Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 60309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 60309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 302(@200wpm)___ 241(@250wpm)___ 201(@300wpm)
There are the traditions, the happy consistent things. How Mom tries to keep the Christmas spirit alive with making gingerbread houses, even though we’re both lazy carpenters and always end up eating the walls. How Kinney secretly loves the joyful holiday tunes. How Moffy spends the most time with us. How excited Dad gets in gift-giving. His face turns childlike and youthful seeing Xander geek-out over LOTR collectibles and watching Kinney try not to beam over a makeup palette she didn’t think she’d get.
And the lake house.
It’s always here. Waiting for us during the winter.
But this year, I know it’s different. I feel different, and I don’t know if it’s because I’ve fucked up so much or if it’s because I’m getting older.
We all are.
Eliot isn’t twelve anymore, being swallowed whole by his fur coat outdoors. He’s nineteen, sky-scraper tall, and his floor-length faux-fur coat seems magically made for him. Like no other human could pull off his wardrobe with the same magnificence.
He stands atop a tree stump in a small secret alcove in the woods. Moonlight and crackling fire illuminate his face, bare chest, sweatpants, and that fur coat. He holds a book like he’s about to read from it, but I know this book has blank pages.
“‘Live in each season as it passes,’” he recites Thoreau from memory, “‘breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influence of the earth.’” He takes a dramatic pause. “‘Heaven is under our feet as well as over our heads.’”
I snap my fingers while Tom strums a couple pretty notes on his guitar. He’s more bundled than his brother in a black beanie, puffy winter coat, and scuffed boots.
At least it’s not so cold by the fire. I scoot closer to the flames that swarm the charred logs, and I pull my hoodie’s hood over my head. Still on the tree stump, Eliot sucks on a blunt and then squats down to pass it to me.
I grab it and take a hit before passing to Tom.
Smoke fills my lungs, and I exhale deeply, needing the calm. “Super glad we’re not doing shrooms tonight,” I tell them. We did try that…once. “I definitely don’t need to go on a bad trip.” Weed is better. It calms me down. Eases my anxieties, and I have plenty of those lately.
I didn’t call a meeting out in the woods tonight.
We’re at the lake house.
Nighttime fireside chats are our thing. We’ve been going to this little spot in the woods for what’s felt like forever. It started when we wanted a secret club away from our older siblings and cousins. And something that the younger kids can’t join. Something that was just ours to read, to recite, to sing, to dance, to just…be. Then it turned into a “hideout” to vape away from their mom and my dad, who really despise smoking.
We’re old enough now that we don’t have to sneak out at two in the morning to come here. It’s only 10 p.m., and our families think we took a night walk around the lake.
“Bad trips can be the best trips,” Eliot jumps off the stump and sits on it.
“Or they can just be plain bad,” Tom refutes with another strum of his guitar. He passes the blunt back to Eliot without smoking.
“Not in the mood, brother?” Eliot wonders.
“There’s enough weird shit going on lately,” Tom mutters, pressing his hand to his guitar strings. The sound dies. “Our sister is icing out Mom and Dad, which I never thought would happen. Like ever.”
Eliot sobers. “She has good reason. They should’ve trusted her.” His eyes darken, even when the firelight glints against them.
“Why didn’t they?” I ask them. I’ve thought about this a lot, and I’m sure they have, too. Why did all our parents jump to the conclusion that Jane and Moffy were lying? They’ve never really lied. Not like the three of us have.
We’d be the first ones they should doubt.
I’d peg Jane and Moffy being the very last to mistrust.
Tom thinks. “Something had to have happened in that camp cabin when all the parents were there, right?” He looks to Eliot. “Jane won’t talk about it.”
“Or they just didn't believe them,” Eliot says quietly. “I would have. The moment they said it was a tabloid lie, I would’ve believed them. Hell, I did.”
Tom sets his guitar aside. “You also were the first one who said ‘maybe’ when we heard the incest rumors.”
“Shakespeare rotted your brain,” I sing-song.
Eliot points at me, the joint between his fingers. “I’ll allow the insult to the world’s greatest playwright. Only because I love you, and not in that way.”
Tom laughs.
I smile, and it is true that Eliot did somewhat believe the tabloids could be true about Moffy and Jane. Just for a moment. I didn’t think they were and neither did Tom, but after we heard that Moffy and Jane denounced the whole thing, we always believed it was just a salacious lie and clickbait.