, I swear I can almost see the tight buds climbing it begin to crack open and reveal their downy yellow petals.

At last, a white Nissan sedan pulls up and Jeremiah gets out clutching a stack of five or six books under one arm.

“Bought some books, huh?” I call out, hardly giving him time to close the car door.

I know, I know. I heard it too. I’m having an off day. It’s the hangover talking.

“Well, yes, but no,” he says as though the sentence makes sense.

“So those aren’t books then?” I tease.

“N-no, they are books. They’re definitely books, b-but they aren’t mine.” I love it when he gets all spluttery like this. His cheeks go pink and he starts blinking harder and faster than normal. “I mean, they are mine, but I didn’t buy them.”

“How come?”

“Because I’m on a very strict book ban.”

“What’s a book ban?”

“What’s a book ban?” His face transforms as I watch. Spluttery to infinitely pleased with himself in under two seconds. “Well, well, well. Looks like we finally found something that the legend next door isn’t an expert on.”

“What am I not an expert on?”

“Being bookish.”

“I know about being bookish.” I’m talking straight out of my ass, but I’m having fun. Entertaining myself, that’s what I’m doing. I’ve been bored for a while. I get like this when I’m bored.

“Fine,” he says, pursing his lips and raising his brows in a challenge. “What’s a book ban?

“Never heard of her.”

A quick, short burst of laughter leaves him, but he bites it back hard. “You haven’t answered.”

“It’s when people buy banned books.” Jeremiah’s mouth quakes at the sides from the effort not to laugh and his eyes dance. Like really dance. Like shadows and happiness and humor flicker and light up his whole face. “Am I right?” He shakes his head gravely. “No? Are you sure? Am I at least close?”

“Not even a little bit,” he says.

“Fine, I’ll bite. What’s a book ban then?”

He relents, electric blue glittering in a way I’m not sure is achievable for most people. “It’s when a responsible member of society makes a deliberate decision to curtail their book-buying habit out of consideration for their budget.”

“Oh,” I say, dropping my gaze to the stack in his arms. “Looks like it’s going well.”

“Well, that’s the thing. I didn’t buy these. Vanessa bought them for me. I, er, I mean, technically , I did buy a few books for her too, but…”

“Sounds like a flagrant foul to me.”

“Hmm, the book ban rules are a little unclear on what constitutes a flagrant foul.”

“Purposefully unclear?”

“Now you’re getting it.”

“Looks like I’m not as unbookish as you thought, huh?”

“You’re plenty unbookish, Ben Stirling,” he says. “Believe me.”

Hearing him say my full name affects me the same way hearing him call me Captain does. A tiny flutter erupts under my sternum and isn’t sure where to go. Fortunately, Amy pulls up in her SUV and saves me from having to spend more time with that.

“Jelly!” cries Luca as soon as Amy opens the passenger door for him. He launches himself out of the vehicle and throws himself at Jeremiah.

“ You’re Jelly?” asks Amy, her enthusiasm almost exceeding Luca’s. “Lovely to meet you! Luca talks about you all the time.”

“You’re Amy? Auntie Amy?” He peers into the car and spots Luca’s cousins. “And you’re Rory and Cam? Luca’s cousins? You guys look like triplets.”

The boys pile out of the car, complimented beyond belief by the fact that Jeremiah said they look similar. They waste no time rapid-firing a series of questions at him about things like surprise flowers and ice cream and the aerodynamics of LEGO planes.

What happens next is something that only happens when a group of terribly, terribly excitable people encounter others like them. They talk over and under each other, getting louder and louder until Amy yells an invitation for Jeremiah to come in for a glass of iced tea over the din.

I happen to know Jeremiah thinks that drinking tea, hot or iced, anytime other than right before bed is sacrilegious. Tea, according to him, tastes like brown water if you have it during daylight hours. Despite that, he looks crushed all the same.

“Sorry, I can’t. I have a work thing I need to get ready for. A photography shoot. If it keeps ruining my life like this, I’m going to stop doing photography altogether. Don’t think I won’t.” Amy and I laugh at his theatrics, and the kids act like they think quitting his job to spend time with them is an excellent idea. “Next time though, okay?”

“Next time!” chorus the boys.

“Gosh, he seems nice,” says Amy. She’s sitting on the kitchen stool closest to the wall. It’s her favorite stool because she has a thing about sitting in rooms with her back exposed to hallways. Liz was the same. She’s holding her glass of iced tea in both hands, sipping gingerly. She’s talking about Jeremiah. It’s the second time she’s said it, and she appears to be expecting a reply.

“So nice,” I say again.

“I’m glad the two of you had a good time last night.”

“A little too much of a good time.” I rest my head in my hand and squint an eye at her.

“No such thing. You deserve to have fun,” she says firmly. “And you should be proud, Ben. He looks worse for wear than you do, and you’re quite a bit older than him. That’s one of the things about getting older, isn’t it? Hangovers become incredibly vicious.”

“I’m not that much older than him.”

Seven years, but who’s counting. There’s a point in adulthood where age blurs into nothing except when you’re talking about decades of difference.

Everyone knows that.

Amy tells me her plans for the weekend, and we talk about the hockey camp we’ve signed the boys up for. The longer we talk, the more I suspect we’re really talking about something else. This isn’t a casual drop-in. This is a check-in. An in-depth assessment. Amy’s worried about me, and she’s worried about how I’ll handle going to the game tomorrow.

She’s worried about me going and keeping my shit together, specifically.

That makes two of us.

Thankfully, she doesn’t say so exactly, and I’m grateful for that because, honestly, I’m not sure what there is to say about hockey and my involuntary early retirement that hasn’t already been said.

Before she leaves, she hits me with one of those really intense Amy looks. It’s a big-sister look. An I’m-the-eldest-and-I’m-in-charge look. When she does it, I feel the way I always feel when it happens. Like we’re bonded by blood, even though that blood is no longer with us.

Amy’s eyes are the same color as Luca’s. The same color Liz’s were. Honey brown. Liz’s eyes were flecked with humor, audacity, and sweet things she only ever said when we were alone. Amy’s used to have splashes of mischief too. Now, there’s a hollowness in them that wasn’t there before. A loss that casts purple-blue semicircular shadows under them.

Amy and Liz were close. Crazy close. They talked every day and told each other everything. They loved each other with that off-the-wall, almost insane tenacity that only happens when two girls grow up sharing a bathroom and a ton of DNA and still passionately love doing life together.

I know she feels the gaping wound Liz left every day. Death and loss mean different things to people, even when you lose the same person. Losing a sister hurts differently from losing a wife or a mother or a daughter or a friend, but I know Amy feels the loss like I do. Like her world stopped turning too.

It’s a lot to say with a look, I admit, but Amy says all that and more.

“Thank you, Ben.” She sighs, and when she speaks, it feels like it’s a different day or that a page has turned and a new chapter has begun. “For being here. With us.”

She means thank you for uprooting my life and moving to Seattle to be with Liz’s family instead of with my own, not thanks for choosing to be alive or anything that heavy. Or maybe she does. I’m not sure.

“I know you could’ve stayed in Tampa. You have family and history there. It would’ve been easier for you in some ways. Lots of ways. But I hope you know how glad we are that you’re here. We need you here. Lizzie was my baby sister, and in case you didn’t know, that makes you my brother. Not just my brother. My kid brother.” She points a no-nonsense finger at me. “You’re here now, and you’re getting the big-sister treatment whether you want it or not. That means that if anything is a problem for you, you let me know. You don’t fuck around if things are hard. You call me, and I take care of it for you. Got it?”

“Got it,” I say.

Once she’s wrangled Rory and Cam into the car, she gets in the driver’s seat, clicks her seatbelt in, and makes a fist at me that has a vaguely militant air to it. She pairs it with another, possibly even more pointed look and shakes her fist at me with meaning.

I feel a little afraid, mildly bullied, and a lot happy that eight years ago, I married into a certifiably crazy family.