Chapter 21: Tug-of-War
The Cooper living room on a Friday night had a particular quality — the specific ease of a house that had exhaled after a full week and wasn't asking anything of anyone for the next two days.
Mike and Sheldon had ended up on the couch in front of the TV, which hadn't been a plan so much as the natural result of both of them being in the same room with nothing more pressing to do. The educational channel was running a documentary about molecular structures, narrated by a professor with impressive white eyebrows who treated every atom like a personal friend.
Sheldon was watching with genuine attention. Mike was watching with the comfortable detachment of someone whose week had been eventful enough that a documentary about molecules was exactly the right speed.
Connie had put her cards away — Sheldon's depleted chip stack had apparently made solo practice unrewarding — and retrieved a Lone Star from the Coopers' fridge with the ease of someone who had been treating this kitchen as partially her own for years. She settled into her armchair and joined them in comfortable silence.
The bedroom door burst open.
Missy came out in a oversized black leather jacket, enormous sunglasses that were clearly borrowed from somewhere in the adult section of the house, and carrying a plastic guitar with the full-body commitment of someone who had been rehearsing this entrance.
"Sheldon," she announced, in the declaratory tone of a nine-year-old rock star, "you are about to hear my newest—"
She saw Mike.
The rock star energy evaporated completely. Something crossed her face in rapid sequence — surprise, the specific horror of being caught mid-performance in front of the wrong audience, and then a calculation.
She backed up.
The bedroom door closed.
Sheldon looked at the space where his sister had been. "What was that?"
Connie took a sip of her beer and said nothing.
Forty-five seconds later, the bedroom door opened again.
Missy reappeared in a completely different outfit — a yellow dress with a small cardigan, hair straightened, holding a handful of Jolly Ranchers with the composed presentation of someone who had absolutely not just done an emergency costume change.
"Oh, Mike," she said, with great casualness. "I didn't know you were here. Would you like some candy?"
She held out the Jolly Ranchers with the dignity of someone offering something at a dinner party.
Mike accepted two with complete seriousness. "Thank you, Missy."
"You're very welcome," she said, in her most composed voice, and sat down on the couch directly next to him — which required pushing Sheldon approximately eight inches to the left, which she accomplished without acknowledgment.
Sheldon looked at the new arrangement and decided not to address it.
Mike unwrapped a cherry Jolly Rancher and noticed Sheldon tracking the motion with the involuntary attention of someone whose body had opinions his brain hadn't approved.
"You want one?"
Sheldon straightened. "Sugar consumption this late in the evening has a measurable negative effect on sleep quality and dental enamel."
His stomach produced a sound that made its own counterargument.
The room was quiet for a moment.
"When did you last eat?" Mike asked.
Sheldon considered whether this question required a precise answer. "Lunch was at twelve-seventeen."
Connie looked up from her beer. "Mike, what about that chicken you made earlier in the week? I've been thinking about it since Tuesday."
"I'm not really in a cooking mood tonight," Mike said. "But I'll grab food. What does everyone want?"
The response was immediate and overlapping.
Missy: "Fried chicken. A lot of fried chicken. The kind with the crispy parts."
Sheldon, after a moment of consideration that clearly involved Tam's lunch descriptions: "I'd actually like to try something different. Tam mentioned a Vietnamese place downtown. Pho, or maybe the lemongrass chicken."
Connie: "Whatever's easy. I'm not fussy."
Mike pulled up his phone and was checking delivery options when the back door opened and Georgie came in from the yard, still holding a half-finished Coke.
"Are we ordering food?"
"What do you want?"
"Pizza. Pepperoni and beef. Extra cheese." He didn't hesitate. "And I'll go pick it up — saves the delivery fee."
Mike looked at him. "You sure?"
"I know where everything is. Give me the list."
Mike handed over the order details and enough cash to cover it with reasonable margin. Georgie memorized it in one pass, grabbed his keys, and was back out the door with the efficiency of someone who had been looking for something to do.
He was back in twenty-five minutes with a large paper bag, a pizza box, and, tucked under his arm, two bottles of Lone Star that he set on the table with the studied nonchalance of someone making a choice and being calm about it.
Connie looked at the bottles. Looked at Georgie. Said nothing, which was its own kind of permission.
They spread everything across the coffee table — the pho in its container, the fried chicken in its box, the pizza open in the middle — and ate in the loose, comfortable way of people who had nowhere to be.
Sheldon tried the pho with the careful attention of a scientist documenting a new experience. His expression moved through several stages before arriving at something that was clearly positive but which he seemed reluctant to endorse too enthusiastically.
"The broth has a more complex flavor profile than I anticipated," he said.
"That means he likes it," Missy translated, without looking up from her chicken.
Sheldon did not confirm or deny this.
George Sr. and Mary came back around nine.
Mary came through the living room door, took in the spread on the coffee table, the various containers, the easy arrangement of kids and Connie and Mike — and her expression did something warm and immediate before she caught it and replaced it with the more measured version.
"Looks like everyone survived," she said.
"Thrived," Connie said, raising her Lone Star slightly.
George Sr. spotted the two beer bottles in front of Georgie and stopped.
Georgie met his father's eyes with the expression of someone who had known this moment was coming and had decided the chicken was worth it.
George Sr. looked at Mike. Mike looked back with the carefully neutral expression of someone who had been present but had not been in charge of anyone else's decisions.
George Sr. looked at Connie.
Connie finished her beer.
"George," Mary said, in the preemptive tone she used when she needed him to make a choice about which conversation to have.
He made the choice. He sat down, picked up a piece of pizza that was still in the box, and let it go.
Mike and Connie said their goodnights and crossed back over to her house a few minutes later, the night air still warm, the street quiet.
Mike had just finished washing up and was coming through the living room when his phone buzzed.
Cady.
He picked up. "Hey."
"Hey." Her voice had the slightly careful quality of someone who had picked up the phone and then immediately wondered if it was too late to call. "I just wanted to — tomorrow's still noon, right? You didn't forget?"
"I didn't forget," Mike said. "Noon. I'll be there."
"Okay." A pause. "My mom made a whole thing of reorganizing the collection today. She's been moving pieces around for three hours. I think she's nervous."
"Should I be nervous?"
"No." Another pause, shorter. "Maybe dress like you respect anthropology."
"I can do that."
"Okay." He could hear the smile in it. "Goodnight, Mike."
"Night, Cady."
He set the phone down.
Connie was in her armchair with the tail end of her Lone Star, watching him with the bright, unhurried attention of someone who had been waiting for exactly this.
"That the Heron girl?"
"Yes."
"She sounds sweet."
"She is."
Connie set down her bottle and looked at him with the specific expression she used when she was about to say something she'd been thinking about for a while. "Mike. You've been here a week. You've got the football girl, you've got the transfer girl, and unless I'm reading it wrong, the blonde from the senior class is circling." She paused. "I'm not your mother. But I am the adult in this house, and I want you to be thoughtful about people's feelings. Including yours."
Mike looked at her. "I know."
"Good." She stood up, collected her bottle, and headed for the kitchen. "There are clean towels in the hall closet. Don't stay up too late."
She paused in the kitchen doorway.
"And Mike?"
"Yeah?"
"The Heron girl." She didn't turn around. "She called to make sure you didn't forget. That means something."
She went to bed.
Mike stood in the quiet living room for a moment.
Then his phone buzzed again.
Unknown number — but the area code was local. He picked up.
"Hello?"
"Mike?" The voice was warm, familiar, slightly self-conscious about being both. "It's Karen. Karen Smith. From school."
"Hey, Karen." Mike settled onto the couch. "What's up?"
A half-second pause — the specific pause of someone managing a three-way call, which Karen was not as subtle about as she probably intended to be.
"I was just — I wanted to see how you were doing. After everything this week." Another pause, fractionally different in quality. "It's been kind of a lot."
"It has," Mike agreed. "I'm good though. Thanks for asking."
"Good. That's — yeah, good." Karen's voice had the particular warmth of someone who was genuinely glad to hear that and was also navigating a situation with more moving parts than she'd signed up for. "So. Are you doing anything tomorrow?"
Mike leaned back.
"Noon commitment," he said. "But the evening's open."
On the other end of the line, he could just barely detect — in the quality of the silence, the slight adjustment in how Karen's next breath came — the presence of a third party listening.
He filed it without comment.
"That sounds great," Karen said. "I'll — we'll figure something out."
"Sounds good," Mike said. "Goodnight, Karen."
"Goodnight, Mike."
He set the phone down on the coffee table and looked at it for a moment.
We'll figure something out.
He smiled slightly, turned off the living room light, and went to bed.
(End of Chapter 21)
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