Chapter 7 - The Prodigal Brother Knocks
It was a chilly Saturday morning in late October when the knock came. Harper was out at a local farmer’s market, and I was in the garage, running an orbital sander over a piece of live-edge black walnut for a new dining room table. The rhythmic drone of the tool was suddenly interrupted by three heavy, tentative raps on the side door.
I clicked off the sander, wiped the sawdust from my safety goggles, and pulled open the door. Standing on my concrete driveway, looking pale, exhausted, and visibly thinner, was Sutton.
He didn't look like the homecoming king anymore. He was wearing an expensive designer fleece that looked rumpled and unwashed, his hair was thinning at the crown, and the confident, booming swagger that had defined his youth was completely gone. In its place was a hunched, nervous posture and dark purple circles under his bloodshot eyes.
“Hey, Alex,” he said, his voice quiet, lacking any trace of the fire he had spat through the phone eighteen months earlier. “Can I… can I come in for a minute?”
I stood in the doorway, blocking the entrance with an arm resting against the jamb. Brisket sat calmly at my heels, letting out a single, low huff. “What are you doing in Charlotte, Sutton?”
Sutton swallowed hard, glancing back at his leased sports car, which had a noticeable scrape along the front fender and an overdue inspection sticker on the windshield. “I drove down from Richmond. I need to talk to you. Man to man. Brother to brother.”
“We haven't spoken since you screamed at me over tacos,” I said evenly. “Our parents haven't sent a single text in a year and a half. We don't have a brother-to-brother relationship, Sutton. We have a transaction history.”
Sutton flinched as if I had struck him, but the desperation in his eyes outweighed his pride. “Look, I know things were bad. I know Waverly and I acted like complete jerks about the wedding. We were under an insane amount of pressure, man. Everyone was watching us, and we were trying so hard to project this image of success. It was stupid. It was wrong. I’m admitting that to you right now. I was wrong.”
I studied him for a long moment. It was the first time in thirty-four years I had ever heard Sutton utter the words 'I was wrong' without our parents forcing him to do it. But I also knew my brother. Sutton never confessed without an agenda.
“Come inside,” I said, stepping back into the kitchen.
May you like
He walked into the house, looking around with a strange, defensive curiosity. He saw the newly installed quartz countertops, the custom cherry cabinetry I had built by hand, and the sleek modern fixtures. For years, Sutton had assumed that because I lived quietly, I lived poorly. Seeing tangible evidence of my stability seemed to rattle him even further.
He sat down at the island, wringing his hands together. “Alex, I’m in deep trouble,” he whispered, his voice trembling. “The bank is calling in the note on the warehouse project. If I can’t produce eighty-five thousand dollars by the end of next month, they’re foreclosing on the commercial property and attaching my personal assets. And because Mom and Dad co-signed the primary equity loan, the bank is threatening to put a lien on their house in Richmond. Mom is having panic attacks every night. Dad is talking about going back to work on electrical lines at sixty-seven years old.”
