by Lori L. Otto
Jack left them both in the yard with the ball. Their game of catch was over, but for Max and Trey, their lifetime of friendship was just starting. I’d watched them for a few minutes before Livvy and I stole some time for us, but Jack and Emi returned to the yard to revel in their joy.
I lift my head and look at the two of them now. Mid-twenties, both in love with amazing people, and still I don’t think anyone or anything would come between Trey and Max as friends.
“Can I have my son back?” Will asks, taking him from me.
“Yeah.” I shake my head, getting myself back into the present. “He’s perfect, Will. I can’t wait for him to meet Luca. We’re on standby, starting now. You just tell me when I can bring him over.”
“We just need to get settled at home,” Shea says. “Then I want all of you to come–Luca and the girls. And all of you.” She looks around the room. “The whole family. I want him to grow up knowing all of you.”
“Well,” Emi says, “it just so happens that on October seventh…” She looks at me in time to see my face fall, my head bow to the ground. “Jacks and I are hosting dinner at our house for anyone who can come.”
I shake my head.
“It’s mandatory for Jon, but optional for anyone else.”
“No, I’ll drop the girls off or something. Maybe Luca and I can… I don’t know.”
“You’re coming, Jon,” Jack says.
And I know there’s no way I’ll be able to get out of it.
Chapter 32
Three weeks later, Jack and Emi asked to take Luca on what we’d all decided to call Livvy Day from here on out–October 7, Livvy’s birthday. It was a day that was significant to all of us–one that rotated around her while she was alive and the one we’ll use to celebrate her life today. Not having Luca or the girls to care for on a weekday, and in a vain attempt to keep myself distracted, I went into work. I’ve been going for half-days three days a week and working from home as needed for a month, but this was my first day to be at the office for an entire day.
I had a few internal meetings, but none with clients. Regardless, I shaved this morning and wore a suit–I know I would have if she had still been here. When I was getting ready, I imagined her in some beautiful, faraway place watching me with her vibrant smile and wishing she could be with me today on our 10th wedding anniversary. Never in a million years would I have imagined that we wouldn’t still be together to celebrate this milestone.
In the middle of the afternoon, I shut my door and pull all the blinds closed, feeling consumed by a flood of emotions and memories.
Tomorrow, it will be twenty years ago to the day that we went out on our first official date. I remember back to that night, frozen on the moment the night started when she opened the front door and I saw her in a dress for the first time. The words lingering on my tongue when I saw her were ‘You look so sexy,’ but Jack and Emi were right there and if I uttered those words, they’d never have let her leave the house with me.
To prepare for the date, I’d asked teachers, shop owners, librarians–anyone I could find–what the most upscale restaurants were in the city. It was not a subject I was even remotely familiar with. I had many suggestions, but when someone mentioned the name One if by Land, Two if by Sea, I stopped asking. I remember going to the computer lab at school and looking it up, and it was everything I was going for. Expensive enough for a Holland and known to be romantic. The only thing I didn’t know is if Liv had ever been there, so I had called her house to ask her parents. Emi was so kind when she answered my call, and I was relieved when it wasn’t Jack, who terrified me back then. She encouraged me to take her somewhere less fancy and warned me how expensive it was, but when I assured her I had enough money and, more importantly, wanted to take Livvy to the best place I could choose, she didn’t try to stop me.
When I selected the place, I didn’t expect Livvy to dress up. She always looked cute–she’d wear shorts in the summer and jeans and pants in the winter. She always looked like she could have walked out of the pages of any fashion magazine. No girls at my school ever dressed like her, so I knew whatever she wore for our date, she would be stunning and perfect and look way out of my league.
So that dress was a wonderful surprise to the hormonal teenager that couldn’t wait to hold her hand or, better yet, kiss her at the end of the night. And after that date, she wore dresses often. It was a turning point for her, and I always insisted she did it to drive me crazy. If she didn’t purposefully do it, the action had that effect on me, nonetheless.
That date wasn’t the best we would go on together, not by a long shot. It was awkward as we tested the boundaries of conversation and got to know each other’s limits. She learned that I had already slept with someone before, and I learned–a week later–that she couldn’t keep a secret–that secret–from her parents.
I will never forget that first confrontation with Jack. It would be the first of many, and it showed me what kind of man he was and what kind of man I’d have to learn how to communicate with–and he was never going to make it easy for me.
He was confident and had no difficulty making me feel uncomfortable, out of place and completely in the wrong, even when I wasn’t. The first time, I wasn’t prepared. I didn’t talk back. I just let him speak his mind. He told me his daughter was too young to be in a serious relationship. “You can erase every last one of those ideas you have flitting around in that 17-year-old head of yours, because they’re never going to happen. Do you understand?”
I told him I did.
Then he railed on me for taking her on a city bus at night.
I had no fear when I was younger and felt pretty damn invincible. That’s just how it was, being brought up in the neighborhoods we’d lived in, spending so much time defending myself and my brothers in the streets of the city. The dangers Manhattan posed to his daughter were not obvious to me until I became better acquainted with their family, so when he brought this up, I was honestly offended, surprised and a little amused by his display of what I thought was ignorance, privilege and snobbery. It wasn’t the Jack Holland everyone knew–and I’d soon learn that was a completely incorrect assessment of him, anyway. He closed the conversation by handing me a hundred-dollar bill. “Take this and swear to me you will never put her on another city bus. I don’t even like her on the subway. You need to be able to have more control over the situation when she’s with you, do you understand?”
I’d nodded my head, intimidated by the few inches he had on me. He’d used his height and stature, his clear and commanding voice, his piercing blue eyes–all of it–to his advantage. In hindsight, I knew it was all calculated and carefully orchestrated. He was making his claim on his daughter, letting me know he wasn’t ready to let her go.
It had taken me about five minutes to cool off and break down what had happened. Five minutes to assess the situation. Five minutes to know that, if I could get Livvy on my side, I would do everything to let Jack know that I was there to take her away from him.
Those days are such a distant memory. The Jack I knew then is so different from the man I know now. There’s no one I respect more. No one on this planet. He’s the father I never had; mine couldn’t show me love. He’s the father my brothers never had, too. The most welcoming, most considerate, most compassionate person who has cared for me like no one else, with the exception of his wife, of course–unconditionally and with no prejudice whatsoever.
He did the same for Livvy. I feel like the love I had for her was all consuming and that no one could love her more than I did, but he and I competed for her attention for years–and I truly think that the love we had for her was equal. He loved her as a daughter every bit as much as I did as a wife.
Livvy Day is not only important because it’s roughly the anniversary of our first date; we also got married on this day ten years ago. It was a surprise wedding on her birthday–we lured her parents down to Brazil from America under the guise of a surprise birthday party for h
er, but we turned the tables on them and gave them the surprise news of our nuptials–and told them a grandbaby was on the way.
To top it all off, this is the day that Jack and Emi finalized Livvy’s adoption when she was four. Thirty-two years ago, she became a Holland.
I’m not, I hear her in my head.
But you very much are, Liv. Who else would have taught you to love me so fiercely–considerately, compassionately, and most importantly, so unconditionally–if not the Hollands?
My assistant knocks on my door. Typically, she comes in without waiting for me to grant her permission, but today, she waits.
“Come in, Angel.”
She walks in with an arrangement of flowers. “These were left up front.” She sets them down with the card facing me.
For Livvy… It’s hand-written, not typed. I take the small paper and flip it over, but it’s not signed. “You don’t know who they’re from?”
“They weren’t signed.”
I smile and nod, and she leaves the room.
Studying the arrangement, I ponder who they might be from. If I were to guess, I’d say a woman wrote the card, but it could have been the florist. There’s no indication anywhere which florist these came from, either.
White roses, sprigs of lavender and a sparse mingling of another type of flower I’m not immediately able to name. Some sort of lily, and the insignificant blossom feels out of place in an arrangement like this. It’s a small, delicate wildflower that would hardly catch my attention had I not been studying the bouquet.
There’s really no point in studying it. It could have come from anyone. Any stranger, any minor acquaintance, an old friend–an old enemy? Hundreds of possibilities, really. It’s a thoughtful gesture to remember her today, though, but I can’t say they were thoughtful to remember the day. Even mainstream news had a brief tribute to her this morning to honor her life, which was nice, but hard to watch as I was getting ready for work.
After setting it aside, I dig back into a new sketch I’d begun earlier, getting used to the feel of my drafting table again and appreciating the return of at least some of my creativity. I was worried it had died with her, but it hasn’t.
Three hours later, I feel at peace in the Holland home with my son in my arms and one of my daughters sitting on either side of me on the couch, the two of them taking turns as they tell me about their days at school. They both had good days; they both have excellent grades to show off and cute stories to tell about how they were kind to a classmate. It was a new challenge that Trey had set forth for them a month ago, and they’d both taken it to heart: come home every day with a story of how you were truly kind to a classmate or how you went out of your way to help someone.
It was brilliant, and I’d already seen the positive changes in my daughters. I knew that he was the right choice to be a godfather for Luca. Having been raised by the Hollands, he would have ideas that would help my children grow up in the way Livvy would have wanted them to. The fact that he’s stepping in and helping with the girls already makes me cherish the bond we have even more.
I’m surprised when Coley walks in the door with him a half hour after I arrive. They both encourage me to stay seated with Luca, who’s now sleeping, while the girls shower them with hugs in the foyer. They come into the living room to talk to me after they’ve greeted Jack and Emi.
“Shouldn’t you be in Boston?” I ask him.
“I skipped one class and took Dad’s jet,” he says. “I couldn’t miss this.”
“I’m so glad you’re here.” I don’t know why I’m emotional, but I am. Coley somehow absconds with my youngest without waking him, but it allows me to embrace my brother-in-law tightly–a gesture I need, and it seems he does, too, although when he pulls back, he shows no evidence of sadness. I always thought I was the strong one, the stoic one, but it’s Trey. As an adult, I’ve rarely seen him cry, although he’s one of the most empathetic people I know.
Livvy’s aunts, uncles and a few of her cousins are the next to show up. There’s so much laughter and chatter in the house, it’s hard to feel sad among the people I’ve learned to call my own family. For many of them, it’s the first time they’ve gotten to spend any quality time with Luca, so he’s getting to see many new faces, and Jack, Emi and I are answering a lot of the same questions over and over again.
“He’s moving his head around on his own, yeah, and he’s learning that he can make different sounds.”
“He just started smiling when he sees us about two weeks ago. So, it took him a little longer to recognize us, but he’ll catch up.”
“We show him pictures of Livvy all the time. He’ll definitely know all about his mama.”
“The girls are doing great with him. They know how to feed him and change his diaper. They don’t volunteer, but they’ll do it if we ask. They do try to play with him all the time. They’ll speed his development along…”
“Yes, they still call him Froggie. No, the rest of us still call him Luca.” Even Emi has been calling him that tonight. I guess it’s to make sure no one else adopts the nickname she wants to use for him, and I appreciate it. I’m sure she knows how much I appreciate that.
My brothers and their “others” show up together and are attacked by my daughters, even though Will has his hands full with a diaper bag and a car seat carrying little Charlie. Quickly, I get up and take everything from him, freeing my nephew from his restraints.
He’s awake but quiet, with his eyes barely open. “Look at you, little man!” I say quietly, holding him into my chest. “Big man!” I correct myself, again noticing the weight difference. Shea brings over a blanket and wraps it around him. “How’s he been doing?”
“Pretty good. I hope he stays awake through this whole thing so we can all sleep a little tonight.”
“Good luck with that.” I smile at her, knowing exactly what she’s going through. “Luca was sound asleep. Hopefully all the passing around has woken him up… although I’d probably know if it had. He would probably be crying after seeing people he didn’t know.”
“Is anyone sick?” she asks.
“Emi told anyone who was sick not to come,” I tell her, “so if they’re here, they’re well.”
“Okay.” She scans the room. “And they have hand sanitizer out.”
“It’s all over,” I laugh, showing her four different dispensers. “I’ve watched people use it on their own and I’ve watched both Jack and Emi point it out.”
“Good. Does the worry ever go away?”
I nod. “Yes. With the second child.”
“But…” She frowns playfully. “Oh, such a cute arrangement!” she says, taking a seat next to me and looking at the bouquet I’d brought with me to the party. “Did you buy that for her?”
“Someone sent it to the office. I don’t know who. It wasn’t signed.”
“Hey, that’s a sego lily,” Will says, taking a seat in the club chair on the other side of me. Willow sits in his lap.
“Wils, come on. You’re too big for that.”
“It’s fine,” my brother says, trying to look over a book she’s attempting to show him. “Did you know that’s a sego lily?”
“No. Why is that significant to me?”
“It’s not,” he says.
“Why do you know that, babe?” Shea asks, touching the thick mop on Charlie’s head.
“I picked a bunch of those for Laila because I didn’t have the money to buy her flowers one time. They’re the state flower of Utah.”
“Huh.” I find that curious.
“They only bloom in the summer, though, and I’ve never seen them in New York. Maybe they have a greenhouse here where they cultivate them.”
“Who’s Laila?” my youngest daughter asks.
“A witchy woman who lived in Utah when your uncles were there,” Shea responds for my brother. “She took Uncle Will’s delicate little heart and blasted it to pieces.”
Will laughs at her answer, and at Willow’s s
hocked expression.
“How’d you put it back together?” she asks her uncle curiously.
“I didn’t.” He shrugs, then points to his wife. “She did.” When Willow looks at me for confirmation of their story, I simply nod.
“Wow. You must have magic powers...”
“All women do, Wils. Stick with me, and I’ll show you how to use yours.”
“Really?”
“Absolutely!”
“Today?”
“Not today. When you’re a woman.”
“So, when I get my period?” She’s loud enough that at least ten people in the house stop what they’re doing and look in her direction. My daughter doesn’t seem fazed by this.
Shea nods. “Exactly.” There’s not a topic my sister-in-law won’t discuss. “When you get your period.”
“I can’t wait,” she says, giggling. “And Edie, too?”
“Of course!”
“I’m gonna go tell her!”
“Okay!”
After she runs off, the three of us laugh together. “I mean, if I can put a positive spin on that life event,” Shea says, “I really do have magic powers.”
I completely agree with her.
I hear Luca getting fussy in the other room and hand off Charlie to her so I can check on my son. When I look up, I see people looking at us “Shea, they’re coming for yours,” I tease her.
By the time I navigate through the crowd of relatives, my baby is quiet again. Callen’s holding him in the formal dining room where it’s quieter.