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That made me snort. “Get out. You are making that up.”
He held his palm up. “Hand to God. I’d say the Beafontaines are jerking my chain, but they took video while they were waiting for the cops because I was scaring them.”
“What song?”
“After the Fire Is Gone.”
I just stared at my brother. I was too horrified to laugh. “That’s incredibly disturbing.”
“Indeed. Though I’m a much better singer than I realized,” he said. “I think all that juice knocked me in key. I sound amazing.”
“Oh my God.” Now I did laugh.
* * *
An hour later, my father was outside chopping wood, working out his emotions. Conway was in bed, though my mother had already checked twice on him to make sure he was breathing. The second time she’d gone in, I’d heard him begging her to just let him sleep in peace and that if she didn’t he was going to his own apartment.
She’d come out of his old bedroom looking sheepish. “I think he just wants to sleep,” she said.
“I guess I don’t blame him.” I ladled gumbo off of the stove into a bowl. Mama had been stress cooking.
She sighed. “It’s hard to watch your kids make mistakes.”
I raised my eyebrows. “He didn’t mean to get struck by lightning, Mama.” I sat down at the island with my bowl.
“I was talking about you,” she said.
“Me?” I exclaimed. What did I do?”
“Honey, you’re a Young.”
“I am aware of that, Mama.” I dipped my spoon in my gumbo and raised it to my lips. The minute it hit my lips, it felt like home. “This is so good.”
“Thanks, baby. But what I mean is that Youngs don’t have starter relationships. We don’t fall in love easily. We don’t live with a couple of different partners over the years until we finally find our forever person. It’s one and done.”
I shoveled another spoonful into my mouth. I chewed and thought about what she was saying. She wasn’t wrong. For everyone else. “I can see that.”
“Look at me and your dad. We met and that was that. George and Alison. Cash had that one girlfriend in college, but it wasn’t that serious. Then he met Sera and he just knew. Patsy is single.”
It was like she was telling me something I didn’t know. “Patsy is in Haiti working her ass off.”
“None of your other brothers have really had serious girlfriends either,” she continued, like I hadn’t spoken. “Because they’ve never fallen in love.”
“Good luck with Hank. He may be your bachelor son for life.”
“No, he won’t.”
It was like she didn’t know Hank at all. “Mama, Hank likes his solo life.”
“Hank just hasn’t met his perfect match.”
“Okay.” It was better to just tacitly agree than to argue with her.
“My point is this.” Mama shook her kitchen towel at me.
“I was hoping you’d get to it eventually.”
“You’re in love with MacKay.” It wasn’t a question. She stated it.
