He's All In

She spins around and points a finger at her older brother. “It’s a metaphor.”

“Metaphors are figures of speech describing something abstract. Rain is not abstract.” He flicks to the next page.

“I hate you.”

“You’re irritated.”

Baker stomps her foot, looking more like six than sixteen. I lean back against the wall and try to hide my smile. I’m glad for the rain and the prom cancellation.

“If I don’t get to go to the dance tonight, I will literally die.” Baker throws herself down in the chair, crushing two thousand dollars’ worth of tulle, satin, and silk. Chandler had the dress made in Paris. I think she’s living out her own missed senior prom—the one that got canceled because of the pandemic.

“We didn’t die, and we had the whole pand—”

“Please don’t say it,” Baker begs her mom. “You bring that up every day.”

“Every day? I don’t think I bring it up every day,” protests Chandler. “Do I?” she asks.

“No. Never,” I say even though Chandler does bring it up every now and then. Why wouldn’t she? It impacted our lives for two years. Granted, most of the time we spent screwing each other’s brains out, so whenever Chandler mentions it, I get slightly hard. Even thinking about it now...I angle myself away from the kids.

“Let’s have people over here,” Chandler suggests.

“No.” Baker gets up to peer out the window again as if she can stare the rain away.

“Why not? We can turn the library into a dance floor. It’s large enough if we push all the furniture to the walls. We’ll get a caterer to come in and make punch and finger food. I can whip up some pastries.”

Baker scrunches her nose and shakes her head.

“It’s because of you, Dad,” Mav informs me.

“Me?” I point a finger at my chest.

“Yeah, she wants to make out with her boyfriend and can’t do it when you’re around. If the party was held here, you’d be around,” he explains.

“Of course I’d be around. It’s my house.” I frown. Boyfriend? “Did you say boyfriend?”

“God! Mav. Do you have to have such a big mouth?” Baker picks up the skirts of her dress and runs down the hall. Chandler takes off after her.

“Boyfriend?” I swivel back to big-mouthed Mav, who is not actually real talkative. He must not like the bastard. “I’ll kill him.”

I start for my bedroom.

“You can’t. You don’t know who he is.”

What did Baker once call Maverick? A know-it-all? That fits. “Tell me then.”

“No.”

“Why not?” How did I go so wrong with my kids?

“Because then you’ll call him and make threatening noises which will make Baker cry. Baker crying will make Mom cry and then you’ll be in a terrible mood because you hate to see Mom cry. Mom crying and Baker crying and you being in a piss-poor mood means a bad day for me, so no, I won’t tell you who he is.” Mav shuts his book and gets to his feet.

I’m always mildly surprised when I see him standing in front of me, eye to eye. In my head, he and Baker are still tiny tots, with Mav chasing after Baker with a worm dangling from his hand, yelling that worms are very industrious, and she shouldn’t be afraid.

“I will tell you that if he gets out of hand or hurts Baker, I’ll pound his face in and feed his dick to the fish in our pond.” He slaps me on the shoulder with his book. “I got this, Dad. Might as well call up the caterer since the hurricane is going to keep us from the party.”

“I thought it wasn’t a hurricane.”

My son arches an eyebrow. “You’re going to argue with Baker? Good luck.” He’s laughing as he walks away.

Chandler returns soon after. “Were you two telling jokes?” she asks, gliding over to me. I catch her up in my arms and place a kiss on her lips.

“Yeah.” We were bonding over him pledging to make a eunuch out of Baker’s boyfriend—a boyfriend I didn’t realize she had.” I give Chandler a look because I’m certain she knows of this boy’s existence in our daughter’s life.

“Leon is not her boyfriend exactly. Just a friend that she likes.” She glides her fingers up my shirt until she reaches my neck. I’m being buttered up for something—probably the party here. She isn’t aware that Mav has already talked me into it, and I don’t plan to enlighten her any time soon. I enjoy being bribed with sex. It’s one of my favorite activities.

I put on a stern face. “That sounds like a boyfriend to me.”

“We were young lovers, too,” Chandler reminds me.

My eyes widen. “L-lovers?” Real alarm skitters down my spine.

“Shhh.” Chandler presses a finger to my lips. “It’s going to be okay. Just like we were okay.”

“But we got married. My baby can’t get married. She’s sixteen.”