He'd turned to face me. He was leaning against the railing of the deck he'd added to the house my mom and dad had built when they were expecting Jason. Mom and Dad hadn't gotten to enjoy it for much more than a decade. They'd died when I was seven, and when Jason had gotten old enough to live on his own (in his estimation), he'd moved out of Gran's and into this house. It had seen many a wild party for two or three years, but he'd become steadier. Tonight it was very clear to me that his recent losses had sobered him further.
I took a swallow from my bottle. I wasn't much of a drinker - I saw too much overindulgence at work - but it had been impossible to turn down a cold beer on this bright evening. "I wish I knew where Dermot was, too," I said. Dermot was the fraternal twin of our half-fairy grandfather Fintan. "Niall sealed himself into Faery with all the other fairies who wanted to join him, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed that Dermot's in Faery with him. Claude stayed here. I saw him a couple of weeks ago." Niall was our great-grandfather. Claude was his grandson from Niall's marriage to another full fae.
"Claude, the male stripper."
"The owner of a strip club, who strips himself on ladies' night," I corrected. "Our cousin models for romance covers, too."
"Yeah, I bet the girls faint when he walks by. Michele's got a book with him on the cover in some genie costume. He must love every minute of it." Jason definitely sounded envious.
"I bet he does. You know, he's a pain in the butt," I said, and laughed, surprising myself.
"You see him much?"
"Just the once, since I got hurt. But when I picked up the mail yesterday, he'd sent me some free coupons for ladies' night at Hooligans."
"You think you'll ever take him up on it?"
"Not yet. Maybe when I'm ... in a better mood."
"You think Eric would mind you seeing another guy naked?" Jason was trying to show me how much he'd changed by his casual reference to my relationship with a vampire. Well, give my brother points for "willing."
"I'm not sure," I said. "But I wouldn't watch other guys take off their clothes without letting Eric know about it ahead of time. Give him a chance to put in his two cents. Would you tell Michele you were going to a club to watch women strip?"
Jason laughed. "I'd at least mention it, just to hear what she'd say." He put the steaks on a platter and gestured to the sliding glass doors. "We're ready," he said, and I pulled the door open for him. I'd set the table earlier, and now I poured the tea. Michele had put the salad and the hot potato casserole on the table, and she got some A-1 steak sauce from the pantry. Jason loved his A-1. With the big barbecuing fork, Jason put one steak on each plate. In a couple of minutes, we were all eating. It was kind of homey, the three of us.
"Calvin came into the dealership today," Michele said. "He's thinking of trading in his old pickup." Calvin Norris was a good man with a good job. He was in his forties, and he carried a lot of responsibility on his shoulders. He was my brother's leader, the dominant male in the werepanther community centered in the little settlement of Hotshot.
"He still dating Tanya?" I asked. Tanya Grissom worked at Norcross, same as Calvin, but she sometimes filled in at Merlotte's when one of the other waitresses couldn't work.
"Yeah, she's living with him," Jason said. "They fight pretty often, but I think she's staying."
Calvin Norris, leader of the werepanthers, did his best not to get involved in vampire affairs. He'd had a lot on his plate since the Weres had come out. He'd declared that he was two-natured the next day in the break room at work. Now that the word had gotten around, it had only earned Calvin more respect. He had a good reputation in the Bon Temps area, even if most of the people who lived out in Hotshot were regarded with some suspicion since the community was so isolated and peculiar.
"How come you didn't come out when Calvin did?" I asked. That was a thought I'd never heard in Jason's head.
My brother looked thoughtful, an expression that sat a little oddly on him. "I guess I just ain't ready to answer a lot of questions," he said. "It's a personal thing, the change. Michele knows, and that's all that's important."
Michele smiled at him. "I'm real proud of Jason," she said, and that was enough. "He manned up when he turned panther. Wasn't like he could help it. He's making the best of it. No whining. He'll tell people about it when he's ready."
Jason and Michele were just startling me all over the place. "I haven't ever said anything to anyone," I assured him.
"I never thought you would. Calvin says Eric is like a chief vampire," Jason said, hopping into a different topic.
I don't talk about vampire politics at any length with nonvamps. Just not a good idea. But Jason and Michele had shared with me, and I wanted to share a little back. "Eric's got some power. But he's got a new boss, and things are touchy."
"You want to talk about that?" I could tell Jason was uncertain about hearing whatever I chose to tell them, but he was trying hard to be a good brother.
"I better not," I said, and saw his relief. Even Michele was glad to turn back to her steak. "But apart from dealing with other vampires, Eric and I are doing okay. There's always some give and take in relationships, right?" Though Jason had had scores of relationships over the years, he'd learned about give and take only recently.
"I been talking to Hoyt again," Jason said, and I understood the pertinence. Hoyt, Jason's shadow for years, had dropped off my brother's radar for a while. Hoyt's fiancée, Holly, who worked at Merlotte's with me, wasn't a big Jason fan. I was surprised Jason had his best buddy back, and I was even more surprised Holly had consented to this renewal.
"I've changed a lot, Sookie," my brother said, as if (for once) he'd been reading my mind. "I want to be a good friend to Hoyt. I want to be a good boyfriend to Michele." He looked at Michele seriously, putting his hand over hers. "And I want to be a better brother. We're all we got left. Except for the fairy relations, and I'd just as soon forget about them." He looked down at his plate, embarrassed. "I can't hardly believe that Gran cheated on Grandpa."
"I had an idea about that," I said. I'd been struggling with the same disbelief. "Gran really wanted children, and that wasn't going to happen for her and Grandpa. I was thinking maybe she was enchanted by Fintan. Fairies can mess with your mind, like the vamps can. And you know how beautiful they are."