Page 56 of Love is Angry

“Are you sure?” Madison asks him, as if hoping for a different answer.

“Yeah. Of course I’m sure,” he chuckles.

The man has no idea of the history between us. Maybe that’s for the better. He seems like such a good and gentle soul. Telling him about that time I walked in on my father pounding Madison on my parents’ bed would besmirch this inherent sweetness of his. Poor fella.

“Okay,” Madison replies as she looks to Laura and me. “I guess brunch won’t kill anyone.”

“We won’t stay too long,” Laura assures her. “I’ve got some charity stuff to work on, as well, but I figure we deserve a break, what with you and Rhue toiling through Cornell, notto mention my own career and education-related plights.” She laughs lightly. “Anyway, we’ll leave you, now. Rhue and I will pick you up tomorrow at eleven, is that cool?”

Madison nods slowly.

“Thank you,” I tell her and offer a slight bow of the head. Mr. Willis pats me on the shoulder and heads back inside.

“You be good, kids,” he says before disappearing through the dark foyer.

Madison changes back to her thorny self in an instant. “I’ll see you both tomorrow,” she says. “Emphasis on both.”

“Pinkie promise!” Laura replies, and Madison goes after her father, shutting the front door with a heavy thud. “Whew. That wasn’t too bad.”

“You’re gonna be a third wheel tomorrow,” I grumble.

“That was the whole point,” Laura says. “I was never going to let you two brunch on your own. No, I will be acting as the mediator while you two take out your laundry and put this whole nastiness behind you.”

“Dad will get mad if he hears we’re palling around with her.”

Laura’s eyes turn fearful for a moment, but she is quick to find her resolve. “It’s okay. In the event that someone tells him, he’ll forgive us.”

“Your manny, maybe?” I reply.

We both look back to see him standing at the street corner, pretending to be on the phone. He’s trying so hard not to make eye contact with us, it’s almost amusing.

“He won’t,” Laura says. “He has been surprisingly discreet since that Italian restaurant episode. We had a talk back then about trust and confidentiality.”

“Madison hates me,” I tell my sister. I don’t tell her that as much as I’m done with fighting, I’m pretty sure a part of me still hates Madison, too.

“She has every reason,” Laura sighs deeply. “But hate is not forever. You can mend hate with a little bit of kindness and a whole lot of redemptive action.”

“Fuck me, you’re all grown up,” I notice, raising an eyebrow.

She purses her lips for a second and sucks in a breath. “I kinda had to.”

That is the truth of this world. Each of us has had to grow up a bit faster than most. Yes, Laura and I come from financial privilege, but we have our own demons to battle—some worse than others. Madison got herself dragged into our family nightmares; I suppose, in that sense, at least, fate dealt her a shitty hand, too. At the end of the day, we are three souls in need of peace, already tired by what life has thrown at us thus far.

Making my peace with Madison feels organic. Necessary.

I can only hope that tomorrow’s brunch will yield something good, because I am terrible at handling rejections of any kind. That much I have proven rather extensively.

Chapter 25

Madison

Dad gives me a worried look.

It’s too early in the morning for me to explain what has me so strung out and so dangerously close to a dark edge. Rarely has he seen this side of me, and when he did glimpse it, I made every effort to keep him away. It’s not the rage I’m concerned with. It has been my companion for a year, now, and I have learned to live with it. No, I’m terrified that I will let something slip and that my dad will find out what happened. It’ll put his business in jeopardy, and my actions have already done so much harm. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if he suffers.

So, instead of feeding into his worries, I put on a bright smile and load my plate with blueberry pancakes and honeyed bacon. Still my favorite breakfast, and still his best dish to date.

I’ve got brunch with Rhue and Laura in an hour. It would be common sense to eat less now and leave room for later, but I could also just make Dad happy now by scarfing down everything and simply drown in champagne cocktails later. Mimosa qualifies as a brunch basis, anyway and with the Echeverias in tow, I doubt we’re gonna need to show our Ids.

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