We don't go where we're not wanted. He's dead to us. We're all we need now.
Everett taped off the boundaries for the two of them years ago, and as far as he knew Zora upheld their agreement. Joseph was no more than a sperm donor as far as Everett was concerned.
She lifted her arms now and firmly gripped his shoulders. "Ev..."
"What the fuck is going on? Do I need to be worried here? Because I getting there. Fast."
With the seriousness he hadn't seen on his sister’s face since the day Babs died, Zora pressed her lips together before letting out three words. "She's leaving tomorrow."
He couldn't figure where his mind went, but he searched through what felt like a million faces before he understood Zora meant Sophia.
Mike had steered clear of the room up until this point, up until the direction of the conversation took a turn out into left field, but he just materialized in the doorway out of nowhere.
The second Zo dropped the bomb about Sophia, Everett felt Mike's attention riveted on him.
"Bro, if you want to go, it's cool. We've got this." Heat crawled up to Everett's cheeks. His heart raced, and he swallowed hard, unwilling to meet Mike's gaze. He didn't know why, but he felt guarded all of a sudden. Defensive.
As if to echo his inner turmoil, both Zo and Mike barked the same thing at him at the same time: "You can't keep running."
The hollow thud of Mike's footsteps on the tile growing nearer to them sucked Everett back into Babs’s house. He was nine and Zora was four. It wasn't even six months after they found their mother unconscious on the bathroom floor surrounded by empty pill bottles, when they heard the hard cracks of Joseph's boots searching Babs’s house. Then he paused and loomed over the two of them, curled in the corner beneath the kitchen table, and said the words Everett had been trying to unhear ever since: She was the only one who wanted you.
If his mother loved him, how could she leave? How could they both have left?
As Everett swallowed the memory, he studied his sister protectively, then looked at Mike, blinking away the sting of tears. He asked himself the same question now about Sophia. She didn't even give him a chance to fight, to be there, to explain, or let her explain.
"It's time to do something. Now." Zora's words blasted a hole in his conflicting thoughts, and he gave her a shaky smile.
"What can I do? She doesn't want me." He straightened his back before he could collapse against the cushion. "Plus, I made a promise to Babs, and I'm keeping it."
"Fuck the house, Ev. Babs isn't here, but Sophia is. At least until tomorrow." Zo's hands went flying in the air, and the low rumble beneath her shrieking tone made her frustration almost palpable. She paused briefly, seemingly to let her nerves settle before starting in on him again. "Patton Place is a piece of property. This is the rest of your life we're talking about here."
Everett ran his hands over his hair. "I know. I know."
"I don't think you do. Are you honestly telling me you're going to sit here and do nothing when it's all in your hands this time?" Zora asked. "This isn't about Mom, or Joseph."
Just the mention of his father's name made his skin prickle and pulse with a mixture of anger and anxiety. He’d never held out on his sister until now. Knowing what he was keeping from her only added to his mounting worries. Sooner or later he was going to have to figure out a way to tell her what he learned today. And, judging from what happened with Sophia, it better be sooner.
For now, he let his head fall back and closed his eyes. Beside him, he could hear Mike plop down on the stuffed leather armchair. A second later, he felt both their hands wrapped over his—a mixture of hot and cold blending together, leaving him warmer on the inside. Even though his eyes were still closed, their proximity surrounded him with warmth, and the soft, even rhythm of their breathing soothed him.
They were rooting for him.
Their combined wills were so strong their effect was more like a single, powerful prayer uplifting him.
As much as Everett wanted to take the prayer and use it to rationalize what he needed to do—what his heart wouldn't allow him not to do—nothing could excuse his behavior. His lies. How much he’d behaved like his father.
"You have what you need to get her back, so go to her," Mike whispered. "I didn't trust her at first, but if you love her, I'm sure I will, too."
Taking her cue, Zora leaned in close to add her own two cents. "She expected it to be you when she opened the door, Ev. It's not too late to turn this around. Do you love her or not?"
She was challenging him the way she always had since she was born. Keeping him on his toes, meeting him measure for measure. But something in what she said didn't quite make sense. He heard her clearly, but what was she talking about?
What door?
What’s more, there was Zora’s question. Do I love Sophia?
Deep down, though, it wasn't his love he was worried about. If she asked him a million times, his answer would be a million times yes. Yes, he loved Sophia.
Admitting it wasn't the hard part, either.
There wasn’t a doubt in his mind how much he loved her, or where he could see this crazy, mixed-up match between them going. Everett knew himself. But there was still the elephant sprawled out in the middle of the room. The one thing he couldn't get around. As much as he was aware that he made his own bed, he’d given her no reason to trust him, let alone love him.
It was her love Everett doubted. What if she doesn’t love me back?
"Does it even matter?” he asked. “If she loved me, how could she leave?"
"I could ask you the same question. If you love her the way I know you do...because you wouldn't be sitting here beating yourself up about it otherwise...then how can you even fathom letting her go? You have to fight when it matters." Zora was pleading now, the strain in her voice begging and all but shoving him to move forward, to do something.
To not give up.
It was annoying as hell, but it was exactly what Everett needed. Of all the things that could motivate him to act, goad him into action, what always worked was the terrifying thought that he could be anything like the man who gave up on him and Zo. Joseph chose not to raise them, not to be a part of their lives. Abandonment was the worst thing you could do to a person you claimed to love. Essentially, it was saying, you're not worthy.
And Sophia was worthy of love.
With a renewed sense of urgency and his heart thumping erratically against his rib cage, he sat up, a mixture of adrenaline and defeat leaving him breathless and hopeless all at once.
"So what do I do?" he asked, unfamiliar with being on this side of right and wrong. His posture was bone-straight as he scooted to the edge of the couch.
He was ready for...for whatever would work.
Zora and Mike flanked him, seeming as anxious as he was. She nodded at him, as if agreeing to whatever thought zapped through his wired mind. Mike all but gave him a fist pump and an attaboy. This was the high school locker room all over again, but with two coaches instead of one, hyping him up until he was ready to take on an ironclad defensive line.
But then, Everett's brows knitted together. "Wait...what did you mean, 'she thought it was me at the door?' Whose door? Where was she?"
Only then did Zo's pep rally come to a halt. Her unwavering gaze dropped as she raked her fingers through her hair. "I went to see her at Babs’s house."
"You—"
"I couldn't go in," she blurted out before her brother could get a word in edgewise. This was his consolation. She still couldn't set foot in the house, but she made it there finally. Not to visit Babs’s grave or funeral, but to the house where Babs raised them, and without her big brother holding her hand.
He should have been hurt to learn Zora was holding out on him, but he was doing the same thing. The disappointment weighed down on him. Secrets.
When did they let the distance between them grow so wide?
She swallowed hard, her big brown eyes round and innoce
nt and remorseful.
"It's okay. I'm glad," he said, forcing a closed-lips smile.
"Wait." Zora shook her head and held up her palms, as if to halt all conversation while she rewound the back-and-forth and sorted through her thoughts. "What did Mike mean when he said you have what you need? And you still didn’t tell me where you guys were all day."
If the timing wasn't all wrong, Everett might have entertained his sister's questions, but the clock was ticking, and fast, if Sophia was leaving tomorrow.
So he didn't utter a word. He simply got up from the couch and strode to the entry table, where he retrieved Babs’s wooden box. When he returned to the couch and set it on Zo's lap, her mouth fell open, her eyes welled with tears, her lips began to quiver, and the dam broke.
With his hands over hers, he quieted her sobs.
"How did you—?"
Before she could finish her question, Everett responded. "It's with us now. And I think I know a way to make everything right," he said.
Babs gave him the tools to see things through. Now he had a plan for how to achieve his goal.
Chapter Twenty
After Zora’s visit, Sophia decided not to delay leaving Portland. With a call to the airline, she was able to get on the redeye that same night, and the second she landed the weight of everything she’d been through crashed down on her. She was back home in Las Vegas, but nothing about it felt like her home.
She was lost in space, floating, waiting to feel something solid—needing something real.
With Julie’s wedding creeping closer every day, Sophia threw herself into the plans and last-minute details, content to let the spotlight remain firmly on her cousin. She attended the prim and pearls bridal shower, and the wild, raunchy bachelorette party, all while wearing a toothy Vaseline smile...but deep down, the hollow ache in her heart gnawed at her from the inside out.
She was still existing somehow, but she missed Everett like mad.
Weeks had gone by since she spoke to him or Zora, and he’d stopped calling and texting. He was moving on. Her only Portland tie left was Kara. Just last week Sophia called and gave her an update on the house and the move. She told Kara she wished they’d hung out more and promised to hire her the second she figured out how she was going to get her restaurant up and running. But then she hurried off the phone because the restaurant made her think of Everett, the way everything did.
Don’t think about him.
“Snap out of it,” Mom yipped in Sophia’s ear, unscrewing her from her downward-spiral thinking. “The lady is talking to us.”
“Oh. Sorry.” She could feel her face burning. “What did you say?”
“No problem. I was just saying, please have a seat. And would you care for any tea or macaroons?” The woman at the bridal salon where Julie was having her final dress fitting looked like she was doing her best to plaster on a carefree smile, but her coastal blue eyes were impossibly wide and her woodsy brown locks were frazzled around the edges—like she, too, was having a day.
Along with Mom and Aunt Marian, Sophia followed her instructions and shuffled into the sitting area sans the tea and crumpets. The place was small, a tight space with a petite, dusty pink velvet settee where Sophia was sandwiched between her mother and aunt, suddenly finding it hard to breathe.
"I'll let you guys sit," Sophia said as she worked to get to her feet, but in classic Mom form, she was not having it. She jerked her daughter back down. Apparently the sandwich was by design.
She squished back into the teensy hybrid sofa/loveseat, chair, deflating with a loud sigh. "What?" Her legs, crossed at the ankle, ticked impatiently. She could just throw her hands up at this point. This was supposed to be about Julie, but somehow she knew Mom and Aunt Marian would find a way to make it about her.
"Now wait a minute, honey. While we've got a few minutes, I want to show you something." Seriously, her mom could be like gravy. A filling, spicy mix of warm and smothering.
Mostly out of necessity as opposed to choice, Sophia crossed her arms too, and shifted in the seat. She clenched her teeth and pasted on a tight smile. "Yes, Mother. What would you like to show me?"
Finally, with the spotlight, Mom whipped out a single, razor-sharp business card. As nonthreatening as it should have been, Sophia could feel in her bones that the glittery rectangular card was yet another one of Mom's boxes—ones to be checked off methodically. Find Sophia a house within a one-mile radius. Box. A budget-breaking retail pad able to meet Mom's high standards for a restaurant. Box. A new, handsome, wealthy man worthy of being her son-in-law, located no farther than Summerlin (because anywhere in the northwest or the southwest was acceptable, but the northeast and southeast were both beneath her and beyond her city limits).
Box.
Box.
Box.
Box.
"Is this really what we should be discussing while Jules is in there slipping into the dress she's going to be married in?” Fumes threatened to leak out of her ears. “Today is not about me. It doesn't always have to be about me on other days, either."
Given her usual expedited timeline and the peppy-looking realtor's card, Mom was already hard at work. It wouldn't be long until the plots for marriage and grandbabies were back in full force.
"Aw, honey. I'm just trying to help you."
Lord have mercy, woman, listen to reason.
"Any minute now Jules will emerge from that dressing room to show us this gorgeous gown. She's going to tell us she's never felt more beautiful, and we're not even going to notice because you insist on talking about how your friend has property listings for me. I have a house, and I found a place to open up my restaurant, but it's a little far from here, wouldn't you say?"
"And him? Do you still have him?" Ouch!
With a sharp intake of air, Sophia opened her mouth to unleash her fury. "Are you kiddi—?"
Aunt Marian pressed her hand down on Sophia's knee, silencing her. "It's just because you look so down, sweetheart. Like you're lost," she said, in her velvety voice. The woman hardly ever said anything, but when she did, you knew you better listen, and listen good. It was going to be something sage, something Maya Angelou-like, filled with depth and wisdom and inspiration.
Tears sprang to her eyes as she met her aunt's warm look.
"Now I know he's a nice young man. A good one, too, if you gave him your heart after everything you've been through. It's unfair, I know. We just want to remind you you're not alone. We can help you put down new roots here with us."
She laced her fingers with Aunt Marian's and squeezed, leaning against her.
"Do you remember when you were about seven and you played with this little tin baking set? Might have been six or seven. Anyway, it might not have seemed like it then, but you were running a bakery right from your mother's kitchen."
"Oh, shit, Marian. What's any of this got to do with the listings?" Mom chimed in. "Yolanda found one only three blocks away from us. She should be thinking about getting her life back in order. You know they have an app you can use for that kind of thing now." She waved her phone over Sophia's shoulder, apparently on the off chance that Sophia wasn't aware of what an app was or how to use one. "It's short for application. Like little websites on your phone, computer, or tablet."
"Thanks. I know what an app is, Mom."
Satisfied with her daughter’s digital knowledge, Mom stuffed her phone back in her purse and picked up a bridal magazine. Just past her, a girl holding a long veil and a bedazzled sash in her hand slipped into Julie's room down the hall.
Sophia imagined stepping into a sheer lace and tulle ball gown with a sweetheart bodice and a modest engagement ring on her finger. Nothing elaborate or too fancy, just family and a few friends coming together to celebrate two needles who found each other in a haystack. Even if Everett hadn’t loved her enough to tell her the truth, Sophia still loved him. She didn't know if she ever could get past it, but her heart still hoped they could share their love for the only home ab
le to tie the good from both their pasts and futures together.
And somewhere deep down she knew it was all Mom wanted for her, too.
Sophia looked away from Julie's dressing room back to her mother with her golden heart and iron will. Softly, she brushed a kiss across her cheek.
"I want you to be happy. Whatever it means for you," Mom said.
"Thank you for everything, Mom." She kissed her one more time before turning back to Aunt Marian.
"Anyway, it wasn't a restaurant you wanted back then, but you were selling cookies for fifty cents, and milk or lemonade for another fifty. You were a pint-sized businesswoman. But it was never about the money then. Your father’s the one who put all the importance on material things. Do you remember what you told me?”
Sophia shook her head.
"I about fell out of my chair laughing when I told your mother what you said, but somehow I didn't doubt you. It wasn't the way you were built. You told me you wanted to be the owner, because then you could be in charge of your own life. I want you to remember your dreams. You're still in charge of your own life, so if you want something...and now your mom is going to be mad at me for saying this...go for it. But it may or may not be here in Las Vegas."
"Goddammit, Marian. Now, don't you start. Why can't you look at the pretty dresses and mind your own business?" Mom pursed her lips. She was fuming mad.
Aunt Marian and Sophia doubled over with laughter, but her aunt, sweet as she was, continued advising her niece despite Mom’s agitation.
"It may or may not be a house around the corner from your family, or a family restaurant. It might be following your heart or starting a family of your own. You have to decide, sweetheart. It's your decision to make. Not mine. I'm sure she'll disagree with me, but it's not your mother's either."
On such an amazing note, Sophia reeled her aunt in for a breathless, giggling bear hug. The embrace itself was like clarity. She wasn't sure how she didn't notice it before, but she must have been waiting for this. For permission. For her mother's blessing, although she'd take her aunt's in lieu of her mom’s.
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