Make a Right

by Willa Okati

  The fuck? Tuck made a face at Cade. Cade refused to look back at him, his shoulders set in a silent warning against—what?

  Megan shook out her hand; looked like that had hurt her as much or more than it’d hurt Cade. Hannah rubbed her face and dragged a backward rake of fingers through her tangled blonde hair. “Can we go inside now, babe? Please?”

  “Not yet.” Megan’s bare feet had begun to turn faintly blue in the freezing chill of dew on grass. “My turn to talk. Your turn to listen.”

  “You’re going to get sick,” Cade said. “Go inside, Megs.”

  “No.” She crossed her arms tight. “I get why you did it. I’ve had that pounded into my head all night long, and I don’t want to hear any more. Okay? So don’t tell me ‘I never meant to hurt you.’ You know better than anyone else around here that’s pure bullshit. That’s what people say after they put out a cigarette on your arm for being too noisy.”

  “Not the same thing, and you damn well know it.”

  Hannah kneaded Megan’s shoulder. But she shook her head and remained silent.

  So many things he could say to that. The only one that came out was, “I’m sorry.”

  Megan’s chin came up. “You should be. I am not some weak little kid, you get that? I know what you think when you look at me, and I’m not her anymore.”

  “Deep down, we’re all still lost boys and lost girls,” Cade murmured. “Aren’t we?”

  Megan faltered the tiniest bit but recovered fast with a jut to her chin more stubborn still. “You were the ones who raised me to be strong. Where do you get off thinking I’m weak? Wrong. I’m strong. Neither you nor anyone else gets to decide how tough I am for me.”

  The sting in Tuck’s heart faded, but the way he figured it, he’d be carrying that ache for a while. He bent his head once, acknowledging and accepting.

  Megan shook her hair out of her face. “Good.” She took a deep breath and uncrossed her arms, planting her fists on her hips. “So here’s the part I don’t get. You say you’ve been faking it. What-the-fuck-ever. And I might have been up past my eyes trying to get this project done, but I’m not oblivious. The way you two look at each other? Act around each other, most of the time? And now, the way you’re jumping in for each other, you—” She caught herself and found enough composure to go on. “What are you now? Tell me the truth, or turn around and go home.”

  Tuck wanted to look to Hannah, to check with her and see whose side she was on, but fuck that. There were no sides here.

  Cade answered for him. “What truth do you want?”

  Wham. Bam. Lightning flashed dimmer than Megan. “Are you together or not? Tell me the truth.”

  And the thunder rolled, leaving silence in his wake. Tuck couldn’t stop what came as reflex and instinct, checking with Cade, searching for answers.

  Weird thing was, he thought he saw one.

  “Better,” he told Megan, tasting the hope. He wished he could take Cade’s hand. “Better is where we’re headed. Past that, I don’t know.”

  Eternities, or maybe just seconds, passed before she closed her eyes and shivered, the cold finally getting to her. Maybe. “You are better than this. Keep being better. Come inside, and hurry up. I need coffee. Now.”

  She stormed ahead of them, hair flying out behind her. Hannah laid her hand briefly on Tuck’s arm, offering him a wry half smile. “Believe it or not, this is her after she’s calmed down. She won’t forget, but she will forgive. Sooner or later. You had to know that’s how it would be.”

  “So what do we do?” Tuck asked, feeling lost again, as if he were on streets he’d never seen and didn’t know how to drive.

  Hannah studied them, him and Cade. “Do what she said, I think. Keep getting better. Come in when you’re ready.”

  Then she was gone. Tuck gestured at Cade to follow her. “You should put some ice on that,” he said, brushing close to the red marks on Cade’s cheek. Those had to smart. “I forgot the stuff I bought. Got a feeling a peace offering wouldn’t hurt. Might even help. Go inside and get them settled.”

  “You were always the one who did that.”

  “But I wasn’t the only one.” Tuck stood aside, leaving the door free and clear. “Go on. Megan needs you more than me right now anyway. Hannah needs Megan. It’ll be okay.”

  Cade hesitated, but he kissed Tuck’s forehead and cradled the back of his neck. “All right.”

  Tuck watched him go.

  Thomas stayed. The girls had forgotten about him, and Tuck hadn’t noticed him there, though he should have. Figured. He stood in the back corner of the veranda, watching. Just like always, A shadowed shape in a black sweatshirt and black sweatpants, his hair dark and his skin pale. Handsome in his way. Tuck had never seen that before.

  “You told them,” Tuck said, not really needing an answer he already knew but wanting to ask it anyway to see what Thomas would say.

  Thomas inclined his head. “They needed to know. You asking Hannah to lie to Megan? No.”

  Damn, but that was a bitter truth. “I know,” Tuck said.

  “I’m not sorry.”

  “Wasn’t asking you to be.”

  “Fair enough,” Thomas said.

  “It’s really not.” Tuck leaned on the veranda rail, staring out into the night. Sort of. Though bullfrogs croaked, crickets raised their rasping song, and fireflies spun and danced, he noticed them only in a vague sort of way. “I asked Cade, and he gave me his answer. Now I’m asking you. Do you love him?”

  He hadn’t stood this close to Thomas without fists flying. Ever.

  Then again, he’d never wanted—no, needed—to hear what the man had to say before now.

  He had to wait for it. Thomas took more time than Cade ever had.

  Tuck frowned at Thomas. Looked at him, seeing him clearly for once, with his long, plain face, the eyes of a priest, and a ton’s worth of lead weights draped over his shoulders.

  Did it ever occur to you that he was as lonely as we were? That he had a place in the world but no one to care about? That he’s a man too, not just a faceless enemy?

  Fine time for Cade’s parting shot to ring in his ears. On the other hand, Tuck couldn’t have thought of a time when he needed to hear it more.

  Fuck it; he’d never in his life expected to feel sorry for Thomas and he didn’t want to start now, but there you had it.

  He waited.

  “Yes,” Thomas said, voice blending in with the grasshopper song and the rustle of wind through the leaves of the old trees. “I love him. I always have.” He turned to face Tuck head-on. “But I know where his heart lies, and always will. I’m not a fool, and I’m not a saint.”

  Tuck tried to understand. He did. “And yet you’re still here.”

  Lame. Thomas still got what he meant, and Tuck could have hated him a little more for that. Only, he actually couldn’t, even if he wasn’t sure exactly why. “Love bears all things,” he began to recite.

  “Thomas, stop.” Tuck wanted to put his hands over his ears. He couldn’t listen to that ring of trust and not want to break a window, or steal a car and roar off into the night.

  Thomas didn’t stop. “Love is patient. Love is kind. Love never ends. Love bears all things, hopes all things, and believes all things. Love never dies.” He shrugged. “You did ask.”

  Sure. And he’d thought he knew the answer. Or had he? Tuck’s head swam and ached with trying to keep up and sort things where they needed to go. They were worse than old city streets, the way these new thoughts twisted and turned and opened up onto thoroughfares or smacked into dead ends that might just be blocked paths.

  Thomas waited for him. “Go ahead and ask.”

  One question crystallized, and it tasted like bitter-apple sour candy when it cut its way past his lips. “If it hurts you that much, why do you stay?”

  “Because he needs someone he’s safe with.”

  “That’s me,” Tuck protested.

  “Sometimes. Sometimes not.”

/>   “What’s that supposed to mean?” Tuck guarded himself. “You do know. What he’s not telling me. Why he is the way he is. You knew all along, didn’t you?”

  “It’s his story to tell.”

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “It’s all the answer I’m giving you.”

  Tuck growled and threw his weight against one of the veranda pillars. “Make up your mind. Either you want this to self-destruct or you don’t.”

  “Mmm.” Thomas met Tuck’s gaze and held it with an equal amount of challenge in his stare. “Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. And the greatest of these is love.”

  A beat of silence.

  “Do something about him, Tuck. If you don’t, I will.”

  Fuck. Anytime the God he’d prayed to at St. Pius wanted to chime in, Tuck’s ears were open and ready.

  C’mon. Help a guy out. Please?

  In the end, without divine intervention, Tuck turned his back on Thomas. “I’ll be back in a few. Go do what you do.”

  Any other man would have asked what’s that supposed to mean? Not Thomas. Thomas stood still, watched Tuck go, and didn’t say a word. His quietness wasn’t like Cade’s.

  But they were alike in that way. Knowing when not speaking said more than anything, and be damned if Tuck couldn’t get that thought out of his head no matter how he tried.

  * * *

  Things had calmed down a little further still by the time Tuck made his way to the kitchen where everyone else seemed to have instinctively congregated. Even Thomas. Tuck grumbled at that, glad his lips were concealed behind the boxes piled so high in his arms he could barely see. What he could get a peek at seemed worlds away better. The air clearer, even if eyes were tired and yawns hidden behind hands. Suzie-Q had even fallen asleep under Megan’s chair.

  Hannah and Megan looked equally curious about the boxes. “I thought you went out to kick some merchant ass,” she said, offering the first olive branch.

  Tuck took it, and gladly. “I did. There’s more than one way to skin a cat. Though why anyone would want to, I don’t know.” He eased the boxes onto the table and dusted off his hands, reached for his wallet, and hauled out the stack of bills. Those he gave to Hannah.

  Hannah’s lips parted, and her eyes widened in surprise. So did Megan’s. “You actually got our money back?”

  “He can be very persuasive when he wants to be,” Cade remarked. Tuck watched one of Thomas’s eyebrows lift.

  Tuck eased the biggest box out from beneath the rest. “Sometimes. This is yours, Hannah. Peace offering, or as close as a guy like me can come. Open it up.”

  Hannah and Megan asked silent questions of one another once again. Tuck liked these better. A little gleam of excitement in there, like kids on Christmas morning. “Go on,” Tuck said. He tensed up. What if she didn’t like it? “Before the suspense kills us all, Christ.”

  Hannah laughed. Laughed. “You didn’t have to.”

  “I really did.” Tuck stood back and found himself at Cade’s side. Cade, warm against him. That helped.

  Curiosity overtook Hannah completely. She opened the box the way a lady would, discreet logo on the top noted with a blink of surprise, top laid aside, and tissue paper crinkling delicately as she unfolded it, sensing somehow this needed to be treated with care.

  When the last folds were out of the way, she put her hand to her mouth. “Oh God.”

  “What? Did I get it wrong? Hannah, come on, don’t get weepy on me again,” Tuck said, alarmed. “I can take it back.”

  “Let me see.” Megan lifted a corner of silk. She stared at it, then at Tuck. “She’s been lusting after this dress for months. How did you know?”

  “I didn’t. It looked like her, that’s all, so I took a guess. It’s okay, then?”

  “Oh God,” Hannah said again. She clasped the box, tissue paper and all, to her chest and—not quite fled, but sure as hell exited the room at high speed.

  That left everyone else watching Tuck. He raised his hands in confused surrender. “Someone tell me what that was all about, would you?”

  “Dummy.” Megan propped her chin in her hand. “Wait. You really have to ask?”

  “Are you kidding me? She’s a girl. I have no idea if that was good or bad.”

  Everyone except Thomas laughed at him. “What?” Tuck protested, though he too laughed on the inside. He’d take his respite where it came tonight. “All I know about girly stuff I learned from you two, and trust me, neither of you is that damn dainty.”

  Megan turned in her chair to glance back in the direction of rustling sounds just around the corner. “Says you.”

  Hannah emerged. Her hair was tangled in a giant yellow cloud, and she wore a pair of bunny slippers instead of heels, but that dress—she’d put it on—swear to God, that tea gown fit Hannah like it’d been made for her.

  No one said a word. Just looked and couldn’t stop looking. Even Thomas stared in apparent awe.

  Hannah didn’t say anything either. She crossed the kitchen in giant steps, careless of anything but throwing her arms around Tuck’s neck and squeezing the breath out of him. Exactly as she’d done when she was thrilled to see him the first time around.

  Tuck chanced stroking her crazy hair. “If you cry on me, I will take that damn thing back to the store.”

  She pounded one fist against his chest, light as a heartbeat. “There’s more than one kind of tears. Oh God.” She stood up straight, somehow prettier still with her eyes red from tears. “I wanted this dress like you wouldn’t believe.” She stopped, going pale. “Tuck, this cost—”

  “I had some savings,” Tuck said, trying to shrug it off. “I wanted to.”

  Megan tapped the edge of the kitchen table. “You couldn’t have paid the tux rental for me, then?”

  Hannah didn’t have to reach far to give Megan a playful shove or to bend to press her cheek to Megan’s. Megan stroked her hair, and both looked better at the job and did it better. “Fucking gorgeous,” she told Hannah. “Look at you.”

  Hannah blushed. “You really think so?”

  “For what it’s worth? I’ve never seen anything prettier.”

  “Or me,” Cade said quietly. He was looking at Tuck when he did, though Hannah didn’t notice—and Thomas did.

  Tuck regarded Thomas with a sort of flat calm. The trouble wasn’t all sorted out there, no. He simply couldn’t be bothered caring about that now; he had better things to think about.

  All the oomph that had dimmed from her rushed back to Hannah. She sat up straight, her head coming up and her chin high.

  She also sniffed the air, nose twitching.

  “The fuck is that?” Tuck asked, though honest to God he thought it was adorable. “You look like Thumper, only with your schnoz.”

  “That,” she said, adopting the grand dignity of the good professor’s house tempered just satisfyingly enough with Jersey Girl sass, “is what a second wind smells like.”

  Tuck wasn’t the only one who groaned. Megan knocked her head against Hannah’s. Funny how the way they all showed affection was by beating on one another, but whatever worked, right? He rested his head against Cade’s chest. “Yeah? Is that a good thing?”

  “You better believe it.”

  “And cheesy as hell,” Megan said, eye to eye with Hannah, grin totally giving her away. “They were right. Beautiful.”

  “Cheese,” Hannah agreed, her smile broad and bright again. “You love it, and you know it.”

  Tuck would have averted his eyes from their soft kiss if he could have. For one, he was trying to be a gentleman for once, the gift bringing that out in him; for two, girly parts in any combination made him squirm; three, if Megan were a guy instead of a girl and Tuck hadn’t ever met her before this trip, he’d have had a shotgun on standby just where Megan could see it.

  But c’mon, they were like three inches away from him, and he couldn’t help but get a close-up view of Megan’s slim, steel-tough hand gentle on Hannah
’s cheek and the heart in that kiss. The stars in their eyes.

  He wondered if anyone had ever looked at him and Cade and seen the same things pass between them when they kissed?

  “We’re making the gay men nervous,” Hannah teased. She pushed Megan away; Megan went, but only to take Hannah in hand and pull her to her feet. Hannah clapped her hands together. “Cheesy or not, I do have a second wind. That means the rest of you are back on the hook. Megan: dissertation thesis waits for the morning. Everyone else get to bed, and I don’t mean maybe.”

  God, but she could blaze on when she had her ginger up, couldn’t she? Tuck admired the hell out of her. They’d raised this one right, and he didn’t figure it was a bad thing to look at her and be pleased.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Hannah, Cade, and probably Thomas too had finished with breakfast the next morning before Tuck made his way down. He’d waited until then on purpose. Hannah had assigned him a task before they fell asleep, after all, and he needed that kitchen all to himself, save for Megan and her books, to manage the job.

  He didn’t so much mind. Cade had teased him about it. And to be fair, he had brought the job on himself, forgetting that effectively blackballing them with caterers and bakers instead of negotiating still left them screwed, blued, and tattooed.

  Eh, so be it. Tuck wasn’t the best chef in the world, but he wasn’t one of the worst. With Megan buried peacefully in her work once more, the kitchen was quiet.

  Tuck had to marvel again at her concentration. It took Megan the better part of an hour, all the way from Tuck’s gathering ingredients, bowls, pots and pans and baking dishes, to stir out of her fugue and blink at him.

  “What are you doing, feeding the five thousand?” She closed her book and stood, stretching her arms over her head.

  “Five thousand, no. Five hundred? Fifty? How many people did you invite?”

  “Around forty, but probably only twenty-five will show.” She sniffed the air as eagerly as Suzie-Q on a mission. Where was Suzie-Q, anyway, that she hadn’t been tempted once to gallop in and check out the smorgasbord? He heard her barking. Probably out with Cade. It pleased Tuck more than a little to think, as usual.