“Charlie?”
I turned around and saw that there was a guy standing in front of me. He was wearing a baseball cap and a long-sleeved T-shirt with STANWICH LANDSCAPING printed across the front of it, and jeans with dirt stains on the knees. He looked like he was the age of my older siblings, with blond hair and green eyes, and it took me a moment to place him—this was Olly Gillespie, Linnie’s high school boyfriend.
“Hey, Olly,” I said, lifting a hand in a wave.
Olly and Linnie had been pretty serious in high school—they’d dated through junior and senior year, and then the summer before college. She’d broken up with him before she went to Dartmouth. Apparently, after Linnie and Rodney had gotten together, he hadn’t taken the news that Linnie had moved on very well. I wasn’t clear on what had happened in real life, but Olly’s strip doppelgänger drove to Dartmouth in the middle of the night to stand under her dorm window with an iPod and a portable speaker to try to win Linnie back. It obviously didn’t work, and I didn’t see much of Olly until Linnie moved back after her split with Rodney.
A few weeks after she’d moved home, Olly Gillespie started showing up again—he was in the driveway, picking Linnie up, standing around the kitchen with us, in the backyard talking mulch with my dad. From what I’d been able to gather, he’d never really left Stanwich, and after college he’d started working for his dad’s landscaping company. Although it was clear to all the rest of us that Linnie and Rodney were going to get back together eventually, it seemed like Olly had never gotten over Linnie. I was never sure what, exactly, had happened with them when she and Rodney were broken up—but as soon as she got back together with Rodney, Olly disappeared again.
“I thought it was you,” he said. “What are you doing here?” He crossed to the Stanwich Landscaping truck that was parked two cars down from mine and hoisted out a leaf blower. I turned to gesture to Bill, to introduce him, only to see that Bill was on his phone again and had walked halfway to the steps.
“Just wedding stuff. Linnie’s getting married this weekend, so . . .” I immediately wondered if that had been tactless.
Olly grabbed a rake with his other hand and nodded. “I know.” I was about to ask how he knew this, when I remembered that you couldn’t be following any of Linnie’s social media feeds and not be very aware that a wedding was in the mix. “Don’t let me keep you,” he said with a quick smile. “I’ll see you soon.” He gave me a nod after saying this, and walked with his equipment around the side of the building.
I turned away from Olly and hurried to the Inn’s front steps, where Bill was waiting for me. “Sorry,” I said. “That was . . .” I glanced back to where Olly had disappeared to, but there was no sign of him. “Just a family friend,” I said, figuring that was true enough, and also that the wedding coordinator’s nephew didn’t necessarily need to know details of my sister’s romantic history.
We headed up the steps to the Inn together, and as I walked in through the door Bill held open for me, I looked around. The lobby of the Inn was just like I remembered it. There were chandeliers above, dark wood furniture, and woven, patterned carpets. There was a bar in the lobby, which always became the reception area when there were events. From the beginning, it had been Linnie and Rodney’s choice for the rehearsal dinner, and they’d rented out the private dining room in the restaurant. I glanced around, wondering what exactly the problem here was and who we should talk to to fix it, but Bill was already making a beeline toward the tiny check-in/concierge desk.
By the time I joined him, a woman in a pantsuit was crossing around from the desk and motioning us to follow her toward the restaurant. “I’m glad you’re here,” she said, her voice low and serious, the way people talked about impending disasters and grave illnesses. “I had a feeling it wasn’t right when the boxes were delivered, but they had the correct name on them, so they were signed for. . . .” We followed her through the restaurant—empty except for a few yawning servers setting up for lunch—to the private dining room in the back. She opened the door and hit the light.
Immediately, a song I vaguely recognized started blasting, something about coming from a land down under. My eyes widened as I looked around, and Bill took a startled step backward.
There were life-size cutouts of kangaroos, koalas, wallabies, and crocodiles placed around the room. There was a map of Australia stretching across one wall, streamers with the Australian flag on them hanging in delicate, twisted loops from the ceiling, and a blown-up picture of two of the Hemsworths.
“I assumed these were not the decorations intended for the rehearsal dinner,” she said, and Bill and I both shook our heads wordlessly. She sighed and crossed the room to where an iPod had been docked and shut the music off.
“There were supposed to be pictures of my sister and Rodney,” I said, noticing now that there was a stack of gift bags in bright neon, lined up in neat rows. “Everything was supposed to be peach and gray? And there weren’t . . . supposed to be marsupials.”
“Well, this clears it up a little.” I turned and saw Bill holding up a banner, the kind that was clearly meant to be stretched across a doorway. G’DAY, CLAY! HAPPY 9TH BIRTHDAY, MATE! was printed in huge letters across it.
“Okay,” I said, nodding. “So there was obviously just a mix-up. And this Clay kid probably got our decorations by mistake, that’s all.”
“You have to admire a kid who wants an Australian-themed birthday party,” Bill said as he rolled up the banner. “That’s a pretty awesome move. I’m pretty sure the theme of my ninth birthday was just ‘eat as much pizza as possible without puking.’ ”
The woman behind us cleared her throat. “I let William know this already. But my staff needs to have the proper decorations in enough time to get set up before the event begins.”
“Right,” I said, nodding, like that would help me come up with a plan for tracking down what had happened to Linnie and Rodney’s stuff. “We’ll get them to you,” I promised recklessly.
“Absolutely,” Bill agreed.
“Great,” she said, heading toward the door. “Just let us know when you have the right materials here and my staff can get started.”
When she’d left, I looked at Bill, hoping that he secretly had some plan beyond the one I had formulated, which was to google “Clay birthday location nine Australia.”
“Okay,” Bill said, “so I’m guessing this is a Clementine issue? Pland said that she was getting events mixed up.”
“You’re probably right,” I said, silently cursing Clementine in my head.
“I’ll get in touch with Pland,” Bill said, already typing on his phone. “Find out where this birthday party is taking place. And—”
My phone buzzed in my back pocket, and I pulled it out, expecting that maybe it was Linnie, wanting an update on the decorations. But it wasn’t Linnie. My screen read MIKE CALLING.
I hesitated; then right before voice mail would have picked up, I answered. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d even spoken to Mike. “Hello?”
“Hey, Charlie.”
I turned away and took a few steps toward the door. It felt too surreal to talk to my brother while a kangaroo cutout looked back at me. “Um. Hi.”
“Sorry to bother you,” he said, speaking, as usual, more quietly than most people, so that you had to lean in to hear him. Linnie always claimed that Mike being soft-spoken was just a normal reaction to following J.J. in the birth order, but I knew it was a low-key power move.
“What’s going on?” I asked, not in the let’s catch up way, but in the what do you want way.
“Can you come get me?”
“Come get you?” I asked, turning the volume up all the way on my phone and pressing it closer to my ear.
“Yeah. I’m at the airport,” Mike said, and I felt my breath catch somewhere in my throat. “I came for the wedding. I’m here.”
CHAPTER 5
Or, The Prodigal Son Is Waiting at Baggage Claim
* *
*
TWENTY MINUTES LATER, I DROVE through the entrance of the Hartfield-Putnam Airport. Bill had assured me that he could handle things at the Inn—he’d texted another of the Where There’s A Will employees to come over to the Inn and help get to the bottom of the decoration mistake. “But if we can’t,” he’d said, eyeing another banner, this one reading HAPPY PERTH DAY!, “how do Rodney and Linnie feel about Australia? Are they fans?” My expression must have given away how I felt, because Bill immediately looked stricken. “I was just kidding,” he said quickly. “Total joke. It’ll be fine, I promise. Here.” He grabbed what looked like a wrapped salami and held it out to me. “Want a Great Barrier Beef?”
Feeling like things were being handled, I’d left, after exchanging numbers with Bill so that he could call me as soon as there was news. I’d texted Linnie that Mike was coming after all and that I was going to the airport to pick him up. She’d texted me back a series of emojis—startled, confused, then turning into a stream of happy faces. I’d texted her back a thumbs-up, then headed to the airport, not exactly hurrying. I even stopped at Stubbs Coffee on the way and picked up an iced latte. I knew Mike was at baggage claim—but there was a piece of me that, frankly, didn’t mind that he was waiting. He shouldn’t expect the world to revolve around him and that I’d drop whatever was going on to come get him. If he’d wanted to have someone there to meet him at the airport, he should have let us know he was coming.
The taxi in front of me slammed on its brakes, even though it was going only about four miles an hour, and I slammed on mine as well. Shaking my head, I drove around it, pulled forward toward baggage claim, and put the car in park.
I got out and looked around, but there was no sign of Mike. Which was so typically my brother—call for a ride but then not be there when you came to pick him up.
I took a drink of my latte, then pulled out my phone to call him just as it buzzed with an incoming text from Siobhan.
Siobhan
Want anything from Zingerman’s?
Me
YES
One of the brownies PLEASE
Also
Siobhan
What?
Me
Mike’s here
Siobhan
WHAT?
Me
Apparently he’s coming for the wedding
Can you ducking believe it?
I’m at the airport now
UGH
Siobhan
Whoa
Linnie must be happy though, right?
Me
Yeah
But still
I looked down at my phone, feeling like if anyone was going to understand this, it was my best friend. I took a deep breath and started typing faster.
Me
He’s going to wreck things. He’s going to make it about HIM
He’s going to derail this whole weekend
He wasn’t supposed to be here!
It’s bullshirt
Bullshirt
SHIRT
I give up
Siobhan
But Lin wanted him there
And it’s her wedding
And I’m sure he’s not going to ruin anything
He wants Linnie to be happy
Me
Right, that’s Mike. Mr. Selfless.
Siobhan
Anyway, guess what!
My roommate next year is here too
So I get to meet her!
Me
The one who never used exclamation points?
Siobhan
Yes. Correct. That’s the one.
Me
Lol
Let me know how it goes!
Siobhan
Be nice to Mike.
Me
I’m always nice.
“Charlie?”
I glanced up from my phone, and there my brother was, standing in front of me, for the first time in eighteen months.
We just looked at each other. I was sure it was only a few seconds, but it seemed to stretch on longer as I tried to replace the version of him in my head with this one. Mike was the shortest of all the boys, just an inch taller than me, with curly light-brown hair and brown eyes. His hair had been cut short since the last time I’d seen him—and unlike the baggy shirts and cargo shorts he’d seemed to live in then, he was wearing a fitted button-down shirt and dark jeans. It was still Mike—but this seemed like a different version of him, older and more polished somehow.
“Hey,” I said, and then we were in motion at the same time, giving each other the kind of hug we always did—fast, a pat on the back, barely touching.
“I didn’t know you were here,” Mike said, gesturing toward baggage claim. “I was waiting inside.”
“Yeah, I just got here.”
Mike looked down at the iced latte in my hand and raised his eyebrows but didn’t say anything. Mike was the only person I knew who could be somehow passive-aggressive even while remaining silent.
“So, I guess we should go,” I said, heading around to the driver’s seat.
“No, it’s okay. I can get my own bags,” Mike muttered under his breath.
“Did you want help?”
“I’m fine.” This was classic Mike—he’d mutter something that he wanted you to hear, but if you called him on it, he’d back away.
I rolled my eyes as I got into the driver’s seat, slamming the door probably harder than I needed to. A second later, Mike got into the passenger seat, and I put the car in gear and headed toward the exit.
We drove in silence, Mike hunched over his phone, his eyes fixed on the screen. As I concentrated on getting out of the tangle of streets that led from the airport, I pledged to myself that even though Mike was here, it didn’t mean I was going to let him derail this weekend. I would just have to work harder to make sure that everything went off perfectly, that was all. But he wouldn’t wreck it. I wouldn’t let him.
“What?”
I looked across the car. “I didn’t say anything.”
“Oh.” Mike shook his head, then looked back at his phone, and I rolled my eyes. I’d been around my brother for five minutes, max, and I could already feel my Mike-specific slow-burning anger begin to bubble. I decided that I wasn’t going to speak unless he did. The conversational burden shouldn’t be on me—after all, he hadn’t seen me in eighteen months, not to mention the fact I was currently doing him a favor. But as I drove on, the silence in the car seemed to expand, like it was taking on physical properties.
Mike apparently had no desire to catch up, ask me anything about myself, or even exchange basic pleasantries. And this had always been Mike—even before everything that had gone down last February with our mom. For as long as I could remember, he’d been keeping himself separate, standing slightly outside our family, like he was just visiting for a while and not really part of us. Mike not participating, Mike not playing along, Mike always putting a damper on things when the rest of us were all in, the one person rolling his eyes while we played running charades. I knew my older siblings noticed it, but it had never bothered them like it did me. When everyone else had moved out and it was just me and Mike in the house, I sometimes felt like I was the one holding up the kids’ end of things myself while Mike would be hunched over his phone, headphones on, like he was trying to pretend he was somewhere else entirely.
When we were halfway home, Mike finally looked up from his phone. “Actually,” he said, peering out the windshield, “if you could just take the next turn, that would be great.”
“What?” I asked, even as I took a right into the first street I saw. “Why?”
“Not this one,” Mike said with a sigh. “It’s the next left. Juniper Hill.”
“Well, why didn’t you say that?” I asked as I looked around for a driveway to turn around in. As I did, I realized where we were—Grant Avenue.
It was just a small side street that bordered Stanwich Woods, the gated community that had an actual guard in a gatehou
se out front. I’d never been, but I knew Grant Avenue well, entirely because of my older siblings and their reign of terror on the street—specifically, the street sign.
“Why did you need me to take Juniper Hill?” I asked as I pulled into a driveway, then started to turn around.
“Because that’s where I’m staying.”
“What do you mean that’s where you’re staying? You’re not staying at home?”
“No, I’m not.”
“But . . .” I just looked at him. Mike not staying at the house frankly sounded great to me, but I had a feeling my parents wouldn’t see it that way. “What’s Mom going to say?”
“Not being a psychic, I really have no idea.”
“Mike.”
“Can you just drive, Charlie? I’m already running late because you took an hour to come to the airport.”
Just like that, I was suddenly, instantly furious, in the way that only Mike was able to make me. “Well, maybe if you’d let anyone know you were coming, someone would have been there to meet you.”
“Oh, do I get a Charlie Grant lecture? Goody. It’s been way too long.”
“Listen—”
There was a knock on my window, and we both jumped. I turned and saw a police officer motioning for me to unroll the window. I did, immediately, trying to figure out what I’d done wrong. “Hi,” I said as the officer—his name tag read RAMIREZ—leaned down to look into the car. He looked like he was in his midforties, in a dark-blue Stanwich Police uniform.
“You need to move your vehicle,” he said.
“Sure,” I said, nodding emphatically. “I’ll do that.”
“Why?” This was from Mike, who was leaning over the center console to talk to Officer Ramirez. “I mean, did we do something wrong?”