Lonely and Tired

Talking Turkey

Brian and I lingered outside for a little longer while I explained my reasons for not telling him about the Eli and Steph shit storm. Yes, those reasons sounded monumentally stupid when expressed aloud, something Brian very kindly pointed out to me. I'd begun to protest but he'd silenced me with a kiss. When we joined the others inside after what had turned into a very enjoyable make-out session talk had turned to everyone's Thanksgiving plans the following week.

Until Cathy and Jeff invited me up to San Francisco to spend it with Jeff's family my plans had been vague at best. My parents were on their boat somewhere in the Pacific Ocean and hoped to arrive in time for Christmas but were definitely not planning on being around for Thanksgiving. It had been a long time since I'd had Thanksgiving with my parents, not since Ryan's death. The idea of a family Thanksgiving dinner without Ryan around felt strange.

Growing up Thanksgiving had mostly just been me, my parents and Ryan. My family did Thanksgiving for a couple of reasons. My dad was American and it reminded him of his childhood. When we were little kids he'd pull Ryan and me out of school for the summer holidays a couple of weeks early and we'd head to the USA for the whole of the holiday period and spend time with his family for Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year. Thanksgiving was a thing in our Australian household because my mother had an insane, ridiculous way over the top love for pumpkin pie. My dad was the one with the pie making skills so he made pie if Mum cooked him turkey. It did mean that she refused to turn around and cook another turkey for Christmas a month later so therefore our Christmas dinners were a very Australian seafood feast and, of course, ham.

"What are your plans Ace?" Brian asked collapsing into a seat and taking me with him. I couldn't miss the smirks the others exchanged when Brian and I returned with make-out hair and swollen lips. Nor could I miss the kindness in their eyes along with the amusement. Brian's friends were glad we'd made up and had forgiven me for not sharing the full details of my divorce with him. That was good, I wouldn't need to plan an elaborate revenge on Zacky for blowing my secret, because plotting to extract revenge on a guy whose last name was Vengeance was almost guaranteed to never end well.

"I'm off to San Francisco with Cathy and Jeff, then the day after I have some friends in San Francisco who've hired a house at Lake Tahoe so we're heading up there for a few days." Chris and Angie had invited me up to Tahoe with them when I'd called to see if I wanted to catch up while I was in San Francisco. Angie said they usually headed up there to escape the Black Friday shopping hell and try to burn off some calories.

"You ski?" Brian asked with interest.

"Better than I surf," I answered and laughed as he dug his fingers into my ribs to tickle me.

"What do you have planned Brian? Cathy and I'll be back on Saturday. You going to hit the links with me, Matt and Zack that weekend?" Jeff asked. Dr Cathcart loved that he'd found new golf partners with wives that Cathy liked, most of the wives of his usual golf partners were more interested in botox, networking and auditioning for 'The Real Housewives'.

"I'm not one hundred percent sure. It's...awkward," Brian stopped tickling me and dropped his face into my hair.

"Brian," I sat up a little at the dead serious tone in Matt's voice. Wow, he sounded like a disappointed dad, "You know exactly what you're doing on Thanksgiving. You're coming to Val's and my place and you're spending the day with your family." I looked over at Val who was twirling the stem of her wine glass between her fingers and watching carefully from where she sat between Cathy and Meghan on the sofa. I wondered why she wasn't saying anything until I caught a glimpse of carefully concealed emotion crossing her face. It was clearly not the first time this topic had been discussed and it looked as though Val didn't want to push too hard. Maybe she was scared that if she didn't back off Brian would do the opposite of what she wanted.