Page 88 of Four Weekends and a Funeral

The bitter-cold air finds every hole in my orange sweater. I bob on the balls of my feet to generate heat. “We dated for a little while. Before.”

June’s big brown eyes are brimming with sympathy. “I’m sorry. Sam was a good guy, and I know Adam’s been taking it hard.”

My eyes fall onto the Coke box I’m breaking down.

I’m ashamed to admit that for the past week, we’ve existed in a mostly grief-free bubble. Since we delivered Sam’s keys, I’ve been too preoccupied with my growing feelings for Adam to notice much else.

Not sure what to say, I change topics. “I can’t get over how Adam’s been sleeping in that tiny bunk bed this whole time.”

June cracks open a Coke and laughs into the can. “That ridiculous bunk bed!” she says before taking a sip. “I want to buy something nicer, but every time I bring it up, Adam swears he’s going to build whatever Otis wants. At this point, I’d take anything that doesn’t sway when I sit on it.”

I smile at the image of Adam swinging into the bunk each night.

June leans her back against her house. I do the same, so we’re shoulder to shoulder drinking pop and looking out over her small, snow-covered lawn. The chicken coop stands in the back corner like a dollhouse on stilts, surrounded by an out-of-season soccer net, orange Adirondack chairs, and abandoned tiki torches. The whole scene looks vaguely postapocalyptic in the way it all peeks out from under the white blanket as nature reclaims the city.

“I bet it’s a challenge to get a big piece down from Duluth. When he starts his shop down here, it’ll be easier to build something for Otis.”

Her laugh is sharp and thin. “Yeah. I’ll be counting down the days.” June’s face falls when she registers the confusion on mine. “I didn’t mean…Adam’s always supposed to move back here, but it’s not something we’re counting on anymore.”

I guess seven years of stasis will do that.

“Might be different now. Like I said, he’s different with you.” She takes a gulp of her Coke, and the silence drifts from comfortable to stilted to tense, hitting every possible step on the way down.

Adam appears in the open sliding door. “Did she give up all of the blackmail material?”

I shoot upright like he’s busted us in the middle of a drug deal, even though we were only quietly drinking pop.

“I didn’t tell her about your childhood obsession with The New Yankee Workshop, if that’s what you’re asking.”

His sister hands him a beer, and he does that fratty thing where you pop off a bottle cap by slapping it on the ledge of a patio railing. I know I must be far gone because I find every bit of the maneuver—the easy confidence with which he does it, the tiny flex in his arm muscles it produces, the way he catches the cap in midair—unbelievably sexy.

“But the girl deserves to know that you used to cry out for Norm Abram when our parents turned off the TV.”

I delightedly mouth, Norm? at Adam. Color creeps up his neck.

June shuffles us back inside with a cheeky big-sister smile. “His first words were drop leaf table.”

I squeal in delight, but Adam’s face reddens by the second. “That’s an exaggeration.”

“Is he telling you about the radial arm saw he asked for every Christmas, even after the mall Santa lectured him on age-appropriate gifts and blade safety?” Dev hollers from the living room.

“I was like six years old!”

His protesting only makes me laugh harder. “That doesn’t make you sound more normal!”

Otis appears out of thin air. “Cleo’s sister said that mall Santas aren’t Santa and he won’t make any of the gifts you ask for.”

Dev and June trade telepathic parent looks.

“I wouldn’t listen to her, bud.” Adam swings his nephew onto his back. “Cleo’s sister doesn’t understand the complicated bureaucracy of the North Pole. Now, let’s show Alison the new skylight before dinner in…?”

Dev stands and studies his smartwatch. “Two hours. Definitely no more than three.”

“See, Adam? You make fun of Crock-Pot Thanksgiving, but these are the conditions I’m working under,” June argues before instructing us to not fill up on chips like last year.

With that, she shoos us kids upstairs until dinner is served.

Three and a half hours later, there’s a turkey carcass on the counter, a platter of meat, and six simmering slow cookers filled with every classic Midwestern Thanksgiving side. Since I followed instructions and did not fill up on chips, I load up my plate with mashed potatoes, gravy, green bean casserole, stuffing, sweet potatoes topped with marshmallows, and, finally, a bit of turkey.

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