Page 22 of When We Were More
“Yeah, well, it’s not my fault my tight ass younger brother is opposed to us hiring an assistant for him.” I take a long swig of my beer.
“Kiss my ass. You know it’s not about money,” he answers.
“Do I?” I hide a smirk behind my bottle.
“It’s a family business, man. You can’t be too careful who you trust.”
I chuckle. “You can’t deny we need help, Harrison. We can’t grow if we only ever hire family members. Hell, we’ll eventually run out of people.”
“We’ll see. Now, tell me why you’re spending all that time at that job site. The truth this time. Not that I don’t believe you enjoy the refinishing work, but you’re there way more than necessary if it’s just that.”
I hesitate, but I may need to talk to someone about this. I recognize that I’m acting out of the ordinary, and I’m not sure what the hell is wrong with me. Harrison and I are close. We always were, but when our dad died, we both had to grow up real fast. Mom and our younger brothers needed us.
I turn my head and stare into the flames. “I honestly don’t fucking know, man. I mean, the house is amazing. It’s a century farmhouse with a ton of cool features. I love seeing its transformation…”
“But?”
I turn to look at him. I think about pretending it’s nothing, but maybe he can explain why I can’t stay away from that house… that woman.
“The owner, she’s… She makes me kinda crazy.”
Harrison leans forward, his interest piqued. “Go on.”
“I don’t know. I met her when Lucy gave me a complaint to follow up on and?—”
“Is this the piss incident? The one we had to fire Lewis over?”
“Yup. Fucking Lewis. I’m still disgusted that I had to clean up his urine. Pig. Who pisses all over someone’s floor and leaves it there?”
Harrison laughs—a rare thing coming from him. Nowadays anyway. He wasn’t always stoic.
“Anyway, you were saying…”
“She makes me kind of nuts. She’s such a smart ass sometimes, but she’s also got something about her that tells me that’s not all there is to the story. The house belonged to her grandmother. She seems incredibly sad when she talks about her.”
He narrows his eyes and stares at me, but remains silent. Then he shakes his head. “You don’t see it? Seriously?”
“What are you talking about?”
Harrison leans back. “Do you think perhaps she reminds you of…” He stops and looks at the floor. “Maybe it reminds you of Mom’s situation.”
I don’t answer right away. Could he be right? Could that be all this is? Though it doesn’t explain the insane attraction. That I haven’t had sex in way too long might be partly to blame for that.
“She’s notthatsad, Harrison. She gets out of bed and functions. Jesus, Mom… I can still remember what she was like as if it were yesterday. I’ll never forget it.”
“Yeah, I can’t believe you didn’t ask for help sooner. You shoulda, you know. It wasn’t fair for you to bear that all alone. I—” he pauses, gripping his beer in both hands and looking down at his feet, “I’m sorry I didn’t see it. Didn’t help sooner.”
“Harrison, look at me, man.” He hesitates but looks up after a few seconds. “You were dealing with your own grief. It’s okay. I had it. It was my job as the oldest. I’d do it again if it meant I could have shielded you and the others from some of it. Plus, you had to make sure our dumbass brothers didn’t derail their lives. Your handling of them enabled me to deal with Mom.”
Before he can respond, Hayden and Holden come through the door.
“Party’s here!” Holden yells too loudly.
“Shh, the kids…” Hayden reminds him.
“Shit.” Holden looks at me. “Sorry, Henry. I promise I’ll get them back to sleep if I woke them.”
Over the next few minutes, my brothers grab drinks, and we sit and talk about Heath’s football stats.
