He grinned, "Is it my turn to get rowdy?"
"After putting up with me last night, it's your turn to do whatever you want," I teased. There wasn't any sexual innuendo intended, but there was something intimate about our casual and comfortable banter.
A twinkle flashed in his eyes, "Whatever I want? I'm not sure that's something you can handle."
A sudden bang of a screen door announced Oliver's return. Moments later, he and Lauren both joined us in the living room. As smooth as a professional hostess, Lauren said, "Does anyone else find it warm in here? Why don't we have our drinks on the porch?"
"What a great idea," I agreed, still feeling the heat from Bryce's comment.
Lauren and I settled on the porch swing and Bryce and Oliver on the top step. I felt an elusive feeling of delight. Nothing felt uncomfortable. Everything felt fluid and natural — something I could get used to. The evening lay calm before us, and all we had to do was enjoy it.
"Thank you for dinner," I said, realizing I should have mentioned so earlier. Lauren smiled, even though she knew I hadn't eaten enough for my gratitude to matter.
She took a deep breath, and the swing rocked back and forth. Oliver had mowed the yard that morning, and a sweetness floated in the air. Fresh cut grass seemed to have a different odour in the city: less aromatic, less pure. As though concrete and pollution tainted it at the root.
"This is nice," I said. "Someone could get used to this." Someone other than myself. I enjoyed city living too much.
"No, you couldn't," Oliver said, reading my mind. "You'd be bored to tears."
"Not immediately. I could last a few weeks before agitation set in."
"We'll see. It's only been a few days. Tell me at the end of the week if it's still something you could get used to."
"You forget, I lived here for eighteen years."
Lauren blurted out, "You may have resided here, but you never really lived here."
I felt ganged up on, and I smothered the immediate urge to argue. Instead, I said, "You're right. But I'm confident I could do to it again if I had to."
"If you had to?" Bryce echoed. "Your choice of words is very telling. You make living here sound like a prison sentence."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to offend. I meant that it’s a different world than the one I live in now. It's calm and peaceful and -"
"Boring?" Lauren interjected.
"I didn't say that." And wouldn't have. In the three days I had been there, I had not been bored once. "But you must admit, the pace is different. If I did live here again -- for whatever reason -- it would take some time to rewire myself."
"Is that something you'd ever consider?" Lauren asked. "Moving home?"
"Not here, no." A part of me wanted to tell her that I didn't consider River Bluff home and hadn't for a long while. "There are too many memories here — some good of course, but also a lot of bad. I have considered retiring outside of the city when the time comes. Though not anywhere this far from Starbucks."
Oliver laughed. "You city folk and your expensive coffee. If I ever pay six-dollars for a cup o’-coffee, there better be some rum in the bottom of that cup."
I smiled. "What about you, guys? Do you ever consider packing-up and moving someplace new?"
"No." Lauren didn't even have to ponder.
"Never? Hasn't it crossed your mind once? Even when we were kids?"
Oliver spoke. "In high school, Lauren and I talked about leaving someday. I thought I'd be a big hockey star, and she wanted to run a catering business."
"Those both sound like big and healthy aspirations. What happened?
He shrugged. "I got hurt. Tore a ligament, and it never healed properly. After that, I wasn't NHL material. I was still good, but I wasn't great anymore. You need to be great to pursue hockey full time. Besides, that was all before Lauren…" Oliver trailed off.
That was the second time Oliver eluded to an event but not elaborated; once with Bryce and now with Lauren. The first I was content to chalk-up to none of my business, but this time, it was difficult to stop myself from asking.
"Am I missing something? What happened?" Oliver looked hesitant and turned to Lauren for approval. "You don't have to tell me --"
"No, it's fine." Lauren sighed. "I got pregnant a few weeks before graduation. It changed our plans a bit."
"I'm so sorry," I said, recognizing the absence of a nephew or niece meant the pregnancy did not come to fruition. Suddenly their wedding right out of high school made sense to me, "That's why you got married." I didn't phrase it as a question.
"No, that's not why we got married," she said, insulted. "It may be why we got married when we did, but that's not why we got married."
"Of course, that's not what I meant," I assured her. "Do you mind if I ask what happened?"
"You can ask, but I can't tell you. One moment I was pregnant and the next..." Oliver placed his hand on her foot from his perch on the step.
Sadness hung in the air. Bryce looked like he might want to say something, but instead, he excused himself and went back into the house. I knew I should have let the subject die there, but the journalist in me was desperate to know. "Why didn't you tell me? I know it must have been devastating for you. I would have wanted to be there for you."
Lauren almost laughed. "Honestly, Parker, why would I tell you? We hadn't spoken in six years by that point. We were practically strangers."
"I was still your brother."
"Yes, you were, but not in any way that mattered."
My heart felt heavy with sorrow and my mind full of regret. So much time wasted, so much life missed. Of course, blame was not mine to bear alone, and I knew she understood that. In turn, I needed to understand, in many ways, for many years, our kinship was more past than the present. Only a ghost of a relationship once had. No more tangible than a deceased loved one. I willed myself to accept that at that time in her life, it would not have occurred to her to tell me. Our relationship had improved over the years, bit by bit, phone call by strained phone call, but to expect her to reveal that trauma over casual conversation, was unreasonable. The fact that she was unveiling that intimate detail of her past now, should have been more than enough.
"You're right. I'm trying to change that now."
She gave a slight smile, "I know you are. I'm trying too. But you can't be upset if there are things about my life you don't know. You weren't there for a lot of it."
I nodded understanding.
"But," she sighed. "All that is past. There's no sense dwelling on it. We can't change it. We can only learn from it."
"Mom used to say that," I reminisced with a smile. "I'm glad to see that one of us retained the lesson."
"I don't think it’s a lesson we ever really learn. It's an ongoing struggle. It's in our nature to dwell on the past. If it weren't, why would we dream about it so much?" She sipped her Chardonnay. "Maybe that's why Mommy said it so often. Not only to teach us but also to remind herself."