NINE-TENTHS
Part Two
"I've got it," Gem says, leaping at the chance to be helpful. "Four glasses?"
"Extra ice in mine," Stu calls at Gem's back as she breezes into the living room and over to the booze hutch. We all pretend Gem's not wiping at her eyes. "I gotta drive home."
"You're not staying?" Mum asks him.
"One of my guys got in the weeds with something at the museum."
"But Colin's come all the way from St. Catharines," Mum protests. "I thought you'd at least spend the night."
"I have a perfectly good bed a ten minute drive away."
Mum's lips pucker. I hate seeing her unhappy, but what am I gonna do? Tie Stu to the chair and not let him leave?
Ha.
"Could use your advice," Stu says to me. "Figure out the best place to—"
"I know what you're doing, and the answer is no," I say, but I force a smile through it. "Try all you like Stu-pid, I'm not coming to work with you."
"It'd be nice to see both my boys working in their Dad's company," Mum says, trying to keep the peace.
"I need a landscaper for the summer—"
"My degree is in environmental and sustainable tourism," I remind everyone. "I wrote my thesis on biodynamic viniculture. Not grass-cutting."
"It's all outdoors and nature, isn't it?"
"Give it a rest."
"It’s just a job," Stu presses. "I know you're still figuring out the career thing, but you gotta make money in the meantime—"
"I have a 'just a job'. Hadhirah pays as good as you, and I don't have to get eaten alive by bugs in the backwoods—"
"Orillia is hardly the 'backwoods'," Mum tuts.
"I'm happy in St. Catharines," I say, trying to stay firm but non-confrontational, like Dr. Chen taught me. "I like my friends, and I like Beanevolence. I don't want to work for Stu when he has no idea what I actually do."
"It's not like I'm going to kidnap you and force you to wear a tool belt. Don't get your feathers in a ruffle, mo leanbh," Stu says, in his best imitation of Mum's Scots brogue.
Mum was seven when she and my Nan emigrated to Canada to get away from Nan's horrid husband, and Mum still has that pretty Scottish burr. Doubly so when she gets off the phone with her half-sister Patricia. I wish you could inherit an accent.
"Thank you for the offer," I say, baring my teeth. "But I decline."
"Suit yourself," Stu says. Stu rubs his hand through my hair, which, rude! Some of us actually style our hair and use product, like civilized people, Stuart!
"Plan to." I take a sip of my cold tea before I can say anything that will turn this into an actual argument.
"Need help, Gemmy?" Mum asks. As a way to change the subject, it's not a subtle one.
"I'm coming," Gem says, over the clink of glass tumblers on Dad's mid-century bar tray. Dad had a thing for cocktails and James Bond. Mom has a thing for a good peaty scotch, so it was a match made in a shaker.
Gem sets down four Old Fashions, extra ice in Stu's, and extra cherries in mine. Our "Slàinte mhath!" is maybe too forced, but whatever.
Casting around for something to start a new conversation, Gem says: "I like your shirt. It's not black."
"Oh, yeah," I say, stroking the olive button-down. It's a tight fit, one of those tailored shirts that makes me look gawky and skinny, but Mum always appreciates the effort. Gem is wearing one of those cute dorky matching summer-dress-and-cardigan sets she likes, and Stu is in a bright blue tee-shirt and dark jeans that are actually free of construction debris or paint. "Beks picked it."
Mum perks up. "And where is Rebekah? I expected her to drive you."
"Mum," I groan, and it's a waste of Dad's good Scotch and Gem's artful work, but I down the cocktail in one go.
"What?" she asks.
"They broke up last year," Gemma reminds Mum gently.
"Doesn't mean she's not still your friend. She could have driven you up."
"It's five hours, Mummers," I protest. "I don't want to be in a car with her that long."
"Maybe all you need is the chance to have a good conversation, sort out—"
"There's nothing left to sort out," I cut in sullenly. "Yeah, we're still friends, but that doesn't mean I can just let you ambush her—"
"Ambush!" Mum echoes, looking guilty enough that it's obvious she totally had plans. "I would never."
"You have," Gem reminds her. None of us have forgotten Gem's high school crush, and the inflatable kiddie pool.
"Well," Mum says, flustered and caught-out. "It still would have been nice to see her."
"You could have brought Caden," Gemma says with a sly eye-side.
"Choke and die." I offer up a sharkish smile.
"Colin!" Mum scolds.
"Who's Caden?" Stu asks. My himbo brother likes gossip just as much as his twin.
"Breach of contract!" I snarl at Gem.
"There was no NDA," Gem says through her own knife-slice grin.
"Who's Caden?" Stu asks again, amused.
"He's no one," I insist.
Gem scoffs. "That's not what you—"
"He's no one now," I amend, fiddling with my glass, watching my ice cube melt and wishing I hadn't drunk it all in one go. I always feel like a jerk if I get up and refill before everyone else has finished. I'm not, like, an alcoholic, but I don't want my family thinking I am one. They already watch me like a time-bomb when it comes to mental-health shit.
"Oh," Stu says, catching what I mean.
"You’ll just have to try harder next time," Mum says. It's meant to be pleasant and understanding, but I literally grind my teeth together so hard Gem shoots me a startled look. "I don't know what I've done wrong, that you can't keep a partner, mo leanbh."
"Gem and Stu are single right now too, Mum, it's not like—"
"Just remember what Dr. Chen said about needing stability, Colin. It's not good to jump from relationship to relationship like this."
That's skirting dangerously close to calling me a 'greedy bisexual,’ I think, but don't say, because that's not a conversation I want to have right now.
"Cut Colin some slack," Gem says gently.
"I just don't know why Rebekah couldn't come up with you," Mum says, wringing her hands. "She was such a nice girl, and you were going to get—"
"You said you weren't going to bring that up," Stu stops her.
My stomach bottoms out, and I shove away from the table.
"Just forget I said anything, okay?" Mum says. She pats my shoulder lovingly, and leaves to go turn on the TV. I hate when she does that. Can't argue at her back, cause she can't read your lips that way. Mum keeps her hearing aids turned down so she can't hear anyone or anything that isn't directly in front of her. It always bugged her when we screamed across the house.
The TV flicks on, the channel flips, and Stu stands up to peer into the living room when it stops on a program with someone singing in that high, signature ‘70s tone we are all very familiar with.
"Mum's watching Lawrence Welk reruns again," Stuart says accusingly as Gem starts to tidy up.
"Rebekah broke up with me," I snap.
"We know," Gem says. "Stu, when are you going?"
"Might as well be right now," Stu grunts. Then he comes around the table and wraps me up in a huge bear hug that has me dangling a few inches from the floor. "Have a good trip back tomorrow."
"Thanks," I wheeze, nose smooshed.
He sets me down and slaps my shoulder in a manly, hetero way. "Happy birthday."
"Just one year away from my quarter-life crisis. I'm thrilled."
"Will you have figured out what to do with your fancy degree by then?"
"Har har."
"Oh!" Gem says, and turns away to rifle the junk drawer. She sifts through archeological layers of take-out menus, dried up pens, and loose Canadian Tire money and emerges with a rumpled, used-to-be-white envelope. "This came for you. Like, last year."
"Why didn't you forward it?"
"I'm not your secretary."
I take the envelope. "I was here at Thanksgiving. And Christmas. And Easter."
"I'd forgotten. Mum found it when she was looking for the birthday candles."
I slip the letter out of the envelope. The paper is textured and expensive. The letterhead is crowned with maple leaves, and a little flame. Underneath it says, From the Office of Lt. Gov. Francis A. G. Simcoe.
Dear Colin Fergus Levesque; the letter reads, in computer-generated font. On behalf of the office of the Lieutenant Governor of the province of Upper Canada, and in the name of her Royal Majesty, Elizabeth Regina, we are pleased to congratulate you on the occasion of your graduation from your post-secondary studies….
…blah blah blah.
"What is it?" Stu asks, looking over my shoulder. "Oh, one of those."
"Yeah." I chuck it into the recycling bin under the sink. "Just the same thing the dragons always send. Nothing special."
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