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The roar of the motorcycle cut through the press of workers pulling up streamers and placing ornamental hedges in looping lines along the sprawling grass. The rider kicked down the stand and leaned forward, peering over the tops of her dark sunglasses towards the extravagant faux-marble arch being erected just off the driveway.
“Fucking pricks.” She muttered and pulled off her helmet. The door was fuck-off massive and she almost respected the energy.
The butter who answered had a face that looked puckered like a lemon and his blatant disgust at the dark mud scuff marks of her boots on what she could only imagine was a thousand dollar doormat pushed her annoyance into amusement.
“I need to speak with Oliver. Oliver Quick?” She asked and the man seemed to be nearly vibrating with interest he tried valiantly to tamp down.
“I'm afraid he is unavailable at the moment, may I have you find a seat–”
“Listen,” She huffed. “Either you go find him or I will, and I think we both know it'll be quicker if you do it and save you the trouble of cleaning up all the muddy footprints I'll leave behind, yeah?”
That convinced him. Though, he had shuffled her off into a sitting room and she leaned back with a soft, “fucking hell.”
Felix had spent the two hours since returning from fucking Prescot either fuming or drinking. It was why he was the last to know of their strange visitor until Venetia had nearly broken his door down with her mock-whispered call of “Oliver has a girl here!”
Somehow out of all the lies, this seemed the most unbelievable. And yet, when he followed the veritable parade of Cattons to the drawing room as they tried to casually lounge about as if this stranger hadn't caught them in the midst of a party.
“Welcome! Oh it is so lovely to meet one of Oliver's…?” his mother fluttered and preened over the woman when she was shown in. She had left the question hanging in the air and Felix answered it snidely.
“Sister.” He'd seen her photo on the picturesque mantle in Oliver's home, even if she had been sans biker jacket, nose piercing, and dyed red tips.
“Sister?” His mother questioned confusingly, then, “Oh it hardly matters! You absolutely must stay for the party tonight, his birthday! I'm positive we can scrounge up a costume that fits you!”
The woman smirked, only half her mouth raising, as she slid her hands out from Elsbeth's and looked around, taking each of them in in equal measures before laughing slightly.
“Mmhm, sister. We ain't close, a bit older yeah?” She hummed and Venetia's smile she'd politely hidden behind her hand seemed to make the woman laugh too. His sister's humor seemed to evaporate and that pissed him off more than Oliver already had.
“Something funny?” Felix demanded and even though his mother hissed at him, he couldn't take his eyes off the woman. She even looked like Oliver, though it seemed she favored her mother's coloring over her father's like Ollie. But there was this cruel little smirk they did with their little worm mouths which rankled him.
“Oh, nothing!” She said as if a joke had been said. “Just seeing why Ols likes you all so much.”
And that had a hush falling over the room. Felix could almost smell the mocking on her comment, the little underhanded joke that was not for them and it made him want to call Duncan in and kick this woman out.
“Sam?”
All eyes turned on the door and Oliver stood there half dressed in his costume for tonight and panting. Clearly he had run down from his room to stop whatever confrontation he was worried would happen and found it already too late.
“What are you doing here?” He demanded softly, eyes flicking worriedly from Felix's family and back to his sister. He was gauging how much he'd have to lie to worm his way out of this one and Felix could see that possibly shrinking with each step Sam took away from the family and towards Oliver. For his part, Oliver looked at her as if she were a tsunami that would crash down upon him whether he ran or not.
“We talk outside?” Sam asked and Elsbeth jumped in though Felix thought the question had been directed at Oliver.
“Of course, of course! Down the steps and to the right.” She directed and Sam looked back over her shoulder with a nod which had too many teeth to be anything other than mocking.
His mother was horrid, Felix decided, because the landing was directly under the far most window of the drawing room and when one cracked the pane and leaned in, the stone walls echoed the voices up, clear as a bell. His mother and sister went directly to the window and leaned in, his father trailing more because his mother went. Felix followed, he convinced himself, because he had a right to know after all the horrid things Oliver had done to him, he deserved to know if they were planning something.
“We gotta go, Ols. Beth's in hospital and she needs us.” Sam said softly.
“But…” Oliver whimpered, honest to goodness, whimpered and there was the shuffling of clothes that made Felix think Sam might be hugging him. “They planned a party for me, Sam, like two hundred people and this costume…what if you went and I came tomorrow? Or I grab a cab–”
“Hopscotch.” Sam said apropos of nothing and yet it shut Oliver up. A code word, like the kind he and Venetia had when they were young. Felix risked a look over the window and he couldn't say whether it was because he was looking for it, or that he'd simply gotten better at reading Oliver's faces, but he could see each emotion as it flashed passed. Anger, then hope with his bargaining, then confusion gave way to hopelessness. Felix flinched a bit when Oliver's head buried in his hands and the soft noises were him crying.
Ollie's sister just pulled him into a hug and refused to let go even when he struggled until finally he went still.
“Oh that poor dear, to hide a sister like that, she must be the one who helped his father, don't you think?” His mother whispered to the air, not really expecting a response. “God, should we call the police?”
“Mum,” Venetia hissed but she was clearly enjoying the misery below, smiling slightly at Ollie's sobs and hiding laughs when he cried so hard he hiccupped.
Felix remained kneeling under that window with his family whom he loved and for the first time in his life wondered if he liked them.
They were still talking, mostly about Oliver and his family and he wanted to tell them the truth. Tell them about the square brick home and trips to Greece each year, and the lies and lies and lies. Yet, he held his tongue. Even if Oliver was a horrid person, he didn't quite want to add fuel to the mockery which was already happily burning between his parents and his sister. It felt too much like kicking a dog while it was down and for all Felix knew he could be mean, he never truly wanted to be cruel for cruelties sake.
So he kept his mouth shut and scuttled to the nearest chair when footsteps could be heard stomping up the stone steps and the pair slid back into the room. His mother threw herself onto the couch and his father stood next to the bookshelf and yanked out the nearest copy to pretend to read, despite the fact that Felix could see it was clearly upside down. Venetia didn't move, just sat on the ground in the patch of sunlight right under the cracked window. Oliver was giving his apologies for leaving before the party, mostly to Elsbeth about how much work she'd put in and how truly sorry it was to see it wasted.
“Oh no dear, family must come first!” His mother stood and took Oliver's hands in her own and gripped him so tightly her knuckles turned white.
She was blathering on, but Sam had turned to look at them all with that same smirk, a touch knowing and mocking. While they spoke, she walked over to where Venetia was sitting, leaning just far enough towards the window to see the small terrace below where they'd been standing and talking. She let out a laugh and looked down at Venetia with just the softest touch of disdain in her smile.
Venetia was many things, but Felix had found that above all, she hated being left out of a joke and despised being the butt of one. It was one of the reasons she never invited anyone home for summer; she couldn't risk anyone who knew the fake Venetia meeting the people who knew the real one. The overlap would be like that experiment they did in labs where the whole beaker exploded.
As if revving up to tell a spectacular joke, Venetia, without breaking eye contact with Oliver's sister, called out, “Don't worry about the party, Oliver, no one really remembers it's a birthday party anyways.”
Felix cringed a touch. It was as underhanded as he had expected from his sister and hit Oliver right where it hurt. His whole face seemed to crumble and his pale blue eyes seemed to scream that he was close to tears.
“I'm going to go pack.” He said and then nearly ran from the room. They all knew the help would have already packed everything anyways, it was just an excuse to leave. Felix held down his response to follow.
Sam smiled but there was a sharp edge to it now. She knelt down, her leather riding shoes polished to a shine creaking as she did. Quietly, so as not to be overheard, she whispered something to Venetia. All three watched the smile drip off her face like mascara in a swimming pool. When Sam rose and made to follow her brother with only a perfunctory thanks, she left behind Venetia who wouldn't meet their eye and refused to tell anyone what was said. That was rare.
Felix was focused on the door Oliver had run out of. It would have been easy to follow him, stop him in the Blue Room and convince him to stay a bit longer, that all this work for this party shouldn't be wasted, that his sister–but that would be cruel because he didn't mean it, he just wanted to piss off Oliver's sister. But Oliver was no longer Felix's to save. No more dinner coats or cuff links.
And yet.
Ignoring his mother pestering Venetia and his father, seemingly having figured out to flip the book over, had actually begun to read whatever it was he'd grabbed.
Felix found Sam leaning on the pale stones out the open front doors, holding an unlit cigarette as she clicked a clearly empty lighter before giving up. Instinctively, Felix held out his own, polished brass and engraved with his name, and this seemed to draw a chuckle out of her too.
“Did you need something?” She finally asked when the end caught and burned a bright orange.
“I just wanted to say…” Felix wanted to be a good friend, and so the next words were not an admonishment but something approaching kindness. “Oliver needs help. He has some issues and they aren't helped by a sister bailing him out.”
Sam looked shocked for a minute and then she threw her head back and laughed so loudly it had the servants carrying decorations and expensive seafood duck their head and walk faster.
“No, no, Felix Catton.” She said, taking a long drag and then pointing accusingly though she was still smiling. “No, what my brother needs is a real fucking friend but he always comes back to assholes like you.”
“What?” Felix demanded. He wasn't sure which part he was offended by, being called an asshole, or that he wasn't Oliver's friend.
“What? You think you were his first?” Sam cooked her head as if examining him again. “No, every year he always manages to pick the worst tosser he can find to love. God, first it was that Princeton prick, then Charles I and Charles II, then fucking Philip–fucking cunt that he was.”
“Listen–” Felix tried to wrangle the conversation back around and gain back whatever upper hand he'd started with.
“No, you listen. You probably think that you are some saint among men, plucking my dear baby brother out of some gutter slum and showing him the magical wonders of the posh elite fuck-faces you rub elbows with, but really, Philip, you're nothing but another rich tosser playing pretend in ratty trousers held up by an Hermes belt worth more than my bike.” She finished took another drag and flicked off the ash. “You want to be treated like everyone else while still staying in this perfect world of fucking-whatever-this-place-is-called where every one of your servants knows better than to look you in the eyes.”
“It's not like that…” Felix tried, but he felt wrong footed, like stepping down stairs and missing a step. “Oliver and I–we…”
“Listen, I get it.” Sam muttered around a lungful of smoke. “He is good at reading people, giving them what they want. You were some spoiled man-child who wanted his ego stroked. It must have felt good to be emotionally jacked-off every time you helped my brother, yeah?”
Felix sputtered and nearly choked on his own spit.
“But the thing is, Oliver deserves better. So, I'm going to take him with me, and you can fuck off to whichever ivory tower filled with silver spoons you were popped out in, yeah?”
“Oliver wronged me!” Felix yelled, louder than he intended and when he got a handful of questioning looks, he tried smiling and lowering his anger to a whisper. “He told me he was an only child, that your father died of an overdose! He had me believing he was some scholarship kid who needed my help! I'm the victim here!”
“Aren't you just? But I couldn't give two shits about you, and that's my baby brother.” Sam explained, as if telling him the weather. “So go fuck off doing cocaine and sleeping with whichever title-chasing tart finds her way into your bed and leave my brother alone.”
Felix stood gaping as she took him in, seemingly finding him wanting, nodded as if she had finished and marched down to her bike to pull another helmet from the saddlebag.
“Felix?” Oliver stood there, handing off his bags to one of the footmen to be driven behind him to whichever destination he ended up at. “Is everything alright?”
Felix was not cruel, that was the only thought he could focus on when the urge to open his mouth rose in him. It would be easy, just lean in, use his height to block out Oliver's sister and ask him to stay, promise to give this a try, the whatever was growing between them that he'd spent all summer playing around with but never committing to. He could do it. It'd be easy.
“Have a good summer.” He said instead and pushed down the rolling tempest at how broken down Oliver looked.
“Goodbye, Felix.” Oliver said softly and there was his Ollie.
“Bye, Ollie.” Felix muttered and ignored how tears had gathered in Oliver's eyes.
“Ols!” Sam called and Oliver gave him a smile like he used to, as if saying would you look at that? It nearly made him sick. Sam leaned over her handlebars as she kicked up the stand and revved the engine. “Bye Philip!”
Felix's last sight of Oliver was him tucked along his sister's back, head craned around to watch Saltburn shrink on the horizon.
Their house hadn't changed, but now it stank of burnt sugar and the sickly sweet tang of simple syrup. His mother looked to have been baking for most of the day and long lines of treats lined the counter like soldiers going to war.
“Oh, Oliver! Not again!” She cried but there were no tears so she wasn't too mad. He tucked himself into her neck and let her pet him, letting her chiding roll over his shoulders and settle into a heavy knot in his gut. “And you missy!”
Oliver peeked out and spotted Sam freeze guiltily with a cupcake half way up to her mouth.
“You said you would check in on him! Especially after the last one! Oh, Samantha…” his mother pleaded but there was no real anger in it. In comparison to the other obsessions he'd had, Felix's had ended rather timely by result. He figured now was not the time to bring that up. “Go get ready for dinner, your sisters are coming too.”
“Sam said Beth was in hospital?” Oliver asked.
“Yes, the scheduled surgery to get her appendix out? Last month?” His mother said. “Really, Samantha, could you have been any more dramatic?”
“I could have said dad died, but I figured that was in poor taste.” Sam muttered and Oliver threw an unfrosted cupcake at her head.
They were shooed upstairs. He had plans to unpack, but the car was maybe an hour behind them and even if it wasn't, he had no energy to open that literal and metaphorical can of worms quite yet. Instead he laid down and threw his arms over his eyes to avoid the fading sunlight.
Sam came in at some point and kicked off her heavy boots to lay down beside him like a particularly warm perpendicular line. He kept his eyes covered now to hide how red they were from crying. He felt familiar arms wrap around his side when Beth arrived.
“You staying strong, Olive?” Beth asked softly and Sam answered for him with a succinct No. Pat had arrived at some time and joined the pile on his twin bed. As there was no room, she simply climbed up his stomach, shoving knees and elbows everywhere, until she collapsed comfortably on his chest.
“He need the Philip treatment?” Pat asked without inflection.
“Naw, just another pretty rich boy Oliver charmed too much.” Sam explained. “Damn near cried when I talked to him.”
“He's more than that…” Oliver tried to argue but it came out mumbled under his arm. “He can be really sweet and generous. And his family was so nice!”
Pat and Beth turned to Sam.
“Horrid vultures listening at the window. The mother was vanity made flesh; she wore an evening gown at 3 p.m. before she even changed into her costume. Sister was a little leech who feeds off the misery of others. And the son–”
“Don't!” Oliver pleaded and Sam relented but only because she mouthed a pointed Later to her sisters.
Dinner was the usual when their mother forced them all home. It was the exchanging of pleasantries, then as she had a few glasses of wine, those would fall away and the truth of their strange little family was revealed.
“Patricia, what have you been up to?” Dad asked.
“Autopsies mostly. Dr. Morgan has allowed me to begin working on active murder cases!” Pat smiled and cut into her baked potato with the same viciousness she had when Charles II had called Oliver a fag for kissing him and Pat had pulled a knife on him and his beloved Valentino bag. Pat shoved a bite into her mouth and around it she muttered, “I'm looking to see if there are any openings in Glasgow.”
“Oh, lovely! A Glasgow girl!” Mum clapped. Turning to her eldest, she asked, “Samantha, how have you been?”
“Fine. Bar's good.” She muttered and when they all looked to her, she sighed. “Really good. Smith thinks we could expand and I've been looking for the right spot.”
“How wonderful!” Da raised his glass of water in a toast. “We need more bars around, it's good for the economy!”
“What would you know about the economy?” Mum laughed. She gestured to her Master's diploma and then his. The bickering went on for a while before they refocused. “Small businesses are good for the local economy, and we are so proud, Samantha. Bethany, how are the twins? Bill?”
“Oh, you know. I swear, I blink and they get bigger.” She smiled and looked close to pulling out her phone to show them photos before she pushed down the need. She leaned over and bumped Oliver's shoulder. “Ollie? How are you?”
“Been better.” He muttered and they left it at that. “Mum, dad?”
“Worried about you all, as usual. The firm is good.” Mum answered, picking at her nail beds. Da chimed in with, “Neighbor drama, but what did I expect with retirement?”
The conversation was light and as the sun began to set, they all rose to wash their dishes and shove them into the washer. Mum dragged out a cake she'd made and with a piece in front of each of them, Da sighed and sat down.
“Hopscotch.” He said and then, “Mrs. Sybil planted ficus along the fence line. FICUS. She leaned over to tell me about which fertilizer to use and I wanted to snap off her skinny wrist with the hedge trimmers. What good is that diamond tennis bracelet from her boss if she's got no hand to wear it on.”
Mum nodded sagely and Oliver and Beth hid their laughter under their napkins. Sam nearly spat out her cake. Mum went next.
“Firm placed me with a newbie. They think they can replace me after nearly thirty years.” Mum poured herself a cuppa and took a delicate sip. “I tripped her in the boardroom with a box of paperwork and she spilled scalding coffee into the lap of my boss's boss.”
“Clever.” Pat muttered and when all eyes fell on her she sighed. “I really like cutting open bodies. Like REALLY like it.”
“Do you…?” Mum questioned but stopped by the rules of Hopscotch, put in place when Sam was ten and nearly ran over the neighbor kid with a golf cart and then complained when their parents wouldn't let her finish the job. It really was much cheaper than therapy for six people, and much more effective in curbing each of their worst impulses. You could ask, but once you shared, no more needed to be said. Still, Pat shook her head and Mum reached over to take her hand, patting it softly. “Sam?”
“I smashed a bottle over the head of some sleazebag. Think he might be in a coma.” Sam muttered, shoving a large bite of cake into her mouth. “But he deserved it! The girl was underage, his pants were on the ground!”
“A good thing, really. Helping clean the streets.” Beth nodded and poured herself a glass of wine. When all eyes slid to her she took a long, fortifying drink before sitting it down and groaning. “I may have had a long and vicious daydream of smashing in Bill's head with a mallet.”
“Why?” Oliver asked. Beth had picked Bill precisely because the man had the personality of a wet paper towel and just about the same level of intelligence.
“I think he's cheating on me.” The room fell quiet.
They all were different. That's what Mum called it. Something in their brain just didn't always connect the right way and they didn't always think the same way people often did. It was why they'd started this. It was why the next words that came out of Oliver's sister's mouth would matter so much.
“You want us to do something about that?” Oliver spoke up.
Beth wouldn't meet their eyes, but focused on her plate. She wasn't avoiding it, but giving it her full attention. Finally, she came to a decision.
“I think I would enjoy taking him to court. Divorce?” She answered, then looked to their mum. “Could I get his land?”
“We'd need to fabricate a bit of abuse, maybe some embezzlement charges. How hard can that be?” Mum hummed. Then, as if she was waiting for her son to think he was safe, she added, “Oliver, your turn.”
“Nothing to tell. I got in a little too deep.” Oliver muttered. His cake had turned into a pile of mush under his fork. But the more he thought about it, the more he had to explain. If Felix wouldn't listen, he knew his family would. “It was just getting him to look at me, yeah? Then I told myself if I could be his friend, that would be enough. Then it was best mate, then it was…I don't know. I wanted to be his everything.”
“Fuck, this is just like Philip.” Sam hissed.
“This is not like Philip!” Oliver hissed back and pushed down the need to chuck his plate at her face. Sam was mean, that was her whole thing; Oliver could lie with the best of them but his sister's preferred form of expression was her fists and occasionally her steel-toed boots. “Felix was different! He has this savior complex that is so beautiful–”
“Jesus H. Christ, Ollie.” Pat muttered. “Just fuck the boy and move on.”
“Enough!” His mum hissed. She'd stood a bit and brought down the tension with a hand she slowly lowered, like one would with a toddler. “Oliver, baby, if you were wanting this boy, all you had to do was tell us! I thought your lies were going to be your academic ones. I could have played, what was it? A coke whore or something?”
“It was just the coke part, mum, no whore stuff.” Sam said then licked her plate clean like a fucking dog.
“Not like it matters anyways. Felix will never talk to me again.” Oliver groaned and smacked his head down on the table just as Pat yanked his plate out of the way so the white frosting wouldn't get in his hair. “You should have seen him! He looked at me like I was a fucking stranger!”
“That's why I talked to him.” Sam said and everyone looked at her, even Oliver who peeked out from his arms. She smiled. “Gave this really fucking aces speech about how he was a stupid cunt and everything–”
“Oh god.” Oliver groaned and covered his ear too.
“--no, no, listen! I pegged him as this needy, slothful, rich kid type the moment I realized our Ols liked him. It was simple to make you interesting again, Ols, just give it a few weeks to marinate and he'll give you a call.”
“Which you will ignore.” Beth continued. Oliver was back up again, listening intently. His sister leaned down to meet his eyes. “Boys like him, they like things to go smoothly, not having to worry about anything. He wants his friend back and you deny him, well, then he'll come crawling back.”
“And we will make his life hell if we need to so he comes crawling back.” Sam assured Oliver and smiled when it drew a shaking chuckle from her brother.
“I'll blow up his dorm.” Pat added helpfully.
“No, Pat, bring it down a few notches.” Sam muttered.
“His…bike?” Pat tried again.
“Yeah, babe, sure, you can blow up his bike.” Sam decided. Then she looked back to Oliver as if to check if that would be needed.
Oliver laughed, still half-buried in his arms but so overwhelmed with love for his family that it nearly suffocated him. Arms wrapped around him and pulled him up from the table to all tumble down onto the couches to watch whatever episode of whichever baking show his mum had started on.
During the commercial breaks they spoke of blackmail, horse heads in beds, and fake ransom notes to push Felix back into Oliver's orbit and for the first time all summer, he was thankful to be home.