We Are the Brennans

by Tracey Lange

  “She won’t be there this late,” he said.

  “That’s fine. We’ll just leave it in the office.”

  Since he needed to pick up deposits anyway, he agreed to go. The pub was steady with late-afternoon weekend patrons, high energy but not yet the rambunctious crowd that would be overflowing the tables and bar-stools later that night. Paul was behind the bar and Denny would be in to help. Kale was momentarily waylaid by the kitchen staff, then hurried after Vivienne and Luke to the office. If they didn’t make this quick his night off would cease to exist.

  He opened the office door to see Vivienne standing there talking to Sunday. He was surprised Sunday was there, though Denny had probably told her Kale was off for the night. It was painfully uncomfortable, being in the same space where they’d argued yesterday, watching an oblivious Vivienne show off her list of potential bookkeepers.

  Sunday’s eyes met his for a second, then dropped to Luke before she focused on the pages again. “Vivienne, this is great. I’ll check these people out.”

  Luke pulled on his hand. “Daddy, can we play with the cars?”

  Grateful for something to do, Kale knelt down and opened the bottom drawer of the file cabinet, where they kept a few toys for the kids. He focused on keeping Luke occupied with Matchbox cars, listening while Vivienne described reviews she’d read or heard about the various candidates.

  “I’ll show you the two I would start with,” Vivienne said. “Let me find a highlighter…” She sat at the desk and started digging through drawers.

  Kale gave Luke the two-minute warning so they could get the hell out of there ASAP without a fuss.

  “Thanks again,” Sunday said. “I’ll start making calls…”

  Luke held up two cars. “Should I put these away, Daddy?”

  “Yep. Let’s park them back in the drawer.”

  It took a moment to realize the silence behind him had gone on for too long. When he looked back over his shoulder, he saw Sunday staring down at the desk. Vivienne, sitting in the chair, appeared to be looking up at her, but he couldn’t see Vivienne’s face.

  Sunday swallowed. “It’s just … a silly keepsake,” she said to Vivienne, with a dismissive shake of the head.

  “Daddy, should I close the drawer?”

  “Yep.” Kale stood, trying to see what it was they were talking about.

  Vivienne rose. “Well, maybe you shouldn’t keep it here.”

  The way Sunday froze, eyes wide, mouth open but nothing coming out. It was like she’d been busted with something she shouldn’t have.

  Then Kale knew.

  He stepped near them for a closer look at what was sitting on the desk, clinging to the hope he was wrong. But he wasn’t. It was the postcard. He’d slid it in a desk drawer years ago, wanting it somewhere nearby but safe, where it would cause no harm. Sunday hadn’t been busted, he had.

  “It’s not appropriate,” Vivienne said.

  He drew in breath. “Vivienne—”

  “No, she’s right,” Sunday said. “I’m sorry. It must have gotten mixed in with papers I brought from home.” She reached for the postcard with the Kale and Sunday stick figures drawn on the beach, the one they used to find ways to surprise each other with, and slid it into her laptop bag on the floor.

  She was taking the fall for him. Was he going to let her do it?

  Her cheeks were flaming when she straightened back up, but she met Vivienne’s eye. “I’m really sorry about that.”

  Vivienne, slight lift to her chin and pucker to her mouth, nodded. Then she turned to Luke. “C’mon, sweetie. Time to go.” She took his hand and led him past Sunday and out of the office, shooting Kale arched eyebrows on the way.

  Sunday remained, staring at the space where Vivienne’s face had been seconds before.

  He had, indeed, let her take the fall.

  She closed her eyes, turned away from him.

  What was he supposed to say—Thanks? I’m sorry? Oh, and yes, I kept our postcard all this time.

  If the situation with Sunday had become more complicated the day before, it was a hot mess now. But he couldn’t fix anything in that moment, while his wife and son waited on the other side of the open door.

  So he turned and followed them out without saying a word.

  * * *

  After dinner they popped in a Pixar movie, but Luke was out in ten minutes. When Kale picked him up, Luke’s little arms wrapped around his neck. He carried him up to his room but didn’t put him down right away. Instead Kale held him and gently swayed for a bit, grounding himself in his life. In his son’s bedroom surrounded by all his toys, in the house he’d shared with Viv for almost four years now. She had asked him about the postcard when they got home, if he and Sunday had gone to that beach, and he said no, it had been a “maybe someday” thing. He officially moved from lying by omission to lying by commission when he agreed with her that it was irresponsible for Sunday to leave it in the office where anyone could find it.

  He’d assumed the postcard would be safe in that drawer; he was normally the only person who used the damned desk. Maybe Sunday had already come across it, but based on her reaction in the office he doubted it. She had taken the blame, and now they were complicit in this lie.

  And it wouldn’t be long before she noticed the note he added to that postcard just a few months before she left New York.

  Maybe she covered for him as a peace offering after their argument. He still had trouble believing the things she’d said. Probably as long as I waited for you to come after me. That just didn’t make sense. She was the one who changed back then, the one who accepted a job three thousand miles away and left him wondering what he did wrong for years. Just like his mother had.

  You seemed to get over it awfully quickly. The truth in that one stung a bit. Viv had gotten pregnant less than a year after Sunday left. They’d been dating—casually, in his mind—for a few months when she told him. Initially they’d used condoms, but she was also on the pill so he went with that after a while. The cold truth was he hadn’t been paying much attention.

  As the weight of a decision pressed upon him, there’d been a moment when he considered going after Sunday, or at least calling her. But what would he have said—Hey, I got another woman pregnant so I just want to make sure it’s really over between us? Besides, she’d been gone ten months, and from everything he heard she was doing well out there. And he couldn’t just walk away from his responsibilities. Planned or unplanned, he was going to be a father.

  So he decided to embrace it, despite Denny’s response—I forbid you to marry her. He saw it as his chance at a family. He cut way back on his drinking and made plans with Viv: moved into the empty house his father had left him, attended doctor’s appointments and Lamaze classes, had a small wedding ceremony, which the Brennans had attended.

  He laid Luke down in his bed and tucked him in tight like a burrito. Once Luke had come along the doubts had quieted. He loved his son to an impossible degree. So much so it eclipsed uncertainty about Vivienne, those moments when it felt like something was missing or he was married to someone he would never quite know, not all the way.

  As he headed back downstairs to his wife, he admitted to himself that he wanted answers from Sunday to questions that had plagued him for years, and she had added more to the list since coming back. But asking those questions would lead nowhere good, and no matter what her answers were, they would never justify what she did to him. The only solution was to focus on his family, keep his distance, and seal up the crack in the box that held their history.

  And he would hold on to a little of that righteous anger she had mentioned. It was straight-up self-preservation.

  * * *

  When he arrived at work the next morning he was greeted by an enthusiastic Shane, who was helping Jackie stock the bar.

  “Where have you been, Kale? We didn’t work on our GT model in forever.”

  That triggered a twinge of shame. Kale hadn’t talked to Shan
e in weeks. “Sorry about that, Shane. What’re you guys doing here?”

  “I offered to open,” Jackie said. “Don’t worry, I got permission from my probation officer. Denny wasn’t sure when you’d be in and he had to go out to Mamaroneck.”

  “What for?”

  “The foreman’s there today and Denny wanted to ask more questions about what the hell happened with that pipe.” Jackie shrugged. “He can’t let it go.”

  Shane picked up two empty crates. “I’ll take these out back and break them down, okay, Jackie?”

  “Thanks, dude.”

  Shane headed out the back door.

  “He doing okay?” Kale asked.

  “He had a rough night at work yesterday, started head-banging after one of the asshole cashiers yelled at him for not getting the carts in from the parking lot fast enough.”

  “Shit,” Kale said. “Do we need to talk to that cashier?”

  “I had a chat with him. I don’t think it’ll happen again.” Jackie pulled his hands through his long hair. “It’s no wonder though. Things are just tense lately. Theresa’s still gone, Denny’s in a shit mood.” He checked over his shoulder and lowered his voice. “And Shane’s afraid Sunday will leave again. He follows her around like a puppy.”

  Shane had always been the family barometer. Things in the Brennan house were out of whack.

  Jackie started playing with a bar towel. “It’s not easy for her, being back here.”

  Maybe she’d told Jackie about their argument. “Is she here?” Kale asked.

  “She’s down in the cellar with Molly.”

  Kale headed for the stairs.

  “What happened between you two?” Jackie asked.

  “Why? What’d she say?”

  “She didn’t say anything, but I know when she’s upset.”

  “It was nothing.”

  “Maybe to you.” Jackie leaned on the bar. “We just got her back, man, you know?”

  Kale didn’t respond, the message was clear. He went downstairs where he heard Sunday and Molly talking.

  “… it go here, Sunday?”

  “Yep. That’s right.”

  When he got to the cellar he leaned against the doorjamb and watched.

  Molly was taking her time placing a bottle on a low shelf just right, label facing front. She stepped back from her work. “Did I do it okay?”

  Sunday was crouched down next to her with a clipboard. “That’s perfect. But just wait until I tell Auntie Clare you were carrying around a bottle of scotch.”

  “Nooo, Sunday. You won’t do that.”

  “I will.”

  “You better not!”

  “Oh yes, I will.” She started tickling her, but Molly broke away in a bubble of high-pitched giggles and ran out the door, stopping to return Kale’s high five on her way past.

  Sunday stood and spun. When she saw him standing there her smile didn’t fade exactly, just became sort of rueful. The bruises were almost gone, though there was still a shadowy tinge to the skin around her eyes. The scar on her left temple was less obvious; her hair covered most of it. She flipped the clipboard up against her chest, crossed her arms over it.

  “I’m sorry about yesterday,” he said. “I didn’t think about the postcard. It’s been in there for years.” Just a silly keepsake. But had she taken it out of her bag and flipped it over yet? “I should have told Vivienne the truth.”

  “That wouldn’t have made anyone feel better. Especially her.”

  He shoved his hands in his pockets and stepped farther into the room. “Listen, about the other day … I think it’s best we stay away from the past, you know. Just keep it all in the rearview.”

  She nodded. “I’m sorry I’m complicating your life. But I don’t think I can leave just now—”

  “Leave? I don’t want you to leave.” He’d said it without any thought. He was about to follow up with a lame platitude about how they’d all get through it, but Jackie appeared.

  He raised his arms up against the sides of the doorframe and eyed them both. “Everything okay in here?”

  “Yeah,” Sunday said. “We’re fine.”

  But Jackie didn’t look convinced. “Since you’re both here,” he said, “I think it’s time for a come-to-Jesus with Denny.”

  Kale was about to ask whether Jackie was referring to a come-to-Jesus about Theresa, the money, or the family. But it was probably all three.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Jackie

  “I think it’s time for a come-to-Jesus with Denny.”

  It had been brewing for weeks. The tension at home was thick and Denny had to pull his head out of his ass before he fubar’d everything and Theresa never came back, or Shane ended up in a hospital, or Sunday left again—which had caused Shane’s first and only trip to the psych ward. Jackie was used to riding out Denny’s storms, maybe because he caused a lot of them. But this was getting out of hand.

  “Okay,” Sunday said. “When?”

  “He closes tonight,” Kale said. “Let’s catch him when he gets home. He’ll be tired, maybe it’ll be less of a fight.”

  Jackie cocked an eyebrow. “Have you met Denny?”

  “No, that’s a good idea,” Sunday said. “Let’s do it.” She turned back to inventorying shelves. There was a weary quality about her, flat tone, wilted shoulders. That’s what worried Jackie. She’d been beaten down physically when she first got home, but her spirits had been good. Over the last five weeks it had reversed.

  * * *

  He made sure his dad and Shane were in bed by ten, doors closed in the event things got loud, a distinct possibility with Denny. Kale walked over around ten thirty.

  Jackie opened the door for him. “Since when do you knock?”

  Kale just shrugged, like he no longer knew what the rules were.

  A wave of nostalgia hit Jackie when he led Kale back to the kitchen where Sunday waited. The kitchen table had been the center of their universe for many years. Everything else—school, friends, jobs—had revolved around this space, where they all started and ended so many of their days together. Where they celebrated and commiserated, argued and laughed, planted themselves until the late hours. Watching Kale choose the seat across from Sunday, rather than his old one next to her, felt unnatural.

  They made nervous chitchat for a few minutes, but before long Denny blew in the back door, along with the strong odor of cigarette smoke. His eyebrows shot up when he saw Kale. “What’re you doing here?”

  “Waiting for you.”

  Denny looked around the table, from one to the next, and let out a long sigh that ended in “Shit.” Then he reached up to the cabinet above the fridge.

  “We want to talk to you about a few things,” Sunday said.

  “I think I’m going to need some sustenance for this discussion.” He pulled down the Jameson bottle with one hand and four shot glasses with the other, placed it all on the table, and sat across from Jackie. Then he started to pour. “And I’m not participating in this little intervention unless you all have a drink with me.”

  Everyone reached for a glass and Denny tapped his on the table twice. “Sláinte.” They all drank to their health.

  He did his arms-crossed, hands-in-pits pose. “Well?”

  Jackie kicked it off since this had been his idea. “You’re a mess, Denny.”

  “Pot, kettle.”

  “He’s right,” Kale said. “Just tell us what’s going on.”

  “If this is about Theresa, first I’ll just say it’s none of your fucking business. But once she sees how things calm down after the opening, it’ll be fine.”

  “So you haven’t talked to your lawyer again?” Sunday asked.

  One side of his mouth pulled up. “Only when he called me to ask about you.”

  She rolled her eyes and went red.

  Classic Denny, turning the tables. “What about your foul moods lately?” Jackie asked. “They’re upsetting everyone.”

  Denny turned to him with
narrowed eyes. He was the one used to demanding answers, not the other way around. “You have enough of your own problems without worrying about mine, Jackie. You know, taking care of this family isn’t easy.”

  “Oh, is that what you’ve been doing?”

  “Think you could do a better job? Why don’t you give it a shot. You can support us all with your painting—after you finish paying off your lawyer fees from two years ago.”

  “Fuck off, Denny.”

  “Stop it,” Sunday said.

  But Jackie had swallowed enough of Denny’s shit; he was tired of being his scapegoat. “Your wife left, you’re lying to everybody. Time to grow a pair and tell us what’s going on before you torpedo everything and it’s too late.”

  They all gaped at Jackie. No one was used to him jumping into the conflict. He usually avoided it, or nodded and smiled his way through. Even Denny seemed at a loss for words.

  Kale seized the opportunity. “What about the money, Denny?”

  His response was to glare at Sunday.

  “What did you think was going to happen?” she asked. “Your books are a disaster, there’s no rhyme or reason to the cash flow. I can’t make sense of it.”

  “Sorry I asked for your help.”

  “It’s not her fault,” Kale said. “I know you’re hiding stuff from me. I’m your goddamn partner. What the hell is going on?” His tone was insistent, with a pinch of pleading.

  Denny poured himself another shot and threw it back, shifted around and grunted. He ran his hands down his face, and Jackie could hear his palms scraping stubble. “I was going to tell you in a couple of weeks, after the pub opened.” He held his hands up. “Just know before I start that it’s all worked out, everything’s taken care of.” Which, to Jackie, sounded way more ominous than reassuring.

  Once Denny decided to talk, he didn’t stop for a while. His voice was the only sound in the house, and it grew coarser as he went on. He stared at the table and told them how it all went down, how he drained his personal account and then the business account to stay afloat and pay for his share of the new place. Then he’d resorted to a home equity loan and credit cards. He talked them through the darkest hour, when the city threatened condemnation, and the possibility of bankruptcy became very real.