Chapter 4: The Man at the Table
Nobody moved.
Jamie stood in the hallway.
Dad sat at the table.
I stood between them like a wall that hadn't decided which side it was on yet.
"Jamie," I said carefully.
"I know who that is." Jamie's voice was very quiet.
That was the thing about Jamie — he didn't get loud when he was angry.
He got still.
"Why is he in our house?"
"He came to the door this morning.
I let him in."
"Why?"
I didn't have a fast answer for that.
Because I wanted to see what he'd say.
Because I needed to know about the envelope.
Because some part of me, after fifteen years, still wanted an explanation that would make sense of everything.
"Come sit down," I said.
"I'm fine here."
Dad pushed his chair back slowly and stood up.
He was a tall man, or had been once.
He looked smaller now.
"Jamie," he said.
"Don't." Jamie pointed at him.
One word, one finger, and all the stillness broke.
"Don't say my name like that.
Like you know me.
Like you have any right."
"You're right," Dad said.
"I don't have the right.
I know that."
"Do you?" Jamie stepped into the kitchen.
He didn't sit.
He stood with his arms crossed and looked at our father the way you look at something you've been afraid of for a long time and are finally seeing clearly.
"Because I used to think about you.
When I was seven, eight, nine years old, I used to think about what I'd say to you if I ever saw you again.
I had whole conversations in my head."
"Jamie—" I started.
"Let me finish." He didn't look at me.
"I was five years old.
I didn't understand what was happening.
I just knew that one day you were there and then you weren't, and nobody would explain it to me, and every family they put us with sent us back, and the only person who never sent me back was her." He nodded toward me.
"She was eighteen.
She had nothing.
And she kept me."
Dad's jaw tightened.
His eyes were wet.
"I know," he said again.
"So what do you want?" Jamie said.
"Why are you here?"
"He has nowhere to go," I said.
"Claire left him.
He's broke."
Jamie laughed.
It wasn't a kind sound.
"Claire left him." He shook his head slowly.
"The woman he chose over his own kids finally left him, and now he's here."
"I'm not asking for forgiveness," Dad said.
"I know I don't deserve it.
I just — I had nowhere else to go."
"That's not our problem," Jamie said.
"Jamie." I put my hand on his arm.
"There's something else.
He brought a letter.
From Mom."
That stopped him.
The anger didn't leave his face, but something shifted underneath it.
His eyes moved to the envelope on the table.
"From Mom," he repeated.
"She wrote it before she died.
She left money for us, Jamie.
In an account.
In my name." I paused.
"Dad and Claire spent it."
The kitchen went silent.
Jamie looked at our father for a long time.
Then he pulled out a chair and sat down.
Not because he was ready to forgive.
Because his legs needed to.
"How much?" he said.
Dad told him.
Jamie put his face in his hands.
I sat down across from my brother and waited.
Outside, a car passed on the street.
The refrigerator hummed.
Dad stood at the edge of the table like a man who had already accepted that he was not going to be invited to sit back down.
May you like
Then Jamie lifted his head.
"I want to read the letter," he said.
