“‘Is Dad dead?’ Seth had found the courage to ask first. Gage looked to Mrs. Henry for help. Mrs. Henry sat down at her desk as if she needed the support of her chair. ‘Boys, I’m afraid I have some terrible news,’ she’d said quietly. ‘I called your mom to come take Gage home for the day. On the drive here, she was in an accident’. Right then the door to the principal’s office burst open. My dad stumbled inside looking as if someone had reached into his chest and ripped out his heart.”
Luke looked up and stared out at the window as if he was imagining his own neighborhood. “Just three corners from the school, and a half mile from our house, a cement truck ran a stop sign, killing our mom.” He turned back to me. “Gage always blamed himself. If he hadn’t gotten in trouble for fighting on the playground, our mom wouldn’t have been driving through that intersection. My brother, who’d already found more than his share of trouble, became too much for my dad to raise on his own. He sent Gage up north to live on my grandfather’s ranch. He never came back. He still lives up there.”
“And Seth?” I asked. “He’s your twin?”
“Yeah, fraternal. We’re nothing alike. Seth and I shared a womb, but that is where the similarity ends. He has my mom’s light brown hair and blue eyes, and I inherited my dad’s black hair and gray eyes. Seth takes everything in stride, and I take everything personally.”
I smiled. “Sounds like your dad had his hands full.” There was one more question that I’d avoided and with good reason. “Was there anyone else special in your life?”
He stopped as if he needed to think about it. For a moment, I worried that there had been. He sensed my concern and seemed to pause longer just to tease me.
“No one,” he said finally. My shoulders relaxed in relief.
I’d finished the monotonous task of apple peeling and coring. Luke watched me as I chopped up the fruit and tossed it into a bowl with sugar and cinnamon. We piled the mixture into the two pie crusts and slid them into the oven.
“Want something to drink?” I asked. “There’s some soda in the fridge. I’m just going to look in on Gracie and then we can sit out on the porch while we wait for the pies to bake.”
“Sounds good.”
I handed him a cold drink, peeked silently in back to make sure Gracie was sleeping and followed him out onto the porch.
Gracie’s orange tabby cat, Whiskers, hopped into my lap the second I sat down. I rubbed his ears, and he responded with a loud purr. I pressed the cold soda can against my forehead. “I didn’t realize how hot it was today until we stepped out of that kitchen.” I seemed to be mastering the art of small talk, and I knew my main motive for chatting about the darn weather was to avoid anything heavier. I’d told him, unquestionably, that I wanted to stay with him no matter what happened. But there were so many paths this whole thing could take, it was too hard to think about for now. I would be happy just continuing as we were, alone most of the time and left to do what we liked. But the conversation about his family had reminded me that he hadn’t been placed on this earth solely for me.
“Luke,” I said quietly, “I know you need to get back to your life again.”
He reached over and took my hand. “We need to get back to it,” he amended. “I’ll figure something out, Angel. Not sure what yet, but yeah, I need to get out of here soon.” He grew quiet. There was something much more he hadn’t told me yet. Something that weighed heavily on his mind every time we talked about the reality of our situation. I held my breath hoping that he’d decided to let go of the secret, but he remained silent.
At times, it was easy to convince myself that this could end easily. We could just walk out of the compound hand in hand with my grandfather’s blessing and farewell. And just as the notion of having Luke all to myself forever crossed my mind, my grandfather appeared in the distance. At first I breathed a sigh of relief as it seemed he wasn’t heading our direction. But Luke’s whole body tensed next to me as my grandfather turned toward the kitchen.
There was always a slight hitch in his step, an old football injury he’d always claimed. His silver earrings caught the sunlight as he crossed the yard, and he wore the leathery but congenial expression that I liked to see. He so rarely looked friendly anymore, seeing it now made me lower my guard. A mistake.
“Grandpa,” I called before he could start the conversation, “Gracie needs to see a doctor. Her blood pressure is too high.”
His mouth straightened in irritation. “You’ve told me that many times, Angel, but your aunt doesn’t want to see a doctor. And I can’t say that I blame her.”