Page 15 of Corkscrew You
“Hey, bro.”
Danny, too. And Ava. All four of my siblings are sitting around the pit, sharing a bottle of Jack Daniels. For a second, I hesitate on the edge of the firelight. I’m the oldest, and sometimes I think the others formed such a tight bond because I was the one Dad expected to be responsible. I was the wrangler, the keeper of order, the stand-in disciplinarian. That meant I got left out of a few things. Maybe more than a few, who knows? I don’t blame them. Much.
But then Ava grins and holds out a plastic tumbler. “Shot?”
I take my place around the fire.
“Line ’em up,” I tell her.
“Rough first day, huh?” asks Danny.
Danny is the number three Durant sibling, twenty-five, and the only one of us who refused to go to college. He apprenticed instead as a motor mechanic, and now he not only fixes high-end sports cars for the rich and famous in LA, he also buys them on their behalf. His wealthy customers pay all his travel costs and a frankly eye-watering commission. He makes a shitload more money than I do, the Harvard business grad. But then I haven’t always made smart choices.
“How’s the lady winemaker?” he asks. “Crazy as you feared?”
Inwardly, I cringe. The family got my account of the first meeting between Shelby and me, in which I relayed my impression of her as untethered from reality and possibly clinically delusional. Unfair and unkind. Seems I’m making a habit of being a jerk.
I take a slug of neat spirit and feel the burn like a reproach.
“We’ve got a big job ahead of us,” is all I’ll say.
Then I change the subject. “How wasyourday?”
Ava and Danny exchange a look.
“I’d rate it as a firm eight on the denial scale,” says Danny.
“Eight?” I say. “Why so low?”
“Doc Wilson paid a visit and laid out the hard facts,” says Ava. “And Mom burst into tears. Triggered a rare moment of introspection on Dad’s part. Won’t last.”
“He was googling Peruvian altitude cures when I forced him to hit the hay,” added Danny. “He’ll be back up to a ten tomorrow.”
In the Durant family plan, Ava and Danny volunteered as temporary in-home care. Danny has a crew back in LA who can work on the cars in his absence, and if he tag teams with Ava, he can travel for his clients if they need him to.
Ava’s into horsepower of a different kind. Little and strong, she’s an exercise rider for a racehorse stable in Kentucky. It’s not that easy for her to take time off, but she’s taken it. My guess is she’s too valuable for her boss to play hardball with her.
The twins, of course, have to make college their priority. They’ll pull their weight while they’re at home, but come late August, they’re out of here. Ava and Danny won’t be far behind them.
That’s where I come in. I’ve volunteered to donate half my salary to pay for whatever support is required when my siblings have to head back to their own homes, and their own lives. Made sense for me to stay because I don’thavea life, and this is the only real home I’ve known. Only a few short weeks ago, I thought I was about to make a new one. I was wrong.
“He asked me if there were any bio-nanotech advances that would come on stream in the next couple of years,” says Izzy. “I said I’d look into it.”
“Really, Iz?” Max says. “Do youhaveto fuel the insanity?”
“Don’t start blaming me!” Izzy slops bourbon from her tumbler as she waves both arms in protest. “If I’d said ‘There’s no chance you’ll get organic nano-bots to fix your heart, Pops,’ he’d have only heard the opposite anyway!”
Max nods. “True. And, to be fair, if some guy can breed flowers that glow bright enough in the dark to read by, then why not?”
Dan knocks back the last of his bourbon and gets reluctantly to his feet. “OK, team, I’m hitting the sack.” He drops his hand onto Ava’s shoulder. “Sis here is on monitoring duty, so I intend to sleep like a baby.”
“And the babies will join you.” Max gets up, pulls Izzy to her feet. “We have to be sharp tomorrow. We’re taking Mom out for lunch.”
“She agreed to that?” I ask, surprised.
Mom hasn’t wanted to leave Dad’s side for a moment, even when he behaves like a first-class heel and uses her as a verbal target for his anger and frustration. When we suggested she shouldn’t have to put up with that bullshit, she told us she knows he doesn’t mean it. She’s healthy and he isn’t, Mom said, so she can afford to be kind. Above all that, she loves him. She’s loved Dad, and only Dad, for thirty-five years.
“She agreed just to shut us up,” says Izzy. “Which means she’ll find an excuse to back out at the last minute.”
