Chapter 3

three

DYLAN

I opened my parents’ front door and immediately sniffed the air. The delicious aroma of chicken, garlic, and fresh herbs wafted toward me. Mom’s pot pies were legendary in the Holmes household, and no one, not even the prodigal son, missed pot pie night.

“Hi, Dylan.” Steve, my youngest brother, hurried downstairs. “Mom’s in the living room. We’re wrapping the table favors.”

I stepped out of his way and noticed his new haircut. “I like your hair.”

“Thanks.” Steve skidded to a stop, his mop of dark hair now cut close to his scalp in a classic short back and sides style. “Mom said we can’t go to Luke and Jarrod’s wedding looking like a bunch of orangutans, so she sent us to The Barber Shop. Tell Luke his hair looks great. It’ll make him less grumpy.”

“Was Mom okay with me not being at the barber’s?”

Steve’s smile lifted some of my guilt. “Don’t worry. She wasn’t too upset you had to work.”

At least that was one less minefield I had to navigate. The second one wouldn’t be so easy. With three gay sons, Mom had her work cut out for her, especially when she was helping to organize her middle son’s wedding.

“Is that you, Dylan?” Mom’s voice drifted into the entryway.

“It is.” I shrugged out of my jacket and left it on the coat stand. “I’ll be there in a minute.”

“The coffeepot’s hot.”

Steve waved a roll of navy-blue ribbon in the air. “Luke’s waiting for this. I’ll see you in the living room.”

With heavy steps, I followed my brother. Mom sat on a chair, cutting lengths of tulle into circles. Luke was cross-legged on the floor, filling each circle with a bag of candy and tying a ribbon around the top.

“Can I help?” I asked.

Luke wiggled to the right. “Sure. You can help Steve fill the tulle with candy. He’s eating more than he’s wrapping.”

“I am not,” Steve grumbled. “I’m eating the candy from the reject pile.”

I wondered how a sealed bag of candy could be rejected.

Mom’s eyebrows rose. “Steve Holmes, I swear, if your nose grew any longer, you’d look like Pinocchio.”

Steve clamped his hand over his nose. Even though he was in his mid-twenties, he was still a little neurotic about the prominent feature he’d inherited from our Italian-American mom.

“Your nose isn’t that big,” Luke said unhelpfully.

Twin dots of color appeared on Steve’s cheeks. “You can be so mean sometimes.”

“At least you’re helping,” Luke said with a pointed stare at me. “Why weren’t you at The Barber Shop?”

“I had to work.”

Luke wasn’t impressed. Somewhere in his twenty-eight years, he’d forgotten what it was like to focus on something other than himself.

“I’m getting married in two weeks,” Luke reminded me unnecessarily. “And you need a haircut.”

I sat on the floor beside Steve. “I told you when you made the appointment that I couldn’t leave work early.”

Luke’s jaw clenched. “Loretta couldn’t fit us in any later. She’s offered to see you tomorrow at two-thirty.”

Mom handed me half a dozen tulle circles. “I’ll come with you. And afterward, we’ll meet your brothers in town for a final suit fitting.”

It was time to tell them the bad news. “I have to work all weekend.” The explosion I was waiting for wasn’t far away.

“You can’t be serious!” The sparks in Luke’s eyes could ignite a forest fire. “After all the plans we’ve made, you can’t back out now.”

“I’m not backing out of anything,” I said. “We chose our suits two weeks ago. I don’t need to try mine on again.”

“That’s not the point,” Luke growled. “I’m getting married. Everything has to be perfect.”

“It will be. I’m here now, aren’t I?”

Steve handed me a bag of candy. “Luke’s stressed because the florist can’t get the peony roses he ordered.”

“The theme of the wedding is French country chic. How can you do that without peony roses?” Luke pushed the party favors he’d wrapped to one side. “I need coffee.”

Mom watched her middle son leave the room. “Do you need to work all day, Dylan? Just come to the suit fitting.”

“It’ll be fun,” Steve said half-heartedly.

I looked closely at my youngest brother. What he really meant was that he needed all the support he could get. At our last appointment, Luke was so picky that even Mom lost patience with him.

“What time is the suit fitting?” I asked.

“Four o’clock,” Mom replied.

“Say yes,” Steve begged. “It won’t be the same without you.”

Leaving my youngest brother with Luke was more than my conscience could handle. By four o’clock, I should have handed over most of my work. Anything that wasn’t done would have to wait until Sunday.

“Okay. I’ll meet you at the suit rental place.”

Steve grinned. “I knew you wouldn’t let us down.”

I sighed. Even though I liked the suits we’d chosen, I had other issues. The biggest and worst was the possibility of missing my brother’s wedding completely. And, if that happened, no one would speak to me again.