Huck

by Jessica Gadziala

"You look great, babe. If they don't see that, fuck 'em," he said, surprising me by offering me his arm. "Saw this in a movie once," he added when I stared at him for a long moment before linking my arm through, hand holding onto his bicep.

  "Thanks for this," I told him as we walked down the street. "This isn't going to be fun for either of us. But it's kind of nice not to have to be here alone," I admitted, feeling the words trip out before I could stop them.

  "Jesus Christ," Huck hissed as we stepped in front of the open gate, giving him a view of the house for the first time. "So you come from money money," he said, looking over at me.

  "I mean, technically, no. Jones does," I said, shrugging.

  "Are you related to the fucking Rockefellers?" he asked.

  "No. I mean, well, a couple generations back, a distant Rockefeller married one of my great-great step-aunts, but it barely counts."

  "Crib like this, babe, it counts. Do I even want to know what this is worth?" he asked as we walked up toward the three-story white stucco mansion that I couldn't see through Huck's rose-colored glasses since the ones I had to wear made this place look like a prison of sorts.

  "Best guess? Thirty," I said, shrugging.

  "Thirty million?"

  "Yeah. I mean it has never been on the market, so it is hard to say. But it has to be around there. Twenty-thousand square feet. The best of everything. My grandparents were always the showy sort."

  "Where are we going? "Huck asked as I led him away from the front path. "Do we have to enter through the help entrance?" he teased.

  "It's a garden party," I told him, walking over toward the arbor, the sweet peas still in full bloom, delicate red, pink, purple, and white flowers draping the wooden frame romantically.

  There wasn't much I liked about this estate, but the gardens were some of them. I felt justified in liking them, though, since they had absolutely nothing to do with my family, and everything to do with a sweet, gentle old gardener by the name of Harold who made the grounds positively magical.

  He used to find me hiding from the family in little nooks, would bring me with him, pointing out plants and flowers along the way, making me commit them to memory.

  Lantana with its purple outer flowers with paler pink ones in the center. Bright, happy yellow buttercups. Dramatic and stunning purple bougainvillea, my personal favorite.

  I'd always hoped to one day have a place that was fully mine so I could have a garden like this one.

  "This place is packed. I'd almost be surprised your family could find you in this crush," Huck said as we moved into the back, the sprawling grounds dotted with wrought iron bar tables without chairs, guests expected to spend most of their day standing, socializing.

  These events were always more for connection-building than actual interest in one another, in close interpersonal relationships.

  "Oh, they'll find me," I said, sucking in a deep breath. "But let's get a drink before they do," I added, pulling him over toward a bar under a dogwood that had long since dropped her white flowers. "Yep," I said, grabbing a set of the flutes set up there, "that'll do," I agreed, taking them.

  "Are we supposed to tip?" Huck asked as I led him away, handing him a champagne flute.

  "My grandmother would make sure they could never work in this town again if they accepted a tip from a guest."

  "That's cold."

  "You have no idea," I agreed, throwing back half my champagne in one sip.

  Once upon a time, when I was a little girl, I used to dream of a day when I could grow up and sip champagne like one of the elegant men and women around me.

  Little did I know that the adult version of me would chug it like water in the hopes of making these dreadful events more tolerable.

  "Oh, that was fast," I said, seeing my grandmother standing a few paces off, her hand resting on my grandfather's shoulder.

  "That's your grandparents," Huck guessed.

  "Yeah."

  "What's wrong with your grandfather?"

  "Stroke," I said, seeing the frozen half of his face, the wheelchair he'd been stuck in since I was twelve. "He's still alright in the head," I told Huck. "But he's trapped in a body that only half works."

  "Let me guess," Huck said, seeming to start catching on. "That makes him mean."

  "Yes, it does."

  "What about your grandmother? What's her problem?"

  I threw back the rest of my champagne, reaching to place it on a tray of a server as they passed. "They blame me for the stroke," I told him, yanking him forward with me, making a beeline for my family, wanting to get the most uncomfortable part over with.

  "Harmon, so nice of you to make it," my grandmother said, standing there with her perfectly coiffed white-blond hair and understated makeup that never seemed to slip into the fine lines and wrinkles next to her eyes and lips. There was a familiar tight smile on her lips. "And who is this?" she asked, her gaze moving over Huck, likely trying to figure out what kind of suit he was wearing, what it cost, what that said about what he did for a living.

  I knew a thing or two about suits, and while nothing about the Huck I knew suggested he gave a crap about things like labels, I knew the one he was wearing was quality.

  "Grandmother, Grandfather. This is Huck. Huck, this is Colette and Johnathan Tillman."

  "Huck," my grandmother repeated, rolling his name round, chewing it like she was trying to decide if it was the kind of quirky that came with money or not. "Have you been seeing our Harmon long?"

  "A couple weeks," he said, not seeming the least bit tense even though the air around us was thick enough to start slicing with a knife.

  "And what is it that you do, Huck?" she asked.

  Once upon a time, I found the way my grandmother repeated names as elegant. Now, it just pissed me off. It almost always sounded condescending to my more mature ears.

  "I'm in imports," he said, the words sliding off his tongue with all the airs of someone who belonged in this sort of place with these sorts of people. I didn't know if I wanted to laugh, or be in awe of his ability to tell a half-truth without a hint of the lie beneath.

  "Oh, wonderful," my grandmother said, torn. Because she was buying his lie, and she wanted to be impressed with him. But that would mean, by extension, she would need to feel a bit of pride toward me as well. "And Harmon, are you still doing your little vid—" she started, only to have a smooth as hell Huck interrupt her.

  "Excuse me, Colette," he said, pressing a hand into my lower back. "I see an old friend of mine," he went on.

  "Oh, of course. Of course. It was lovely meeting you. I hope to get some more time to talk with you later."

  "That was slick," I hissed into his ear as he led me away, unable to stop the smile pulling at my lips. "How do you lie that well? Is it a criminal thing?" I asked, feeling a little giddy, never having gotten through a conversation—however casual—with my grandmother without feeling flayed open.

  "Close. I actually wasn't lying," he told me, giving me a warm smile before nodding his head toward a corner where I finally saw what he was looking at. Who he was looking at.

  The man I'd seen first when I'd brought Remy's dog back that first night.

  The little person with the harem of women. And that absurd hat.

  Teddy.

  "What is he doing here?" I asked as we made our slow approach.

  "Didn't anyone tell you? Teddy is fucking loaded. Theodore Kane, the Third. Old money too."

  "Old old money," I said, shaking my head. "How do you know him? Did he just show up at a party or something once?"

  "Not exactly. I jacked his car. With him passed out in the backseat. Fucking bombed. Soon as we saw him, we got out of there. But he sobered up, tracked us down, and blackmailed us into letting him into our world. He used to give us tips on cars to chop back when that was our thing. Probably cars of people he hated, now that I think of it."

  "You have led a very interesting life," I declared just as we were making our way in front of Teddy.<
br />
  "Oh, get the fuck out of here," Teddy said, smiling at us as we approached. "What? Did Remy's dog make it all the way to Miami?" he asked, surprising me that he remembered who I was. But, then again, I guess I had made a spectacle of myself with the whole seizure and nearly drowning thing, bringing the party to a screeching halt.

  "Not exactly. This is my grandmother's house. My step-grandmother."

  "Oh," he started, smile falling. "I'm so sorry to hear that," he told me, making a snorting laugh bubble up and burst out.

  "Thank you!" I said, throwing a hand up. "I have been trying to explain to him that they are, well..."

  "The coldest assholes south of Connecticut?" Teddy supplied.

  "Yes, exactly. Why are you here if you hate them so much?"

  "You have to rub elbows with all sorts of undesirables if you want to keep your business running. So, if you are the granddaughter, then your brother is..."

  "The family disappointment?" Jones asked, coming in out of nowhere.

  While he made no move to cover his ink or take out his piercings for family events, he did leave all the gel out of his hair, which made it fall long to one side, making the other side appear to be the only one shaved.

  "Oh, please," I said, snorting as I took the champagne out of Huck's hand. "We all know that is my title."

  "True," Jones said, giving me a smirk. "But they hate me more because they can't hate me," he said, shrugging.

  "He means," I clarified to Huck who was looking at us with furrowed brows, "that all of my many shortcomings can be blamed on the fact that I am not one of them, that my step-father was so gracious to take in his new wife's bastard daughter when they married. They don't get to blame all of this," I said, waving at Jones's face, "on breeding."

  "Well, they try," Jones reminded me, giving me a little kick to the gut as he and I shared a look.

  "Your mother," Huck guessed.

  "Yes. The only reason I am here," I said, feeling my shoulders slump a little, not sure I was prepared to see her, to see what they had done to her since I'd seen her last. It seemed that every year, she got smaller, frailer, like she had stopped eating, like she was trying to disappear. I would want to disappear, too, if I had to deal with her husband day in and day out.

  "Why not just see her alone?" Huck asked.

  "Because my stepfather moved her up to Connecticut." I let the rest of it hang, knowing Huck could pick it up. And it makes it impossible for me to visit. And he knows that. It was part of the reason he did it.

  "She looks thin," Teddy said, confirming my fears.

  "I bet," I agreed.

  "He's a dick, huh? Teddy asked, meaning my step-father.

  "Yeah."

  "Kind of a shame he got the use of his legs back then, huh?" Teddy said, giving me a humorless smile.

  I could feel Huck's gaze on the side of my head, knowing I would have to give him more of the story.

  After I found my mom and told her I loved her, I missed her, I would give her a place to stay if she ever left. I knew it was pointless, that she was in too deep, she was too far gone, but I had to say it. Just in case there was some small part of her that was considering leaving. After all this time, I knew the chances were slim, but I had to hold onto a little bit of hope.

  "Oh, this fuckwad," Teddy said under his breath, making us glance over to a man who was waving as he approached. "He fucked his third wife's eighteen-year-old daughter and thinks no one else knows about it. The pig. Hey, Mitchum! Long time no see. How have you been?" Teddy asked, moving away.

  "Okay, if I thought you were impressive, Teddy takes the cake," I decided, watching him slip from complete derision to sycophancy in a blink.

  "Mitchum owns a company Teddy is planning a hostile takeover of," Jones told us, "No one is supposed to know that."

  "And how do you?" I asked. "You hate this world as much as I do."

  "Yeah," he agreed. "But I'm thinking about the long game here, Harm. If I play my cards right, I can set us both up for life without needing to worry about kissing the matriarchal ass of our beloved grandmother to secure my place in the will."

  "Will," I snorted. "Please, evil people never die."

  "True," he agreed, sighing.

  "Besides, I don't need you to take care of me, Jones. You're my little brother, remember? I'm supposed to take care of you."

  "You need someone to look out for you," he said, more serious than I had seen him in a long time as he looked at me.

  "I—" I started.

  "Harmon!" my mom's voice called, a glint of the old her in her voice, happy, excited, pleased to see me.

  "Mom," I said, turning, giving her a smile, reaching for the hands she offered me. Hugs, it seemed, were a thing of the past for us. We held hands and squeezed hard. That was as good as it got. And, I guess, in a way, it was a relief because if I embraced her, I would feel all the bones popping out of her skin, would know for certain just how thin she had gotten under a dress made of a thick material that refused to cling, so it covered up a lot of what was beneath.

  "You look lovely," she said, eyes warm as they moved over me. "And you brought a date!" she said, beaming over at Huck for a moment.

  You know, until my step-father moved in beside her, all stiff on his braced legs, pushing a lot of his weight onto his ornate dark wood cane.

  I swear my mother shrank as he moved beside her, making me hate the man more than I already did. "Jones, we appreciate you attempting to look like a normal human being," he said, nodding his approval at my brother. "Harmon," he greeted me, making no comment on my attempts to look presentable for them, to not embarrass them.

  "Evan," I said, watching as his jaw tightened enough for a muscle to tick there. When they'd married I'd been forced to call him my father.

  It wasn't until after The Incident that I reverted to calling him by his first name. It pissed him off. And that brought me a small bit of joy.

  We shared tense, formal conversation as a "family" for fifteen minutes before my step-father led my mother away.

  She glanced over her shoulder at me, mouthing that she loved me.

  I mimed back to call me, getting a nod even though we both knew she probably wouldn't, almost never did, unless she was drunk and sad and needed someone to cry to.

  "I need a drink," Jones said, jaw tight, reminding me a bit of his father, even though I knew that was about where the similarities started and stopped.

  With that, he was gone, and Huck was standing there, his face a mask I couldn't see under.

  "So, let me get this right," he said as he led me over toward a private corner of the garden under a towering maple. "Your step-father keeps your mom away from you. And your mother is trapped somehow."

  "Essentially, yeah. I mean, she could leave. Of course she could. And I remind her of that every chance I can. I will try to again before we leave. But she just... she can't. I don't understand it, but she can't."

  "And you come here and put up with your shitty family just to get the chance to tell her she can leave if she wants to."

  "Pretty much."

  "You're a good daughter, babe," he told me, making it feel like someone had squeezed my heart in my chest. "Hey," he said, eyes going wide, concerned, making me realize that the sting in my eyes was tears, and that they were threatening to spill over. "No, don't do that," he demanded, looking lost.

  And the look of sheer terror on his face when a single tear managed to spill over and slide down my cheek actually made a hysterical laugh bubble up and burst out.

  "You're acting fucking crazy right now," he declared as the laughs kept coming, as the tears kept streaming at the same time.

  "Your... face... oh... God..." I gasped, leaning my forehead into his shoulder, trying to pull it together. "Okay. Whoosh," I said, straightening, reaching up to wipe the wetness off my cheeks. "Wow. I needed that. You looked ready to bolt," I told him, smiling. "Didn't you ever have to deal with your sister crying?"

  "You'd have to meet G
us to understand, but she's not really much of a crier. A shit-starter, a pain in the ass, the reason I had trouble sleeping my entire life until she settled down and moved away, sure, but not a crier. And if she did cry, I'm guessing that was what she had Ayanna for."

  "Well, your sister and I have that in common. The not crying thing. My therapist says it is unhealthy. She'll be happy I had a manic cry today," I said. "Come on, want to get some very expensive, very unsatisfying food to hold us over until we can get out of here and eat something greasy and disgusting?"

  "Sounds like a plan," he agreed.

  In the end, Huck had been a perfect date. And his effortless lying about his profession left me speechless and the various guests tried to figure out where they might have known him from, why the name didn't sound familiar. After all, he was in a designer suit, and on the arm of one of the grandchildren—step or not—of one of the wealthiest families on the East coast.

  "Okay, I have to ask," I said as we got our fifth round of cucumber sandwiches. "Where did you get the suit?"

  "Teddy," he told me, smiling. "He had the idea that when I jacked cars, I should do it in a suit, so no one suspected anything. It worked like a fucking charm, too. These are disgusting," he said, as he had with each previous one.

  "I know," I agreed, glad that the crowd was starting to dwindle down, hoping I could get one last conversation in with my mom.

  Eventually, I got one.

  Again, thanks to Huck's skills at pretending to be someone he was not, leading my step-father away for a moment so I could get a few desperate words in with my mother.

  After that, I linked my arm through Huck's, leading him toward the small crowd that was making their way out.

  "Harmon," my grandmother called. "We need to have some words," she said, making my belly drop.

  "Collette," Huck said, voice dropping at the end, sounding apologetic. "I'm afraid we double-booked social engagements today," he told her, and I had to press my lips together to keep from smiling. Social engagements. The term sounded so absurd coming out of his dirty-talking biker mouth.

  "Oh, of course," my grandmother said, clearly flustered, not used to being denied something. "Do come again... Huck."