Broken Records by Bree Bennett
Chapter 17
Sparrow Hill, Indiana, was a lie. Jack did not see one single hill. He was not greeted by sparrows. Someone might call it a one-horse town, or in modern terms, a one-traffic-light town. Even that wasn’t technically correct because it was really just a blinking four-way stop, the unpaid intern of traffic lights.
As they drove through the town in their airport rental car, Lucy rambled out trivia, pointing out her elementary school, the only pizzeria, and a grocery store that could fit inside his house. She glowed with pride when she mentioned that they had not one but two gas stations, as if that elevated the prestige of the entire village. They were in and out of the town in less than five minutes in their whirlwind tribute tour to rurality.
If New York City could be considered all verticals with its skyscrapers, then out in the heartlands, the world was one big horizon. There was nothing but farmland and telephone poles for miles in all directions, with an occasional farmhouse popping up out of the ground like a curious prairie dog. Jack’s head spun, dizzy from the sheer openness of it all, as if someone had suddenly switched his internal settings from fullscreen to widescreen.
Lucy turned the car into a gravel driveway, parking in front of a farmhouse straight out of a Grant Wood painting. He recognized bits and pieces from her photos—the sail gray barn, the yard as vast and expansive as the rest of the land, and bare, skeletal fields as far as he could see. Trees across the property were shedding the last of their autumn colors, giving the entire property a sleepy sense of hibernation, paused for the cold season.
“Any last advice?” he asked, lifting their suitcases from the trunk, his palms clammy around the plastic handles.
She paused on the rickety wraparound porch, her head tilted in thought. “Hold onto your butt,” she said and ducked inside.
The first thing Jack noticed about Lucy’s childhood home was the smell. It smelled like burning firewood, fresh-baked bread, and pasta sauce, but above all, it smelled like home. Not like his cold Brooklyn townhouse or the garish Manhattan penthouse he’d grown up in, and certainly not like any of the stock hotel rooms he drifted in and out of on tour, but this ethereal, primitive idea of the sense of home, the sense of belonging.
They shucked their shoes and coats in the mudroom—a feature Jack didn’t think even existed in the city—and added them to coat hooks already weighed down with several layers of down jackets. They headed down a hallway lined with braided rugs that opened into a dining room.
As they stepped inside the chaos, the cackling laughter, raucous conversation, and even the clinking of plates and silverware came to an abrupt stop. Nine heads swiveled their way. Jack felt like the villain in a Wild West movie, strutting into a saloon and startling all the patrons from their respective poker games.
There was a moment where Jack wondered who would recognize him first and what the proper way to react might be. Acknowledge and change the subject? Sign autographs and then stuff his face to avoid additional attention?
“Oh my God,” one woman said, breaking the silence with sharpened shock. “Lucy brought home a guy.”
Lucy’s cheeks bloomed with rosy color, and she cleared her throat. “This is Jack,” she said. There was no descriptive noun, no fiancé/boyfriend/friend/roommate. “He came home with me.”
“We can see that,” said another woman.
Another silence descended, one built on confusion and curiosity and innate protectiveness. Lucy shifted on her feet.
“Well, come on in,” said a middle-aged man from his seat at the head of the table, and the tension shattered into the mayhem of friendly voices and creaking chairs and footsteps on an old wooden floor. Jack was flooded with hello and nice to meet you and oh, I like your hair and was half-panicked trying to remember everyone’s names. Halfway through the introductions, he just gave up and started assigning nicknames in his head. Lucy would have to give him a cheat sheet later.
Jack was passed between them, a human baton in a relay race, but as he was handed off to the last person, a hush fell over the room. A woman entered from the kitchen, a wooden spoon clutched in her hand like a nun’s disciplinary ruler. Jack felt like he was being cornered by the school principal, or perhaps General Patton.
She crossed her arms and peered at him through half-moon glasses. “Who are you?” she asked. Any sense of bravado melted away, and Jack stared at her, liquid apprehension flitting through his veins.
“I’m Jack,” he said, because he was. Just Jack.
“Hmmm,” she said, eyeing him from head to toe with an arched eyebrow.
“Jack,” Lucy said, coming from behind him. “This is my mother, Rose.”
“Jack who?” her mother asked.
“Jack Vincent.”
Another unreadable “hmmm,” and then, “He looks familiar.”
“Well,” Lucy paused. “He’s a musician.”
“Hmm.” Her eyes narrowed, and she looked him over once more. Sweat dampened Jack’s hairline, but then Rose nodded a curt, satisfied bob. “Ben, set another place at the table.”
Lucy’s father left the room and returned with a black thigh-high metal bottle, painted with a quaint design. Jack stared at it, not quite sure what he was supposed to do with it.
“It’s an old milk can,” Lucy whispered. “We have to get creative with seating sometimes.” She sat on a wobbly piano bench and laid her napkin in her lap before adding, “The milk can is a seat of honor.”
Jack perched on the milk can, his eyes darting around the dining room as plates of food were carried in. He offered help as they were set around the table, but was waved off by one family member or another until, at last, everyone was seated and ready for Thanksgiving dinner. He stared at the food like Tiny Tim at Scrooge’s born-again-nice-guy feast, his mouth watering at the scents and sights and sheer massiveness of the meal.
“Am I allowed to ask about the spaghetti thing yet?” he whispered to Lucy, but Twin #1, the overly cheerful one sitting on his right, overheard.
“Ma, Jack needs your spaghetti speech,” she said, snagging a still-steaming bread roll.
“The pilgrims came over, committed genocide, and then wanted us to celebrate it,” said Rose in a clearly-practiced recital. “I’m not following their xenophobic rules and I’m not serving some dried-out bird. This is my family. My dinner. My rules.”
Jack paused, a ladle-full of crisp green beans hovering mid-air. “Oh.” While he absolutely agreed with her sentiment, he hadn’t expected to discuss genocide within ten minutes of meeting his fiancée’s family, and felt woefully incompetent. Lucy flicked his elbow, and he unfroze, dropping the green beans onto his plate.
“So, you’re a musician?” Lucy’s father—Ben, a name Jack remembered because it was short—asked, passing a plate of chicken parmesan around the table.
“You look a lot like Jack Hunter,” another sister said. Her hair was cut into a pert pixie, and dyed with red and orange streaks. He would call her Flamehead until further notice. She peered at him, and then her eyes rounded. “Holy cow, you are Jack Hunter, aren’t you?”
Lucy stiffened at his side, and he laid his fork down. “That’s my stage name, but yes, that’s me.”
“Damn, Lucy,” Flamehead whistled. “You’ve started bringing home live specimens for your music collection.”
“Watch your mouth,” chastised Rose.
“Jack Hunter?” Ben tapped the fork to his mouth in thought. “Would I know your songs?”
Jack opened his mouth to answer, but one of the brothers beat him to it. “He did that ‘Slow Down’ song. You know, the one that goes ‘da da duhn da duhn.’”
Ah yes. Da da duhn da duhn was his biggest accomplishment.
“Oh, yes, I know that one,” Ben said with a head nod. “So you sing then?”
“Guitar and piano too,” Jack answered. “I dabbled a little with the bass guitar, but it wasn’t for me.” It was strange, discussing his music so casually, as if he were a plumber or a teacher instead of a triple platinum artist, but he liked it.
“Dad plays the guitar too,” said Twin #1, drowning her salad in a deluge of dressing. “So does Matteo.”
“I had all the kids take at least one year of music lessons,” said Rose. “Good for the brain, you know. Only Matteo and Sophia stuck with it.”
“I’ve been focusing on banjo lately, though,” said Matteo with a proud grin. Jack said a silent thank you—Matteo was the brother that reminded him of a golden retriever, all bouncy and happy-go-lucky. One sibling name down, six to go.
Twin #2 snorted. “Yes, Matteo plays the banjo. Loudly.”
“Sophia, be nice to your brother. He’s getting better,” said Rose, and Jack assigned Sophia to Twin #2 in his brain.
“He’s not getting better,” whispered Twin #1 from the corner of her mouth.
“The banjo is a difficult instrument,” Jack said in a placating tone. Matteo held up his hands in a Right? motion.
“And yet a puppet frog plays it better,” muttered Sophia, receiving another glare from her mother. She passed a container of cottage cheese to her twin sister, who, to Jack’s horror, took a spoonful and plopped it on top of her spaghetti and sauce.
“The fuck?” Jack said.
“Jack, watch your mouth,” said Rose, her tone firm. “And Ariana, put the phone away. It’s dinnertime. Business can wait.” Flamehead—a.k.a. Ariana—scoffed and whispered something that sounded like “goddamnit.”
Lucy’s lips were pressed thin against imminent laughter. She gathered a scoop of cottage cheese curds in the serving spoon and held it above his spaghetti. He stared at it, wide-eyed, nose flared.
“Cottontail,” he whispered.
“Mmhmm?”
“Nowhere in our contract does it say I have to eat your weird spaghetti.”
Her nose scrunched in amusement, and she dumped the cottage cheese on top of his pasta.
“I know where you live,” he hissed. Lucy burst into laughter, her shoulders shaking with giggles as she pressed a napkin to her mouth to stifle it. Jack loved her laugh. It was like happiness and mischief and pure, uninhibited glee molded into a sparkling sleigh-bell sound. But when he looked up, he found the entire family staring at them as if they were some sort of zoo exhibit.
Jack’s cheeks burned. He must have said or done something completely wrong, so he did the only thing he could think of to salvage the moment— he closed his eyes and dove into the cottage cheese-spaghetti concoction. It was surprisingly edible, delicious even, adding a hint of ricotta taste. Lucy grinned at him, oblivious to her gawking family, and ate a forkful of her own.
“So, Jack,” said The Tired Sister, which probably wasn’t a polite way to remember her, but her eyes were lined with exhaustion. She had a dazed expression as if she’d learned that aliens were real, but she still had to act normal. “How did you meet Lucy?”
“We ran into each other at a record store,” Jack said, and half of the people at the table let out a simultaneous “ohhh” as if that were no surprise.
“Did you get any records while in New York?” asked her father, his focus intent on his daughter. Affection mixed with a bit of bewilderment reflected in his countenance.
“A few,” said Lucy. “I found a good Sam Cooke live album.”
“Oh, yeah?”
“Yeah, the 1963 show at the Harlem Square Club,” she said. “Oh, and also, Jack and I are getting married.”
Jack gasped, causing a strand of spaghetti to catch in his throat. He sputtered and coughed, eyes tearing as he drew in sharp inhales. Twin #1 clapped him on the back a few times until he waved her off, reaching for a glass of water and downing it in one gulp.
“You good?” asked the oldest brother—the one that reminded Jack of a grizzly bear—as Jack’s coughs diminished into watery eyes and the occasional hack. He bobbed his head between coughs, and Grizzly nodded once in acknowledgment before focusing on Lucy. “Now, the hell did you say?”
“Nico, watch your mouth,” said Rose, but her earlier conviction had faded.
“Jack and I are getting married,” Lucy repeated. Jack scrambled for her hand in a frantic show of solidarity.
“No, you aren’t,” laughed Matteo, but he stopped when no one else joined him. “Wait. Really?”
Lucy nodded and gave a half-grimace, half-smile. Suddenly, three very large, very angry, very overprotective brothers dropped their forks and were glaring at Jack. Jack tried to match their glare as best he could, but it ended up as more of a neurotic wince.
“How did this happen?” Sophia gestured at the two of them like a scolding schoolteacher, and then she gasped and shoved a finger toward Jack. “Did you knock her up?”
The three brothers kept their eyes tracked on Jack as if they expected him to run for the non-existent hills. The third brother—the one that looked as if he would sneak out of a corner, break someone’s neck without a sound, and then go casually drink a glass of Merlot—cracked his knuckles.
“I’m not pregnant,” Lucy said in exasperation, fidgeting in her seat.
“Uh-huh. Where’s the ring?” asked Rose, pointedly looking down her nose at Lucy’s left hand.
“Here.” Jack fumbled inside his pocket and slid it on her finger. “We didn’t want to shock you right away.”
“Yes, because the delayed shock is so much more preferable,” muttered Ariana.
“Have you set a date?” asked Rose.
“Errr,” Lucy looked at Jack for backup.
“We were going to do it next week, actually,” Jack said. “In New York.”
The room went silent again except for the ominous drumming of Rose’s fingers. “New York,” she said as if it were a curse word.
“It’s complicated,” said Lucy. “We wanted to tell you first before the media found out.”
“Media,” repeated Ben, a little hoarsely.
“You’re actually serious,” said Grizzly Nico, throwing his arms in the air.
“Jack, Lucy,” said Ben, his forehead creased in confusion, as if he weren’t exactly sure how he had found himself in this situation. “You have to understand our concerns.”
“Of course,” Jack said, because he would be blowing a gasket if any child of his were dating Jack Hunter. “But I can promise you, I’ll take good care of Lucy.” He wove their fingers together.
Partners. Equals. We’ve got this.
“And vice versa,” said Lucy with a modest smile.
“This is messed up,” growled Nico. “Lucy, he’s taking advantage of you somehow. You haven’t known each other long enough.”
“Nico,” warned Rose, but Jack was already halfway out of his chair, ready to smack him in his grizzly bear face. Lucy hauled him back down into his seat while Ariana muttered something about the ridiculous constructs of masculinity.
“I’m not taking advantage of her,” Jack seethed. “Yeah, it hasn’t been long, but anyone who spends a minute with Lucy can figure out how amazing she is. And I’m going to do my best to get as many of those amazing minutes with her as I can, for as long as I can.”
His voice wavered, and something behind his sternum stretched and squeezed, something that knew his speech wasn’t a lie. Lucy was frozen in place, gazing at her water glass with a blank look.
“Eh, not bad,” said Sophia, raising her glass as a salute. “Could’ve used some work on the delivery.”
“Jesus Christ, Sophia,” Ariana snorted.
“Ariana, your mouth,” groaned Rose before returning to Jack and Lucy with a softened gaze. “You know, Nonno and Nonna only knew each other six weeks before they got married.”
Matteo made a disgruntled sound and reached for a roll, shredding it apart with his long fingers.
“But,” Rose added, “We’re discussing this ‘getting married in New York’ thing tomorrow.”
“Ma—” started Nico, but she held up a hand to silence him.
“Tomorrow.” She fixated each and every one of her children with a cool end-of-discussion-or-else look.
Jack jumped as the crackle of the baby monitor cut through the air, and a distorted wail echoed through the dining room.
“Now the baby’s up,” huffed The Tired Sister, rising from her chair. She jabbed her pointer finger in the general vicinity of the table. “Nobody have any other life-changing news until I’m back.”
“There’s pumpkin pie for dessert,” said Rose casually, as if the past half hour hadn’t even happened.
“Do we have ice cream?” asked Twin #1.
“I picked up vanilla bean yesterday,” said Ben.
“I failed my geology midterm,” said Sophia. Everyone’s head spun to face her. “What, so Lucy gets to be spontaneous, and I don’t?”
Jack clenched his jaw against the sudden urge to laugh. Despite the lingering tension, that sense of acceptance covered him again, like a velvet magician’s cloak. He felt calm and hopeful and—and slimy. Definitely slimy.
“Oh God,” he inhaled, his body stiffening as a rough, squelchy wetness enveloped his right heel. “What’s happening?”
“Oh,” Twin #1 said, glancing down at Jack’s feet. “Jack, meet Larry. Larry, meet Jack.”
Jack lowered his head to regard the pot-bellied pig, nuzzling and glomming his heel. The black and white, jowly, solid tank of a creature blinked and regarded him as well.
Lucy leaned down and whispered into his ear. “Welcome to the family.”