Jake looked at his brothers. They were throwing him a lifeline, a way to grab hold of the past by segueing into an old routine.
“Champagne’s for chicks,” he said, the line coming to him as readily as his next breath. “Wine’s for wusses.”
“But beer—” Travis said solemnly.
Caleb finished the silly poem. “—is for real men.”
Jake could almost feel his tension easing.
They’d come up with the doggerel years ago. It had been valid when they were in their teens. Not anymore. They’d all grown up; they’d traveled the world and, in the process, their tastes had become more sophisticated.
Travis even had a wine cellar, something they teased him about unmercifully.
Still, a cold beer sounded good, almost as good as the memories dredged up by the silly bit of shtick.
“A cold beer,” Jake said wistfully. “A longneck?”
“Does real beer come in any other kind of bottle?”
The three Wildes smiled. And moved from the porch into the room.
“Hell,” Jake muttered.
He’d forgotten the crowd. The lights.
The reaction.
People gasped. Slapped their hands to their mouths. Whispered to the person beside them.
Jake could have sworn that all the air in the big room had been siphoned away on one deep, communal inhalation.
“Crap,” Caleb muttered. Travis echoed the sentiment, though with a far more basic Anglo-Saxonism.
“It’s okay,” Jake said, because if ever there’d been a time when a lie was a good thing, it was now.
A surge of partygoers surrounded him.
He recognized the faces. Ranchers. Their wives. The couple who owned the hardware store, the town’s pharmacist. The owner of the local supermarket. The dentist. Teachers who’d known him in high school, coaches, guys he’d played football with.
Most of them had recovered their equilibrium. The men stuck out their hands. The women offered their cheeks for kisses.
All offered variations on the same theme.
Jake, it’s wonderful to have you home.
“It’s wonderful to be home,” he answered.
Another lie, but what was he going to say? No, it’s not wonderful? I can’t wait to get the hell out of here? I don’t belong here anymore, I don’t belong anywhere?
“Just keep moving,” Travis muttered.
Jake nodded. One foot in front of the other …
Who was that?
A woman. Standing all the way in the rear of the big room, near Em’s piano.
He’d never seen her before.