Chapter 7: The Table Again
Marcus was in his chair.
His elbows were on the table and his hands were folded in front of him, the posture of a man who had run out of performances.
Dad sat at the head of the table.
Mom took her seat.
Jennifer came in last and sat beside Marcus without touching him.
I sat across from my brother.
Nobody reached for food.
The dishes were still on the table — the lukewarm turkey, the cranberry sauce, the rolls nobody had finished.
The best china still gleaming under the chandelier as if the evening had not happened to it.
Marcus looked at me.
"I don't know how to do this," he said.
"Do what?"
"This." He gestured vaguely at the table.
At me.
At the space between where we had been three hours ago and where we were now.
"I spent tonight telling you that you'd wasted your life.
That you were afraid.
That you were sad." He stopped.
"And you sat there and knew."
"Yes."
"That must have been—" He shook his head.
"I don't have a word for what that must have been."
"Lonely," I said.
"Mostly it was lonely."
Mom made a small sound.
"I've been lonely at this table for years," I said.
"Not because you were cruel.
You weren't always cruel.
But because I couldn't tell you the truth about my life without it changing how you saw me.
And I needed to be seen clearly first." I looked at him.
"I needed to know the version of me you saw when I walked in with a cracked phone case was still someone worth talking to."
Marcus was quiet for a moment.
"Was she?"
"You tell me."
He looked at the table.
"No," he said.
"I didn't talk to her.
I talked at her." He paused.
"I've been doing that for years."
"Yes."
"Why didn't you ever push back?"
"I did once," I said.
"You were twenty-six.
You told me my idea for the company was cute.
I pushed back and you laughed and changed the subject." I picked up my mug.
"After that I stopped explaining and started building."
Jennifer looked at her hands.
"The entry-level marketing job," Marcus said.
"I have four hundred employees," I said.
"I run a company that produces content seen by sixty million people a month.
I have been in rooms with studio heads, senators, and one sitting president." I said it without heat.
Just facts.
"The entry-level job was a generous offer."
Marcus pressed his fingers against his eyes.
A short, sharp gesture.
Then he lowered his hands and looked at me directly.
"I'm sorry, Alexandra.
Not because of the announcement.
Not because I got caught.
Because I was wrong about you for a long time and I chose to stay wrong because it was easier than asking questions."
The grandfather clock ticked in the hallway.
"I know," I said.
"That's it?"
"What else do you want me to say?"
"I don't know.
That you're angry.
That I deserve worse."
"You probably do deserve worse," I said.
"But I'm tired and it's Thanksgiving and your financial situation is already doing most of the work." I looked at him.
"I'm not going to hold this over you.
I'm not going to make you perform remorse at every family dinner for the next five years.
But I need you to actually change.
Not the words.
The behavior."
"What does that look like?"
"It looks like asking questions before drawing conclusions," I said.
"It looks like not deciding what someone's life is worth based on what they drive.
It looks like calling me because you want to talk, not because you need something." I paused.
"It looks like treating me like your sister instead of a problem you've already solved."
Marcus nodded.
Slowly.
Like each movement cost something.
"I can do that," he said.
"I know you can," I said.
"You're not a bad person, Marcus.
You're a frightened one.
You've been frightened for fourteen months and you've been covering it with certainty." I looked at him steadily.
"The certainty was always the tell."
Jennifer looked up at that.
Something shifted in her expression — not quite relief, but the beginning of it.
Dad cleared his throat.
"I'd like to say something."
We all looked at him.
He had his wineglass in front of him but he wasn't drinking from it.
He was looking at the table with the expression of a man composing a sentence he had been avoiding for a long time.
"I knew what Alexandra was building," he said.
"Not the full scale of it.
But I knew it was real.
I knew it was serious.
And I said nothing at these dinners because I thought it was her choice to tell you in her own time." He paused.
"That was partly true.
But partly I said nothing because it was easier.
Because the dynamic at this table was established and I didn't want to be the one to disrupt it."
Mom looked at him.
"That was wrong," he said.
"You are my daughter.
And I let your brother speak to you tonight in ways I should have stopped." He held my gaze.
"I'm sorry, Alexandra.
That's long overdue."
The dining room was very quiet.
"Thank you, Dad," I said.
He nodded once.
Then he reached for the wine bottle and, for the first time all evening, offered it to someone else first.
May you like
He held it out toward me.
I picked up my glass.
