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The sound became a whiny wail. “I feel like I’ve already tried them all! And… and…” He exhaled. “I forgot what I was going to say. And anyway… I should probably hang up now. I know we’re not supposed to call. I didn’t… didn’t mean to hit the Call button. I pulled out my phone to text and accidentally hit the Call button… which is really a lie. Because I meant to hit the Call button. I really hope you don’t remember that when you sober up.”
I slid down to sit on the floor, grinning stupidly. “I won’t, I promise.”
“Can we change the subject? How’s your business whatever?”
“Strategy sessions are productive. So far, so good.”
“Are you supposed to be meeting now? It’s daytime there, right? I should probably let you go.”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw through the glass conference room door to the table full of executives. One of my VPs shot me a concerned look. I gave him a thumbs-up and gestured for them to continue without me.
“It’s daytime, but there’s no rush. Did you get your edits done on the Patrick wedding?”
“Yeah.” Hugh’s defeated tone disappeared as he began to tell me about the pictures he’d captured at last weekend’s wedding job. “There’s a shot of the bride with her family that came out perfect,” he added.
“Such a perfectionist,” I said fondly.
“Sometimes, yeah. But I’m particularly proud of myself for that one because one of the adult sons was a total pain in the ass. Didn’t want to be in the pictures.”
“Mm. Maybe he didn’t want to be at the wedding at all.”
Hugh hesitated, as if the thought had never occurred to him. “Don’t be ridiculous. Who wouldn’t want to be at their sister’s wedding?”
I made a low dismissive noise, but Hugh must have sobered up enough to catch it. “Oscar? What was that for?”
I sighed. Normally, I didn’t talk about my family, even with Hugh. It was an old habit that was ingrained too deeply to break. But it had gotten harder to keep that part of myself from him. Plus, he was so drunk he’d probably forget everything by morning. “My stepsister is getting married at the end of the year, that’s all. And I definitely don’t want to be there for it.”
Another hesitation, only this time, the silence felt heavy and full of judgment. When he finally spoke, Hugh’s voice was dangerously understanding. “But… why? And how did I not know you had a sibling?”
“Stepsibling,” I corrected automatically. “And there’s not just one. I have eight stepsiblings in total. It’s a little much to explain, so I usually just… don’t.”
“You have eight siblings and I never knew about them? How? Who?… and how? When?”
“Stepsiblings,” I said again, more forcefully this time. I took a deep breath. It wasn’t that I minded him knowing about my mother’s family, exactly; it was just that no one seemed to understand why I kept them at arm’s length. I was sure Hugh, who adored his sister beyond reason, wouldn’t be any different.
“My mom remarried when I was in my twenties,” I explained. “At the time, I lived in a shitty shoebox in Harlem—remember, this is pre-gentrification—and my across-the-hall neighbor was a widower with eight kids. Nice guy. Working really hard to raise his family, but it was damned near impossible with nine of them living in a two-bedroom apartment.”
“You helped him.” Hugh sounded sure of himself. Smug.
“Well, yes. Someone had to. And I didn’t know anyone else in town at the time. So it benefitted me too, obviously.”
“Obviously,” Hugh said wryly. “So you became friends and then set your mom up with him.”
I shifted on the floor until my knees were pulled up in front of my chest. “Not exactly. I helped him with the kids—the little ones, I mean. The older ones were my age and just as busy working as Birch was—and over time, I realized that he was really good at being a busy dad. He had all these… hacks, we’d call them now. Single dad hacks.” I picked at an irregular thread in the fabric of my suit pants. “I thought if he helped other single parents like himself, maybe he could monetize it somehow. So I helped him start a dad blog. Got him set up on a cheap computer and wrote most of the posts. Took pictures and video and figured out how to post them too. Eventually, we were able to get him some big sponsorships. Paid for extracurriculars for some of the kids and college for some of the others. Then he got a book deal?—”
“Holy shit, Oscar. Are you kidding?”
“No. It was really cool. He was one of the first micro-investments I made. I paid a marketing firm to set up a brand around the blog and book deal. I paid for the attorney to make sure he was protected in the agreements he made. And then he paid me a cut like an agent. I reinvested the money for us in some branded products and hired a kid to figure out how to sell them on his website. Birch was quickly able to move to a nicer place. That’s when he finally met my mom. When I decided to spend a little money to fly her out from Texas.”
“Birch… wait.” I could practically hear the gears turning in his head. I knew it was only a matter of time before he put it together. “Your stepfather is Daddy Birch? Of Daddy Birch’s Tots, Teens, and Tips? Seriously?”
I felt the familiar burst of pride. “You’ve heard of him? I thought it was mostly parents who knew about him.”
“Wait… didn’t all his kids have like… plant names or something? Something cornball…”
“Yeah. He made those up to protect their privacy online. He referred to them by flower names instead of their real names, but over time, pretty much all of them got more used to being called their flower names than their real names. So it stuck. When he met my mom, he roped her into the crazy. Her name is Gloria, but… well, he calls her Gladiolus. Ridiculous, I know. Sappy as fuck.”
“Sweet,” he said, sounding like the love-drunk person he was on any other day. “I’d love to have a nickname like that. Something meaningful or sexy or… Anyway. Doesn’t matter. I’m just saying, it’s not sappy. It’s sweet.”
