“Whatever. Get all loud all you want. You know Miss Leona. She doesn’t care if you live next door. She will kick you right off the lane if you push her too far. Especially if you come at her disrespecting her like this. She is your grandmother. She is the matriarch of this family. You need to act like it.” Lilah was speaking the whole truth, but Jesse had already tuned her out. Sam could see the vein on the side of his face threatening to burst. Lilah sucked her teeth as she followed after Evie. When they heard a door close down the hall, Zach looked over at Sam. They were going to have this talk with him now.
“Alright. What’s going on with you, man?” Sam said.
“Sam, you need to back off,” Jesse snarled.
“What the fuck are you talking about? You’re the one who’s about to Hulk out—” Sam shot back, but Zach cut him off.
“Jesse, you need to relax and talk to us.”
No one wanted Zach to bust out the breathing techniques their mom had taught Jesse when he was going through puberty. A growth spurt had tackled his ass at age ten. And by the time he was thirteen he was already. Football and basketball coaches around the state were lined up to get a piece of him, ready to add him to their roster. But Jesse just wanted to bake with Evie and Miss Leona and be left alone.
Kids at school teased him mercilessly for his large, awkward body, and the adults were much worse. People who didn’t know him didn’t know he was a kid and that made things even harder. Adults who did know him wanted to take advantage of him or make him show off his strength and athletic skill like he was some circus animal. He grew a tough shell quickly, but that didn’t stop the pain and confusion from simmering below the surface. There was almost a full year when he barely spoke, only responding to his family when addressed directly.
Something happened when he went away to college and by the time he finished business school and the rest of his peers had caught up with him in physical maturity, he’d seemed to level out, but if people pushed him, that fucking temper. Sometimes you’d see it coming. He’d warn his brothers when they were getting on his nerves. Sometimes, though, the top would just blow right off.
Sam and Zach let out frustrated breaths, both thinking about how they could get through to him before their grandmother came walking in the door.
“You can be concerned about Miss Leona seeing someone new, but you can’t stop her from doing it. I want to know why it pisses you off so much,” Zach said.
“It’s not—” Jesse finally started to unclench. He let out his own breath and tried again. “I know that she doesn’t want me in her business, but I am just trying to protect her.”
“From what?” Zach asked calmly.
“The guy she’s talking to, Frank Chester?”
“Yeah, the organ guy from church. What about him?”
“He was trying to get at the ranch.”
“Why didn’t you say something?” Zach asked.
“Yeah. I’ll fight a Frank Chester,” Sam added, making Zach laugh.
“’Cause I took care of it.”
“Miss Leona said you scared the shit out of him.”
Jesse stopped pacing, then cracked his knuckles. “Literally.”
“Oh man!” Zach threw up his hands. Sam winced.
“Okay. I don’t want to lose the ranch to some old man who put one over on Miss Leona, but what’s Frank Chester, like, seventy-eight?” Zach asked. “You could have given him a heart attack. You can’t be rolling up on the elderly like that.”
“Whatever, he’s fine.”
“Okay. So you’re trying to protect Miss Leona’s wallet and the ranch. Fair. But how do we know this new guy is after her money? He could be a nice dude,” Sam said.
“What do you mean ‘this guy’? She’s out with Frank Chester again.”
“Uh right, she is.”
“There’s someone else?!”
“Jess. Calm down,” Zach said, palms up like he could soothe the rage out of him.
“I’m not gonna calm down.”
“Fine. Don’t. But can you at least go back to your own fucking house? Break some shit over there. Heat the pool and take some laps. Whatever you need to do. But you know damn well Lilah is right. You cannot go off on Miss Leona.”
“Fine, whatever. Fuck you two.” Jesse stormed toward the door, but Zach grabbed his arm before he could leave the kitchen.
“Nah. Something else is up your ass. Out with it.”
“There’s nothing up my ass. Senior and Mom are six thousand miles away on a good day. Uncle Gerald is too afraid of Lilah, Uncle Justice just doesn’t give a shit. I know Miss Leona is her own woman. I also know she’s too sweet and too kind and eighty-two fucking years old. If someone in our family let Corie have her way, she’d be setting Miss Leona up with a different dude every week. Do you know the STI rates among the elderly?”
“Okay. I do and no, I don’t want to think about that. But I don’t know why you think Evie and I don’t care—”
“Or that I don’t either,” Sam said, offended as hell. He loved his grandmother and it was fucked up for Jesse to imply otherwise.
“I cut back at the ranch so I could be present and shit, for Evie and the family. I’m here, man, and I care about Miss Leona too.”
“Yeah, I know. Let me go.” Jesse stormed out of the kitchen and down the hall, slamming the front door behind him. Zach scrubbed his beard
