The Other Brother (Chop, Chop Series Book 4)

by L. N. Cronk

She shook her head.

  I sat down on the bed next to her and took one of her hands.

  “It’s not good,” I said gently.

  “What?” she asked, squeezing my hand as I saw fear flash across her face.

  “Chase is really sick,” I told her.

  “Chase?”

  “Yeah,” I nodded. “Do you know anything about Huntington’s disease?”

  She shook her head, and so I explained it all to her . . . about the hallucinations and the swallowing and the paralysis. Then I got to the part about Tanner and Jordan each having a fifty percent chance of having it too.

  “No,” Laci whispered, tears welling up in her eyes.

  I nodded.

  “No, no, no, no, NO!” she cried, burying her head on my shoulder.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. I held her tight and stroked her hair while she wept. Finally, she stopped crying and sat back.

  “How did Tanner seem?” she asked, wiping her eyes.

  “Um, I don’t know. Okay, I guess . . . all things considered.”

  “What about Jordan?” she wanted to know.

  “Jordan doesn’t know right now,” I explained. “We can’t let anybody know . . . especially him or Charlotte.”

  “But they have to find out sometime!”

  “I know,” I said. “But they want Jordan to get through his first year at college without having something like this on his mind.”

  “Jordan’s a lot stronger than they’re giving him credit for,” Laci said.

  “I know,” I said. “I think they’ll be surprised at how well he handles it, but right now it’s not up to us.”

  “And how are we supposed to keep this from Charlotte?”

  “Well,” I said, “we won’t be seeing her as much now that she’s away, so that’ll help . . .”

  “Are you kidding?” Laci asked. “She’s only two hours away. We’re gonna see her all the time!”

  “We’re just gonna have to pretend we don’t know about it,” I said.

  “I wish I didn’t know about it,” Laci said, tears coming into her eyes again.

  “I know,” I said. “Me, too.”

  ~ ~ ~

  TWO DAYS LATER, Tanner called and told me that he’d decided to get tested for Huntington’s. He must have also decided that life was too short and that he was going to enjoy it no matter what, because he bought himself a new pontoon boat and was going to have a big picnic on Cross Lake.

  “This weekend. Can you and Laci make it?”

  “It’s gonna be crowded,” I warned. “It’s Labor Day weekend.”

  “I know,” he said, “but I figure if we get there early enough we can have our pick of spots, and if we don’t get a good spot we’ll just hang out on the boat. It’s big enough.”

  “I’ll double check with Laci,” I said. “But that sounds great.”

  “I’m gonna ask Mike and Danica and Ashlyn and Brent. And Natalie and her new boyfriend are coming.”

  “Her new boyfriend!?” I cried. “I thought you were her new boyfriend!”

  “Naw,” he said. “We decided it wasn’t gonna work out.”

  “Aw, Tanner . . . now I’m gonna get yelled at.”

  “Why are you going to get yelled at?”

  “’Cause every time you screw up I get yelled at.”

  “I didn’t screw up,” he said. “It was a mutual decision.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bet.”

  “It was,” he insisted. “We’re still friends.”

  “You have a lot of friends,” I told him, shaking my head.

  Charlotte found out about the picnic and – never one to pass up a day on the lake – invited herself along. Jordan, unfortunately, wasn’t planning on coming home until Christmas.

  “Plane tickets are sooooo expensive,” she explained on the ride up to the lake. Tanner, Charlotte, Laci and I were riding in Tanner’s truck, pulling the boat. Mike was following us with Danica, Natalie and Julian – Natalie’s new boyfriend. (Ashlyn and Brent hadn’t been able to come.) “I’m flying down there over fall break and my ticket was over seven hundred dollars!”

  “You’re spending over seven hundred dollars just to see Jordan for a couple of days?” I exclaimed.

  “About a thousand if you wanna count my hotel room and stuff.”

  “Is that really smart, Charlotte?” I asked. “Can’t you just wait ’til he comes home at Christmas?”

  “That’s over three months away!” she cried. “I’m not waiting three months to see him!”

  “Charlotte–,” I began.

  “Don’t start, David!” she interrupted. “I’m not in the mood for one of your lectures about my money.”

  After her dad and brother had been murdered, a trust fund had been set up for Charlotte. Once Charlotte’s sweet little seven-year old face had been splashed across the Internet and TV news, donations poured in and had been accumulating interest for the last ten years. I didn’t know exactly how much money there was, only that (according to Mrs. White) there was enough so that she could “get her bachelor’s degree and her master’s from any university in the country and still have money left over”.

  When Charlotte had turned eighteen, she had legally gained access to all of that money, but then she had also received a full scholarship to State. Now – with all that money at her disposal – I just wanted to make sure that she made wise decisions.

  “I don’t think you need to be squandering all your money away,” I told her. “One day you’re going to want that money for something!”

  “Guess what? I already want that money for something! I want it for a plane ticket to go see Jordan!”

  “David,” Laci interjected, “I don’t think it’s unreasonable for Charlotte to spend a little bit of her money.”

  “A thousand dollars is not a ‘little bit of money’!” I protested.

  “Well,” Tanner argued under his breath, “relatively speaking . . .”

  “Shut up, Tanner,” I said. “Look, Charlotte, you start spending a little bit here and a little bit there, and pretty soon it’s all gonna be gone. And what are you going to have to show for it? You need to be frugal!”

  “Frugal?”

  “Yes, frugal!”

  “Nobody uses that word anymore, David. You sound like my mom.”

  Tanner grinned.

  “Shut-up, Tanner,” I said again.

  “I didn’t say anything,” he laughed.

  “Look, David,” Laci began, but Charlotte cut her off.

  “No, no, Laci. He’s right. I need to be more frugal. I’ll cancel my hotel reservation and just shack up with Jordan in his dorm room. That’ll save about three hundred bucks.”

  “Very funny, Charlotte,” I said, and Tanner and Laci both laughed.

  “I’m just trying to be frugal!”

  “Guess what?” Laci asked, successfully changing the subject. “I might be flying to Texas myself in December.

  “What?” I asked, craning my neck to see her because she was sitting behind me.

  “Yeah,” she nodded. “I haven’t had a chance to tell you yet, but I’ve been invited to speak to Ergon’s Board of Directors.”

  Ergon was Ergon Ministries – the organization that Laci had worked for when we’d lived in Mexico. Its name came from the Greek word for “work” – as it’s used in Colossians 1:10 – bearing fruit in every good work. Ergon Ministries was an outreach program, specializing in providing organized mission trips for youth groups from the US After the groups raised enough money, they could work at an orphanage (the same one we’d adopted our children Dorito and Lily from) and at a landfill where the poorest of the poor lived.

  “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I said. “You’re not going back to work for them.”

  I meant it as a question, but it came out as a statement.

  “I didn’t say I was going back to work for them,” she answered evenly. “They just asked me if I could fly down there for this one event.”

  “How long w
ould you be gone?”

  “I don’t know. Probably four days.”

  “Four days?! What am I supposed to do while you’re gone for four days?”

  “I’m confident you can handle it,” she said, patting me on the arm.

  “What about the kids?”

  “I’m confident you can handle that, too.”

  “I can’t believe you’re gonna leave the kids for four days!”

  “You just told me that I needed some time away from them!” she exclaimed. “Remember? That’s why they’re with your parents right now instead of with us!”

  She deepened her voice to imitate me. “Let’s get my parents to watch ’em, Laci. You need time away from the kids.”

  “One little picnic is a whole lot different than four days!”

  “I’ll come over and check on him,” Tanner promised Laci.

  “Thank you,” she answered.

  “When is it?” Charlotte asked.

  “Well, I’d probably fly out on the fifteenth and fly back on the eighteenth.”

  “I’ll be coming home for Christmas break on the sixteenth,” Charlotte said. “I’ll check on him too.”

  “See?” Laci asked me. “You’ll be fine. You’ll hardly even know I’m gone.”

  “I couldn’t believe it when Tanner told me that you and Danica were actually going to join us,” I told Mike while we were waiting for Tanner to back the boat trailer onto the ramp.

  “I couldn’t believe that somebody called me and wanted something other than free medical advice,” Mike answered.

  “Actually, now that you mention it, my shoulder’s been aching,” I told him, rubbing it.

  “I’ll be glad to amputate.”

  “How’s your mom?” Laci asked him.

  “You’ll never guess,” he answered.

  “She’s getting married!” Laci squealed. (Mike’s dad had died the summer before Mike started high school.)

  “Okay,” Mike muttered, “maybe you can guess.”

  “Really?” I asked. Mike nodded.

  “Do you, I mean . . . is he a nice guy?”

  Mike shrugged. “I guess.”

  Just then Tanner hopped out of his truck and looked at us.

  “All right, which one of you clowns is driving?”

  “Driving the boat or the truck?” I asked.

  “I shudder at the thought of either,” he said, “but since I can’t clone myself . . .”

  “I’ll drive the boat,” I volunteered.

  “Good choice.”

  “Shut up, Tanner.”

  A few years earlier, I’d turned too sharply while backing the boat into his garage and the boat trailer had put a hole in his tailgate.

  Mike jumped up into the boat with me and Tanner stood on the wheel-well, leaning over the side.

  “Don’t touch anything else!” he growled after he was finished showing us how to start it and back it off the trailer. “I don’t even know what half these buttons do.”

  “We’re a doctor and an engineer,” Mike pointed out. “I think we can handle it.”

  “Don’t touch anything else,” he warned again. He patted the boat. “I’m sorry, girl.”

  “He’s not sorry,” I told the boat. “He’s clearly choosing the truck over you.”

  Cross Lake was dotted with islands and, like Tanner had suspected, we’d arrived at the lake early enough to find one without a crowd. He beached the pontoon boat and he and Mike started cleaning out a fire pit we found about twenty feet from the shore. Charlotte was on the phone with Jordan. Natalie and Julian headed off down the beach in one direction, looking for wood, and Laci and I went in the other.

  Before long, we came across a little creek, filled with cold water and covered with a blanket of tiny algae. Frog eyes disappeared beneath the surface as we approached, and when we got very close, several of them leaped to safety.

  “Dorito and Lily would love this,” Laci said. “We’ll have to remember this place next time we come here.”

  “See?” I said. “You can’t stop thinking about the kids. How are you gonna survive without them for four days?”

  “If you don’t want me to go, I won’t,” she said.

  I sighed. “What do they want? Why are you going?”

  “They were thinking about starting a campaign to expand the ministry before I left, but now they’re having trouble just keeping things going like they were. Aaron wants me to talk to the board and help them redefine the search parameters and pay scale and everything.”

  Aaron was her old boss, and apparently he hadn’t been able to find a suitable replacement for Laci since she’d left two years earlier.

  “You’re irreplaceable,” I told her. I got only a small smile from her.

  “Look,” I said, “you know I don’t care if you want to go to Texas for four days, but . . .”

  “You’re worried they’re going to try to convince me to go back?”

  “Yes.”

  “David,” she said, stopping and taking my hand. “You know I wouldn’t go back there unless God lets us know that’s what He wants us to do.”

  I leaned my forehead against hers and held both of her hands.

  “I don’t want to go back there,” I told her.

  “I know you don’t.”

  “I do not want to go back!”

  “I know,” she said again, squeezing my hands, “but you will if God tells us to, right?”

  “You know I will,” I said unhappily.

  “So then, let’s quit worrying about it right now. I don’t think that’s what this is about. This is just about them getting some practical feedback from me. It’s a one-time thing.”

  Somehow I doubted that, but I nodded, and we started walking into the woods.

  “So, when do you go?” I asked, leaning down and picking up a large tree limb.

  “They want me to fly down there on Tuesday the fifteenth and then I’d come home on Friday. That’s the last day of school for Dorito before Christmas break.”

  “So that’s really only three nights,” I said, breaking the limb in half over my knee. “I guess I could have dinner with my mom and dad one night and with your parents one night and with Mrs. White one night . . .”

  “You think you’ll be able to make it?” she smiled.

  “Yeah,” I said. “I’ll be fine.”

  After lunch we all went swimming and then Laci and I spread a blanket out on the beach and lay down to dry off in the sun. Charlotte helped Mike spread out another blanket and they both sat down on it.

  “So tell us about this guy your mom’s marrying,” Charlotte suggested.

  “I dunno,” Mike said, shrugging.

  “You don’t seem too thrilled about him,” Laci noted.

  “It’s not him,” Mike said. “I think that no matter who it was I’d probably be a bit . . .”

  “Overprotective?” Laci guessed.

  “I suppose,” he admitted.

  “My mom dated some guy when I was in middle school.”

  “Mr. Barnett?” Mike asked.

  “Yeah,” Charlotte nodded. “I hated him.”

  “Why?” Mike asked.

  “I think mostly because I was in middle school,” she smiled. “It’s like you said, there wasn’t really anything wrong with him . . .”

  “She hasn’t dated anyone since then, has she?” he asked.

  “No,” Charlotte said, “and now I really wish she’d find somebody. I’m not there very much anymore and I hate her being all alone . . .”

  Mike sighed.

  “When’s the wedding?” I asked.

  “I don’t know,” Mike said. “They just got engaged.”

  “How long have they known each other?” Laci wanted to know.

  “I guess ever since we moved. He goes to our church.”

  “What’s he do for a living?” Charlotte asked.

  This went on for a while as we continued to grill Mike for details about his future step-father. Ultimately
, we decided that his mom could do worse.

  “I suppose,” Mike finally agreed.

  I rolled over onto my back and sat up on my elbows.

  “What’s up with those two?” I asked, pointing at the pontoon boat where Natalie and Tanner were deep in conversation.

  “What about ’em?” Charlotte asked.

  “Don’t you think it’s odd that Natalie brought her new boyfriend along, but she’s spending all her time with Tanner?”

  “Maybe she’s keeping her options open,” Charlotte laughed.

  “And what about them?” I asked Mike, pointing offshore about ten yards. Danica and Julian were still in the water and seemed to be engrossed in a discussion of their own. “Isn’t that your wife?”

  “Ah,” Mike said. “That one I can explain. Julian’s a counselor. He’s probably still picking Danica’s brain. They talked about the Oedipus complex the entire ride up here.”

  “The what?” I asked.

  “Never mind,” he said. “You don’t want to know.”

  “Well,” I said, rolling over and wrapping my arm around Laci. “You’ll notice that my significant other is right here by my side.”

  “Actually,” she said, “I was just going to see if Mike wanted to take a stroll with me down the shore.”

  “Ha, ha, ha,” I said as she kissed me.

  “I miss Jordan!” Charlotte wailed.

  “When’s he coming home?” Mike asked her.

  “Not until Christmas.”

  “That’s a long time,” he acknowledged.

  “Oh, but don’t worry,” I said. “She’s going down there over fall break.”

  “That’ll be fun,” Mike said.

  “I’m hitchhiking,” she told Mike.

  “You are not.”

  “Yes, I am,” she said as her phone rang. “And I’m shacking up with him when I get there. I’m going to be frugal.”

  She stood up as she answered her phone and started heading down the beach.

  “Talking about you,” we heard her say as she walked away.

  “So neither one of them have any clue about Chase?” Mike asked as soon as she was out of earshot.

  “No,” I said. Mike shook his head.

  “I don’t see how they’re gonna keep this from Jordan for almost a year. From what Tanner’s told me, Chase is already quite symptomatic.”