The Will by Kristen Ashley
“Their homework’s out in the truck, Josie,” Jake told my back.
“And we got a hamster in class, not a gerbil. But I never get to watch him seein’ as I killed the last one when it was my turn to take him home for the weekend,” Ethan also shared this relatively dire information with my back.
I turned to him and the room to see father and son had drinks and Amber’s head was in the fridge.
They seemed comfortable here and I knew they were because they’d been in that kitchen time and time again.
It was still strange.
And it was also strangely welcome.
“Dad said it was his time,” Ethan shared. “Not because I dropped him on his head.”
I blinked.
“He was squirrely. He didn’t want me to hold him and he got his way,” Ethan further explained.
I said nothing.
“Don’t worry, honey, we bought the class another hamster,” Jake assured me.
Before I could reply, Ethan dashed to me and asked, “Can I help with something?”
“Well, you could but most everything is done. I just have to mash the potatoes,” I told him.
“I can so mash potatoes. Lydie taught me how,” he declared.
She’d taught me how too. And knowing she taught him how made me feel even warmer.
I didn’t share this.
“All right then.” I moved to the stove. “Let’s get these drained and get you started.”
“Amber, babe, put another place setting on the table.” I heard Jake order quietly as Ethan shadowed me carrying my pan of boiled potatoes from Aga to sink.
Thus commenced the final preparations for dinner where not only Ethan but everyone got in on the act.
I found in supervising him that Ethan was expert at mashing potatoes.
I also found that Amber knew where everything was and put another place setting on the kitchen table that I’d already prepared (I felt a family dinner should be consumed in the kitchen, not made formal in the dining room, so that was where we were to eat).
Even Jake helped and he did this by ordering Amber to assist with putting the peas, carrots and corn in bowls and working alongside her, putting the warmed rolls in a basket.
When I approached the table with the main dish, all was on it. Jake had even put my wineglass and the bottle of wine I’d opened earlier and began consuming while preparing dinner by my seat at the end.
“Shit, babe, you made meatloaf?”
My alarmed eyes cut to Jake to see him staring at the dish I was arrested in the endeavor of putting it on the table.
He was also smiling which was contradictory to his tone and thus confusing.
“Rosemary meatloaf with a tomato-based sauce,” I told him.
“It…smells…awesome!” Ethan announced, his big eyes on the meatloaf.
“Rosemary meatloaf with a tomato-based sauce,” Jake strangely repeated after me, his gaze moving from the dish to my face.
“Don’t you like meatloaf?” I asked, finally setting the dish on a scrolled-iron hot plate.
“I do,” he replied. “Though, a pretty woman who wears five hundred dollar shoes and two hundred dollar sweaters serving meatloaf is shocking as shit. I thought we’d have to force down coq au vin or something.”
I decided not to inform him that my shoes were six hundred dollars and my sweater four. I also made a mental note, should they come over for dinner again, that I shouldn’t make my coq au vin, which I thought was excellent and was one of my signature dishes, but clearly it would not be well-received.
Then again, I had no chance to inform him of anything as he continued speaking.
“Though, rosemary meatloaf in a tomato-based sauce is less of a surprise. Not sure I’ve ever had rosemary in meatloaf, but by the look and smell of it, I’m lookin’ forward to it.”
I tossed the oven mitts I was wearing to the butcher block and sat, murmuring, “Well, I hope it satisfies.”
“I’m just glad there’s lots of veggies and rolls,” Amber mumbled into our exchange.
Jake sighed.
“Can we dig in?” Ethan asked.
“Please do,” I invited.
Without delay, they did.
It was after bowls were passed around and plates were passed to me so I could cut and serve the meatloaf and everyone was eating, all of this done in silence (and rather swiftly), when I decided conversation was in order.
“And what’s your eldest son doing this evening? Um…Conner,” I asked Jake.
“Probably a threesome,” Amber muttered.
Ethan chuckled.
I stared at her with wide eyes.
Jake bit out, “Amber.”
She looked down to her plate.
Jake looked to me. “He’s got a job in town, Josie. He works at Wayfarer’s. He’s on tonight.”
“Ah,” I murmured.
With nothing else to add to that, we all resumed eating.
After I buttered my roll (purchased, incidentally, at Wayfarer’s Grocers, the only market in town—it had a variety of the usual sundries but mostly it was a gourmet market with a superb butcher’s counter, fresh organic vegetables, an extraordinary seafood selection, a large plethora of cheeses, and a fabulous bakery that made excellent breads, rolls and also pastries), I asked, “And how old is everybody?”
“I’m eight,” Ethan shared immediately, mouth full.
Amber said nothing so Jake told me, “Amber’s sixteen. Conner is seventeen, nearly eighteen. She’s a junior, he’s a senior.”
“Ah,” I repeated my murmur, surprised at Conner’s age. He’d appeared older.
We again lapsed into silence as we continued to consume the meal.
“This is really good, babe,” Jake eventually said.
I looked to him and smiled, again feeling warm inside. “Thank you.”
He winked at me and turned his attention back at his plate.
But when he winked at me, my stomach did something strange. It felt like it dropped and when it did, tingles shot across my skin, and neither were disagreeable sensations.
They were, however, confusing ones. But it wasn’t the time to process them so I looked to Amber to see her eyeing the meatloaf.
I felt my lips curl up slightly.
She was no vegetarian and although she loaded her plate with veggies and potatoes, I knew she wanted to try the meatloaf that her father and brother were gratifyingly devouring.
I didn’t bring attention to this. I picked up the basket with the rolls and offered it to her.
“Would you like another?”
She looked to me then back to her plate. “I’m good.”
I studied her as I put down the basket.
She was very becoming and thus I wasn’t surprised she had a boyfriend. She probably could have several if she chose.
And more if she didn’t look like a teenaged lady of the evening.
Studying her, I made a decision and put it into action.
“Amber,” I called and she looked at me. “I don’t know if my grandmother told you, but I work in fashion.”
“Yeah, she said,” she muttered, looking back to her almost empty plate. It seemed that was mostly all she could do: mutter, mumble and murmur.
She also had a lovely voice so this was unfortunate.
Now was not the time to get into that, however.
Priorities.
“Then, I hope you don’t mind that I share, you’re exceptionally pretty.”
Her eyes darted back to me and they held some surprise.
And this surprised me. Surely, she’d looked in the mirror.
Then again, the way she applied cosmetics, perhaps not.
I kept speaking.
“However, you’ve a heavy hand with cosmetics. Your eyeliner is quite thick and eyebrow pencils are meant to fill in what’s already there, not draw something new.”
The air in the room changed as Amber’s face changed. It went slack then started twisting.
It was imperative.
So I kept talking.
“Jean-Michel DuChamp taught me how to do makeup,” I declared, her face stopped twisting, her eyes got huge and her lips parted. “If you’d like, I’d be happy to show you some of the things he showed me. You’ve clearly got an eye to what shades suit you best, you simply use too much of them.”
“You know Jean-Michel DuChamp?” she breathed.
“Of course,” I replied.
She blinked rapidly for a long moment before she told me, “I’ve got both his books. The one where he did all those supermodels up in crazy ways, like making that chick look like a baby doll and doing Acadie up in that badass futuristic look. I also have the other one where he did awesome stuff with all those Hollywood movie stars.”
I knew the model Acadie. She was very beautiful as well as very sweet. I also knew of those books mostly because Henry had worked on one.
“Henry shot that one with the models,” I told her.
“Ohmigod,” she whispered. “How didn’t I know that? Lydie told us you worked for Henry Gagnon. I should have known that.”
I shrugged. “I’ve no idea how you didn’t know, though that book was about Jean-Michel’s vision, not Henry’s photos. He’s often like that. Sometimes, it’s about the pictures. Sometimes it’s about what’s in the pictures. And when it’s the latter, he doesn’t like overshadowing that. He was credited in the book, of course, but with that book, he wished for it to be about Jean-Michel so, if memory of his contract serves, his credit was unobtrusive.”
“Cool.” She was still whispering.
I threw out a hand and offered, “If you like, I can take a photo of you. I’ll send it to Jean-Michel and ask him to share some pointers. He does this for me often. I’ll take a picture of an outfit I’m wearing and tell him where I’m wearing it and he’ll email me rather detailed instructions on how to make up my face. I’m sure he’d be happy to do something of that ilk for you.”
Her eyes were now very large and very bright and she was still whispering when she said, “Are you freaking serious?”
“Of course,” I replied.
“Ohmigod, oh my freaking God,” she breathed and then looked to her father. “Dad, you so have to lift the ban on my cell. I have to tell Taylor and Taylor about this!”
Jake opened his mouth but I was able to ask before he said anything, “Taylor and Taylor?”
“Her best friends,” Ethan answered. “Taylor is a girl. The other Taylor is a boy and he’s gay.”
“He wants to be a makeup artist just like Jean-Michel,” Amber shared. “And Taylor wants to be a model.”
“You can tell them at school tomorrow,” Jake put in at this point and Amber’s eyes shot back to her father.
“Dad! Please! Seriously, we’re talking Jean-Michel DuChamp!” she cried. “They have to know, like now.”
“Babe, you’d cut the shit you been pullin’, they’d know, like now. But you didn’t cut the shit you been pullin’ so they’re gonna know, like tomorrow,” Jake stated and finished on a, “Yeah?”
“That’s totally unfair and totally crazy,” she returned. “It’s like…like…Jimmy Choo strolled in and offered to fit me with shoes and you won’t let me tell my friends about a dream come true.”
Surprisingly, it appeared I shared some things in common with Amber as well.
“Tomorrow, Amber,” Jake declared.
“God!” Amber snapped and slouched back in her chair.
“This is, alas, a rather difficult lesson,” I noted and felt all eyes come to me but I was looking at Amber. “I don’t know what…shit you’ve been pulling but it clearly upsets your father. You can, of course, choose to act dramatically and feel misunderstood. But in truth, the easiest route to getting what you want is behaving as your father wishes. Then, your freedoms would be granted and you’d not feel like you’re feeling right now. And thus, you would be able to share this with your friends.”
“Right. Do what he wishes when Dad’s totally unreasonable,” she hissed.
“And how is that?” I asked.
“He doesn’t like Noah,” she answered.
“And who is Noah?” I queried.
“My boyfriend and he’s totally righteous,” she replied.
“I’m uncertain I understand,” I admitted. “Your father is being unreasonable because he does not share your opinion that this Noah is”—I paused—“righteous?”
“No,” she said. “He’s being unreasonable because Noah wants to take me to a concert in Boston and Dad refuses to let me go when everyone’s going. It’s just one state over, it’s not like it’s in Miami or anything. And I guess Dad didn’t like it all that much when I told him exactly how I felt about him being totally unreasonable.”
“She used the f-word,” Ethan shared. “Like, a bazillion times.”
Good God.
The f-word?
It was clear someone needed to take this girl in hand and having her at my grandmother’s table with my grandmother not there to do it, I decided it would be me.
“First,” I began, “A lady shouldn’t curse. It’s crass. There are times when foul words have their uses but they are rare. Second, the idea of a sixteen year old girl going to another state with her boyfriend to see a concert is utterly preposterous.”
She stared at me, again blinking rapidly, and I heard a grunt come from Jake but I was not done.
“Amber, I’m certain I don’t need to point out your father is a man—” I began but she lost her astonishment and interrupted me.
“No, you don’t need to point that out,” she snapped.
“As I was saying,” I went on unperturbed when she’d stopped snapping. “Your father is a man which means he was once a young man much like your Noah. You’re an exceptionally pretty young woman. I’m certain this fact is also not lost on your father. It would be my guess that your father knows much more about young men, seeing as he used to be one, than you do. So, if he dislikes this Noah, if you look at it from this perspective, he probably knows what he’s talking about.”
I heard another grunt, this one swallowed and amused from Jake. I also heard a not-swallowed giggle from Ethan but I kept going even as Amber glared at me.
“Regardless, Noah could be a paragon of virtue but if your father loves you, it’s his duty as a father not to like him. If he didn’t care you were spending time with a boy, that’s when you should be upset. The fact that he cares about anything, Amber, says a great deal and you should take a moment and hear him because he does.”
When I was finished speaking, Amber was no longer glaring, there was no humor coming from the two male Spears and the air in the room felt heavy.
I knew why.
It was because they knew about me. About Gran. About my grandfather and my father. And about how my father didn’t care about me.
Not in any way.
No way at all.
My mind was torn from this alarming understanding when Amber spoke and she did it quietly.
“That’s what Lydie would say. She wouldn’t say it like that, using words like ‘paragon of virtue,’ but that’s probably what she’d say.”
“As my grandmother was the wisest person I know,” I replied, “then perhaps you should listen. Now, do you want some meatloaf?” I asked and finished, “Or, is Noah a vegetarian and you fear you’ll appear unattractive in some way if you are not as he is?”
“I heard it’s a good way to lose weight,” she shared.
“Well, it isn’t,” I returned. “It’s a practice that people who do it have a belief in. Although that does not factor, if your belief is to do it just to lose weight considering there’s no need for you to concern yourself with losing weight. You have a fabulous figure. I can’t imagine why you’d try to change it.”
“That’s what I said,” E
“You’re eight and my brother,” Amber returned, eyes narrowed on her brother.
“Well, I’m not eight or your brother and I’ve worked in haute couture for twenty-three years,” I reminded her and her gaze came to me. “And trust me, you have a fabulous figure. You’ve made two mentions of losing weight and you’ve barely been here an hour. Cease doing that. It’s ridiculous. And if someone tells you differently, simply inform them of that ridiculousness.”
She again blinked at me.
Ethan burst out laughing.
“Now,” I spoke through his laughter, “after dinner, are we taking your photo for Jean-Michel or are we not?”
“Totally,” she whispered, not in wonder this time. I didn’t know what made her whisper and it mattered not to me.
“Excellent. You’ll need to wash your face,” I instructed. “He’ll need a clean palette.”
“I can do that,” she agreed.
“Fine,” I returned and then looked to the table and asked, “Is anyone wishing seconds?”
“Meatloaf!” Ethan said, doing this for some reason over-loudly.
And I found that coming from Ethan, who was a very amusing and sweet boy, it was not annoying in the slightest.
“Give me your plate,” I ordered.
He handed me his plate.
I gave him meatloaf.
Then I returned my attention to my plate but after partaking of some carrots, I felt something unusual so I lifted my eyes.
And my stomach dipped in that way again when I saw Jake watching me. His face was soft and his eyes, now gray in the lights of the kitchen, held something in them I couldn’t decipher.
Before I could put my finger on it, his mouth slowly, lazily lifted in a devastating smile that did devastating things to my breathing pattern before he turned to his daughter and said, “Pass the rolls, babe.”
I found that I really wished to know what was behind that look. What he was thinking and maybe more, what he was feeling.
And I found that it caused an inexplicable pain that I would never know because I would never ask and it was likely he’d never tell me.