But he wasn’t coming back. He was going to help them load the final grapes from their shift onto the receiving table. He was going to study those grapes to see what they had to tell him.
I watched him go, wanting to call out after him now that I knew what I wanted to say. Which was, I love you and I’m here for you. Who doesn’t start with that?
“Nice,” Bobby said, glaring. “You need to learn when to back off.”
I looked down at the bucket of grapes, angry at myself. I had pushed my father too far because I didn’t know how to push him in the way he needed pushing—toward my mother.
“Is this because he didn’t ask you if you wanted the vineyard?”
I met Bobby’s eyes, hurt that he thought I was thinking about myself as opposed to our family.
“’Cause you’re moving to London with Ben. You can’t do this thing long distance. I don’t want it. I have Margaret and the kids. Margaret is talking about going back to work. And Finn . . .” Bobby shook his head.
“What is going on with you two?”
He wiped his hands, reached for the water. “You’ll have to ask him.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means you’ll have to ask him.” He shrugged. “He’s acting like a dick. And he doesn’t want to talk about it with me, which is probably my fault. I’ve been a little judgmental.”
“About what?”
Bobby chugged his water. “All the women he’s been messing around with.”
“Finn always is dating someone.”
“This is different. He’s dating everyone.”
Bobby put the water down.
“And he says he wants to move to New York to go work for his buddy Sam, who has a new restaurant. He’s talking about selling me his share of the bar. I only bought the bar so he could run it. Now he’s leaving me with it.”
Bobby crinkled his forehead. He looked hurt that Finn was freezing him out—when they never froze each other out. Hurt that Finn would want to move away from him.
They were truly best friends—my good brother, my bad one. They always had been. I was the little sister they took care of in different ways: Bobby tutoring me in algebra, Finn sneaking me out for two-for-one pizza and a drive-in movie the night before the algebra test. But their relationship with each other was reciprocal, the two of them always sticking by each other’s side. Until, apparently, now.
His cell phone rang. He reached into his pocket, a smile returning to his face.
“Hey, pal.”
Then he held out the phone so I could see who it was. Ben, complete with a smiling photo, beckoning. Bobby put the phone back to his ear, happy to be talking to him.
Bobby loved Ben, though he loved him for the wrong reasons. He loved him for being an impressive architect, an upstanding member of society, a member of Soho House. All the things Bobby valued these days.
“You coming up?” Bobby said, into the phone.
I shook my head and whispered to Bobby, “Tell him I’m not here.”
“Sure,” Bobby said. “She’s right here.”
He handed the phone over.
Instead of putting the phone to my ear, I ended the call. And handed the phone right back to him.
Bobby looked down at the phone in his hands, confused.
“What the hell?” he said.