"Oh, we should maybe make him something to eat." I close my eyes, blinking away the sleep, before sitting up in bed, and tossing the top cover to the side. Sliding out of bed, I tiptoe toward the front door while I hear another whisper. I stand in the doorway, making sure I recognize the voices before I walk out.
"We should have brought doughnuts or something." I shake my head and look out of the bedroom, seeing my three sisters all huddled at the front door. "You go and get him." Presley pushes Shelby toward the stairs, and if I hadn’t just awoken from a deep sleep, I would laugh at the three of them.
"What the hell are you guys doing here?" I say, stepping out of my bedroom and looking down over the railing. The sound of all three of my sisters yelling fills the house. They all look up at me, huddled together.
"Jesus fucking Christ,” Shelby, my oldest sister, says, putting her hand to her chest. "You gave me a fucking heart attack." Her black hair is tied up on top of her head, and she wears black yoga pants with a white shirt. Her blue eyes glare at me as if I did something wrong.
"Why the hell are you sneaking into my house?" I put my hand on the wooden banister and look down at them.
"We aren’t sneaking." Clarabella shakes her head. "Who sneaks in by using a key?" She holds up the key she got from under the mat outside.
"You are lucky that I didn’t come down with the baseball bat I have in the bedroom." I look at each of them.
"One." My youngest sister, Presley, puts up a manicured finger. "You suck at baseball," she reminds me. "You lost the game for us last year, and two"—she puts up another finger—"go get dressed. I’m about to throw up my croissant I just ate."
"I’m in my boxers," I say, looking down at myself. "And you are in my house. Imagine if I was naked." I throw my hands up, and my voice goes louder. The three of them all grimace with the fact that I could have been naked. "And two, I did not lose that game. It was the three of you thinking you can each catch a ball and fall into each other." I point at the three of them, all of them rolling their eyes.
"Go get dressed. We’ll start the coffee,” Shelby says, walking into the house and toward the kitchen.
I shake my head and walk back into my bedroom, going straight for the bathroom. I wash my face and run my hands through my hair before grabbing my blue sweatpants and going back downstairs. The smell of coffee fills the whole house. "Okay," Shelby says. "Rock-paper-scissors on who gets to say."
"No way," Presley says. "You’re the oldest." She points at her, and I walk into the kitchen. The three of them stop talking as soon as they see me standing here.
"What the hell is going on?" I look at my sisters as they each look at each other, neither of them wanting to talk. Walking to the coffee machine, I pour myself a cup of steaming hot coffee. I don’t bother with the milk when I turn and lean back on the counter. "Okay, go." I take another gulp.
"Okay, don’t freak out," Clarabella starts. "But the fridges at the venue stopped working."
I look at them, not sure what she is saying as she walks out of the kitchen and goes to the living room, sitting on the L-shaped gray couch. "Okay, and…？" I look at Shelby.
"All the food for the wedding is spoiled." She says the words, and I close my eyes. This is definitely not something you want to hear on your wedding day.
"But the good news," Clarabella says, "is that we already called our supplier, and from what he said, he should be able to get us most of the stuff."
"Most of the stuff," I repeat. "What about the rest of it?"
"Well, that is going to be our problem," Shelby says. "All you have to worry about is showing up on time."
"God, I’m starving," Clarabella announces, going to the fridge and opening it. "Why don’t we have a nice family breakfast before our brother finally ties the knot?" She smiles.
"Oh, we should have brought champagne," Presley says from the couch. "We did not put our best foot forward." She lies down on the couch. "I can’t believe you are giving away this couch."
I don’t say anything. Instead, I look around at the brown boxes stacked all over the place. Jennifer’s things were delivered over a month ago and have yet to be unboxed. Every single time we had plans to unpack, something would come up. I walk over to the couch and sit down, looking around at the bare walls. All the things I had hanging I took down to make Jennifer feel more at home. "I swear you guys will be married five years, and I have a feeling these boxes will still be here," Presley says quietly from beside me.