Chapter 5 - The Council of Siblings
The text message from Jason arrived at six o’clock on Wednesday morning:
Jason: Meet me at the Plaza Cafe at 7:30. Just us. Megan is with Mom. If you don't show up, I’m coming to the studio with Dad’s truck.
I didn't want him at the studio. The studio was my sanctuary, the place where I had rebuilt myself after every holiday dinner that had left me feeling like a stray dog begging for scraps under the table.
I arrived at the Plaza Cafe at seven-twenty-five. The historic diner on the south side of the plaza was half-empty, smelling of roasted green chiles, cinnamon, and strong diner coffee. The morning sun was just hitting the adobe facades of the Palace of the Governors across the street.
Jason was already sitting in a vinyl booth near the back. He had two cups of black coffee on the table and a plate of scrambled eggs he hadn't touched.
He was thirty-one years old, three years older than me, but sitting in the harsh fluorescent lighting of the cafe, he looked twenty-two again—the nervous, eager boy who had spent his entire life desperate to prove to David Miller that he was worthy of taking over the family business. He wore an ironed company polo with Miller Building Supplies embroidered over the left breast and a gold signet ring Dad had given him for his thirtieth birthday.
“You look terrible,” Jason said as I slipped into the booth across from him.
“Good morning to you too, Jason,” I said, pulling my wool coat tighter around my shoulders. I didn't touch the coffee he had ordered for me.
“Why are you doing this, Becca?” he asked, leaning forward, resting his forearms on the formica. His voice wasn't angry; it was strained, cracked around the edges with the raw, bewildered frustration of someone whose world had always operated according to simple, transactional rules. “Just… tell me why. Was it about the invitations? Did you feel like Megan and I got more credit for the planning? Because I told Mom we should have let you design the menus too, but she said you were busy with your deadlines—”
“Jason,” I interrupted, holding up a single hand. “Stop.”
He closed his mouth, his fork trembling slightly against the rim of his plate.
“Do you know what my first memory of Dad is?” I asked.
He blinked. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“My first memory,” I repeated, looking directly into his brown eyes—the same shade as Dad’s, the same shape as Mom’s. “I was four years old. You had just started T-ball. Dad took us to the park behind the elementary school. He spent forty-five minutes throwing the ball to you, over and over, showing you how to turn your wrists. I was sitting on the grass near the bleachers with a piece of cardboard and a yellow dandelion, trying to rub the yellow petals onto the cardboard to make the shape of a bird.”
Jason shifted uncomfortably against the vinyl. “You were four, Becca. Nobody remembers being four.”
“I do,” I said. “When you finally hit a line drive into left field, Dad scooped you up on his shoulders and ran all the way to the car, cheering. He left me sitting by the bleachers. I had to run after him, carrying my little piece of cardboard, screaming his name because the parking lot was gravel and I didn't have my sandals on.”
“He didn't do that on purpose,” Jason muttered, his gaze dropping to his eggs. “Dad has a lot on his mind. He’s always had a lot on his mind.”
“He remembered Buster,” I said. “When Buster was three months old, Dad wouldn't leave the house without checking the back gate twice. But he forgot me at that park, Jason. And when he finally turned around and saw me crying by the chain-link fence, do you know what he said to the other fathers who were standing by their trucks?”
Jason didn't answer. He didn't have to.
“He said, ‘Look at that. Must’ve picked up somebody else’s kid by mistake. None of my family runs that slow.’ And they all laughed. And that was the day the joke was born.”
“It was just a joke, Rebecca!” Jason’s voice rose, cracking with desperation. A couple at a nearby table glanced over before returning to their breakfast burritos. “It’s been twenty years! People say stupid things! Families have bits! In the Henderson family, they tease Mark about being adopted because he’s tall! In the Ortiz family, they joke about Uncle Carlos being a pirate because of his eye! It’s what families do!”
“Families don't leave their children out of the frame, Jason,” I said.
He froze.
“Did you know about the mountain portrait?” I asked.
His eyes flickered. He didn't look away, but the muscle in his left cheek twitched once, twice.
“Mom handled that,” he said, his voice dropping into a defensive mumble.
“Did you know?”
He picked up his coffee cup, held it with both hands, and took a slow, agonizingly long sip. When he set it down, he wouldn't look at me.
“Megan wanted a nice picture for her wedding program,” he said quietly. “She wanted a shot of the family before she got married. Mom said… Mom said if we invited you, you’d make a big production out of what you were wearing. She said you’d want to bring your own photographer friend, or you’d complain about the light, or you’d make some comment about commercial consumerism because Megan bought matching sweaters from J.Crew.”
“And you agreed with her?”
“I didn't want the headache, Becca!” he snapped, finally looking up, his face flushed with shame. “Do you have any idea what it’s like living in that house? Do you have any idea what it’s like working with Dad fifty hours a week? Every single day is an audit! Every single day he’s checking the margins, checking my sales, asking why the lumber deliveries in Rio Rancho were forty minutes late! Mom is constantly monitoring Megan’s weight, Megan’s wedding budget, Megan’s fiancé! We survive by keeping the peace!”
I looked at my brother—really looked at him.
Beneath the company polo, beneath the gold signet ring, beneath the business school degree my father had purchased for him, Jason was terrified. He was a prisoner who had learned that the only way to avoid the whip was to help the warden polish the leather.
“You think you’re the lucky one,” I said softly.
“What?”
“You think because they paid for your school, because your picture is in the lobby, because Dad lets you ride in the passenger seat of his truck, that they love you more.”
“They do love me,” he said, though the words sounded like a rehearsed deposition.
“They love your compliance, Jason,” I said. “They love that you do what they say, that you laugh when Dad tells a joke, that you show up on the mountain wearing the green sweater they picked out for you. But the second you tell Dad that you want to move to Denver, or that you don't want to run the lumber yard, or that you have a dream that doesn't fit on a wholesale invoice—you’ll find yourself out on that gravel driveway with the blue chalk, running after a car that isn't stopping.”
Jason stared at me, his chest rising and falling in rapid, shallow bursts. His hands were clenched into tight fists on the paper placemat.
“What do you want, Rebecca?” he whispered. “Do you want Dad to get on his knees? Do you want Mom to sign over half the estate? What is the price for you to stop this?”
I slid out of the booth and stood up. I pulled my purse over my shoulder and looked down at my brother, feeling an overwhelming, tragic wave of sorrow for him.
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“I don't want their money, Jason. I never did. And that’s what terrifies them the most. Because if my love can't be bought, they have no idea how to earn it.”
I laid a ten-dollar bill on the table to cover my untouched coffee, turned my back on the booth, and walked out into the cold Santa Fe morning.
