Chapter Text
but the wreckage of you i no longer reside in
the bridges have long since been burnt
the ash of the home that i started the fire in
it starts to return to the earth
i’m leaving this town and i’m changing my address
i know that you’ll come if you want
it’s not halloween but the ghost you dressed up as
sure knows how to haunt, yes it knows how to haunt
“Halloween” — Noah Kahan
The microbrewery that Michael and Teresa rented out is some well-established, kind of pretentious place called Flint in the Dallas Downtown Historic District. The outside of the building is simple but clearly luxurious, ornate woodwork framing warm brick and spotless windows. It looks more like the outside of an old fancy hotel rather than a microbrewery. Inside, lantern-shaped lights fixtures cast a warm orange-gold hue over exposed brick walls and huanghuali wood tables. Huge oak barrels sit in every corner, floral centrepieces with heavy-headed flowers on each one to make them look more like side-tables than casks. A collection of vintage pictures in mismatched wooden frames cover one wall above lavish red leather couches. Crawling ivy hangs from shelves over the bar, weaving neatly between glittering bottles of alcohol.
It is the type of place that sells obnoxiously expensive cocktails and will genuinely turn you away if your outfit isn’t dressy enough. Which means it is the also the type of place Lucy and Kate would normally never be caught dead in, instead preferring quiet bars with a few local beers on tap and an appetizer menu that is made of mostly fried food.
By the time Lucy and Kate arrive just before seven, the party is already in full swing. The crowd is decidedly younger than the dinner last night, and Kate assumes that the people here are mostly Michael and Teresa’s friends rather than his parents’ business associates. Lucy had explained on the way to the microbrewery that the party itself is some kind of combined bachelor and bachelorette party that was less about celebrating or lamenting their last night of being single and more about spending time with their friends and loved ones. It is something that Kate actually really respects and appreciates considering that she has been to far too many bachelorette parties of sorority sisters who weren’t ready to be—and definitely shouldn’t have been—getting married.
They give their names to the host at the entrance, who actually checks their IDs before letting them in. Kate exchanges a skeptical glance with Lucy, who just rolls her eyes and shrugs as she tucks her ID back into her wallet. It seems a little excessive to Kate, but she supposes that Michael is the CEO of one of the largest oil companies in Texas and it’s not outside of the realm of possibility for some anti-oil interest groups to crash this party.
Once inside, they bypass the coatcheck, opting to keep their light jackets on them—Kate for the extra warmth and Lucy for the aesthetic of her outfit. They stick to the edges of the room at first, Lucy looking for one of her siblings to go sit with but coming up empty.
As Lucy scans the crowd, Kate stifles a yawn, causing Lucy to swat gently at her. “Stop that,” Lucy chides, clearly struggling to suppress her own yawn, “We need to make it to at least ten before it’s acceptable for us to dip out. And believe me, I will hear about it if we leave any earlier.”
“Sorry,” Kate says around another yawn, “Your niblings really played me out.” She would never admit it to Lucy, but she is a little glad that all seven niblings are staying back at the mansion with their grandparents rather than attending this party solely because she’s not sure she has the energy to chase them around for another few hours.
She hadn’t ended up spending any time alone with Sofia after breakfast because Miles, Olive, Hazel, and Leo had joined them before Lucy could go play Mario Kart with Sofia’s kids. All seven kids refused to leave Lucy’s side the rest of the day, which was both cute and a bit terrifying. It was something that worked out great for their parents, who either got called away for business (Michael) or who took advantage of the distraction to run some errands (Nate and Sofia), leaving Lucy and Kate to take on the role of entertainers for the majority of the day. And while Kate was more than a little intimidated about it at the start of the day, she has realized that she isn’t nearly as bad with kids as she has always thought she was. Hen and Olive are both obsessed with Lego, which is straightforward and methodical enough that Kate could jump in without too much trouble. So while Lucy spent the day playing video games and acting as peacemaker when things got tense over who won the latest round of Mario Kart, Kate spent her time helping Eli and Hen build spaceships for little Lego goats.
Kate enjoyed herself a lot more than she thought she would, and while watching Lucy light up around her niblings was incredibly adorable, Kate is entirely too exhausted to do it again without at least an eight hour period of sleep in between.
Lucy laughs, her eyes scrunched up with clear delight. “Yeah, they can be a lot.”
“I just don’t understand where they keep all that energy.”
“The wonders of not being in your mid-thirties,” Lucy says drolly.
Kate scoffs. “I don’t think I’ve ever had that much energy in my entire life.”
Lucy glances up at Kate with a glimmer of amusement in her eyes and a clear teasing retort on her lips, but is interrupted by a voice calling her name, cutting cleanly through the noise of the crowd.
Lucy glances over her shoulder, her smile only a touch apprehensive when she spots Michael and Teresa making their way to them.
“Glad you made it,” Michael greets with a warm smile. His hand rests on Teresa’s back as he urges his fiancée forward. “Teresa, this is my youngest sister Lucy and her girlfriend Kate.”
Teresa smiles and reaches out to shake both Lucy and Kate’s hands. She has a warm smile and kind eyes behind large gold glasses. Her dark hair is slicked back in a tight ponytail and she’s dressed in a deep forest green dress that flows around her like water. Light makeup accentuates her light brown eyes, a hint of blush colouring her high cheekbones. She looks every bit the glowing bride-to-be, an easy lightness about her that exudes outward.
“It’s great to finally meet you. Michael has told me a lot about you,” she says warmly.
Lucy’s smile falters a bit but she recovers so quickly that Kate thinks she imagined it. “I know it’s a bit last minute to be saying this,” she replies, “but congratulations on the upcoming wedding. I’m really happy for the two of you.” Her voice is genuinely congratulatory but just a bit brittle, an undertone of hurt colouring it.
Kate’s heart thumps heavily in her chest. So she didn’t imagine Lucy’s slight falter then. Before Michael or Teresa can respond, Kate quickly jumps in to smooth over the suppressed hurt she can hear in Lucy’s voice—not knowing about Michael’s engagement to Teresa (or his divorce from his second wife) has clearly cut Lucy a lot deeper than she has let on.
“How did you two meet?” Kate asks, “I’m sure Lucy has told me, but that was quite a while ago.” She waves a hand and lets out a self-deprecating chuckle as if to say bad memory, silly me! even though she has an impeccable memory. She intends the question to be casual enough to not ping Teresa’s suspicions, but obvious enough to show Lucy that she has her back, even in something as mundane and non-life threatening as this.
Lucy shoots Kate a quick look of relief, and Kate offers her a small smile, reaching out to subtly press their arms together. Michael’s eyes track the movement, a bit of defensive suspicion filling them as they dart between his sister and Kate. She can tell that he knows her question was a direct call-out, but he can’t actually do anything about it without revealing his hand to his fiancée—he knows that Kate didn’t forget about Lucy sharing the story of how Michael and Teresa met, because he himself never told Lucy the story in the first place.
Kate may be incredibly nervous about spending time with Lucy’s niblings because she’s not quite sure how to talk to kids, but she knows exactly how to play this particular game.
Teresa’s smile widens, completely oblivious to the trap Kate has left for her fiancé. “It was actually here at Flint! The company I work for was hosting a fundraising gala here and Michael was representing Tara Oil Company as a donor. And we just really hit it off,” she explains with a slightly self-conscious shrug, her cheeks a touch pink. She glances back at Michael and his suspicious expression clears instantly, replaced by genuine warmth as he meets Teresa’s eyes.
“It’s been a wonderful whirlwind of a year,” he says with a fond smile.
Kate and Lucy exchange a quick glance, clearly thinking the same thing—while Kate isn’t judging Michael and Teresa, getting married a year after meeting each other feels rather quick.
And that’s coming from a pair of lesbians.
“What company do you work for?” Kate asks.
“I’m the Deputy Director of an early childcare centre here in Dallas.”
Lucy’s eyebrows shoot up her forehead. “How in the world did you host a fundraising gala here?” she blurts, her eyes widening in horror as she realizes what she just said.
Kate winces a little at Lucy’s unthinking outburst but is also wondering the same thing—schools in this country are famously underfunded, and Kate can’t imagine early childcare education centres are fairing any better. How the hell Teresa’s work managed to host an event at the fanciest microbrewery Kate has ever set foot in is beyond her.
Thankfully, Teresa doesn’t seem to take offence. “That’s a fair question,” she says with a good-natured laugh, “It’s a privately funded centre that serves children with rather wealthy parents.”
“That’s an understatement,” Michael scoffs, leaning close to Lucy and Kate and dropping his voice to a conspiratorial volume, “Dak Prescott’s kids go there.”
Kate knows next to nothing about football, but she has listened to Lucy yell at the TV during enough Dallas Cowboys games to recognize that name.
Lucy’s eyes go comically wide as she gapes at her brother. “You’re messing with me,” she gasps.
His grin widens. “I’m not,” he promises, “Some of Jerry Jones’ great-grandkids go there too.”
“No!”
“Yes!”
Kate doesn’t recognize that name, but she can read context clues well enough to figure that he’s somehow related to the Dallas Cowboys too.
“Michael!” Teresa scolds with a gentle swat to his arm, “You know better than to share that information. I could get in so much trouble.”
He holds his hands up in surrender, but he has the same smirk that Lucy gets when she’s pretending to back off from teasing Ernie or Kai only to swoop back in when they least expect it. “It’s just my sister,” he soothes. “She won’t say anything. Right, Luce?”
Lucy’s eyes are still wide with astonished wonder, but she mimes zipping her lips. Teresa doesn’t quite look convinced, but she is easily distracted by someone calling her and Michael’s names from the other side of the microbrewery.
“Excuse us,” she says with a smile, “Bride and groom duty calls. But it was really nice to finally meet the two of you.”
“You as well,” Lucy says as Teresa takes Michael’s hand and they disappear back into the crowd.
“She seems nice,” Kate says once they are left by themselves.
Lucy turns to Kate, reaching up to brush some hair back behind her ear, her hand lingering on Kate’s cheek for a moment. “Thanks,” she murmurs, her eyes bright and grateful.
Kate knows exactly what she’s talking about, but doesn’t really think that what she did is something that deserves gratitude. Supporting Lucy isn’t something that she does to get accolades or flowers, it’s just a part of loving her. She doesn’t feel the need to say you’re welcome when it is not something she does out of obligation or politeness—it’s just second nature at this point.
And she thinks that Lucy already knows that, so Kate simply smiles and shrugs a little. “Anytime.”
Lucy drops her hand from Kate’s cheek to lace their fingers together. “C’mon, let’s go grab a drink and then try and find Nate or Sofia before any of Michael’s annoying finance bro friends recognize me. The last time I was at a gala with them they spent two hours mansplaining how investing works to me.”
They weave their way through the crowd towards the bar that spans the length of the left wall. Bartenders dressed sharply in all black flit between partygoers, taking orders and mixing drinks with practiced ease. Kate and Lucy tuck themselves into the corner of the bar, patiently waiting for a bartender to notice them.
Lucy tugs her phone out of her back pocket, looking at the screen and smiling softly. Kate glances down—more of an involuntary reaction than out of any intention to snoop—and sees a text from Kai checking in to see how Lucy’s doing. She smiles to herself and turns away to give Lucy a moment to reply to their friend. She watches the bartenders for a bit, admiring the effortless skill they have as they smoothly pour and mix drinks and deliver them without missing a beat.
After watching the closest bartender make the fifth overly complicated looking cocktail in a row, Kate glances absently at the signature cocktail options on a menu by her elbow to see if she can figure out what they’re making. There are six signature wedding cocktails, each named something silly like Just Rosemarried Fizz or Mai Tai the Knot—it’s sweet, if a little cheesy.
Kate’s so caught up in reading the cocktail names that she doesn’t notice the prices right away, but she can’t stop her eyes from nearly bulging out of their sockets once she does. The cheapest one—A ‘Tini Bit Married—is a cocktail made with Beluga Epicure vodka, house olive oil spirit, Mancino Rosso Amaranto Barricato Vecchio Vermouth, lemon oil, and beluga sturgeon caviar, and it costs $178.
It’s so absurd that for a moment Kate can’t even react. It takes Lucy nudging her for her to realize that a bartender is right in front of them, staring at Kate expectantly.
Kate’s brain feels a bit like it’s rebooting in slow-motion, but she manages to order a beer without making a complete fool of herself. A voice in the back of her head that sounds suspiciously like her dad’s is hysterically wondering how much her beer will be if the cheapest cocktail costs more than a full tank of gas.
“This is absurd,” she says out loud, the voice in the back of her head vehemently agreeing.
Lucy’s nose scrunches adorably as she glances at Kate in confusion. “What is?”
“This,” Kate gestures at the specialty cocktail menu, feeling like she’s taking part in some ridiculous, elaborate prank, “This is absurd.”
Lucy glances at the list of specialty cocktails and then back at Kate in bewilderment. “The cocktails?” she asks slowly, “Yeah, I mean the names are kind of tacky but Michael’s always been cheesy like that.”
“What? No.” Kate shakes her head, pointing at the price on the most expensive cocktail, a whopping $244. “I mean, exactly how rich is your family?” she asks, “Because this isn’t just expensive, this is like obnoxiously rich. Like has-more-money-than-can-be-spent-in-twelve-lifetimes rich. Like the-French-revolutionaries-from-1791-would-try-to-cut-your-head-off rich. Like—”
“Kate,” Lucy interrupts, reaching up to grasp Kate’s shoulders, “breathe.”
Kate snaps her mouth shut and forces herself to temper her reaction. She didn’t grow up poor by any means, but being here with Lucy’s family feels like an entirely different world from the one Kate grew up in. Kate’s parents worried about things like the mortgage and the price of eggs and gas going up. They participated in fundraisers and stopped buying name brand food so that Noah and Kate could both play sports at the same time. When the 2008 recession hit and her dad lost his job, they had to take out a second mortgage on their house just to help Kate get through university. Kate worked part-time all throughout her post-secondary schooling to try and cover what her student loans and parents couldn’t. She is still paying off her student loans to this day, and probably will be for another seven years. It wasn’t always easy, but she knows she was still extremely lucky and privileged to grow up the way she did.
And yet, standing here in this luxury microbrewery with the most expensive cocktails she’s ever seen in her life after being driven here from a literal mansion by a private driver, she fears that, in comparison to Lucy, Kate grew up dirt-poor.
Sure, Lucy teases Kate about being excessively frugal for only buying things like cheese or cereal when they’re on sale and often jokes about flying to Europe to celebrate her birthdays growing up, but Kate has always thought that was just banter, not fundamental differences in the way they were raised.
Kate almost can’t even conceptualize the seemingly unfathomable wealth that the Taras so clearly have. She has never had the ability to spend money without careful consideration, and she doubts she ever will—she is always going to balance one budget against another, always going to compare prices until she finds the best deal, always going to worry about how much a new appliance will set her back even when the current one is practically unusable. It doesn’t matter that she has a great paycheque and lives a very comfortable life and has a respectable amount of savings to fall back on, she is never going to outgrow the frugal habits her parents raised her with.
It doesn’t matter how long it’s been since you were a kid or how different your life is from then, there are always going to childhood scars underneath your adult skin.
She feels entirely out of her depth here in the high society of Dallas, like she doesn’t belong in this world Lucy grew up in.
The hysterical voice of her dad in the back of her head is suddenly replaced by a steady, calm voice that sounds suspiciously like Jane Tennant, reminding her that Lucy doesn’t live in the obnoxiously wealthy world of her parents, she lives in the world where Kate and Lucy take turns buying dinner on date nights and spend months saving up for a new TV and get excited when their favourite coffee is on sale.
She may not belong in the world Lucy grew up in, but Lucy doesn’t belong to that world anymore either.
Kate’s breathing comes a bit easier then and the rush of panic and anxiety ebbs away. Thank you for the reality check, imaginary Jane Tennant.
The world comes back into focus and she looks at Lucy—really looks at her—immediately noting the wooden smile and the guarded eyes and the slight furrow between her brows. Kate softens, all of her distress and doubt from a moment ago dissipating. “Hey,” she says gently as she reaches out to take Lucy’s hands, “Ignore my rambling—you know how money-conscious I am. It’s just a bit overwhelming to be around this much excessive wealth. And you also know how poorly I deal with being overwhelmed.”
Lucy musters a smile that doesn’t quite reach her eyes. “Money-conscious is just another word for cheap,” she quips even though her heart is clearly not in it.
“Frugal,” Kate corrects softly, ducking down a little until Lucy can’t avoid her gaze. The callback to their time at the Kahua Koa makes Lucy’s smile a little less wooden and a little more genuine. “I’m sorry,” she murmurs.
Lucy shrugs half-heartedly. “‘s fine,” she mumbles, “I sometimes forget all this isn’t normal to most people.” Her eyes drop from Kate’s again, staring intently at the ground as she grinds her toe into the polished wooden floor. “My parent’s money has always complicated things. People look at you differently when they know you’re wealthy.”
Kate’s stomach twists at the resignation in Lucy’s words. “Well, it won’t complicate things with us,” she promises. “You are still the exact same person to me from before I realized you grew up like Ritchie Rich. I just understand your inclination for expensive watches a bit better. Though, I may need a minute to process the absurdly wealthy thing sometimes, so you may have to give me a minute to be hysterical before I can function properly again. Like whatever the money version of gay panic is.”
Lucy lets out a surprised laugh, fully meeting Kate’s gaze. Kate is relieved to see no trace of resignation on her face, replaced instead with a grin and those bright, sparkling eyes Kate loves so much. “Deal,” Lucy agrees.
They are interrupted by the bartender dropping their beers off, and Lucy quickly closes their tab—neither Kate or Lucy are very inclined to drink a lot on this trip, Lucy because she doesn’t want to give her parents anything more to use against her and Kate because she doesn’t want to somehow make a fool of herself in front of Lucy’s family. They take their drinks and make their way through the crowd, looking for one of Lucy’s siblings and ducking through the crowd whenever Lucy spots one of Michael’s finance bro friends. There’s no trace of Nate or Sofia on the main floor so they elect to head up to the second floor to try their luck.
Once they reach the top of the stairs, Kate almost immediately spots Sofia, Ryan, Nate, and a man Kate assumes must be Nate’s husband sitting around a table tucked into the corner. Kate points them out to Lucy, following her as she navigates them through the crowd to her siblings.
“Lucy!” Nate calls as soon as he spots them, shuffling his chair closer to his husband to make room on his side of the table for his sister, leaving Kate to slide into the empty chair beside Sofia.
It’s a bit quieter on the second floor as there are fewer people up here, and though the buzz of chatter still drifts around them, the corner table that they’re sitting in is thankfully a bit more secluded.
“I don’t believe we’ve met yet,” Nate’s husband says as he reaches across the table to shake Kate’s hand, “I’m Mateo.” His light brown skin is creased with laugh lines and his short salt and pepper hair and neat beard gives him a reserved, distinguished look that is belied by his kind brown eyes.
“Kate,” Kate greets as she shakes Mateo’s hand, “Nice to meet you.”
“Apologies I had to miss last night’s dinner,” he says to the table, “I thought I left work in a good enough state for them to handle things without me, but a rather difficult client brought in a new case last minute and they needed my eyes on it.”
Kate glances at Lucy, wondering what Mateo does for work. “Mateo’s a corporate lawyer,” Lucy explains, answering Kate’s unasked question. She turns to Mateo with a proud smile, and Kate just knows she’s going to brag about Kate in a way that will make her blush; Kate is getting better at accepting compliments considering Lucy showers her in them so frequently, but she doesn’t think she will ever be able to fully stop the blushing. “Kate was a lawyer too, before she moved to Hawai’i,” Lucy says, shooting Kate a quick wink.
The whole table turns to look at Kate with interest, and Kate shoots Lucy a half-hearted glare as she feels the back of her neck heat up. “I only practiced for a little over a year,” she quickly deflects.
“Oh?” Mateo says, clearly interested, “What did you practice?”
“I was just a Junior Associate at a law firm that focused on constitutional law.”
Mateo’s lips quirk up into an easy smile. “That’s nothing to sneeze at. I hated my constitutional law classes in school because I hated interpreting the constitution. I prefer the comparatively straightforward rules of corporate law.”
Kate smiles and inclines her head in acknowledgement. “And I hated keeping track of all the wild loopholes and escape clauses in corporate law. At least the constitution doesn’t have twelve escape clauses for every contract.”
Mateo’s smile widens. “Touché.”
“What made you stop practicing?” Sofia asks from beside Kate, “That’s a lot of schooling to do for you to only practice for a year.”
Kate tightens her hold on her beer and wonders how in the world to answer that question. As a kid (and after her dreams of being Miss America faded), the only career she could ever imagine doing was law. Her and Noah used to hold fake court in their living room every Saturday morning before their parents woke up, Kate’s old stuffed bear presiding over the living room with a black towel robe and a wig made of lace doilies, Noah on one side with his chest puffed up and their father’s briefcase in his hand and Kate on the other side almost falling out of their mom’s heels.
However, like most things, her dream of being a lawyer died with Noah.
She finished out her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and immediately applied and completed her Juris Doctor at Northwestern more out of an obligation to a lifelong dream than any real remaining passion or ambition for it. Moving to D.C. and passing the bar felt more like living out someone else’s life than fulfilling her childhood dream.
Kate stopped practicing law because she had quickly realized that her dream meant nothing if Noah wasn’t there to share it with her.
Lucy’s foot brushes against hers under the table, a steady, grounding pressure against her ankle. Lucy knows exactly why she quit law and transferred to the DoD, knows all the grief and loneliness and hopelessness that lead to that decision—and she knows how hard it was for Kate to actually admit that to herself, let alone to Lucy.
It’s not really something she’s particularly keen to rehash to Lucy’s siblings and sibling-in-laws.
“I got headhunted by the DoD, and it’s hard to say no to them,” Kate explains, which isn’t a lie but isn’t quite the full truth either. She got on the DoD’s radar through networking, but she accepted the offer mostly because she realized that she could potentially prevent deaths like Noah’s as a DIA officer.
“What made you transfer from the DoD to the FBI then?” Nate asks.
Kate meets Lucy’s eyes across the table, unable to stop the small smile that touches her lips. “Transferring kept me in Hawai’i,” she says easily.
Lucy drops her gaze to her beer and takes a quick sip, but is unable to hide her pleased smile or the faint blush colouring her cheeks.
Mateo’s phone vibrating the table interrupts them, and he quickly answers it. Kate can’t make out the exact words, but she can hear the frantic panic of the voice on the other end of the phone as Mateo tries to calm them down. “Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down, bud,” Mateo urges, “I didn’t catch any of that.” He pauses as the voice repeats themself, a little slower but just as panicked. Mateo’s brow furrows as he listens, and then his whole face transforms into pure panic. “Wait, Max did what to your grandparent’s couch?” The voice rises in pitch as Mateo numbly turns to look at Nate, who quickly jumps up so the two of them can step away for a bit of privacy.
“That must be Miles,” Ryan says, his eyes following his brother-in-laws as they have a frantic, hushed conversation a few feet away.
Sofia turns to Kate to explain, a hint of amusement in her eyes, “Max is their dog who our parents already don’t like. And will probably like even less now.”
Lucy raises her eyebrows at her sister. “I thought Max had a lifetime ban from peeing on their Persian rug when he was a puppy?”
Sofia waves a cavalier hand. “That lasted like two months before Miles begged them to let him bring Max over after he finished training him.”
“Well, hopefully it was one of the older couches,” Lucy muses.
“The new GianFranco one?” Nate shrieks, his voice carrying across the second floor and causing multiple people to stop their conversations and turn to look at him. He seems to sense this and him and Mateo turn away from everyone, continuing their heated conversation at a much quieter volume.
“Or not,” Lucy says with a wince.
Sofia snorts and rolls her eyes. “I told Nate not to bring Max this time. Everyone is already on edge with the wedding, the last thing we needed was an overly excitable Australian Shepard tearing our parent’s furniture apart, but he never listens to me. They’ll never let Nate hear the end of this.”
Something in Lucy’s eyes changes, the amusement replaced by a look Kate’s never seen before, a strange defensive mix of worry and anger. It’s gone before Kate can fully process it, wiped clean as Nate comes back and slides into his chair beside Lucy. “Mateo’s got it,” he says, though there is a very obvious doubtful tone in his voice.
“Does he need someone to drive him back?” Ryan offers. “Sof and I drove here and I have another early practice tomorrow so I’ve just been enjoying some real shitty in-house cola.”
“Really? Let me try.” Sofia reaches for her husband’s glass and takes a sip, immediately blanching and scrunching her nose up. “What is that?”
Ryan laughs and gently extricates his glass from Sofia’s hand, draining the rest of it with a wince. “I told you, some real shitty in-house cola.”
“It tastes like someone who’s only ever heard of cola tried to make it from scratch and when that turned out awful they tried to cover it up with— What is that? Lavender?”
“Yeah, artisanal soda isn’t really their strong suit.” Ryan chuckles as he turns back to Nate. “I don’t mind heading out early and taking Mateo so he doesn’t have to wait for one of the drivers to get here.”
Nate looks conflicted for a moment, glancing over at his husband who is still standing against the wall, a death grip on the phone against his ear. That seems to settle something for Nate because he turns back to Ryan with a grateful smile. “That would actually be great if you could drive him back. Thank you.”
“No problem, man,” Ryan says easily as he gives Sofia a quick kiss on the cheek before standing up and heading over to Mateo. He claps him on the shoulder in greeting and says something that results in Mateo nodding vigorously and shoving his phone back into his pocket. They quickly wave at the table before heading towards the staircase that leads to the first floor.
The table lapses into comfortable silence as both Nate and Sofia pull out their phones to presumably text their kids that their dads are heading back. Lucy grins at Kate across the table, tangling their feet together under the table—Lucy isn’t prone to playing footsie, which Kate is endlessly grateful for as she has always found it a little juvenile, but she likes to be touching Kate whenever possible. She’s tactile in a way that took a bit for Kate to get used to at the start of their relationship, when she wasn’t entirely out at work and PDA made her a bit uncomfortable. But now, nearly six years later, Kate knows that it’s less about PDA and more about Lucy craving the comfort of physical touch. When they sit side-by-side, it’s usually a hand on Kate’s thigh or their hips pressed together, but when they are across from each other it’s the steady press of ankle against ankle. It’s a reassurance thing that Lucy needs, which Kate is more than willing to provide.
There’s a sudden raucous cheering from the first floor, drawing everyone’s attention. Nate cranes his neck to look past the railing as best he can, rolling his eyes and relaxing with a huff. “Looks like Michael and Teresa are playing some bachelor-bachelorette game,” he explains.
“I still can’t believe we’re doing this for the third time,” Sofia complains.
“Be nice,” Nate says warningly.
“Why should I?” Sofia scoffs. “It’s the same pattern every time: Fall madly in love with a woman and marry her a year after meeting her, have a kid or two, then get divorced five years later. Rinse and repeat. I’m already tired of it. A hundred bucks says they’re mid-divorce proceedings five years from now.”
“Sofia,” Nate chides, “We aren’t going to bet on our brother’s marriage failing before it’s even started.”
“Why the hell not? Gotta get some sort of entertainment out of it.”
“Because it’s not nice!”
“I’ll take that bet,” Lucy interjects, “But I think they’ll already be separated in three years.”
Sofia grins, smug and amused as she reaches across the table to shake Lucy’s hand and seal the bet.
“Lucy!” Nate exclaims.
Lucy shrugs. “What? We all know it’s true.”
Nate sputters for a moment before deflating. “I know, but that doesn’t mean we should make bets on it.”
“You’re just salty ‘cause you lost the last bet,” Lucy reminds him.
Nate crosses his arms and slumps back in his seat, looking like a sulking toddler rather than the forty-something year-old man he is. “I never win.”
“That’s ‘cause you always bet on losing horses,” Lucy says with a sympathetic pat on his shoulder.
“And are unreasonably optimistic about Michael’s ability to maintain a healthy work-life balance instead of going the way of our parents,” Sofia adds.
“Well, his kids still like him so he’s at least above our parents in that regard,” Lucy mutters under her breath.
“Oh, he’s a great father,” Sofia agrees, “Just an absolutely terrible husband.”
The table falls silent for a moment, another cheer drifting up from downstairs. Lucy presses her ankle more firmly against Kate’s, who glances up to find Lucy tracing her finger around the rim of her glass, something heavy clearly weighing on her mind. Kate presses her other foot against Lucy’s, squeezing her ankle between both feet until Lucy glances up. She offers her a small smile, and that seems to rally Lucy’s courage enough to look at her brother and sister.
“Why didn’t any of you tell me about Michael’s engagement?” she asks quietly.
Nate and Sofia both tense, glancing at each other and having a silent conversation in the blink of an eye. Neither of them look particularly eager to talk first, and that clearly rankles Lucy, her eyes flashing with hurt.
“Did babba and mama forbid you from telling me or something?” Lucy guess. She’s clearly aiming for teasing, but her words land sharp and bitter.
Sofia flinches a little, dropping her eyes from Lucy’s. “Yeah,” she admits quietly, “They did.”
That’s clearly not the answer Lucy was expecting even after guessing it, and her eyes go wide, shining darkly with anger and anguish. Kate’s heart sinks as Lucy shuts down, struggling to mask her pain behind a façade of indifference. She presses her ankles tighter against Lucy’s, the only physical comfort she can offer at the moment.
“So you were keeping his divorce from me for at least a year?” Lucy asks with a hollow laugh. “Were any of you ever going to tell me Michael got married again if I hadn’t come? Were you ever going to even tell me him and Jada got divorced?”
“No, no, it’s not that,” Nate hurries to say, stumbling over his words a little, “I— I mean they did forbid us from telling you when they got engaged, but we didn’t know about the divorce either.”
A heartbreakingly hopeful look creeps into Lucy’s expression as she regards her siblings. “What do you mean?”
Sofia sighs, clutching her cocktail glass between her hands like the cold is grounding her. “We only found out about Michael and Jada’s divorce when he introduced Teresa to us a few months ago,” she admits. “Babba and mama must have known, but they didn’t tell any of us.”
“We all knew Michael and Jada were on the rocks since even before Leo was born,” Nate continues, “But when we stopped seeing Jada around as much, we figured that she just wanted some privacy to recover from the birth. So imagine our shock when we all got together for Michael’s most recent birthday only to be introduced to his new girlfriend, Teresa.”
“Yeah, that was a fun ride home with three confused kids wondering where Auntie Jada was and why Uncle Michael was kissing a woman they’d never seen before,” Sofia says drolly.
“At least Miles was old enough for us to mostly explain it to him,” Nate agrees.
“You remember how it was with Rosa?” Sofia asks. Kate assumes that Rosa must have been Michael’s first wife and the mother of Hazel and Olive. “Right after Leo’s birth Jada stopped coming around as much, just like Rosa after Olive was born.”
“And Michael never stopped working his long hours after Leo was born, just like with Hazel and Olive,” Nate continues. “We assumed that him not being there for either of his wives after going through childbirth is what really led to the marriage crumbling. We just saw it happen in real time with Rosa because we were all around a lot more back then.”
“Jada just sort of faded out of Michael’s life updates without us really noticing until after long the fact,” Sofia adds, a touch of bitterness colouring her tone when she continues, “And now we know that babba and mama knew about their separation and then divorce and were deliberately keeping it from the rest of us.”
Lucy’s eyes still shine with a hint of hurt, but she looks much more relaxed than she had. “I guess the disappointment of a second failed marriage taints even the golden child,” she quips.
Sofia grins sardonically. “The only thing probably worse in their eyes would be if he quit Tara Oil Company.”
“We didn’t want to keep it from you, Luce,” Nate interjects before his sisters can get too off topic, “But you know how babba and mama are.”
Lucy lets out a long sigh, mustering a smile that Kate can tell isn’t entirely genuine. “Yeah, I know.”
Something icy and painful twists in Kate’s chest at Lucy’s resignation at her siblings deference to their parents. She can understand wanting to please your parents to an extend—even as a kid Kate was a terribly eager people pleaser—but at the cost of a relationship with your sister? At the cost of a relationship with Lucy, who is the most lovable, excitable, best person Kate has ever met? That Kate can’t understand.
She supposes that she admittedly doesn’t know much about Amer and Gloria or the relationship (or, rather, lack thereof) with their children, but what she has learned she is liking less and less. Amer and Gloria seem to exert a type of control over their children, even as adults, that scares Kate a bit. Nate and Sofia are both grown adults with spouses and children of their own, but they still seem to live under the whims of their parents wishes. If Noah was still alive, Kate can’t even imagine anything her parents could ask of her that would make her keep something this big from him, no matter what or how her parents asked her.
She can’t even imagine what Amer and Gloria must have been like throughout the Tara siblings’ childhoods to lead to Nate and Sofia allowing them exert such control over their lives to this day.
Nate’s phone buzzes at his elbow, breaking the still lingering tension in the air, and he quickly picks it up to check it. “Mateo and Ryan made it back and managed to calm Miles down,” he reports, his shoulders sagging with relief, “Mateo thinks we can replace the couch without them noticing. There’s an identical one that we can get delivered tomorrow afternoon.”
“Without them noticing?” Lucy asks dubiously, “When has that ever worked for us?”
“Well, we’re fully grown adults now, not thirteen,” Nate retorts, though there’s a hint of doubt in his voice. “And babba and mama have to go into the office for the morning, so it’s basically perfect timing.”
“Sure,” Lucy drawls, “Best of luck with that.”
Nate rolls his eyes, quickly typing out a reply to Mateo before putting his phone back on the table.
Sofia grins at her siblings. “You remember that marble coffee table we broke? I thought we would be banned from the south wing for the rest of our lives.”
Kate struggles to follow the whiplash of the conversation to go from tense, barely concealed heartbreak between Lucy and her siblings, to them laughing and teasing each other. She takes a long sip of her beer and tries not to let her feelings show on her face.
“I still don’t understand how we managed to break a marble coffee table,” Lucy laments.
“It was the way it was built, I think,” Nate says thoughtfully, “I’ve never trusted a table with only one middle leg since.”
“I still don’t know how they found out about that!” Lucy exclaims.
Sofia laughs and takes a sip of her cocktail. “I don’t think we did as good a job of cleaning it up as we thought we did.”
Nate rubs at the back of his neck with a chagrined smile. “Yeah, I don’t know why we thought they wouldn’t notice a missing coffee table from the most used sitting room.”
“That punishment was the worst,” Lucy complains. “They got threw out all of my toys. I was left with, like, one stuffed animal. Which I think was only because it had slid between my bed and the wall and they didn’t see it.”
“Forget that—they got rid of my laptop,” Nate counters. “I had to beg my teachers to give me an extension on all my assignments because I had them all on my laptop.”
“Should’ve done them by hand,” Sofia snarks.
Nate sticks his tongue out at her. “I remember you spending quite a few days crying about losing all your art supplies,” he taunts toothlessly.
“And?” Sofia shrugs, unrepentant. “You had a laptop to lose. They refused to get me one because I got an A- in my AP English class.”
“At least you got into AP classes,” Lucy groans, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard the end of it for not taking them in high school.”
“Ooh, what about those sculptures you broke right before the annual European vacation when you were twelve?” Nate asks Lucy. “I think you were practicing your cartwheels in the hallway? That had to have been a worse punishment. I thought they were going to straight up kill you.”
Lucy’s face creases adorably in remembrance. “Ugh, you mean those weird busts?”
Sofia flips her hair over her shoulder. “The Thomas Schütte ones? I always thought they were ugly. Honestly I think you improved it by breaking their noses off.”
“Wish our parents saw it that way,” Lucy says drolly. “I spent a week stuck in my room while you were all galavanting through Spain.”
“I can’t believe they left you here,” Nate says, shaking his head a little. “You were way too young to be left alone.”
“I had Gerald,” Lucy concedes. “So I wasn’t completely on my own. Not that it mattered much considering how little he talks.”
“I think that was the longest punishment any of us got,” Nate muses.
“They didn’t even let me drive to school with y’all when you got back,” Lucy whines, “It was just Gerald and me driving in a near silent car for two months. I don’t think I was allowed to talk to any of you until like summer break.”
Nate laughs. “And that was the worst punishment of all for you, Miss Professional Yapper.”
Kate quietly watches the three siblings, a ball of ice lodged sharply in her throat. They’re laughing as they reminisce about all the trouble they got into as kids, but Kate doesn’t find it funny at all. The punishments doled out for pretty normal childhood mischief clearly went far beyond timeouts or even being grounded. Kate is sure, based on everything else in the Tara mansion, that the busts were probably priceless, but having all your possessions thrown out or being isolated from your siblings as punishment seems a little extreme.
It doesn’t take Kate being a former lawyer or a current federal agent to know that those punishments certainly didn’t fit the crimes. Especially when said perpetrators—and Kate means that word with as much sarcasm as possible—were literally children.
It paints a very specific picture of Lucy’s parents, one that makes every single mandated reporter instinct in Kate flare up even though all four of the Tara children are over thirty by now.
And it is, with slowly dawning horror and heartbreak, that Kate suddenly realizes that for all of the physical and metaphorical distance between Lucy and her parents, their presence still looms over Lucy to this day. As much as Lucy has broken free from her parents’ control in ways that Nate and Sofia clearly haven’t, the scars they left on her affect her in much subtler, almost subconscious ways.
Suddenly, a lot of things about Lucy’s coping skills slot into place with the realization that she grew up with controlling parents: her unwillingness to talk about her parents or her childhood, her lack of a relationship with siblings she clearly still loves, her sensitivity to rejection and habit of shutting down completely when it flares up, her fierce independence and stubborn inability to ask for any kind of help, even when it does more harm to Lucy’s mental or physical health than good.
It’s why Lucy always strives to be the most useful person in any room, to be as little a burden as possible; it’s why she eagerly volunteers for anything her NCIS team needs, even if it puts her in an overly dangerous, potentially deadly situation.
It’s why she’s constantly trying to prove her worth to the people she loves: Lucy thinks that she needs to earn their love.
Icy rage simmers below Kate’s skin as she has the sudden, terrible, agonizing realization that the woman she loves grew up without any of the safety and love and attention that every child deserves.
“How’d they even figure out it was you?” Nate wonders aloud.
“I have no clue!” Lucy exclaims, “Like the coffee table? Okay, fine, that’s fair. It was in the most used sitting room. But I have absolutely no clue how they figured out the busts were broken considering they almost never went into that wing. Let alone that I was the one who broke them.”
Sofia stiffens beside Kate—if Kate wasn’t sitting right beside her, she wouldn’t have noticed anything. Kate glances her out of the side of her eye, watching as Sofia slowly spins her cocktail glass on the table, her face impassive.
“I swear they must have had like security cameras in every room,” Nate continues, “There’s no way they would have found out about half the things they found out about otherwise.”
“I think we would’ve noticed hundreds of security cameras watching our every move,” Lucy says dryly.
Sofia suddenly stops spinning her glass. “I told them,” she murmurs, her eyes trained on the table and her voice cracking a little.
Lucy and Nate both freeze, turning wide, shocked eyes on their sister. “What?” Lucy asks flatly.
Sofia’s shoulders twitch a little, before she shakes her head, straightens her spine, and looks Lucy straight in the eye. “I told them,” she repeats. “I told them you broke the busts. And about the coffee table. And the couch. And about half a dozen other things.”
Kate’s heart crawls up into her throat, her eyes darting between Lucy and Sofia. Lucy’s foot slides away from Kate’s, and Kate is helpless to stop it, frozen in place and entirely unsure how to offer Lucy any comfort.
“What are you saying?” Lucy asks sharply, sitting up a little straighter, every inch of her posture radiating a slowly burning rage.
Sofia meets Lucy’s blazing eyes. “I’m saying I tattled to babba and mama about a lot of the things we did. Not— Not everything. But a lot.”
“Sof,” Nate breathes, staring across the table at Sofia like he doesn’t fully recognize her,
“Why?”
Sofia shifts uncomfortably, her eyes dropping down to where she is spinning her glass faster and faster. “I couldn’t— I couldn’t handle the isolation,” she murmurs, “Not like y’all. It made me feel like I was losing my mind. I couldn’t sleep, couldn’t eat. It made me paranoid. And babba and mama always somehow knew whenever I was at my lowest. That was when they would come with a promise to end the isolation if I would just tell them what happened.” Sofia pauses, her chin trembling a little and her eyes too bright and too wet as she finally looks up at Nate and Lucy. “They made it seem so simple,” she whispers.
Nate is staring at Sofia with a mixture of sympathy and hurt, his dark eyes wide and stricken. But Lucy is staring at Sofia like she is two seconds away from leaping over the table and strangling her. Her lips are pressed into a tight line and her eyes are blazing with anger and betrayal, her hand wrapped so tightly around her beer glass that her knuckles shine bone-white.
“You think it wasn’t like that for me too?” Lucy demands in a low, dangerous voice. “Or that they didn’t come asking me to betray you too?” Sofia flinches a little at the vitriol in Lucy’s voice. “But I never did because there was nothing they could do to me that would be worse than turning on one of you!”
“Lucy,” Nate chides quietly.
“No!” Lucy turns on him, the edges of her anger sharp and cutting. “I thought it was always supposed to be us against them. Now we find out it was actually us against Sofia?”
“I’m sure it wasn’t—”
“Don’t make excuses for her, Nate,” Lucy snaps. Her eyes flash as she turns her glare back to Sofia. “She knew exactly what she was doing.”
Sofia shrinks back a little but doesn’t dispute Lucy’s words. “I’m sorry,” she says, almost inaudibly. Guilt shines so clearly in her eyes as she regards her siblings that it’s almost hard to look at. It’s clear this is something that has been weighing on her for decades, but Kate has a feeling that finally admitting it has not lifted the weight off Sofia like she probably hoped it would. Not after being met with Nate’s clear betrayal and Lucy’s simmering anger.
“Lucy—”
“I’m leaving,” Lucy snarls, her eyes blazing. Her chair screeches against the floor as she shoots up and, without a single look back, storms off into the crowd.
Kate and Lucy’s siblings stare after her in stunned silence for a moment, before Kate jolts back into her body. “I need to go after her,” she says, still a little shell-shocked by the sudden turn of mood the evening has taken.
Nate nods jerkily, like a wooden doll that has just come to life and doesn’t quite know how to move its limbs. Sofia doesn’t say anything, just stares numbly at the cocktail glass between her fingers.
Kate hesitates, glancing between the spot Lucy disappeared into the crowd and back at Nate and Sofia. Every molecule in her is itching to chase after Lucy, but she doesn’t want to just abandon Nate and Sofia in such a state either, even if she doesn’t know them all that well. “I’ll, uh, see you tomorrow. I’m going to,” she trails off, jerking a thumb over her shoulder in the direction that Lucy disappeared to.
Nate barely moves her head, but he nods in acknowledgement; Sofia still doesn’t move.
Kate hesitates for a moment more, a part of her wanting to ensure Sofia and Nate are okay before leaving them but her heart screaming at her to go find Lucy. Her heart wins out—it always does when Lucy is involved—and she gives a single, awkward wave to the siblings before turning and heading into the crowd where she last saw Lucy.
It’s loud and overwhelming, the sickly sweet smell of alcohol and sweat much stronger in the thick of the crowd. If Kate is overwhelmed by it, she can’t imagine Lucy’s mental state considering how she stormed off from the table.
Which means that Lucy likely sought somewhere calm and quiet—Kate makes it to the balcony railing that overlooks the first floor, scanning the room for a good refuge from the crowd. There isn’t a single corner of the microbrewery that isn’t overrun with people, which leaves two options: the bathroom, or outside.
Kate quickly heads for the stairs and descends to the first floor, weaving her way though the crowd to the front door and hoping that she knows Lucy as well as she thinks she does.
The night air is hot and dry, but the relative silence is a welcome reprieve from the constant hum of chatter and laughter inside. A few groups of people are leaned against the building smoking or vaping, but Kate easily spots her girlfriend through the haze, standing by herself far enough from the smokers and vapers that she won’t be choked out by the smell.
Kate takes a steadying breath, trying to prepare herself for anything, before heading over to Lucy.
Lucy seems to sense her even without looking up. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she says flatly as Kate leans against the wall beside her.
Their arms barely brush before Lucy shifts away from her, putting a good two feet of space between them.
Kate swallows thickly as panic burns hot and fierce in her chest. Her heart pounds unbearably loudly in her ears, her head swimming a little. Lucy isn’t one to turn down physical comfort, and Kate is at a loss as to how to handle it. This whole trip Kate has felt like she’s a dozen steps behind Lucy.
Like Lucy is somewhere that Kate can’t quite reach.
“Okay,” Kate whispers, “Okay, we don’t have to talk about it.”
“Good,” Lucy says shortly. “I messaged Gerald. He’ll take us back.”
“Okay,” Kate repeats, completely unsure what she could possibly do or say to reach for Lucy without pushing her further away.
A tense, uneasy silence falls between them, broken only by the cars rushing past and the occasional burst of laughter from the smokers and vapers. Kate shifts uncomfortably, her fingers itching to reach for Lucy but her fear of doing more damage than good keeping her still. She is acutely aware of Lucy’s stiff body beside her, every muscle coiled and tense like she’s only a heartbeat away from exploding.
Kate doesn’t really care about being close enough to be caught in the shrapnel of it so long as she can be there for Lucy in the aftermath.
She’s so focused on not reaching out for Lucy that she jumps a little when a warm hand suddenly slides into hers. Her head snaps down to look at Lucy in shock, only to find Lucy in the exact same position, still silently glaring out at the cars rushing past, except now she’s holding Kate’s hand.
Kate forces herself to breathe, trying to not make a big deal out of it for fear of accidentally pushing Lucy away. She squeezes Lucy’s hand, the knots in her stomach loosening a little when Lucy weakly squeezes it back.
Lucy may need time to process her anger and betrayal, but Kate will be by her side throughout it all.
She will make sure that Lucy knows she isn’t alone anymore.
And that’s a promise that she refuses to break.