Reuniting Dysfunctional Families

Brad Schuyler was happy to be back home. After taking off a year earlier, he’d expected to go out into the world and meet people who were different—and more pleasant—than his own family. And while he had met a lot of interesting people, he’d also been surprised at how much he missed his own dysfunctional clan.

Of course, there was more to his return than mere homesickness but Brad didn’t want to think about that at the moment. What he wanted to think about was mending fences and try to make his mother and his brother into the family that he wanted.

With that thought in mind, Brad drove to the Schuyler Square Country Club to find his mother. He really had been an absentee son for most of the past year with only a rare text serving as communication between the two of them. Brad had issues with his mother. He had issues with his brother and his late father too. But life was way too short to be cluttered up with a lot of old childhood injustices. At least, that’s what Brad told himself.

The club was crowded that night. Walking through the lobby, Brad spotted several familiar faces—professors he had known while attending Schuyler Square College, old girlfriends, some acquaintances from high school. It was odd; like walking through a yearbook. Most of the people who spotted him smiled in recognition but a few looked the other way. Well, that wasn’t too big of a surprise. The old Brad hadn’t been the nicest guy in the world. As his father had always said, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree.

In the dining room Brad spotted his mother immediately. She was sitting at a corner table and for a moment he didn’t recognize her companions. Brad squinted. Good heavens, was that Rosanne his mother was having dinner with? Their cleaning lady? Maybe he wasn’t the only one who had had an epiphany or two over the past year. Stepping behind a large potted palm, Brad watched. Rosanne looked great. Her hair was a new shade of blonde and she looked like she’d lost weight. He recognized the man sitting with them as Rosanne’s husband, Mike. Things had seriously changed if his  mother would be seen in public with the help.

“Brad? Is that really you?”

Turning, he saw an attractive woman standing next to him. Mindy Something. She worked for the paper and they’d gone to high school together. “Hi, Mindy,” Brad replied.

“What are you doing here? Does Tyler know you’re back?”

“Tyler?”

“Your brother,” Mindy prompted. “He does know you’re back in town, doesn’t he?”

“Ahhh, not yet,” Brad replied. “I’m surprising him. I’m surprising everyone in my family.” He gestured across the room. “Starting with my mother.”

Mindy raised her eyebrows. “This should be fun.”

A shriek interrupted them. “Brad? Is that my baby?” A flurry of beige linen flew across the room and landed in Brad’s arms.

“Hello, Mother,” he said.