“But you’re a divorcé looking for a second shot at love. It’s more interesting,” Palmer says.
“Larkin always talks about the second-chance romances she likes to read,” Ford adds, stealing the attention away from me. Thank God.
Palmer props her chin up on her fist, ignoring her pudding. “Please, tell us more about what Larkin likes.”
“Don’t even start with that,” Ford says. “She’s my assistant and that’s it.”
“Uh-huh.” Palmer blinks. “Surrrrre, Ford.”
Ford doesn’t even bother to respond but instead puts a spoonful of pudding in his mouth.
“You know, your mom was my assistant before we hooked up in the back of the store, in a canoe,” Dad says, picking up a raspberry and plopping it in his mouth.
Together, we all groan.
Yes, this is my family.
We might not see each other often, but when we’re in the same room, the oversharing and invasion of privacy is boss level.
“On that note, Mom, Dad, don’t you have something to tell Palmer and Ford?” I ask.
Mom’s eyes narrow at me, but I don’t even care. They need to get it over with.
“Are you sick, Mom?” Ford asks, his expression full of concern.
“Are you?” Palmer asks, uncrossing her legs and facing them now.
“No, I’m not sick.” Mom sets down her pudding bowl on the coffee table. “I wasn’t planning on saying anything to you tonight, since you just got here, but it seems like your brother has another idea.”
“What’s going on?” Ford asks, setting down his pudding bowl as well.
Mom reaches out and takes Dad’s hand in hers. “We’ve been doing some thinking about our future, and Cooper has been a strong, guiding force behind this decision”—she didn’t need to add that part, but fine—“and after some long conversations and tough decisions, we’ve decided to sell the house.”
“What?” Palmer says loudly while sitting up taller. “Sell this house? Our childhood home? The one we’re sitting in right now? This house?”
“Do you think they have other houses we’re unaware of?” I ask.
“I don’t know,” Palmer says, panic in her voice. “Maybe they do, and that’s where they hide the other halves to Dad’s socks.”
As a collective whole, we all glance at Dad’s socks.
Where are the other halves?
“Are you really selling?” Ford asks, his voice strained but not as alarmed as Palmer’s.
“We are,” Dad confirms with a sturdy nod. “We found a wonderful apartment in the heart of Seattle, right off Western Ave. It’s close to Cooper, walking distance to the water, and the apartment building has all the amenities we’re looking for, including very socially awkward programmers who are excited to have a mom in the building who’s willing and excited to bake cookies for the floor.”
“We’ve made the rounds and introduced ourselves already,” Mom adds.
“Wait.” Palmer closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. Hands extended, a slight shake to them, she says, “You’re going to exchange our childhood memories for a throng of programmers?”
“They’re very sweet when you get them to finally open up. Want me to ask if any of them are single?” Mom asks, growing excited.
“No,” Palmer practically yells. “I don’t get it. What’s the appeal? You love it here. You’re not city people. You’ve spent your whole lives on Marina Island—you grew your business here, you raised your children here—why are you all of a sudden going to move to a high-rise apartment in a city you never even liked? Is this what a late-life crisis looks like?”
Ford turns toward me. “Was this your idea?”
“Not really,” I answer, feeling the blaze of my siblings’ disapproving stares. “They were saying how they couldn’t keep up with the house anymore, they kept calling me to fix everything, and I offered a solution.”
“You told them to sell?” Palmer asks, standing from her seat. “How could you do that, Coop? You know what this house means to us.”
“Hey now, this was our decision ultimately,” Dad cuts in. “And ultimately, the house is too big for us. If you visited more often, maybe we’d consider keeping it, but you don’t. There’s no keeping a large piece of property when we’re the only ones who live here. I hate to say it, but we’re selling, and you’re going to have to clean out your rooms. There are growing families who could benefit from such a wonderful place to make memories.”
“What about our memories?” Palmer asks, getting more emotional than I expected.
Yeah, I thought they were going to be caught off guard, but I wasn’t planning on this kind of reaction.
“Palmer, you’ll still have your memories,” Mom says, a worried look on her face.
“No, some other family will.” With that, she goes to the kitchen, where I see her grab a bottle of wine and head out to the back deck.
“I’ll go talk to her,” Ford says, standing. No surprise there—they’ve always been close.
Which leaves me with Mom and Dad.
Once again.
Unable to look them in the eyes, I stare down at my pudding bowl. “So, that went well.”
I glance up to the disapproving expressions in my parents’ faces.
“Or maybe not,” I mutter.
CHAPTER SIX
PALMER
I tip the bottle of wine back and let the warm liquid flow down my throat.
They’re selling the house.
Actually selling it.
To go live in some sort of high-rise where they can bake cookies for strangers who know binary code better than the English language.
Where the hell did that idea even come from?
Dad wears shorts with holes in the crotch—he’s not a high-rise kind of guy. Mom takes great care of her garden and grows prize-winning zucchinis. Zucchinis that would make any woman weak in the knees with one girthy glance. Does she think she can have a garden in a high-rise?
And not to be selfish or anything, but . . . where the hell am I going to live?
Yeah, my parents are well off and all, but there’s no way in hell I would ever ask them for money, not after everything that happened . . .
And besides, I’ve spent most of my life hearing my parents tell me over and over again, We make our own way, we make our own life.
To prove to them I’m not a screwup, that I didn’t need their assistance, that’s what I set out to do, make my own path, but boy oh boy did that come back to bite me in the ass.
Now I find myself toeing chipped wood on the deck, thinking about how my life has gotten to this point.
The possibility of being homeless—actually homeless—feels like a punch to the gut. There’s nothing left to do but tip back the wine bottle, again and again.
Glug, glug, glug, there go all my plans.
Talk about a kick to the old baby maker.
Childhood house? Gone.
Devious schemes to not end up homeless and broke? Out the window.
Whoosh, just like that, all my worries come flooding back like an endless tidal wave, crashing into me over and over again.