All This Time

8 ⦿ in which i meet the green-eyed monster

December 22, 2010 12:45 p.m.

The clinks of knives and forks is soothing. It means everyone is busily eating and no one is paying attention to me. I have fruit in a cut-glass finger bowl, a two-egg spinach and mushroom omelette, and two crispy pieces of golden-brown bacon.

"While you're here, you should go to Efteling," Levi says, trying to engage me in conversation.

I rack my brain trying to remember where I've heard that name before. Oh yes, a fairytale theme park about an hour away from Oudewater.

"That place is for tourists," Graeme loudly interjects. "It's childish."

"I looked it up earlier. It's one of the can't-miss destinations of most tourist itineraries," Xander pipes up, a forkful of scrambled eggs halfway to his mouth.

Graeme is one cool customer. She changes tactics immediately, her smile saccharine sweet as she croons, "but of course, it's so quaintly charming. It'll be ironic if we go. Of course, I'll be happy to take you."

"I'll go too," Levi says through a mouthful of toast.

"There's no need for all of us to go," Wolf says sharply, glancing between me and Levi with an impenetrable gaze.

"I'm sure as the first-born son, you have more pressing matters to deal with. You're excused from the outing, brother mine." Levi brandishes a victorious smile at his older sibling, which Wolfram does not return.

"What's this?" interjects Marcus.

My eyes flash to his. Somehow all the other conversation has faded away and ours is the only dominant discourse at the table. Unwanted attention, great, I grouse.

"If all the young people are going to the amusement park, then of course you must go with them," Marcus says with a genial smile.

Wolfram looks like he's about to protest, but then Marcus turns his attention to me expectantly. "Your last name is....Wright, yes?"

I nod, barely meeting his eyes. I'm bubbling with resentment; not in this house a full day and I'm already feeling exhausted and cowed by this family. With every new surprise, I feel like I've gone through the ringer. Surely I have whiplash by now.

"Of the Long Island Wrights?" Marcus leans towards a well-toned man with a Caribbean tan. "Didn't we do some business with the Wrights last summer, cousin?"

Graeme is quick to clear up the misunderstanding. "Father, Charlotte's people aren't in banking." She smiles at me, a flash of pearly-white teeth standing out against the gash of blood-red lipstick artfully painted on her lips. A bloody smile is befitting, I think. She's like a grotesquely grinning jackal standing over her mutilated prey.

"So what is it your parents do?" Marcus asks.

I can't sense any malice in the question but I'm strangely embarrassed to say anything. "Actually, my mom does work at a bank," I say. "And my dad is a writer."

I immediately wish I could take those two sentences back. Somewhere down the table, someone releases a hearty guffaw. Wolfram and Levi are silent, but their faces show no disdain. Xander's jaw tightens as our eyes meet, green eyes meeting brown in a helpless plea.

"And has he written anything we may have heard of?" Marcus is oblivious to the tension in the room, or maybe he's happy to let welcome it if it means putting me at my unease.

This is why I don't like telling people that my father is a writer. They always want to know what he's written. I wish I could say that he's James Patterson or Dean Koontz but my dad is honestly more like Danielle Steele. He writes romance novels under a pen name and his annual income is double what my mom makes, despite only working half her hours.