Page 34 of My Brother’s Best Friend

“I did get one,” Cam said, “but not until later that afternoon. They’d left her at a friend’s house, and brought her over when I inevitably crashed and took a nap.”

Arthur snorted. “You tried so hard to teach her how to hunt for truffles—nevermind the fact that we don’t have truffles on Summersea—but all she ever wanted to do was eat old socks and drink ditch water.”

“Mabel didn’t have the most refined palate,” Cam explained. “On the other hand, she did once eat an entire package of Hydrox cookies and survive, so I can’t really complain about her digestive system.”

“Speaking of chocolate,” Doris said, rising from the table, “who’s up for some cake?”

“Oh, Nana, I’m not sure I have room,” Cam said.

“Honestly, me neither,” I said. “Everything’s been delicious, but I couldn’t eat another bite.”

“We’ll just see about that,” she said ominously, sweeping up a stack of plates and whisking them off to the kitchen. Arthur put the big sandwich platter in his lap and followed her.

“Why am I scared now?” I said to Cam.

“Because you’re a smart man.” Cam’s voice was utterly serious. “You’ve issued a direct challenge, and now she’s going to take it upon herself to make you eat more food, even if it takes a funnel and a feeding tube.”

“I knew it was too good to be true when she asked me for this lesson,” I said. “No wonder she offered to pay me so much. She was planning on feeding me to death; she knew she’d get it back.”

Cam cocked his head to the side. “She said something about that, actually.”

“About murdering me?”

“No, about you not usually doing lessons. Which is weird. You seem like a great teacher.”

“I wouldn’t go that far,” I said, a little uncomfortable.

I’d taken the gig because Doris had more or less forced me to, and the pay was too good to turn down. And yeah, it had turned out better than I expected. When I’d focused on Arthur and stopped ruminating on my own shit, I’d felt freer than I had in a while. But that didn’t mean I was any good.

“Look at what you did with my grandfather.”

“I gave him one lesson, and I didn’t even try to get into any of the fundamentals of color theory, or composition, or anything other than, here’s how you hold a brush. I wouldn’t say I taught him a whole lot.”

“You made him laugh.”

“I don’t know if that counts for much.”

“It counts for a lot more than you’d think,” Cam said. “But I guess you’re probably busy with your own stuff, right? So teaching’s just not a priority.”

I barked a laugh, and when he looked at me, I didn’t know what to say. This was the problem, I realized, with spending time with him. Pretending to be the person he thought I was. The inevitable crash back to reality sucked even harder, now.

“I’m sorry,” Cam continued when I didn’t reply. “I don’t want to sound ungrateful, or like you owe Grandpa anything. You should be working on your own stuff. Of course that’s what’s important to you.”

I grimaced and rubbed my temples. I needed him not to be so nice. It only rubbed my failure in more.

“Jordan? Did I say something wrong?” He paused. “Well, obviously, I said something wrong. But could you tell me what it was, so I can at least apologize for the right thing?”

I put my head in my hands and groaned softly.

“I might not have mentioned this,” Cam said, “but this is actually my personal hell right now, knowing I messed up but not knowing how, and I’m about to start babbling to make up for it, so unless you want to hear about oyster mushrooms for the next fifteen minutes, you might want to—”

“I haven’t painted in six months!” I burst out. I dropped my hands and looked at Cam. “You didn’t say anything to offend me, but you did say something wrong, because you’re acting like I’m this great artist when what I actually am is a fake.”

“Jordan, I—”

“You want to know why I’m really back? It’s not just that my boyfriend dumped me. It’s that I haven’t sold a painting in years. Haven’t had a show in longer. And I don’t make enough from coffee shop wages to even rent a closet in someone’s murder dungeon, let alone an actual apartment. I came home because I have nowhere else to go, and I can’t tell what’s worse—the people who say they knew I’d never actually get out of here, or people like you who I’ve somehow tricked into thinking I’m competent.”

I made a disgusted noise in the back of my throat. “Levi’s making me hang up my paintings in The Roastery like they’re something to be proud of. You keep saying I’m going through a rough patch, like this is just a temporary thing. And I know you’re both just trying to be nice, but it actually makes it worse, because I know it’s not true, and then I feel even shittier for being ungrateful to the only people in my life who believe in me.”