Every Happy Family (19 page)

With his foot, he pushes off the edge of the desk and spins in his chair. This is stupid. He's being stupid. Gets up to return to the party downstairs and as he reaches the door there's the sound of a car outside. He trips over himself rushing back to the window, leans over the desk, heart thudding in his ears. A rusted Honda Civic is in the cul-de-sac. It swings around and, though the oak's in the way, he can tell it's parking in front of the house. He breathes in through his nose then exhales hard enough to rattle his lips. Did he just sound like a goddamn horse?

A woman whose shoulders fill out her red leather jacket has stepped into the driveway. She wears brown cowboy boots and from up here he can see the dark roots of her straight blonde hair. His first thought is she's a friend of Auntie Annie's until his brother appears by the woman's side, puts an arm around her neck and kisses her on the cheek. So this is the older woman.

As lean and pale as ever, thinks Beau. Definitely needs a workout routine. And some sun. And a haircut.

Under his shaggy hair, Quinn glances up at the house. Beau gives a quick, embarrassed wave but Quinn, now checking his pockets, didn't see him after all.

Hesitant to walk in unannounced, Quinn knocks on the front door. A large man with a goatee opens it and stands there blocking the doorway, his legs apart and hands behind his back, frowning at them. For a confounded second, Quinn wonders why Mom's hired a bouncer.

“Uh...” starts Quinn, mind racing to remember if Auntie Annie has a new man, if his parents' friends were invited. The man looks somehow familiar. “You must be...”

Leaving his eyes on Quinn, the man turns his head in profile as if to encourage a guess. Quinn decides he's trying to be funny.

“Let them in, Kenneth,” calls Jill.

“Uncle Kenneth, I'm so sorry I didn't recognize you,” says Quinn, though the last time they met Quinn was probably eight. “Great to see you.”

They shake hands and Quinn introduces Holly.

“Advance,” says his uncle, stepping aside. “You are welcome here.”

As soon as Jill comes around the corner, her eyes fix on Holly. “Kenneth, can you see if Mom needs to use the facilities?”

“Facilities. Such as the lavatory?”

She ignores him and hugs Quinn. “Hi Sweetheart. You're looking great. I do appreciate the tie, thanks.”

“Mom,” he says, about to introduce Holly, but Jill speaks first.

“This must be Holly. Very pleased to meet you.”

She's overenunciating, like a snob.

“Nice to meet you, Mrs. Wright,” says Holly in her too-raspy voice.

“Please,” Jill says with a small snort as if she's about to correct Holly's formal address but then continues with, “do come in and I'll take your jackets.”

Each crisp, defined word, thinks Quinn, is a brick being placed in a wall.

“Such a gorrrgeous dress,” coos Holly. “That kinda green's my favourite.”

Uneducated, he can hear his mom say to herself as she takes Holly's jacket which will smell of the cigarette she smoked in the car. He deliberately takes Holly's hand and kisses it.

“You can put your gift on the hearth in the family room,” instructs Jill, pointing to the package under his arm.

“Hey,” says Beau, walking heavy-footed down the stairs and looking bigger and more muscular than ever.

Quinn readies himself. Why isn't Beau dressed up?

“Bro,” says Beau before he chest-bumps him and Quinn has to let go of Holly to keep from falling over. “A tie?” Beau reaches for it and Quinn eases his hand away.

“You're the rugby player,” says Holly. “That's so awesome.”

“Awesome me.”

“Beau, Holly,” says Quinn.

“Gawd, I'd never guess you were brothers.” She looks from one to the other. “You don't look anything alike.”

“You should see our sister,” says Beau.

“She's, like, from Tibet, eh?”

“Just like from Tibet,” says Beau, and Quinn gives him a look.

“How do they say rugby in French?” asks Jill, sounding even more pretentious.

“Rrrugabee?” says Beau, rolling his R.

Jill's laugh is too loud. “It is funny how the French, who appear so certain in their thinking, make questions out of statements,” she says.

Holly gives her an uncertain smile and Jill gestures towards the kitchen. “Help yourselves to...refreshments.” She turns and fusses with the flower arrangement. Shutting him out, thinks Quinn, for not meeting her standards.

Quinn takes Holly's hand again. “Thirsty?”

“And oh, did you bring the slide show?” asks Jill.

“Yes.” He pats the USB key in his shirt pocket.

“I've got my laptop hooked up to the TV like you told me,” she says, “and I'll let you know when that's going to happen.”

“And what do you do, Holly?” asks Beau as they move towards the kitchen.

“I work in an old folks' home. Some people love kids, I love oldies. Not that I don't like kids.”

“Somebody's got to love ‘em.” Beau nudges Quinn. “Game of ping pong later?”

Ping pong was the one physical game at which Quinn consistently beat his brother.

“Holly can beat me. Killer overhand spin.” They played a lot in rehab, he doesn't say, and finds it both typical and funny how his competitive brother looks anew at Holly.

“I'd love to play,” says Holly.

“Soon,” says Quinn and gently guides her away. “I want you to meet my dad.”

The sight of the shrunken bald man napping in his father's chair and attached to tubes makes Quinn feel weak. Sleeping upright, Les's chin recedes into his neck and the corners of his opened mouth drag down in a sad grimace. There's truly no such thing as a happy ending, thinks Quinn, and tries not to linger on the thought or the sight, guiding Holly over to the kitchen where the “refreshments” are front and centre on the kitchen counter.

Beside the mock champagne bottle of sparkling apple juice is a full glass of red wine. A merlot, he guesses by its colour. The tangy scent claws awake a familiar blind hunger and he instantly locates the wine bottles beside the fridge, the box of beer in the corner, the accessibility of the liquor cabinet.
His
refreshments include pomegranate juice, an easy camouflage for wine of either colour and he reaches for it before realizing there's another bald person on the other side of the counter, wearing oversized sunglasses, her nose against the oven window. It takes another couple of seconds before he recognizes her.

“Auntie Annie?”

“Quinnnnn,”
she yells without looking up. “I'm smothering you with kisses but my brie's under the broiler so wait, don't move and that must be your new friend, wait, wait... four, three, two, one.”

She lifts out the bubbling cheese and sets it on the counter. “Okay, okay, come here. Damn you skinny people,” she says hugging him. “You need to eat some of my cheese. And I've got presents,” she sings, “but let's wait ‘til Pema's here. So this is...”

“Holly.”

“Holly.” Annie gives her a hug too, for which he's grateful.

“You're the designer,” says Holly. “That's so cool. And so is your buzz. Can I touch it?”

Annie offers her head and Holly strokes it. “I love that feeling.”

“Against the nap,” says Annie.

“Exactly.” Holly takes Quinn's hand. “Feel.”

“I'm going to start rubbing up against your legs in a minute,” says Annie.

He's never touched his auntie's head before. Its random moles and freckles make curious patterns. He makes out a parallelogram, an obtuse triangle, and his hand twitches, longing to connect them with a pen. In rehab he learned the term OCD as it applied to him and, taking a deep breath, forces his gaze elsewhere.

He wants to ask why the sunglasses when Annie says, apropos of nothing, “Don't you wonder, sometimes, if the world isn't thinking you, and not the other way around?”

“I kinda know what you mean,” Holly says, never one to disagree with people.

It's the type of question with no answer, and he won't think about it. “Holly, what would you like to drink?”

“Is that Quinn?” Les's voice is a hoarse gurgle.

“Here.” Quinn lifts his hand and forces a grin.

It takes several long seconds for Les to clear his throat. “Come introduce me to your prickly Christmas plant.”

Without waiting for Quinn, Holly strides over and takes Les's offered hand in both of hers. “Its leaves are almost as poisonous as its berries,” she says, “but they won't kill ya. Just make ya drowsy and give ya the runs.”

“I could use some then,” says Les, and Holly throws back her head and laughs her free-throated laugh.

Like an alerted dog, Jill, now standing stiffly in the doorway, looks up at the sound and Quinn scans the labels of the wine then the yard for a secluded spot he and Holly might escape to. Just beyond the patio a mallard lands in a patch of sun, his head a brassy green. Quinn twists the cap off the pomegranate juice.

As the family gathers around the appetizers on the coffee table, Jill slips over to the kitchen to take a mug from the cupboard, thinking that, for Quinn's sake, she'll be discreet about having some wine. Between her mom, Kenneth and this Holly person, she needs it. It's a large mug and she fills it up to avoid having to refill it. She takes a sip and then another, watches Holly beside Quinn on the couch, her shoulders hunched, one red bra strap showing. Holly's not drinking? What do you bet they met in rehab? She takes a long drink. What is the attraction? She would be hard-pressed to believe the woman has ever seen the inside of a college classroom and she looks ten years older than him. Quinn is unaware that he's dripped some vegetable dip onto the table and Jill's about to say something when Holly wipes it carefully away with her napkin.

Is it a mother issue? Is it her fault?

“I read in the
Globe
,” says Kenneth to whoever's listening, “that the World Bank president announced to the press he was thinking of buying gold.”

Les nods, takes a deep breath as if working up a comment.

“Meaning?” asks Jill.

“Meaning,” says Kenneth, “to quote Ian Brown in the
Globe
, that's like some staid old dad arriving home from work to announce, ‘You know kids, I think I'd like to try some of that crystal meth everyone's talking about.'”

“Don't ever try crystal meth.” Annie shakes her head.

“One in twenty Tea Partiers” – Les pauses for a breath – “bought gold in the past year.”

“I like coffee,” says Nancy, rattling her cup.

“Would you like some more, Mom?” says Jill.

“What do you make of the Tea Partiers?” asks Quinn, sipping his juice, the smell from the open wine bottle on the table a cartoon waft curling into his nostrils.

“God, Guns and Gold,” says Kenneth.

“If God would only speak up and tell us what
he
believes,” says Jill as she takes Nancy's cup.

“Would people even listen?” Holly says.

Clever comment, thinks Jill.

“Only if he had the gold and guns.” Kenneth laughs. “So, the World Bank guy. If people think money is going to become worthless, like it did in the Depression, they'll cash out their retirement funds into gold and the panic becomes –”

“A self-fulfilling prophecy,” says Les.

Quinn leans into Holly to sing her a line from a song but can't recall it exactly, something about a guy owing money to money he owes.

Nancy spits her piece of bread and brie out into her napkin. “I don't like this.”

“Don't eat it then, Mom,” says Jill.

“I know this Columbian shaman?” says Annie. “Beautiful man, wow. His ancestors, the Makuna, believed gold contained the light of the stars and sun. They called gold the stars of the earth.”

“Neat,” says Holly.

“Even crows collect the bright and shinies,” Kenneth says.

Les struggles to clear his throat and everyone waits to see if he'll speak.

“It's animal instinct to be attracted to light,” says Beau and tosses a baby carrot in the air but fails to catch it in his mouth.

“Not if you're a bat,” says Quinn.

“Beau, don't,” says Jill, returning with Nancy's refilled cup. “You can choke.”

“Darkness has its charms too,” Annie says from behind her glasses.

“If you're a bat hunting bugs,” says Les. The room hangs on his words in case there might be more.

“Hunt,” says Jill. “From the Old English word hentan meaning seize or try to seize.”