Rose said the guest list was about fifty. The decorations remind me of parties the Calloways would throw. Fog machines, pumpkins, scarecrows, spider webs, face painting, and apple bobbing.
Connor says lightly, “Should we sing happy birthday instead?”
“That depends…” I switch lanes and turn into the gas station. “Does it also come with a lap dance?”
Connor grins. “I only give those to people I truly love.”
I park the car and turn towards him. “What lucky bastards.”
He unbuckles his seatbelt. “Only one bastard,” he corrects. “I’ll grab the ice. You two stay here.” He leaves me and my brother, shutting the car door behind him.
Ryke climbs up from the backseat to the passenger, a silver plastic bottle of Ziff: River Rush in hand. He drinks the last of the translucent green liquid in one gulp. It’s the number one selling sports drink to date, a flavor that Ryke helped choose after Greg asked.
My brother notices me staring at the bottle. “Blue Squall is being taken off the market in November,” he says. “It’s still f**king strange that I’m the face of anything.”
“You mean after you went to jail?” He was dropped from plenty of sponsorships after the statutory rape rumors, but it was all false.
He nods, setting the bottle in the cup holder.
“It’s been a year,” I remind him. “People forget.”
“Even if we don’t.” His dark eyes rise to mine. “Do you ever think about four years ago, the night we met?”
“The Halloween party?” I vaguely recall. The memory is blurry, some of it black from booze. I can piece apart scenes, but the ones that contain Ryke are practically all shadowed.
“Yeah, the one that Connor invited you to.”
“Sometimes.” My hand falls off the steering wheel. “I can’t remember a lot of it.” I know I fought with guys on the Penn track team because I stole their family’s alcohol. Someone punched me, and Ryke, dressed as Green Arrow, intervened at one point.
Ryke rests his head back. “I think about it almost every f**king day.”
My brows furrow. “What about?”
He looks at me again. “I think about what would’ve happened if I just left you there.”
“I’ll tell you, bro, so you can stop torturing yourself.” I don’t break his gaze. “I would’ve woken up the next morning, kick-started the day with some Baileys, then switched to whiskey and bourbon. Every hour, every damn day, and I would’ve taken down the only girl I’ve ever loved with me.”
His nose flares as he restrains his emotion.
“You saved me, and the way I see it, Rose saved Lily.” In rehab, the counselors told me that I was a real ass**le—that I said unconscionable things to people, and that no one should be around me when they’re in a bad place. But I needed someone. Without support, it’d be too hard to stand up and too easy to fall down.
Ryke’s one decision changed my world.
“When I think back to that day, or what I can remember,” I tell Ryke, “I don’t usually think about what a f**king ass**le I was. I’m just grateful for the kind of guy you were then and the one you are now.” I flash him a half-smile. “I love you, man.”
“Fuck you,” he says lightly, his lips lifting.
Connor knocks on the passenger window, two bags of ice in hand. I pop the trunk, and after he sets the bags in there, he returns to the passenger window.
“He wants his seat back,” I tell Ryke.
Ryke flips off Connor though and says, “Fuck off.”
Two seconds later, he opens the backdoor and slides in. “I thought you enjoyed the backseat,” Connor tells him. “You have two windows to stick your head out of instead of one.”
“You’re getting him confused with Daisy,” I chime in, remembering a road trip with just the three of us and her. Every time Connor and I manned the wheel, our anxiety hit the roof, and we almost forced Ryke to drive the whole way.
“And she’s f**king cooler than both of you,” Ryke retorts while I drive back home.
Connor’s brow arches. “I take your opinion on the matter with low regard.”
“I’m not a dog, Cobalt.”
“But you are f**king Daisy Calloway,” he replies easily. “Logically, you’d believe that she’s about a b**w j*b or two cooler than us.”
I switch lanes again. “You better add more hand jobs to that,” I tell him. “Lily said that Daisy hates giving head.”
Ryke pinches his eyes with his fingers. “I f**king hate you both.”
I glance at my brother beside me. “It’ll pass, bro. And if it makes you feel any better, Rose apparently hates blow jobs too.”
“Because she can’t take all of me in her mouth and it aggravates her,” Connor clarifies.
Ryke glares. “For f**k’s sake, you couldn’t let me bask in that for at least two seconds, could you?”
“I speak the whole truth. Someone has to.” Connor plasters on one of his fake grins that actually says, half of what I say is bullshit. He digs into a plastic bag at his feet and opens a package of vampire teeth. He mentioned how he didn’t have time to go all-out on a costume because he’s been working since five this morning. He wears his usual suit and tie.
I’m in a gray woolen sweater. Beneath that is a white button-down and a green tie. A green and black scarf lies on my neck. I drive up to the guards at the neighborhood gate and verify who I am. Half a minute later, I pull into our driveway and park in the garage.
We split up to find the girls, and I carry both bags of ice inside. “Where’s my ‘puff?!” I shout as I kick the door open to the kitchen.
Lily looks up from a giant vat of punch, stirring the chunks of fruit with a spatula. I find myself slowing my pace, just to engrain this image of Lily: her cheeks rosy-red as she exerts extra effort, her gangly arms hidden beneath a black sweater and robe, her yellow tie peeking out by the collar.
“Me?” she asks, her nose crinkling in confusion. Christ, I want to kiss her. Wrap my arms around her.
I near Lil, setting the ice on the counter. Then I mockingly check over my shoulder. “Is there another Hufflepuff in the house, love?”
“Maximoff could be Hufflepuff one day,” she points out. “We don’t know yet.”
I don’t have to search far for him. He’s right beside Lily, in his bouncer on the floor. He sleeps in his black wizard robe. We thought about dressing him as Harry Potter with the scar, but he hated the plastic glasses.
“Or he could be Slytherin,” she notes, not leaving out my Hogwarts House. He could be almost anything, and I’d still be proud to call him my son.
There are small moments where I still fear for him. Struggles he may face, mistakes I know he’ll make, but I just remind myself something that I never even considered a year ago.
I remind myself that he has us. And back then, I would’ve pitied him for landing a shit like me. But I’m not a shit. I’m not worthless or pathetic. If my son ever trips, I have no doubt that I can carry him as far as he needs to go. I love my child unconditionally, the way that I love my wife, and I will praise him. I will cherish him. And I will adore him.
I’ll give him everything that we were starved of.
“If he’s Gryffindor,” Lily muses, “does that mean he’s cooler than us?”