Day Zero
In the midst of a busy airport, twenty-year-old Phoebe Johnson nervously smoothed down the fabric of her high-necked, bell-sleeved, floral-patterned dress for the thousandth time as she waited to be picked up after her flight. She had her long, thick, dark hair secured in three large cornrows tucked carefully underneath her favorite headwrap. The sense of security that came from feeling it clinging snuggly to her head helped her to feel a little less overwhelmed, but even with it she felt a bit overstimulated and longed for the quiet and cool the car would bring. She hated crowds, she hated large public places, and most of all she hated airports. The air in the waiting area felt almost suffocating, the continuous press of warm bodies around her making the room even hotter than it already was. Somewhere close by there was a squalling baby contributing to the overall noise. Her noise-canceling headphones helped to block out the loud thrum of voices and commotion as people rushed past her but some sounds still filtered through. She cringed and turned her music up louder, forcing herself to concentrate on her book about a vampire accountant. Her hands switched to playing with the bracelet of jade circling her tawny wrist, a gift from her mother to ensure safe travel and luck (not that she didn't already have a huge chunk of jade round her neck on a thick chord that she had worn for years—her mother just felt like being extra cautious since they had never been so far apart before).
Today she would finally meet her half-brother, who was now fifteen minutes later than expected, face-to-face. She fully resigned herself to that fifteen minutes turning into twenty before he arrived. As soon as he picked her up they would drive to the house, and he would be introduced to his family, something both thrilling and terrifying. Jerry was much older than her, after all, and had children of his own who were not that much younger than her. To say she was nervous barely scratched the surface of her tangle of emotions. She had a half-brother who was fifteen years older than her, one with whom she had not grown up. The separation was awkward enough, but to think that she was a love-child born out of one of his parents' threesomes left a few things to be desired. No one wanted to think of their mother or father being sexually active, and no one wanted to know the circumstances under which they were conceived, but it was a bit unavoidable given the circumstances. How else could her mother have explained their weird family relationship? How else could she defend her assertion that she most certainly did not have an affair with a married man than to include details about his and his wife's consensual polyamory? So her mother had confided in her (leaving out all the gross and unnecessary details), and she decided to reach out to her half-brother.
His name was Jerry Smith, and Phoebe admitted to herself that while her brother seemed a bit limited, he was still her brother and she should get to know him and the rest of her family better. The two of them corresponded over a period of a few months, and when she applied to, and was accepted into, the nearby university for graduate school, it seemed only natural that she stayed with her family there to cut costs. She could have stayed with her father and his wife, but she felt a bit weird about that, and it was a step that she preferred to take in the future. So on top of avoiding an awkward parental situation, it would be far cheaper to stay with the Smiths than renting an apartment on her own, and given that she was a graduate student and not an undergraduate, she could avoid the hell of living in a dorm. Jerry seemed more than happy to accommodate her, and so she found herself packing and purchasing a plane ticket to Seattle. She did transcription work, website testing, and tutoring in English and Mandarin to keep her bank account from stuttering into death throes while she attended school, and Jerry's parents were more than happy to send money to her and her mother, Bailey Johnson, the child of an African American father, Darius Johnson, and a Chinese-American mother, Mĕilì Chung. They never abandoned their lover, actively supporting Bailey and Phoebe throughout Phoebe's lifetime. Even now they were helping offset her college costs. She was appreciative, knowing how lucky she was to have that sort of financial security. Many people couldn't afford college without either jumping through hoops for scholarships or accepting crippling amounts of debt that would follow them until the day they died.
After another few minutes of contemplation spent staring sightlessly at her phone screen, Phoebe minimized her book and switched into her message app. Jerry had now hit the twenty-minute mark according to the time stamp on the last message. She rolled her eyes, slightly irritated. Maybe she had given too much credit to him, she thought derisively. Maybe the man couldn't tell time? She vented her frustration in her head for less than a minute then banished the cruel thought with a grimace, forcing herself to be a bit more patient, a bit more lenient, with her brother. It wouldn't do to write him off within the first hour as a lost cause, especially for pretentious or petty reasons. She huffed in frustration and switched out of the app. Looking between the timestamp and the clock repeatedly would be like watching a pot and waiting for it to boil.
After a few more minutes she actually began to worry. Maybe he'd gotten into an accident, and here she was being the asshole who sat around hating him while he bled out on the roadside. She paused her music, bit her lip, and dialed his number. Jerry picked up on the third ring, sounding harried. He spoke quickly into the phone. "Hello? Phoebe? I'm on my way. There was a little hiccup but I'm coming now."
She bit back a groan of disappointment. "What ah—what happened there, Jerry?" A small, vindictive part of her was hoping for an emergency despite her recent worry.
From his end Jerry sighed in frustration. "My father-in-law," he said unpleasantly, "We had another fight about how he's ruining my son!"
Phoebe frowned. "Oh? How is that?"
"He's...he's...he just is, okay? I'll be there in another ten minutes, don't worry." From their talks she thought he sounded like an anxious and insecure person, but maybe her hot take was wrong and he would be different in person. Today maybe he was just stressed about being late to pick her up, or as nervous about meeting her as she was about meeting him.
"Okaaaay…" Phoebe drew out the word, unsure what to say.
Jerry hung up the phone, and Phoebe sighed, resigned to waiting ten more minutes, which would push her total wait time to a little over half an hour. Since he was supposedly so close she closed Spotify, tucked her headphones away, and double-checked her belongings, which consisted of two large suitcases and two small carry-ons, all in muted shades of red. She gathered everything to her with skill and made her way outside, stopping just by the entrance. She stood in the shade to avoid melting, thankful that her clothes kept her cool. She fiddled with some mindless game so she could keep her faculties about her and observe her surroundings.
The remaining ten minutes seemed to pass faster than the preceding twenty, and soon Jerry called her back. "Um, Phoebe," he said uncertainly, "I'm here. What do you look like?"
Shit. It suddenly occurred to her that not only did he have no idea what she looked like, he likely had no real grasp over the concept that she wasn't quite like him. How could he know to look for a tall woman with skin darker than the haze of the harvest moon? Through osmosis? Shitfuckdamnittohell. "Do you see a tall brown woman in a headwrap with a bunch of red luggage?"
Silence came from the other end of the line for a few moments before Jerry slowly said "...Yes?"
"That's me. I'm probably not what you're expecting."
Another silence, then, "...ah, well, not exactly...but that's okay!" Jerry responded brightly. Phoebe winced internally but wasn't surprised at the assumption. She assumed best intentions, though, so didn't hold it against him. It was likely that it never occurred to him rather than him actively not wanting her to be who she was. Some things that were so obvious to her were invisible to him. He wasn't used to being mixed-race like she was and having family members in varying hues. He didn't know how to think like a brown-bodied person, and before her he likely never had to consider all the implications of having a mixed-race family.
An old station wagon slid up next to her, giving her a view into the vehicle. Through the passenger window she could see a mid-thirties white male driver, thin, probably five-seven to five-nine. He wore a dark green short-sleeved cotton shirt with brown and beige coloring a horizontal stripe in the middle of it. He had light brown eyes, it seemed. Looking into his face she could see a few features they shared, and that eased her mind a little. Same ears, same jawline, same light brown eyes. Their skin might be different, but to anyone actually paying attention they were clearly biologically related. She knocked on his window when he didn't immediately roll it down, and he pressed a button to lower it, at least having the decency to look embarrassed. He'd been staring right back at her, but far more intently and for far longer than necessary. "Could you open the back?" she asked, successfully keeping her exasperation out of her voice.
Jerry immediately looked flustered. "Oh, yeah! And I guess I should help you? I mean, what kind of brother would I be if I didn't?" He let out a nervous chuckle and hopped out of the driver's seat, trooping to the back of the car. He swung open the hatch and her things quickly disappeared into the interior of the cargo space. She kept only her small backpack with her, stretching up to help Jerry close the hatch. She returned to the passenger side, opened the door and slid into her seat. A moment later Jerry slid into his. They fastened their seatbelts and soon they were off, driving away from the airport. Phoebe hoped he would talk about something so the car ride together wouldn't be excruciating.
Jerry kept glancing at her in the rearview without saying anything. After the fifth time she decided to start a conversation. How in the world could the man still be so awkward? Sure, they'd never met, but at least they'd spoken before. Maybe that was it, she realized, once another minute of painful silence passed. Before she was a disembodied voice speaking to him over the phone or through email. She was an abstract, a concept, not a fully formed person, and now here she was suddenly sitting in his car, whole, fully formed, impossible to ignore. "So...do you like dogs?" she tried. Either he liked dogs or he liked a different kind of animal, unless he was one of those soulless people who hated all animals everywhere.
To her relief, Jerry instantly brightened. "I love dogs! In fact, we have one!" His voice took on the tone of an excited child showing off his toys to his new friends. "His name is Snuffles, but we all think he's a little stupid…"
For the next twenty-five minutes they bonded over pets they'd had previously. Phoebe had once owned a small lizard when she was younger, while Jerry had owned a hamster, and they'd both gone through a fish or two. Back at home she and her mother shared a cat that would only answer to Princess (though its name was supposed to be Misty), and Jerry and his family had Snuffles, though he was mostly Morty's. The two siblings shared hilarious pet-related shenanigans, and began to commiserate with each other over losing the dead ones. That part was a bit dark, but their shared grief made her feel closer to him. This must be what they mean by packbonding in all of those Humans-Are-Space-Australians stories, she mused to herself. Now that she saw it in action she understood its power. They moved on to discussing their favorite animals (some of hers were elephants and dolphins) and by the time that Jerry pulled the station wagon into the driveway of a typical suburban home, one considered "modest" by some standards, she felt more comfortable calling him her brother.
Phoebe stalled a moment, wondering what his family would be like, but pushed the worry firmly from her mind. She stepped out of the car with determination and moved to the hatch to remove her belongings. Together she and Jerry lugged everything up to the front door, and she briefly wondered how she had managed everything by herself at the airport without a helping hand nearby. Maybe because the journey was coming to a close things seemed harder than they were in the middle or at the beginning. By this point she just wanted everything to be over and to settle into the house.
They stood on the front step together as Jerry fumbled with the key. Before he could orient it in a way that allowed him to stick it into the lock, the front door opened to reveal someone who could only be his daughter, unless he had a niece or another long-lost sister staying with him at the moment. A thin, bored-looking teenager around five-foot-two or five-foot three stood staring at them, her wide hips and rather round face the only thing keeping her from looking like a stereotypical beanpole. Her nose was long and sharp. Unlike her father, her eyes were a cool silvery color and her loose hair a fiery ginger that contrasted starkly with his mousy brown. She had on purple shorts and a white top, which apparently surprised her father. "No pink?" he said with more than a hint of surprise, which told Phoebe that the teen rarely deviated from the color in her wardrobe choices. Summer, she remembered, was seventeen, and her brother Morty was fourteen. They weren't all that much younger than her, all things considered. Maybe she would get to be that fun Aunt everyone talked about, the one who did cool things and let you get away with crap your parents never would.
"God, Dad," she said, ignoring his comment, "what took you so long?"
"Well, Summer, I—I had a late start," he grumbled. "Your grandfather and I had words before I went to pick up your Aunt Phoebe."
"He was thirty minutes late," Phoebe deadpanned unhelpfully from his side, stifling her laughter when he shot her a hurt look. "Just saying," she shrugged with a smile, "far be it from me to help my brother." She could tell she had redeemed herself because he seemed pleased.
His shoulders straightened. "Summer," he said importantly, far more importantly than perhaps he should sound for a simple family introduction, Phoebe thought amusedly, "this is your Aunt Phoebe."
Phoebe shifted around her things and gave Summer a small wave. "Hello, Summer," she said, "it's good to finally meet you. You don't know how trippy it's been these past few months realizing I wasn't an only child."
Summer looked at her for the first time, having focused on her father. If Phoebe were a more timid person she might have shrunk under the scrutiny, but instead she felt relaxed, displaying her warmest smile. Summer seemed to approve, or at least not to disapprove. She nodded once and stepped to the side. "Come on in, Aunt Phoebe." As they passed, she took the carry-on bags, which made the going even easier. Phoebe really, really wished they had been able to help her at the airport now, but it was neither here nor there. She took a step forward, wondering about her nephew and her sister-in-law, who she assumed she would meet soon. It would be so nice to finally put faces to the names of her new family members.