Hunker Down with the McKallisters: A Cake Series Novella

by J. Bengtsson

  Ugh. Right about now, I wished I had Slater’s superpower. How nice would it be to escape the scrutiny of a job poorly done by holding my breath and passing clean out onto the floor.

  “Casey,” Michelle said, grabbing my hand and squeezing, “you need a breather.”

  “No, I’m fine.”

  “No, you’re not. Go take a break. Get a shower; maybe a nap. Scott and I have the kids.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. Go.”

  “Okay. And if Lily gets a hairball, don’t worry, she’ll just hack it back up.”

  Michelle laughed and then wrapped her arms around me and gave me the hug I sorely needed. “You’re a good mama, Casey. We all have bad days.”

  “I just… I feel like I’m failing Slater. I’m worried something is wrong.”

  “There’s nothing wrong with him, Casey. He’s his father’s son. And those mighty lungs of his will one day carry him across a stage. Mark my words, Slater’s going to be a star.”

  I stood in front of the mirror, my soiled clothing telling the story of my day. Snot, cat poop, and tears all conspiring to ruin my day. I had to let it go. Michelle was right. We all had bad days. Stripping off my clothes, I stepped into the shower and let the water rain down over my head. When had life gotten so rough around the edges? The virus, and the changes we’d had to make to accommodate it, was nothing in comparison to losing Jake. I needed him back. He was the missing link—the crunchy peanut butter to my messy jelly. Closing my eyes, I pressed my head to the glass and let the tears come. I wasn’t sure how long I’d been drowning myself in my watery pity party when the shower door suddenly swung open and my husband was standing before me.

  “Jake?”

  Flinging off his shoes and tossing his phone onto the vanity, Jake stepped into the shower fully clothed and gathered me into his arms, holding me tighter than I think he ever had. Every bit of my anxiety and stress washed away in his strong embrace.

  I gripped some of his sopping t-shirt into my hand and tugged. “You’re such a nut. You couldn’t take your clothes off first?”

  “There was no time. You needed me.”

  Those words. His heart. I knew then everything was going to be all right. I reached up on my tip-toes and kissed him. “Yes, I needed you.”

  Jake trailed a finger over my breast. “I need you too.”

  “Tell me this is over, Jake.”

  “It’s over.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  “Because I’m smart and I do meth with my teacher.”

  “You got the picture?”

  “Oh, I got the picture, all right.”

  “Can you imagine if I hadn’t caught that? The teacher would’ve checked the name and been like, ‘Oh right, the McKallister boy. His dad’s a rock star. They probably bathe in the stuff.’”

  “I think you should have just let him turn it in. I don’t want to be the kind of parent who has to rush in and save my kid. I want him to make mistakes. That’s what life is all about. Look how many mistakes I’ve made, and I’m still ticking.”

  “Yes, but you’re superhuman. The rest of us aren’t as bulletproof.”

  “And that’s why I’m here to protect you.”

  I gripped his chin between my fingers and looked him in the eyes, repeating my earlier question. “How can you be sure you’re all right?”

  “I tested negative, Casey. I’m free—unlike my daughter, who you imprisoned in cat jail.”

  A smile jumped freely to my face, finally finding some humor in the afternoon from hell. “Ah, you heard that, huh?”

  “I heard a lot of things.” Jake laughed. “And might I add, that was some stellar parenting there, champ.”

  “Well, you know. I’ve always been an out of the box kind of gal.”

  “Yes, you have. It’s what I love about you.”

  “And your mom made me feel better about Slater. She said, with his lungs and his temperament, he was going to be just like his daddy.”

  Jake wrapped his arms around my waist. “God help him.”

  “I don’t know.” I reached down and pulled his sopping shirt over his head and tossed it to the floor of the shower. “I say he should be so lucky.”

  “That’s only because you’re biased,” he replied, his hands cupping my ass and squeezing.

  My fingers fumbled with his jeans, now vacuum-sealed to his body and held down by twenty pounds of water weight. “At least you could have taken these off before getting in to save me.”

  “I was going for romantic,” he said, dipping his head into the hollows of my neck and kissing me all while unbuttoning his pants and sliding them over his waist and legs.

  I stepped back, looking at him. Even though he’d lost some weight in quarantine, I couldn’t remember ever seeing him as sexy as he was now, water sliding through his hair and down the rugged body, marked with scars and etched with tattoos, that I loved so much. Jake lay his head against the glass as I traced my fingers over his slick stomach and then grabbed hold.

  “Have you been saving yourself for me?” I whispered.

  “Um…” he hesitated, a charming grin falling over his handsome face. “Sure.”

  I laughed, feeling light and free for the first time since he’d gone away. Everything was going to be all right again. I could feel it in my bones.

  “What about you?” he asked, slipping his fingers down and brushing them between my legs.

  “Sure,” I groaned. Jake kept the pressure up as mini explosions rocked through me. “But nothing feels as good as you.”

  Placing my hand against his chest, I pushed him back against the glass. He didn’t need any prompting, already hard and wanting. Jake lifted me off the ground and my legs wrapped around him. Keeping my eyes focused on him as he entered me, I crushed my lips to his and savored the feel of his body sealed in mine. His capable hands holding me steady, I set the rhythm—slow and steady at first, but as the heat burned through me, I increased the intensity until he was driving deeper inside. Hitting a crescendo, I buried my head in his neck to stifle the screams as my man carried me off to oblivion.

  Returning me to wobbly legs, Jake slid his fingers into my wet hair and pulled me toward him, dropping a kiss to my forehead then moving over the rest of my face. He’d missed me, like I had him. It occurred to me then why I’d been so off lately. Jake and I were never meant to survive alone. Michelle might not have known then, but when she was raising Jake, she was molding him into the man I would someday love. My thoughts shifted to Slater. I would do the same for him – shape him into the best version I could before offering him up to a lucky someone.

  “You good?” Jake asked, tipping up my chin and pressing a gentle kiss to my lips.

  I nodded, smiling up at him as my strength returned. “I’m great.”

  “Let’s go home.”

  Epilogue: Keith

  Lockdown – Day 55

  “You’re late,” Jake said, intercepting me in the driveway.

  “Yeah, well, it was somewhat unavoidable given the circumstances,” I grumbled, readjusting the suit I’d hastily thrown on in my bid to get out the door. Either I’d gained a few pounds during quarantine or someone had snuck into my house while I was eating and snipped an inch or two off the waistband. Or maybe it was just that I wasn’t used to actual clothes restricting my body anymore. The great part of owning a surf shop was that the wardrobe requirements were minimal. My work uniform consisted mainly of board shorts and tank tops. Or, if I was feeling a little more formal, pocket shorts and a t-shirt. Then the pandemic hit, and Sam was lucky to find me in anything more substantial than a pair of boxers.

  “Did Sam and the boys make it?” I asked.

  “Yes. They’re here. Everyone’s here. We’ve all just been waiting on you.”

  What was new? I’d never been the most punctual guy. Why give the most important job of the day to me? What were they thinking?

  “I’m here. Chill out, dude.”

&
nbsp; “I would, except…” Jake’s mouth twitched like it wanted to say something but was worried I might punch it if it did.

  “Except what?” I asked, impatiently.

  “Okay, don’t get all pissed off, but I gotta ask. Did you get caught in a hurricane on the way over here?”

  “What do you mean?” My hands shot to my head. “Oh, shit!”

  My hair. I knew I’d forgotten something. No surprise, given what I’d been dealing with all morning. Sam and I had awoken to a bang. It took all of two minutes to discover the burst water heater in the garage. Typically, such a thing would have been an unwelcome headache, but given that half of our covid-closed store’s merchandise was stacked floor to ceiling in the watery hell, it became a race against time to get our livelihood onto dry land.

  “No offense, Keith, but you look like a lounge singer who’s been throwing up all night.”

  “Yeah, well you look like…” I let my words run dry after getting a peek at my brother and finding absolutely nothing to insult him on. In fact, he looked like a fucking runway model in his fitted designer suit. It even looked like… yes, the asshole had somehow gotten a haircut in the middle of a pandemic.

  Jake continued with his unhelpful commentary. “You might want to fix it because there will be pictures.”

  Like I didn’t understand the situation. I knew full well what today entailed. It wasn’t like my hair was actively trying to derail the proceedings. “Do you have a comb or something?”

  He raised a brow. “A weed whacker might be of more benefit.”

  “Jake! You’re not helping,” I snapped back. “Get me a damn comb, now!”

  “Jesus. So testy,” he said, checking his watch as he jogged up the stairs. “Follow me.”

  We raced into the house and straight to the nearest bathroom. As I scoured through the drawers for something – anything – Jake ran off in another direction to try his luck. He returned a minute later with a brush in his hand.

  I raised a brow. “Tell me that’s not what I think it is.”

  “It’s all I could find,” he panted, offering it up to me. “Take it or leave it.”

  “If I take it, are you going to tell anyone what happened here today?”

  Jake thought about it a moment before giving me an honest reply. “Yes.”

  Of course he was.

  I nodded. “Fair enough.”

  Grabbing the dog brush, I raked it through my rowdy hair.

  Jake and I exited the bathroom together, and while normally the optics of that might have warranted an off-color joke directed at my brother, neither one of us was in the mood for a bit of light-hearted word play. On our way out the door, we ran straight-on into Grace.

  “Keith!”

  That one word encompassed so many different emotions. Anger, frustration, impatience.

  Jake dipped out of the conversation before it even began. “I’ve got to go find Quinn.”

  Really? He was just leaving me on the rocky ridge to die? This was no band of brothers.

  Grace and I watched him walk away before she turned back to me, hand on hip.

  I swallowed, actually somewhat fearful of what she had to say. Wait a minute! Why was I scared of my baby sister? What was she… like, twelve?

  “Grace!” I mimicked back… to show her who was boss.

  “Do you remember our conversation?” she asked, as if speaking to a child.

  I remembered. She’d called last night before bed. In fact, she’d called every night before bed for the last week. But then, I supposed I could cut her some slack since my little sister was the brains behind this operation. Three weeks ago, she’d come up with the idea to surprise our parents for their thirty-fifth wedding anniversary, and since the entire family was homebound in Los Angeles for the unforeseeable future, we all just fell in line behind her like dutiful little soldiers.

  “No,” I lied.

  “No?” The edge in her voice told me Gracie was no longer a child. What year was she born again? I calculated her age in my head while she waited. And waited.

  “Holy shit! Are you twenty-one years old?”

  “Twenty-two,” she sighed. “Focus, Keith. You promised to be here an hour in advance to go over your speaking parts.”

  I wasn’t paying attention, still focused on how she’d grown up without me noticing. “Damn, you’re way older than I thought.”

  “Keith!”

  Another one-word accusation. Damn, she had more Emma in her than I realized.

  “Relax, Gracie-Bear,” I said, patting her head. “I already have my speaking parts memorized. I’ve got this.”

  Moving away from my sister-boss, I slipped into the kitchen to get a quick snack when I ran into Emma. Her assigned job was the food, and damned if she wasn’t taking it seriously. The counter was full of covered platters.

  “Ah, look who the cat dragged in.” Emma smirked as she got a full-body look at me. “You look just lovely. I really like the Labradoodle hair. Very stylish.”

  “Jake told you already?” I gaped. “When does he find the time to tattle?”

  Emma smiled. “Some people accomplish things before noon, Keith. It’s called an alarm clock.”

  “I accomplish things. For example, I have four boxes of bikinis now drying in the sun.”

  Emma cringed. “Yeah, Sam told me about that. Were you able to save any of your merchandise?”

  “Yeah, only the boxes on the garage floor were affected, but they were all wrapped in plastic, so I think it’s fine.”

  “That’s good. And Jake didn’t rush in here to snitch. I was in the kitchen when he found the dog brush.”

  “Why would mom keep the dog brush in the kitchen in the first place?”

  Emma pointed toward the back wall. “Probably for the same reason she has a cat condo off the picture window.”

  Quinn came sliding into the room. “Has anyone seen Jake?”

  “He just took off. He was looking for you.”

  “Oh!” Quinn startled. “Is he pissed?”

  Why Quinn assumed he was in trouble, I had no idea, but now that I knew he did, I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to mess with him. I mean, what kind of a big brother would I be if I didn’t get that blood of his pumping a little faster?

  “Well, he didn’t look happy,” I warned. “Like on a scale from one to ten—I’d say he was maybe an eleven.”

  “Seriously?” Quinn groaned. “I don’t know why he’s mad at me. You’re the one that’s late. And…” Quinn scanned me with his eyes like all of my other siblings had, and like them, he also managed to find fault.

  “Uh, Keith. Are you… um… planning on wearing those flip-flops with your suit?”

  I followed his eyes down, wiggling my toes. The original plan had been to dig my dress shoes out of the hall closet, but in my haste to get over here, I’d forgotten. It wasn’t until I was pulling into the driveway that I realized I was still wearing my beach thongs.

  “Yeah. You got a problem with that?” I asked, puffing my chest to project importance. Afterall, I was still his superior, even though his bank account might say otherwise.

  Quinn lifted his hands to placate me. “Hey, I don’t have a problem. But Mom might.”

  “Mom?” I waved off his concerns. “She hasn’t approved of anything I’ve worn since I was ten. Besides, it’s just family. Who’s going to judge me?”

  Maybe if we were expecting a crowd, I might have put more effort into my appearance, but here at home, surrounded by my loved ones, why try? If anyone would be okay with ingrown toenails, it would be them. That was the beauty of family.

  At Grace’s insistence, I headed outside to take my place on the platform, passing Kyle along the way. He’d been put in charge of decorations and was hanging lights along the white fencing.

  “Hey,” I said, bumping fists with my little bro.

  “Hey, dude. What’s up?”

  “Not much,” I replied, my eyes widening as they took in Kyle’s stylistic c
hoices. “What do we have here?”

  Kyle shrugged. “The decorations.”

  “Huh. Has Grace seen these?”

  “No. It’s a surprise.”

  I nodded. Oh yes, this would be a surprise, all right. I ran my fingers along the string lights.

  “Are these… tacos?”

  “Yeah. Grace said to order something fun and whimsical. What’s more festive than tacos?”

  I gripped his shoulder. It was more consolatory than anything else. Once Grace got a load of this, Kyle would be on life support, so there was no point in ruining what was left of his day.

  “I like it. Oh, and don’t forget to hang that giant blowup chalupa over by the alter.”

  Standing front and center in my too-tight suit, poufy hair, and flip-flopped feet, I watched as my mother made her way down the aisle, flowers in hand, flanked by her daughters—all of them—Emma, Grace, Casey, Kenzie, Sam, and Kate. My dad stood on the stage beside me, with his sons—all of then—Me, Mitch, Jake, Finn, Kyle, and Quinn.

  The only ones left in the audience were the grandkids, the youngest ones being tended to by the oldest. This wasn’t a big celebratory affair. It wasn’t even a small one. This was just family, coming together to honor our own. Thirty-five years of love and struggle. Thirty-five years of laughter and tears. They’d survived it all. But the one thing they’d never done together was walk down the aisle—until today.

  Left to their own accord, my parents would’ve never renewed their vows. They’d always been fine with their bare-bones nuptials at the city hall, attended only by her sister and his brother. They didn’t need pomp and circumstance to prove their love for one another… or their commitment. They just needed each other… and us.

  So, in keeping with that family first approach, my parents had planned a vacation to Hawaii to celebrate their thirty-fifth anniversary and invited all of us to come. But then the virus hit, tipping the world upside down. With their trip canceled, my parents had, no doubt, resigned themselves to a quiet evening alone… until we all began arriving a little over an hour ago. It was only then that they realized something unexpected was happening. Still, they couldn’t have predicted this – an altar set up in their backyard and a chance for my mom to finally walk down the aisle and marry the man she loved.