My mom makes chicken fried steak and mashed potatoes for dinner but retires to her bedroom early, claiming a headache. She's actually pissed off because the first thing she made clear when we got home was that she wanted Richard to do my father's eulogy, since he was the good son. It's a phrase she never tires of speaking. Unfortunately for Mom, my father left instructions that he still wanted me to do the eulogy. My mother appealed to my siblings, trying to get them to agree that Dad wasn't in the place of mind to make that decision after the first stroke scrambled his brains, but everybody except Richard thought we should respect Dad's wishes. Mom hasn't spoken to me since.

Now the rest of us the Stokes clan, minus the spouses and children, who had departed to the living room, sat in the dining room silently, chewing food without tasting it, an unsettled tension almost visible in the air. Finally, Lilly broke the silence, as Lilly would always inevitably do.

"So, Nick, love the hair," she teases, breaking the ice. Everybody started to laugh.

I rub my mostly shaved head. "Yeah, that's a long story," I say, missing the feel of having something on top of my head but stubble. "I can't wait till it grows back." I glance at my younger sister, Jennifer, who had been known for her golden curls when she was younger and now had hair almost as short as David's. The cut, which would have made Marianne look butch and Lilly like a pixie, made Jennifer look in charge, the way an executive should.

Jennifer notices the direction of my stare and her hand went unconsciously to where her curls used to be. "Yeah, I cut 'em off a couple of years ago," she says. The room became quiet again. Another reminder on who hasn't been in home in over three years now.

Richard clears his throat loudly. "So, how have things been, Nick?" he asks, his tone pompous and arrogant, the masculine version of our mother. He plays with his wine glass idly, his chest puffed out like a bird trying to show off how important he is. "Has it been fun living in Vegas? Like living in a permanent vacation?"

"Shut up, Richard," David says flatly, draining the last of his wine glass.

"No, I will not," Richard says indignantly. "The rest of us have been here all this time for Mom and Dad. We've sacrificed for them; we're the ones who've been in pain. And Nick just waltzes back into our lives like everything's okay, like he didn't just abandon his family-"

"Give me a break," Lilly says before I could speak and we all look at her. Lilly has always been the gentle one, the one never to speak a harsh word. "You're not upset that Nick left to go live in Vegas. You're just upset because now he's come back, you're worried that he might steal back his title as Golden Boy, and you would just have to go back to playing the bitch who works hard for no attention. But personally, I think all that's bullshit. I don't give a fuck who the favored boy is because Dad's dead, and that's what we should be thinking about."

There was almost a stunned silence while Richard flushed and crossed his arms like a little boy. Lilly continues to glare at him for a minute and then abruptly leaves the table. Richard glares sullenly at where she had been and also left, walking upstairs in the opposite direction of Lilly. Marianne and David look at each other, shrug, and followethem out, both going to try and calm them down, leaving Jennifer and I staring at each other.

Jennifer smile cynically. "Ain't reunions fun?" she drawls, and I shake my head and also leave the table.

II.

As my other siblings are off being with their families or catching up on work, Lilly and I wash dishes and clean up after dinner, our old chores from when we were kids. Lilly and I had always gotten along best. We were both the dreamers of the family; the kids who grew up and still believed in idealism, in a world that could be perfect. Such notions didn't run large in my family. We couldn't even prove happiness in our own home.

Lilly doesn't seem angry like she had been at the dinner table but she is uncharacteristically silent. Thinking of the fun we used to have washing dishes, I splash her with water, drenching her long brown hair. Lilly giggles and quickly retaliates by pouring a glass of soapy water on m head.

"Hey!" I say, laughing . "Look what you've done to what's left of my hair!"

She looks at me judiciously. "It looks better," she decides. "The soap bubbles give it a touch of class.

I snort. "Right." Lilly begins to dry some dishes and I get down on my knees to clean up the water we had spilled on the ground, leaving my eyes level with her slightly protruding belly. "Mom says you think it's going to be a girl this time."

"I refuse to have another boy," she says. "I need a girl to balance things out. Actually, I need three girls to balance things out. I am concentrating hard and am sure that she'll come out with an XX chromosome."

I laugh. "What are you planning on naming her?"

She shrugs. "I'm not sure yet," she says. "I'd like something original. I thought Gwyneth naming her kid 'Apple' was kind of cute."

"So what? You're thinking Grape? Tangerine?"

Lilly gives me a look but it quickly disintegrates into laughter. Her gaze turns fond, nostalgic. "I've missed you Nick. Texas ain't the same without you."

My smile fades a bit from my face. "Yeah," I say. "I've missed you too." And I have. I've missed them all. David, and his science fiction books, Jennifer and her blunt honesty. Marianne, Lilly, even Richard, because I could remember a time when Richard and I had played football together, and his voice has not been proud and scornful. But I missed Lilly the most, Lilly and her thousand children, her determination to make he world a better place. I missed Mom and Dad and all of Texas. I even missed Luke, though I tried not to admit it.

I turn away to put up some plates and feel Lilly's eyes on me. "Why didn't you come home when Mom called, Nick? Why didn't you even call back for nearly a week? I know you weren't just busy at work, so you don't even try with me. I know you, Nick. Nothing is more important than your family, not to you. Why didn't you tell Mom the truth about why you didn't come?"

"I tried," I say flatly. "I tried and she wouldn't listen. She never gave me the chance to explain. She lost faith in me, just like that." I snapped my fingers. "To lose that much faith that quickly, that soon, makes me wonder if she ever really loved me at all."

"Don't start that," Lilly says. "Mom and Da. . .they loved you the best and you know it." She looks down at her feet, biting her lip softly. "I think even us kids loved you the best, although we may have hated you for it."

I know this but I don't want to. "Did you hate me?" I ask and she looks at me with a smile, a real one.

"Nah. How could I? You're too cute."

I laugh then, relieved, at least a little. "It's good to see you, Lilly."

"It's good to be seen," Lilly says and is quiet for a while. I watch her frowning, an unhappy, nervous expression forming on her face, and immediatly think this can't be good. "What?" I ask her.

"Wellllll. . ." she says slowly and suddenly I know what she's going to ask before she does. I immediately shake my head.

"No."

"Nick, look, I know how angry you are at him and how hurt you were when. . ." She breaks off.

"When what? When my little brother, who I used to read bedtime stories to, slept with the woman I asked to marry me? Jeez, I don't know how I could have overreacted so much to that? I don't know how I could be angry or hurt or-"

"Nick," she interrupts, sounding tired, and I stop and look away. I don't want to think about Luke. I would think Dad and Mom would be enough.

"Look," she says, "he's not doing great. I mean, I know Mom makes him out to sound like he's two steps away from being a homeless junkie, and he's not, but he hasn't been happy. He's moody, irritable, spends way to much time down at Hank's. I don't think he's even had a girlfriend since Julia."

"If you're asking me to be concerned about Luke's love life, you're asking the wrong person," I say flatly.

"I'm not," Lilly says. "I'm asking you to be concerned about Luke. Nick, he hasn't even been designing his cars."

That took me by surprise. Luke, the ultimate gearhead, loved his cars. You could barely pry him apart from an engine. They were his babies, his dreams. If he was upset, I'd expect him to retreat further into his world of playing with cars. The fact that he wasn't at all. . .

"Since when?"

"Since you left."

I try to tell myself this isn't my problem, but dear God. How long since I left for Vegas? How long since I fled from home?

Six, seven years?

"Have you seen him since Dad?" I don't finish the question. She knows what I mean.

"Yes. He spent a whole one night here. Mom was quick to jump on his case, as usual, and so did Richard. " Lilly shook her head. "I don't like what Richard's become."

"Yeah," I agree, "me neither."

"Look, Nick, I know how much I'm going to sound like a shrink, and I know how much you hate shrinks (though I really don't know why) but I think Luke has some, y'know, unresolved issues with Dad." Before I can interrupt, Lilly continues impatiently, "I know, I know we all do. But you have to admit how Luke's had it bad with Mom and Dad. And with Dad gone, Luke doesn't have any way of resolving those problems. And. . .and I thin you're the best person for him to talk to?"

"For Chrissake, why?"

"Because you two have your own issues to work out," Lilly says. "Because you were angry and hurt. And because I think Luke maybe loved and hated you the most out of all of us."

I shake my head. "It's not fair," I say, knowing I sound like a toddler, not really caring much anyway. "It's not fair that I have to go comfort him. He was the one who did this. He was the one who betrayed me, and I'm supposed to go save his soul? I love him, Lilly, I do, but I don't want to do this for him."

"I'm not asking you too."

I raise an eyebrow. "You're not?"

"No. I'm asking you to do it for me."

And there wasn't a lot I could say to that.