Bowling for Turkeys

Thanksgiving with Extra Turkeys

“brEATHE, MILO,” Mari said sternly at ten o’clock on Thursday morning. “Breathe. C’mon now, take a breath and walk me through it.”

Milo nodded and tried to stop running around his kitchen like Julia after the squeaky.

“Turkey’s in the oven,” Mari prompted, and Milo took over from there.

“Turkey’s in the oven,” he echoed. “Potatoes are on the stove. Garth brought over au gratin, already cooked, just needs to be warmed after the turkey comes out and is resting.”

“Good,” Mari prompted. “Keep going.”

“You and Georgie brought the brussels sprouts, and you’ll fry them in an hour.”

“Good, and appetizers?”

“Chips and veggies are already on the table,” Milo said dutifully. “Misty promised something delicious to go with her dressing—something about stuffing jalapenos with butter, cheese, and bacon, which cannot be bad. Michael’s bringing pies. We have ice cream.”

“That’s great,” Mari said. “And Rick and Angela?”

“Are bringing sides and drinks and more chips, and it doesn’t matter what the sides are because we have plenty already,” Milo finished.

“Yes. Exactly.”

“But the plates—” He began to fret.

“I brought the heavy-duty paper ones, son. Your little four-count place settings aren’t gonna cut it here.”

Milo nodded. “Mari,” he whispered. “What are eight people going to do in my house?”

“Ten,” she whispered back. “Angela’s bringing her wife, and you invited Jerry the neighbor. He’s helping Garth with the fence.”

“And four dogs,” he said, his voice cracking. “ I’m an introvert, Mari—what am I going to do with four dogs! ”

She scowled at him. “You are going to calm down before I send you outside to go bother Garth. I’m in charge of sweet potatoes here, Milo, and they’re almost done boiling.”

“What else do you have to do with them?” he asked, distracted from his meltdown.

“According to Georgie?” She gave a conspiratorial, almost manic cackle. “We’re going to dessertify them. Apparently this canned potato in a bowl thing that your parents did?”

“Yeah?”

“It’s bullshit . I’m talking brown sugar, salted butter, cornflakes, pecans—it’s damned near a cake recipe, and they call it vegetables .”

Milo stared at her, enchanted.

“Can I watch you make this?” he asked, suddenly wanting to eat it every day for a week.

“Sure, baby.” She patted his cheek. “Anything to keep you from running around the kitchen like a headless chicken.”

Milo sat down at the kitchen counter and took a breath, enthralled when Georgie threw out instructions like, “I don’t know how many cups, Mari—chop up all the pecans. Yeah. Now about two cubes of butter. Yes. Cubes. Honey, this is holiday stuff—if you don’t gain five pounds it’s not Thanksgiving. Good.”

After some of that, Mari was working industriously on mixing everything, and Milo said, “I like him. He’s a shiny penny.”

“He is,” she said. “And can I say the same about Garth. Did he tell you we talked the other night?”

“Yeah. He said it was about my care and feeding.”

“Yup. We decided we’re both on Team Milo, and we will make sure you’re okay. I gotta tell you, I never got the same promise from Stuart.”

Milo grunted. “Stuart is already embarrassing from a personal standpoint. As in, I’m embarrassed I ever cared for him.”

“Naw, baby,” she said, folding an obscene amount of brown sugar into the smashed sweet potato mixture. “Don’t be embarrassed that you cared for somebody. Just remember that quote from that movie?”

“ Last of the Mohicans ?” he asked, because Mari had taken a Michael Mann class in college, and they’d seen everything he’d ever directed, and they could now quote his movies extensively, which wasn’t saying much because the guy wasn’t fond of dialog.

“Yeah, that one,” Mari told him. “Remember? ‘You are a man of a few admirable qualities, but taken as a whole, I was wrong to have thought so highly of you.’ I mean, couldn’t you die ? That was such a good takedown. There was some culpability on her part, but mostly the guy was a shmuck. So that’s you and Stuart. And now you and Garth get to go have ambiguous sex while the French invade the fort.”

“Yay us?” Milo had never been sure of who won in that movie. “I’d rather have great sex in a bed.”

“Oh, me too,” Mari said, nodding vigorously. “Here, Milo—grab the glass dish. I already sprayed it. I’ve got to put crumbles on top of this, but first I have to dump it in the casserole dish.”

Milo was calm now, and he could help get stuff ready with a cool head, but even more important, he could remember that people working together on the meal could be as much fun as having people in his house in the first place.

MISTY AND Michael arrived promptly at two, right when Milo and Mari were getting the turkey out of the oven. Garth took over with the dogs, escorting them past the chaos in the kitchen and to the backyard. The day was crisp and cold, so Garth had sprung for the heater and a couple of pop-up dog huts with old blankets in them. Michael was delighted at the setup and went out back to sit on a chaise, drink a beer, pet dogs, and talk to Jerry, who had been pleased as punch when he and Garth had finished taking down the fence and cleaning the yard.

Misty came into the kitchen and set her dishes on the stove and the counter and then started offering much-needed advice about what to do with the turkey once it had sat on the counter and rested.

Milo pointed out reasonably that the thing had been doing nothing but resting since he and Garth had brought it home. It had rested in the refrigerator and then rested in the sink in brine and then gotten its skin stuffed with garlic, rosemary, sage, and brown sugar and rested in the pan for the last five hours.

Misty’s laugh had been sweet and not mocking, and she told them both about how leaving the meat on the counter to sort of stew and finish cooking would make it taste better, and in the meantime, could she help with anything else?

She was, as it turned out, a delight. She knew things that Mari and Milo did not about cooking, about having lots of people in the house, about being a host. She complimented Milo’s décor, his art, and told Mari she looked darling in her bohemian dress with her loose bun and the wisps around her face. She asked about having eight cats, saying she’d have to find a bombproof cat who could put up with her two giant dogs. Mari said Georgie could find a cat that would put up with anything , and Georgie wandered by from setting drinks out on the dining table to confirm that.

They were having such a good time that when Rick and Angela arrived, lovely wife Michelle in tow, Milo wasn’t panicking anymore. It occurred to him that everybody was working on this together . The plan had been for people to travel a buffet line through the kitchen and eat wherever comfortable. Angela suggested putting the snacks on the coffee table since the dogs were all outside, and then she and Rick did that while Michelle set up the drinks and plates. Georgie continued to drift in and out, doing super helpful things that Milo had not anticipated, like bringing dog snacks out to the guys in the backyard, who were apparently bonding over throwing balls to giant dogs and Julia. He even found Julia’s favorite squeaky because the bigger dogs kept beating her to the ball.

“I like Georgie,” Milo said. He was watching in fascination as Misty combined presteamed red cabbage, fried bacon pieces, red wine vinegar, and brown sugar into a pot on the stove. She’d done everything at home and then brought it to be heated. “That looks bizarre,” he said frankly. “But it smells amazing. What is it again?”

Misty grinned at him. “German cabbage,” she said happily. “Wait until you taste my dressing—it’s a mess, but Michael and I worked on it for years, and now it’s perfection.”

“So you and Michael are like me and Mari,” Milo said. “That’s awesome.”

Misty gave him a gentle smile. “I never thought about it that way, but yes. Michael was an employee at Jonathan’s company when we married. Jon sort of ripped him out of the boardroom and threw him at me—‘Here, help my wife learn how to have a big house.’ He was so resentful at first, and I couldn’t blame him. I kept leaving him alone to try to find another job, and in the meantime I was making a mess of the house. He found me sobbing over a half-cooked roast one day, right before a dinner party. I remember him throwing the roast away while I looked up emergency recipes—this was before the internet, mind you, so I was looking them up in Jonathan’s mother’s cookbook while she rang this tiny bell from upstairs, letting me know it was time for lunch. Michael stomped upstairs with a peanut butter sandwich and a glass of milk and told the old cow to be happy and give me a break, and then he came back down and researched housekeepers in the yellow pages while I tried to rescue dinner. I was so grateful. So grateful. I went to Jonathan and asked him to give Mike his regular job back.”

Her face fell, and she stepped back from the pot and dried her hands on an apron she’d brought from home.

“What’d he say?” Milo asked gently, exchanging glances with Mariana because this made Misty sad.

“He said that he didn’t know what to do. His board of directors had been trying to fire Michael for, you know, being gay, and Jonathan had just been made VP. He had no power yet, and his father was awful , and Jon had been trying to give Michael a chance to get another position. I-I told Michael that and, well, broke his heart, which was awful. But Michael? He stayed on. Helped me. Has been my friend. And I asked, and Jonathan’s been paying him like an executive, with benefits. I spent our first three years together trying to find him another position. Michael’s so smart. He’s invested his and his husband’s money—hell, he could retire. He just… he likes staying at the house and being my friend, and I love him like my brother, except my brother grew into a homophobic little shit, so I love him more.”

“Why’d that make you sad?” Milo asked, ignoring the elbow in the ribs from Mari.

“I remembered, you know. That I’m mad at my husband for assuming and ignoring and neglecting, but he’s not all bad. He risked a lot to give Michael a way to find another job, even if he couldn’t change the rules back then. He has since. Once he had enough power, a big enough voice, he spoke up for women’s rights, for Michael’s community. He found ways for his company to give back, to give their employees credit for volunteer work—all the things he and I were passionate about when we were young and in love, he’s stayed true to.”

She sniffled, and Milo put an arm around her shoulder. He tried to think of anything about Stuart that he had admired or thought was awesome, and the only thing he could conjure up was “But he wanted me.”

It occurred to Milo that he should have had better standards than that. Misty had. Her relationship with her husband had resulted in other relationships: Michael, a lifelong friend, her children, Garth.

Milo’s relationship with Garth had resulted in, well, a house full of people happy to be here and this lovely woman, who had spent only a few hours in Milo’s company but who had shed mom cells all over him and Mari and made them feel better about everything.

Bright as gold, pretty as a shiny penny or a rainbow, Milo had a standard for what his ties to the human world should give him. Garth had been right. Stuart who?

Within an hour he was outside, telling the “guys”—Georgie included—to come inside and eat. The dogs were all panting by this time, slow off the mark to chase the ball, obviously exhausted from play.

Julia gave Milo a perfunctory nuzzle, and he scratched her rump for a moment. When he stood, everybody else had gone inside, but Garth was right there, wrapping his arm around Milo’s waist and kissing his temple.

“You smell like dinner,” he said, smiling wolfishly.

Milo giggled, not self-conscious at all that it was a giggle. “You can eat me later,” he said, warmed by Garth’s happy guffaw. Garth had been right. Happy sex did wake up the naughty adolescent in everybody, didn’t it!

“Seriously,” Garth said, squeezing him tight. “How’s it going in there?”

“So good!” Milo said, biting his lip. “Rick is being charming to Misty, Misty is trying to adopt Mari and hire Michelle, who apparently is an interior decorator, and Angela and Michael keep talking business strategies whenever he comes inside. The house smells amazing , and….” He tilted his head to rest it against Garth’s shoulder. “And I’m super thankful for everybody in my life. How’s that? I finally get why they call it Thanksgiving.”

Garth turned so they were embracing fully. “I’m thankful for you too,” he said in Milo’s ear, and Milo’s eyes burned because apparently happy tears were also a thing.

Together they walked into the kitchen and washed their hands before getting in the buffet line.

Milo was enjoying sitting in the living room and listening to all the people around him talking—and finishing off a second helping of those sweet potatoes that Mari had made because you couldn’t have too much of those in your life—when the doorbell rang.

Garth tapped his shoulder as he stood up. “I’ll get it, Milo. I’m ready for, uhm, thirds, anyway.”

Milo smiled at him gratefully, and had just stood up himself—it was his duty, after all—when he heard an unfamiliar voice in the foyer.

“Misty!” called the man. “Misty, I tracked the car here. Are you inside?”

Misty rolled her eyes at Michael, who stood up with her. “Stay,” she said softly. “This is him and me, and it’s your day off.”

Michael rolled his eyes and stood anyway.

“Jonathan?” she said, approaching the doorway, where a midsized, middle-aged man in Dockers and a button-down stood, a slightly askew trench coat over his shoulders and a scarf hanging on around his neck by a few inches. At Misty’s voice, there was a rumble at the sliding-glass kitchen door, and Brutus and Daisy both started to howl. Michael hustled back to calm them down while Misty greeted her husband in the doorway. “What are you doing here? You said you were having dinner with your VP’s.”

“At our house!” Jonathan burst out. “And you’re not there!”

Misty shook her head. “I left you with a housekeeper and a catering service. I had already made other plans, and I told you that. You’re the one who assumed. You can’t give me three days’ notice, Jonathan. Not when I’ve been asking you for a month about our plans.”

“But….” And Milo could read the hurt on the man’s face. “But don’t you want to have the holiday with me ?”

Misty, in slacks and twinset, regarded him with composure, although her eyes grew shiny. “Of course, my darling,” she said softly. “But I wasn’t invited into your life until the last moment this year. The house is already your mother’s, Jonathan. I refuse to be your last-minute nook-and-cranny girl.”

Jonathan’s mouth dropped in surprise, and now he was tearing up. “But you’re my wife,” he said, not mindful of the crowd gathering at the doorway to protect Misty. “You’re… you’re my girl.”

She swallowed. “I defy you to think of a single moment in the last year when I was your girl.”

He sucked in a deep, fractured breath. “I’ve been getting ready for retirement,” he said. “We talked about that—”

“You talked about it,” she said. “Have you heard what I’ve talked about in the last year?”

“You got dogs,” he said and then frowned. “Are they here ?”

Misty sighed, and for a moment she appeared helpless.

Garth stepped in to save her. “Mr. Parcival?” he said. “Would you like to come in and have some food? Nobody’s sitting at the table—maybe you two could have a conversation there.”

“We can go outside, Garth,” Misty said gratefully. “I’ve got some cooked giblets for the dogs. I can mix them up with some kibble.”

The crowd jammed into Milo’s hallway parted to let them through, and Jonathan gave them all pathetically lost looks. Milo felt some hope for him then, since Misty seemed to feel he was redeemable, and figured the least they could all do was give the couple some privacy.

He was about to close the front door when he heard Misty exclaim, “Oh, Julia, no !” and then the scrabble of dog toenails belonging to an entire flock of dogs on his kitchen floor. He turned, door rebounding behind him, surprised when a man’s voice said, “Ouch, Milo, you asshole, that hurt!”

Milo whipped around again, almost dizzy, and said, “Stuart? What are you doing here?”

Stuart stood in his doorway, holding a bedraggled, thin, pathetic Chrysanthemum in one hand and a grocery bag of cheap kibble in the other. Milo’s first thought was that he had… faded, somehow. Stuart had always seemed to be made of bold lines and overbright colors. Milo would hide in his room to get away from all that brightness. But looking at him now, he seemed… ordinary. Small. An average guy in a wrinkled suit with thinning blond hair and a sour bracket in the corners of his mouth in lieu of laugh lines. How sad.

“Milo, I want you back. Here’s the cat. Let me in.” And with that, he shouldered his way into Milo’s house full of people.

“No!” Milo cried, backing up anyway because… oh my God, his precious Chrysanthemum. “I mean, yes, I want the cat, but no— Stuart . I’ve got a restraining order against you. Get the fuck out of my house !”

“Aw, Milo,” Stuart said, and at that moment, several things happened. Garth strode into the foyer, taking up the breadth of it with his shoulders, the four dogs following him, including Julia, who had no manners and was growling at the cat like Chrysanthemum was a new flavor of squeaky.

Chrysanthemum let out a frightened yowl, still carried by the nape in Stuart’s scratched hand, and Milo had a terrified glimpse of the chaos four dogs and his poor abused baby could perpetrate on his house. Then Stuart shook the cat again, and Milo whimpered, unable to yell at the fucker when he was holding the cat hostage. Milo was losing all his power, all his resolve, when Garth proved he had the stuff of heroes.

“Milo, get rid of all these people and you and I can talk and—hey!”

Garth reached into Stuart’s space, grabbed the cat by the nape of the neck, and drew him to his body, against his chest, wrapping his arms around the poor thing and sheltering him from the chaos. With one loud bark of, “Julia, Chad, stay !” he whirled out of the room and disappeared down the hallway, leaving Milo to face his ex without the hostage.

And suddenly Milo was furious enough to do that.

“Stuart, get out of my house,” he said, his voice low and menacing. Julia and Chad picked up on the tone and started a toe-level grumble that told Milo they meant business and saw Stuart as a threat too.

“Milo,” Stuart said, and he lowered his head and gave that sort of dimply smile that he used to get his way. “Look, baby, I forgive you for the restraining order—”

“ You bugged my house, you fucknugget! ” The scream came from Milo’s stomach, and the grumble from the dogs turned into an Evenrude motorboat rattle.

Stuart paused and swallowed but did not step back. “Milo, I just wanted to make sure you were okay. If those guys hadn’t found the system and—”

“And given my privacy back,” Milo snapped.

“Well, you have to admit, you didn’t do much for a month. I got worried. God knows what your little friend was going to do to cheer you up—”

Milo slapped him, and Stuart gaped. “Don’t talk about her.” His palm stung and his wrist ached, and that was the only reason he didn’t do it again. “Don’t talk about her or Garth. You keep their names out of your shitty, controlling, nasty mouth, Stuart. I’m done with you.”

“But….” And Milo could see it. The moment it computed in Stuart’s tiny brain that Milo meant it. “But Milo,” he said with a condescending smile, “I’m all you’ve got.”

That broke something in Milo’s brain, and he wasn’t sure what he was screaming in Stuart’s face, spittle flicking from his lips with impunity, but whatever it was, Stuart turned red, then white with fury. In a moment, he was advancing on Milo, arm raised in retribution. He was bigger than Milo—smaller than Garth but still bigger than Milo—with wider shoulders and muscle mass from working out, and Milo suddenly knew he should be afraid, but he didn’t care. Milo had so much more than this sad, slimy, pathetic excuse for a man, for a friend, for a lover.

And Milo hoped he said all that when Mari and Garth stepped smoothly between him and Stuart, Garth taking the arm readying to swing, Mari taking the other side. Together, they dragged him out the still open door, and Georgie, bless his quiet, helpful heart, was the one who slammed it shut behind them.

“SHUT UP, asshole, or we’re going straight to the cops,” Garth said smoothly. “We’ll take you to the police station and dump your sorry ass in jail. Mari, where’d he get this janky polyester suit, anyway?”

“Scumbags ’R Us,” she replied promptly. “Extraweenie size.”

Garth chuckled, because she was referring to Milo’s last screeching tirade delineating Stuart’s inability to make love with an “amazingly tiny weenie” when Milo now knew it didn’t have to hurt even with a “double-extra-large!” Ordinarily, Garth might have found comments on his erection size embarrassing, but seeing that it came with Milo’s self-empowerment, he figured he could sacrifice a little dignity.

“I understand that’ll fit him just fine,” Garth said.

“I’ll fuck you up,” Stuart sputtered, struggling in their grip, but Garth tightened his hands, hardened from manual labor, and Mari executed a self-defense move, her comfy Doc Marten boot scraping right down the inside of his shin.

Stuart crumpled like toilet paper and whined as they dragged him to his truck. Mari searched his pocket and came up with his keys.

“The truck,” she said in disgust, “with all the banners?”

Garth gave Stuart a pitying look. “We’re gay, moron. Driving that thing is like saying ‘Roaches for Raid.’ I thought people like you were a myth.”

“It’s new,” Mari said decisively. “Milo wouldn’t have dated him if he’d seen that thing.”

“Well, get it away from Milo’s yard.” Garth glared at the truck again and then glanced at Mari. “And search it for weapons.”

Mari’s eyes flew open. “Oh shit! Are we taking it to the police station?”

Garth grunted. “No, I got a better plan. Down Sunrise, right on Kiefer.”

Mari chuckled. “Find the biggest field I can,” she said. At that moment the chilly encroaching evening grew heavy with rain, and she smiled. “You throw that ball for Chad every day, don’t you?”

“Every goddamned day,” Garth agreed.

Nobody was out. Twenty minutes later Garth followed Mari into a turnout, a fuming Stuart at his side. The man had said nothing as Garth’s workingman’s truck, complete with scratches, divots, and chips in the paint, followed his pristine red Silverado into the boondocks and then jounced over an open field.

“Give me your phone,” Garth said when they stopped.

“I’m not giving you shit,” Stuart sneered, crossing his arms like a child.

“Give me your phone, or I’m dragging you out of this vehicle by your hair . And when I’ve ripped it off, I’ll search your pockets and take your goddamned phone,” Garth said, his fury boiling in his balls.

Stuart threw it at his head, but since he wasn’t that strong, Garth figured the bruise would heal.

When Mari stopped, he asked her if she’d found weapons.

“Two of them,” she said sourly. “One of them illegal in California.”

“Great,” Garth said cheerfully. “Now, keep the keys and lock the doors. Leave the vehicle on and shut them.”

Mari chuckled and did that as Stuart gasped. “What in the hell? Give me back my keys—”

“9-1-1, what’s your emergency?”

“Yes,” Garth said pleasantly into the phone. “I’m calling on behalf of Stuart Jameson, from his phone?”

“Yessir, what seems to be the problem?”

“Stuart has been acting crazy, spouting off at the mouth about his ex-boyfriend, screaming about revenge because the guy left him. Anyway, I know he has weapons in his truck, and he went running out into the void screaming. I can’t see him from the side of the road, so I have no idea where he is.”

“And what’s your name?”

“Byron!” Mari mouthed. “Byron Kilpatrick.”

“Byron Kilpatrick,” Garth said dutifully, knowing this was probably Milo’s ex-douchebag from college.

“You stay where you are, Mr. Kilpatrick. There will be a police presence out there in a few minutes.”

“That’s a load off my mind, ma’am. I understand Stuart has a restraining order out on him, and I would hate to see him in jail because he violated it.”

“Do you think he’s violent, Mr. Kilpatrick?”

“I think he’s a small-dicked sociopath, but I do hope he doesn’t harm anybody in his way.”

And with that, Garth turned and, without hitting End Call, pitched the phone as far as he possibly could into the empty field. Before Stuart could protest, Garth turned again and pitched his keys in the opposite direction. The ground around them was soft and powdery, the grasses growing in it straggly and brown. Good luck finding those objects, Garth thought grimly, particularly before the cops arrived.

“Shall we go?” he said to Mari.

“We shall,” she replied. Then she glared at Stuart and said, “If you mention Milo tonight, we will put you in prison. Good luck evading the gun rap, asshole. By the way?” She held out her purse. “All your ammo will be in a dumpster somewhere in Sacramento. Enjoy.”

And with that, they both hopped into Garth’s truck. Garth ripped out backward, spinning a donut to get to the road and going back the way they had come. They passed five police cars, lights on, sirens screaming, on their way back down Kiefer to Sunrise, and Mari gave an evil chuckle while holding her chilled hands out to the heater.

“Think he’ll rat us out?”

“Rat who out?” Garth asked. “Does he even know my fuckin’ name?”

She laughed. “Nope. Do you think he’s smart enough to get the license plate number?”

Garth shook his head. “He just sat there, arms folded, sniffling like we’d hurt him. Didn’t even reach for his phone. I mean, think about it—he was all but abducted, and he didn’t have anybody to call. God, what a fucking void .”

“Milo’s taste in men has improved so much,” Mari said, patting his arm.

“We need to make sure Stuart gets arrested,” Garth said soberly. “I mean, he seems pretty vacant, but some guys….”

“Yeah.” She sighed. “It’s never easy, is it.”

“Not if it’s worth it.”

She leaned her head against his arm. “You and me, we make a good team.”

Garth nodded. “If I ever have to make him a hood ornament, I’ll call you for a tarp and a shovel. Doug will come with the cement truck. We can bury him under Misty’s pond. It’ll be fine.”

“That’s what I like to hear,” she said. “A plan.”

MARI TEXTED Milo on the way back, and they walked in, still shivering from the chilly rain, and discovered pie had been served, with hero’s portions saved for the two of them. They ate standing in the kitchen while everybody gathered around to hear the story, which Mari told truthfully, because, as she said, they might need alibis.

Milo had cemented himself to Garth’s side from the moment he walked in.

“I’m sorry,” Garth murmured, wrapping his arm around Milo’s shoulders, loving the rightness of him tucked in there. “I’m so sorry. I should have protected you sooner—”

“What are you talking about?” Milo asked, legitimately puzzled. “You took care of Chrysanthemum . Oh Garth, my poor kitty was in terrible shape. His fur was all bedraggled—Stuart had been feeding him commercial food, which gives him the runs. He smelled, and he was skinny.” He gave a little smile and added, “Georgie made a run to his place for the appropriate food, and we bathed my kitty and wiped him down and put him back in the crate so he could sleep. You were so smart to put him there. The dogs can’t bother him, and he’s in the quiet and the dark. Julia’s got a zillion places to sleep. She’ll learn to share. But thank you. You… you trusted me to deal with Stuart, and you took care of my baby. It was wonderful.”

Garth smiled into Milo’s eyes, dazed and happy. They had work to do. So much work. Milo still needed time, time to trust in himself more and more, time to make his own decisions, time to adjust to the changes in his life and in himself. But for right now, it was Thanksgiving, and while Garth missed his parents, he had faith that this family here, these people with Milo, and Milo himself, would only enrich his life further.

There would always be loose ends—but that was what life was about. If fixing a backyard once was the end-all and be-all of growth and change, he would be out of a job.