Tourists in loud Hawwian shirts and breezy dresses crowded the uppermost deck of the Carnival Horizon as it passed off the coast of Bermuda on the afternoon of July 15. Bright tropical sunshine dappled the surface of the crystalline sea and a warm, salty breeze washed over the prominnode, bringing with it the exotic smells from the bars and restaurants lining the waterfront. Locals, sunbathers, and vacationers from a dozen different countries packed the white, sandy beach, and as the gigantic liner drifted silently by, so big that its shadow reached almost to the shore, they all stopped to watch.

Laid down in 2016 and launched on March 10, 2017 (as the information pamphlet native to every stateroom so proudly proclaimed), the Carnival Horizon was one of the newest and most luxurious members of the Carnival family. Towering fifteen stories above the ocean and complete with a theater, a showroom, and darn near everything else you could put on a ship, it was the single biggest moving object Didi Pickles had ever seen in her life. Save for her aunt Barbara who died at four-hundred-and-sixty-nine pounds. She, Stu, Charlotte, and Drew had been onboard for nearly a week and Didi still had trouble finding her way around. Why, just getting from hers and Stu's stateroom on D-Deck was a challenge: Three times they were late to a meal or theater performance because they got lost on the way.

When they boarded the previous Saturday in New York City, Didi was paralized by the sheer amount of things to do. There was a movie theater, a theater theater, an arcade, a lounge, two bars, four restaurants, a game room, a sauna, a gym, an entire deck of retail stores that resembled a shopping mall, a spa, a yoga studio, two swimming pools, and a roller coaster on the top deck, and those was only the amenities she had actually visited for herself. Back home, there wasn't much of anything to do, even when she didn't have Tommy. Here, there was too much, and no matter how many activities she crammed into a single day, there was still so much left undone.

So much that would remain undone, for tomorrow, they were disembarking at New York City and catching the first flight home. Six days ago, as she watched the storied Manhattan skyline drift away, she regretted her decision to come and wished only to be home with her baby. She called Lou and Lulu every hour to check on him and constantly worried that he wasn't adjusting well to her absence no matter how strenuously Lou assured her he was: She had never been away from Tommy for so long, and Dr. Lipschitz does say that you shouldn't be apart from your baby for an extended period during its first two years of life. She wouldn't have come if Stu didn't pester her for nearly a month. "We both need a vacation," he said, and it was true, they did. She agreed to come, but only reluctantly. Now, as the ship sailed north at eighteen knots, she found herself desperately wishing they could have just one more day.

Standing on the railing and gazing out at the southwestern tip of Bermuda, Didi let out a deep, disappointed sigh. When she was a girl, there was no sadder day than the first one back at school after summer vacation. She hadn't felt that bitter sting in so many years that she'd come to think she was too old for it, too grown-up.

She wasn't.

After nearly a week in the tropics, with nothing to do but lie poolside, go out to eat, adn make your own itinerary - if you wanted to make one at all - going back to her mundane suburban routine was going to be really, really hard.

That wasn't to say she wasn't somewhat looking forward to it, she was. Sitting around the house all day, leaving only to grocery shop, go to the bank, and run errands didn't exactly inspire her, but seeing her little boy after so long did, and turning away from the ocean with a sigh, a sharp edge of long cut through her middle. Later on, she would call Lou and see about video-chatting again so she could see Tommy before bed. They'd done it twice but Lou, so old he sat beside Jesus in third grade, didn't know how to operate the computer properly and there was no sound the first time, and the second time, he somehow enabled a filter that gave him and Tommy both puppy dog ears. They planned to do it again, but something happened on Lou's end and he couldn't "figure the damn thing out."

There is nothing harder than trying to explain new technology to someone who wasn't born into it, and Didi dreaded trying to walk her aged father-in-law through the steps. She really wanted to see Tommy, however, so she'd just suck it up and do it.

"You should invent something to make technology easier for your father," she told Stu the other day. They were in their cabin after dinner, Stu sitting on the edge of the bed and pulling his shoes off and Didi undoing her earrings. They were big and shaped like teardrops, and brushed against the side of her neck the entire time she wore them, annoying her to no end.

"I'm an inventor," Stu said, "not a miracle worker."

They both laughed because it was true. Lou Pickles was as far behind the modern age as a man can be and still be alive. The most advanced piece of technology he owned was a Jitterbug cell phone with extra large keys and no extras (save for a simple-to-use camera). He thought computers were a passing fad "Like that God awful disco stuff" and couldn't operate anything more complicated than a TV remote. Even then he had trouble. In his day (he so helpfully reminded Didi every time he sat down to watch television), there were five buttons on a remote. Now, there were fifty. When Stu and Didi first switched from cable to DirecTV, Lou sat in his chair and stared down at the remote with a perturbed expression on his face. "What does this one do?" he asked.

"That raises the volume, pop."

"Oh. What about this one?"

"Imput, pop, it says so right there."

The old man bristled. "How the hell am I supposed to know what that is? Why do they make these blasted things so hard? I wanna watch my show, not run the goddamn space station."

In bed that night, she lay awake and stared up at the ceiling. For some reason, that brief exchange about Stu inventing something for his father bubbled up from the depths of her mind and set off a chain-reaction that kept her from sleeping. Invent something.

Sigh.

For as long as Didi had known him, Stu was fascinated by the mechanical inner workings of every machine he came across. Sometimes, he would take the coffee pot or a radio apart just to learn how it worked. He was very good at that, but when it came to putting it all back together, he was...lacking. Half the time, whatever he took apart worked just fine afterward. And the other half, it didn't. One time, he disassembled the TV and then cobbled it back together again. An hour later, as Didi was making dinner, Lou cried out from the living.

"OW, GODDAMN!"

She rushed in to find him on his knees and cradling his right hand. The flesh was red, raw, and blistered. He told her that when he pointed the remote at the TV and clicked the ON button, "A lightning bolt shot out of the set and blew the damn remote up."

One trip to the emergency room and one 1.600 dollar bill they couldn't afford later, Stu rubbed the back of his neck like a shamefaced little boy. "Jeez, pop, I'm sorry, I dunno what could have happened."

"You nearly blew my hand off, that's what happened," Lou grumbled. "Congratulations, bucko, you're out of my will. Enjoy watching Drew get everything."

"Aw, man, you mean he's gonna get your collection of Space Vixen movies? I dunno how I'll manage."

Lou's eyes flashed icily. "Shut your damn smart mouth."

Two hours later, Lou called Stu into the living room. "Go down to the drugstore and get me some of that penny candy, and I'll let you back in."

That was the...tenth time Lou had cut Stu from his will and then cut him back in? It was an empty threat that intimidated no one but he played it whenever he could.

The point was: Stu was nowhere near as good with mechanics as he thought he was. Most of his inventions - mainly toys - malfunctioned, and the ones that didn't weren't very inspired. He held out hope that he would one day land a contract with a big manufacturer but Didi didn't think it was going to happen. Once upon a time she did, but not anymore...not after years of failures and pyrrhic victories that moved their family back instead of forward. Making toys and gadgets was his passion, though, and she did her best to support him.

Even though his not working hurt them financially.

Most of Stu's income was commission based. Someone would email him - usually a private collector or mom and pop toy store in Somewhere, USA - and pay him to create a toy from scratch. One man in Rhode Island wanted an anatomically correct Barbie doll and a woman in Fresno asked for a working replica of a Boeing 747. His prices varied, but he rarely brought home steady money. The only stable source of money they had were Didi's paltry teacher's salary and Lou's pension check. Some months they barely scraped by. Other months, they didn't, and one-by-one, the utilities went out. Didi had approached Stu about getting a "second job" (because saying real job would be cruel), and he always promised to talk to her about it "just as soon as I'm done with this project."

Only he never was done. One project bled into another and into another, and eventually, he forgot all about it. She tried her hardest not to nag him, but she didn't know how much longer she and Lou could keep things afloat. She considered asking Lou to talk to him because he'd get results, but she already knew he'd handle the matter with all the grace of an ax murder. "You know who plays with toys in their basement?" she could hear him ask. "Pedophiles. Get a job and stop diddling yourself."

Or...he'd go right for the jugular…

"You know whose power doesn't get cut off once a month? Drew and Charlotte's."

Stu hated being compared to his more successful brother. It cut him deeper than anything else and every time Lou did it (which wasn't very often, for even he knew how much it bothered Stu), his eyes welled with hurt that lingered for days. "I know I'm not as good as Drew," he told Didi once in somber tones. "He's the better Pickles."

She consoled him but he had a point. Drew was the better "man" but he was better off financially. And the saddest part of all was that it wasn't because Drew possessed something Stu did not. They were both very stubborn and determined men who saw things through once they set their minds to it. They just happened to put their energies toward vastly different ends, and Drew's was the more lucrative of the two. That wasn't entirely Stu's fault. Even if he was better at inventing, he had little chance of ever making the kind of money one would expect a famous inventor to make. Inventing was, Didi imagined, like writing. Unless you are in the top one percent of all living writers, you're unlikely to make a living from your work, much less a comfortable one.

Had Stu put his passion into something more productive, he would rival if not surpass Drew. Didi could vividly picture them as CEOs of warring companies, constantly battling back and forth and trying to put the other out of business.

Only things didn't pan out that way. Stu chose the road less travelled and here they were, with mounting debt, unpaid loans, and a mortgage that seemed to get bigger and bigger every year. Didi did not resent him for his choices in life. She just wished he would be open to change.

She suspected that deep down, Stu realized he was never to make it big. Years ago, when he was younger, his eyes burned with exuberance. He was clearly a man who loved what he did and was certain he was good enough at it to make one day reach the stratosphere. Lately, however, he plodded through his projects like a lapsed Catholic going through the motions of worship. She glimpsed that same fire every once in a while, but those instances became fewer and farther between as the years piled up. More often than not, when she went into the basement to do laundry or to ask him to help her with something, she found him sitting at his workbench and doing something other than working, as if he were delaying the inevitable sense of failure that his current project was sure to bring.

While Didi hated seeing him like that, she had to admit, she hoped it continued until he snapped out of it and got a job.

And maybe that was what he needed to rekindle his love of inventing. As it stood now, he was always home, always in his workshop, day after day, week after week. Getting out and clearing his head would probably work wonders for him. As they say, absence makes the heart grow fonder. If he was away from the workshop and the pressure it put on him, he would surely rediscover his love and dedication. It was the same for her. All through the year, her love of teaching slowly leaked out until she was so sick of school, kids, and grading papers she could scream. Then, by the end of summer, she was ready to get back to work like a champion pugilist who prematurely retired and wanted one last run.

She was planning to bring that up to Stu, but Drew brought up the idea of her and Stu going on vacation with him and Charlotte, and she decided to hold off. "We figured you guys could use a little R and R," Drew said one day. They were sitting at the kitchen table over coffee.. The kids were in the playpen in the living room, and Lou was in the armchair watching television. Isn't it funny how most small gatherings wind up in the kitchen of all places? Every time Drew, Betty, or Chaz was over, everyone always gravitated to the kitchen. Didi didn't know why, but she was firmly convinced that it was a lost law of physics.

"We can't," Didi said, "we don't have the money."

Drew waved her off. "Don't worry about it."

That meant he and Charlotte were going to pay for everything.

"We couldn't," Didi said.

"We don't want to impose or anything," Stu added.

"Nonsense," Drew said, "really, we want you guys to come. If Charlotte and I are alone for too long, we get bored and she winds up jumping my bones every hour on the hour. I can't take that kind of abuse."

His eyes twinkled with a mischievous light.

"And there's an image I didn't need," Stu said.

"What about Tommy?" Didi worried.

Drew glanced over his shoulder. Beyond the archway into the living room, Lou stared at the TV screen with his arms crossed and a sour expression on his face. He'd been constipated lately and he got cranky when he couldn't poop. "Just leave him with pop."

Lou's head creaked around and his eyes narrowed. "What about pop?"

Drew told him, and Lou glowered. "You gonna take me on a cruise?"

"I asked you to go to Vegas with me last year. You said you didn't wanna leave the house."

"I don't but you can at least offer."

Drew rolled his eyes. "Hey, pop, wanna go on a cruise with me and Charlotte?"

"No. Now shut up, my show's on."

It was settled. Stu and Didi would accept Drew's offer and they would like it. "He's probably just doing it to show off," Stu grumbled that night in bed. "Look at me, I can afford a cruise for everyone. Eat your heart out, Stewie."

"Oh, I'm sure he's not doing that," Didi said. Stu always ascribed the worst intentions to his brother. Every time Drew treated them to dinner or bought a car, lawnmower, chainsaw, or TV set, Stu believed whole-heartedly that he was only doing it so that he could rub his success in their faces. Drew was certainly competitive enough to do something like that, but Didi knew him well enough that she was certain he wouldn't intentionally flaunt his good fortune under Stu's nose..at least to hurt him. He was something of a show off, but his goal in boasting, when he did it, wasn't to taunt his brother, it was to show the world how well he was doing. If he swaggered around Stu and Didi's kitchen, it was only because he swaggered everywhere. If he put the top down and sped off down the street, it wasn't to get Stu's attention, it was to get everyone's attention.

That's just how Drew and Charlotte were. They meant well, they just liked to brag a little. Of course Stu would take personal offense to it; he felt inferior next to Drew. Drew was able to take two or three vacations a year, afford jet skis and the best of everything, and every year or two, he had a shiny new sports car that looked and handled nice, but couldn't fit groceries and Angelica's car seat simultaneously. In ways, Drew was still a teenager and what other people thought of him mattered a lot more than it should. Stu, for all of his faults, was more mature in that respect, and Didi appreciated it.

Presently, Bermuda receded in the distance, shrinking until it was nothing more than a green and white blur sliver against a panorama of blue, and everyone gradually wandered away from the railing to find something to do. Drew and Charlotte stayed where they were, admiring the ocean, and Stu stood with his arms crossed and a strained expression on his face, During the trip, he had gesticulated between joy and hatred - the former because he was having a good time, the latter because it was only thanks to Drew. All that day, he'd been on the 'hatred' end of the spectrum, his bitterness and jealousy steadily eating away at him. He'd been short since lunch, and Drew and Charlotte had both commented on it.

Hopefully, Drew left it alone.

He didn't.

"Hey, Stewie," he said over his shoulder, "I bet I can beat you in a race back to Bermuda."

Stu sighed.

"Oh, right, you can't swim."

"I can swim," Stu said.

"Not as well as I can."

That boyish twinkle was back in Drew's eye. He took perverse pleasure in needling Stu. Ordinarily, Stu did the same, but right now, he simply whipped his head away and stared out at the point where the sea met the sky. "Come on, Stewie," Drew teased, "I'm only kidding with you. What's wrong? Is it your time of the month?

Charlotte snickered and Didi gave Stu's back an encouraging pat.

"I got your time of the month hanging," Stu said.

"Hun," Drew said to Charlotte, "can Stu borrow a tampon for his vagina? He's gonna bleed all over the deck."

"I don't have any," Charlotte said.

Stu let out a frustrated breath. "He's only playing with you," Didi said into his ear. "Relax."

"I'm relaxed," he shot back, "I'm fine. Even if my brother's a dick."

"At least I have one," Drew said.

"Barely," Stu said.

Drew shrugged. "At least I havet the money to make up for it."

Even later, Didi didn't think that was a dig at Stu, but Stu did. His face darkened, his eyes narrowed, and his lips peeled back from his teeth in a hateful sneer. "Fuck you, Drew."

Perhaps not realizing his brother was genuinely angry, or knowing and wanting to push his buttons, Drew smirked. "What's the matter, Stewie? Are you jealous?"

"I got nothing to be jealous of," Stu spat.

"Oh, I think you do," Drew pressed. "I have it all, Stu."

"Yeah, near-sightedness, flat feet, acne...so much to be jealous of."

Now it was Drew's turn to darken, and Didi tensed. Drew was extremely sensitive about his imperfections. He worried over them the way a man might a faint stain on a white shirt - the kind that no one else would ever see, but bugged him incessantly because he knew it was there. A lot of people have near-sightedness (including Didi herself), and flat feet were as common as arched feet. Adult acne, while not exactly the norm, wasn't abnormal either. Chaz still got the occasional crop of pimples and one of the secretaries in the office at school had a face that looked like a grenade went off in it (God forgive Didi for thinking that). Even when you put all of those things together in the same person, they were so mild that Did hardly even considered them imperfections.

To Drew, however, each disfiguration was more severe than the last - and yes, he considered them disfigurations.

Drew turned from the railing and started over like a boxer from his corner at the ding of the bell, and Charlotte laid her hand on his shoulder. "Drew," she said, "calm down."

"Stu, maybe you should apologize," Didi said.

Even in the midst of anger, Stu was a level-headed man who never allowed himself to lose-control. He always pulled himself back before going too far. And if he did go too far, it was a conscious decision - a split second conscious decision, but a conscious decision nevertheless.

And to Didi's dismay...he went too far now.

"Sorry you were born a freak, Drew," he said. "And sorry no one would go to prom with you."

Didi winced.

"You son of a bitch," Drew hissed. His face was red, his jaw clenched, and his shoulders bunched. His hands balled into fists and his eyes flashed like twin knife blades beneath a threatening moon. He started to stalk forward, but Charlotte grabbed him by the shoulder. "Fuck you, piece of shit," Drew raged.

"Drew, calm down," Charlotte snapped.

"Stu, that was uncalled for," Didi said, unconsciously assuming the stern tone she used on ill-behaved students.

That may have been the end of it - they could have gone their separate ways and calmed down like they had a million times before - but then Drew went too far, his attack hitting Stu with the practiced precision of a laser-guided missile and doing far, far more damage than any blow could have dreamed of. "At least I'm a jobless bum."

Oh, God.

Charlotte looked as uncomfortable as Didi felt, and Stu went rigid. Didi tried to hold him back, but he pulled away and stalked over to his brother. Now they were face to face, nose to nose. "What was that, pimples?"

"At least I'm not a jobless bum who can't keep his shit together," Drew said. "32,000 dollars in taxes, Stu, remember that? Remember owing 30 grand because you're a fuck up?"

Didi's heart sank.

She didn't like this topic.

At all.

Hopefully it ended here.

In Drew's quest to hurt and one up his brother, however, he didn't let it end there.

He went for the throat. "Hey, Didi, tell him our little secret. He's a big boy. He can handle it."

Didi's face turned red.

"What's he talking about?" Stu asked over his shoulder.

"Nothing," Didi said quickly. "It's nothing."

Drew uttered a harsh laugh. "Oh, it's something alright. Go on, tell him. Tell him how I saved your asses."

Did's blush deepened.

Turning to her like an interrogator's bright, burning lamp from one of those old noir movies, Stu cocked his brow. "What's he talking about?" His voice was firm and commanding.

"Well...I" Didi trailed off and rubbed the back of her neck.

Last year, Drew came over to the house to help her and Stu with their taxes. Once everything was ordered and itemized, he discovered that Drew and Didi owed 32,000 thousands. "Well, a kid as smart as Tommy doesn't need to go to college," Drew quipped, "so you're in luck there."

That statement echoed through Didi's head for days afterwards, getting sharper and colder with every pass. The thought of not being able to provide Tommy with the tools he needed to succeed in life...of failing at one of the most basic things a parent was supposed to do...disturbed her deeply, and she cried herself to sleep more than once in the weeks that followed. They didn't have the money to pay it off. It would only get bigger as fines and penalties were tacked on, then...oh, God, then...they would go into bankruptcy. They would lose the house, the car, everything. What would they do? Where would they go?

Didi didn't know and that kept her awake at night.

She vowed that she wouldn't let Tommy's future be ruined over hers and Stu's carelessness and tried to pay it off herself. She broke into her personal savings, applied for loans, and maxed out the inheritance her grandfather left her when he died fifteen years ago. There wasn't much left but it was enough to bring her up to 10,000 cash on hand.

Far, far less than she needed.

For a straight week, while Stu toiled in the basement at inventions that wouldn't go anywhere or bring their family any money, Didi agonized over what to do. The bank turned her down because she didn't make enough money and none of her family could help. Every time she tried to talk to Stu about it, he blew her off and insisted they could get on "some kind of payment plan" and that everything would be fine. He knew as well as she did that any kind of payment plan would include interest...and with their credit scores, it would be a lot of interest. She knew he understood the gravity of their situation, but he carried on like he didn't. He was in some mixture of shock and denial, unable to come to terms with reality, and that led to him sticking his head in the sand. This is fine, he said as the life they had built together burned down around them.

Didi tried everything she could think of to save them from total destitution.

Finally, at her wits' end, she went to Drew.

"You what?" Stu asked now. The edge in his voice cut her like a knife, and she faltered.

She didn't expect Drew and Charlotte to give her the whole twenty-thousand, but to her surprise, he offered to pay the whole thing off. "I knew as soon as I saw it that you guys would need help," he explained. His tone was soft and understanding, devoid of judgement and accusation. "I was going to offer, but Stu gets kind of funny."

Didi sighed. "I know he does."

"You know...I guess I can understand it. If I was in his shoes, I'd get funny about that kind of thing too." He chuckled. "We Pickles' are a proud bunch."

"I've noticed," Didi said. "I...I didn't want to ask for help either but I didn't have anywhere else to turn." A lump of emotion welled in her throat and stinging tears flooded her eyes. She hated doing this. Hated it because it made her feel small...and hated it because it made Stu look bad. "I'm so sorry to do this, I just...I didn't know what else to do.

Drew laid his hand comfortingly on the back of hers. "Hey, look, it's fine. I really don't mind. That's what family is for."

She was deeply touched by the gesture, and even though he told her to think of it as a "gift," she promised to pay him back.

"If you want to," he relented, "okay, but there's no rush."

He whipped out his checkbook and the back of Didi's neck burned with shame. The Pickles' weren't the only proud ones.

As Drew wrote out the check, he said, "I hate to bring this up but...Stu."

Didi looked down at her lap. She suspected this was coming, and why wouldn't she? It was the 900 pound elephant in the room.

"Have you talked to him about him getting a job?"

He spoke with the care and somber respect of a doctor asking someone if they had considered taking their brain dead loved one off life support. If his intention was to put her at ease, it didn't work; it made her feel even worse. "I've broached the subject," she said. "He dances around it."

Why did telling Drew this feel like a betrayal?

"Yeah, that's Stu for you," he said knowingly. "He has pop's hard headedness.." He tore the check out and slid it across the table. Didi took it and tucked it into her pocket without looking at it. "He really needs to find work. I personally think this toy thing isn't going anywhere and he'd be better off doing something else."

"It's his passion," Didi said. It was the only defense she could muster.

Drew nodded. "I know it is," he said, "and I'm not trying to take that away from him, but...he really needs to start bringing in a steady income. Some things are more important than passion. I'm not saying he should give up, he just needs to realize that putting food on the table and providing for his family takes precedence over doing what he loves."

That phrase, provide for his family, rubbed Didi like a piece of sandpaper, and she almost snapped back. She held her tongue, thanked Drew profusely, and went back home. Before she left, she asked him not to say anything to Stu. "It'd bother him," she said.

"I won't," Drew said, "it'll be our little secret."

Only he did say something. He and Stu got into one little tiff, and BOOM, he told. Standing there on the deck of the Carnival Horizon, Stu glaring at her and Drew smiling in triumph, Didi was angry, humiliated, and betrayed. Stu's face crinkled in confusion and he furrowed his brow. "I saw the paperwork from the bank." he said. He sounded lost.

She told Stu that the bank approved the loan. When he asked to see the paperwork, she went back to Drew.

"I forged those papers," Drew said smugly. "To protect your feelings."

A shadow flickered across Stu's face, and his nostrils flared. He opened his mouth, then closed it, then opened it again, visibly grasping for words but not getting hold of any. "W-Why would you do that? Why didn't you come to me?"

"I tried," she said defensively, "I told you that you needed to get a job but you kept waving me off."

Before Stu could reply, Drew cut in, "You had your head stuck up your ass so she had to come to me."

Didi's eyes narrowed dangerously, and she shot her brother-in-law daggers. "I came to you because I was desperate. I thought you'd understand and not weaponize it to hurt Stu, but clearly I was wrong."

"I do understand," Drew scoffed, "that's why I helped you. Stewie couldn't do it, so a real man had to step in."

Drew's words hit her like a fist to the stomach, and something happened then.

She got mad.

"I should have known you'd act this way," she said. "Even your own father calls you petty behind your back."

"At least I can take care of my family."

"At least our kid isn't a devil child," Didi blurted. That was neither here nor there and had nothing whatsoever to do with the topic at hand, but she didn't care; she wanted to hurt him the same way he had hurt her and Stu today.

From the way he flinched, she did.

"Uh, excuse me?" Charlotte asked. She put her hands on her hips and leaned forward as if to hear better.

"Our daughter isn't a devil child," Drew said coldly.

Stu snorted. "She's a spoiled brat. Everyone in the world knows it but you two jokers."

"Fuck you, Stu," Charlotte said.

"Don't talk to my husband that way, bitch," Didi spat.

"Watch your tone, you frizzy-headed ho," Drew said.

Stu had had enough. He lunged at his brother and they locked up like two professional wrestlers. Drew got the upper hand and wrapped his arms around Stu; Stu hooked his foot around Drew's, and they spilled to the deck with a thud. Before Didi knew what was happening, Charlotte was on top of her, yanking her hair so hard that her glasses slipped down her nose and tears sprang to her eyes. Didi cried out, grasped, and caught a handful of Charlotte's hair; she pulled as hard as she could, and Charlotte's head bent to one side. Charlotte responded by tugging Didi's hair even harder. "Fucking bitch," Charlotte hissed.

"Blonde bimbo," Didi charged.

Stu and Drew rolled back and forth on the deck, Stu on top, now Drew, now Stu again. Charlotte and Didi tugged each other's hair, reaching an impasse, neither able to do anything else. Didi kicked at Charlotte's leg and Charlotte stomped on Didi's foot. Curses and spittle flew from their lips and Didi's grip slipped just enough that Charlotte was able to slap her hard across the side of her head. Red pain detonated in the center of Didi's skull and her face ached. She raked her nails down Charlotte's cheek, tearing skin, and Charlotte howled in pain.

A crowd of people gathered around like kids watching a fight on the playground, and unsurprisingly, many of them held up cell phones. Drew, on top, closed his hands around Stu's neck, and Stu responded by punching him in the chin. Drew toppled back and Stu lunged at him. Drew brought his foot up and caught Stu in the stomach; Stu let out a breathless oof and fell back on his ass.

Charlotte twisted around in an attempt to break Didi's hold and Didi tightened her grip.

Suddenly, a team of crew members in white uniforms descended upon them and pulled them all apart. Two of them grabbed Drew and held him back and another one wrenched Stu's arm behind his back. Stu's knees gave out and he went limp with a cry of pain. Drew pulled away and went at Stu, but a black crewman with bulging biceps grabbed him, wrestled him to the deck, and shoved his face against the planks. He wedged his knee into the back of his neck and held him in place. "Stop fighting," he commanded.

"I CAN'T BREATHE!" Drew strangled.

"Police brutality!" someone called from the crowd.

"That man said he can't breathe!"

"Get off his neck!"

Eight minutes and forty-six seconds later, Stu, Didi, Drew, and Charlotte occupied flanking cells in the brig on D-Deck. Stu stood at the door with his arms thrust through the bars and glared into space. Didi sat on a wooden slab chained to the wall and stared nervously down at her hands. "When we get out of this," Stu said without turning, his voice stony and hard, "we need to have a long talk."

The accusation in his voice scoured Didi's already frayed nerves, and his features twisted in defiance. "Yes," she said, "we do."

And thus passed the rest of the Pickles family's vacation.

"I don't know why you would go to him of all people," Stu said.

They were in the car on the way home from the airport, Stu behind the wheel and Didi in the passenger seat. Traffic on the freeway was heavy and they had been stuck in gridlock for almost twenty minutes.

"Because I couldn't go to you," Didi snapped.

"Bullshit," Stu said.

"I've practically begged you to get a job and help me, Stu, but you won't. You leave me and your father to pay everything so you can tinker in the basement like an overgrown manchild."

She regretted her choice of words as soon as she saw the ripple of hurt on Stu's face, but she stood firm. Sometimes in life, you have to be blunt and put things in the ugliest way possible to get your message across. A riot, Martin Luther King once said, is the language of the unheard. So too, she believed, was insensitivity. You can ask politely and try to reason, but that doesn't always work; sometimes, you have to scream and cuss.

"That's not true," he said. "I told you, I was busy -"

"Busy wasting your time," Didi said and crossed her arms defiantly over her chest. "Meanwhile, me and your father are struggling to keep this family's head above water."

Stu's lips twisted in either rage or agony, but he didn't say anything. "You need to get a job," Didi continued. We need an extra income and your inventions aren't doing it. We were so close to losing everything, Stu, but you shoved your head up your ass and pretended everything was fine. It wasn't. That's why I went to Drew for help."

"Because he's a better man than me," Stu said, barely above a whisper.

That statement and the self-pitying tone he made it in pissed Didi off. Here she was telling him how badly she needed him to get off his ass and get a job, and he turned it into a victim narrative with poor Stu at the center. Wah wah wah, you think my brother is better than me. "Because he has a steady income, Stu. Because he goes to work and doesn't sit in his basement all day playing around instead of supporting his family."

Stu's face hardened. "Whatever."

"You act like such a child sometimes," Didi said.

He didn't reply.

The arguing continued when they got home. Finally, after an hour, Stu came downstairs with a suitcase. "What are you doing?" Didi asked. Tommy, Angellica, and the other babies were in the playpen, completely oblivious to what was happening.

"I need some time away," Stu said.

Lou twisted around in his chair and lowered his brow when he saw Stu's suitcase. "Put that damn thing down. I don't know what's the matter with you two but you need to work it out like you have some sense."

"She can go work it out with Drew," Stu said, "he's the better man anyway."

Didi sighed. "Stu, will you stop?"

He went to the door and opened it.

"Stuart," Lou barked, "get back here."

"Screw you, Pop," Stu said.

Then he was gone.

Didi let out a watery sigh and sank onto the couch. Lou glowered after his son, then turned to her. "What in the hell is going on here? You've been at each other's throats since you got back. What happened?"

Breaking down, Didi told him everything, beginning with the tax debacle and ending with the fistfight she and Stu had with Charlotte and Drew. Lou listened, then sighed and sat back in his chair. "You're all acting like a bunch of kids," he said. "Them two especially. Stu with his damn toys and Drew acting the way he did." He shook his head sadly.

Didi sighed. Tears welled in the backs of her eyes and her throat quivered.

"Don't you worry," Lou said, "Stu will be back." He pushed himself up. "In the meantime, I'm gonna have a little talk with Drew."

When he was gone, Didi buried her face in her hands and struggled to keep from crying. Maybe she was too hard on Stu. He was a good man, a good husband, and a good father, he just had a blindspot when it came to his inventing. He had barely made any money from it but insisted that his next project would be the one that "laid the golden egg." She used to love his commitment and positive outlook - it was one of his best qualities - and it was still endearing, but he needed to realize that, like Drew said, some things are more important than following your dream. How long can a musician work a dead-end job waiting for a big break that would likely never come? How many years can a writer hold out hope that his next novel will sell while his bills and debt both pile up? There comes a point where you have to give these things up.

It was sad and unfair that people had to give up on their dreams, but that's life. Once you start a family, the most important thing in the world became taking care of them and giving them the best life you possibly could. She would do anything to give her children a good life and she knew that Stu would too, just as long as he woke up and smelled the fricking coffee.

She ran her fingers through her hair and took a deep breath. Something tapped her leg and she looked up to find Tommy standing there and smiling up at her, the bright red handle of a plastic screwdriver jutting from his diaper. "How did you get out?" she asked and picked him up. She was sure the gate was latched when she last checked.

Pushing that aside, she hugged Tommy to her chest and squeezed her eyes closed, cutting off a rush of tears. "I hope he comes back," she said.

But she didn't know if he would.

And that scared her.

She didn't want to give her children a broken home any more than she wanted to give them a broke one.

Only time would tell, she figured.

She just didn't know how much time.

A week passed. Stu didn't call or visit. Lou talked to him twice but their conversations always turned into Lou scolding him and demanding he come home, and Stu sighing and hanging up. Lou would call him back, but it would go right to voicemail, so he'd leave him a message cussing him out and alienating him further. Didi told him to leave Stu alone, but Pickles' are as stubborn as they are proud, so he kept on.

When he wasn't hounding Stu, Lou was at Drew and Charlotte's house. They both refused to talk about what happened on the cruise and told him that they didn't want anything to do with Stu and Didi until they apologized. "That's not going to happen," Didi said. "Drew betrayed my trust and humiliated me."

Lou rolled his eyes.

All this time, Didi had no idea where Stu was. He told Lou that he was "close" and would eventually "stop by." Every day, DIdi waited in suspense for him to come through the door, but he never did, and the leaden dread in her stomach swelled a little more. Her first instinct was to apologize, but she didn't have anything to be sorry for. She told Stu the truth. Perhaps she could have been more delicate, but he didn't need delicate: He needed to see things the way they were, the way they looked to everyone else...the way they looked to her.

Right though she may be, she couldn't help feeling that she made a huge mistake in the way she handled it. No, Stu didn't need delicate, but maybe he didn't need to be clobbered over the head either, especially after such a terrible fight with his brother. He and Drew were often at odds, but never like this. Perhaps made a mistake with Drew as well. What he did made her so mad, though. She trusted him and what did he do? He told Stu the first chance he got.

On Friday, eight days after Stu left, Kira, Chaz's wife, happened to see him walking across the parking lot of the Starlite Motel on the other side of town. She reckoned that Stu was staying there and offered to go talk to him. At first, Didi told her no, but later, after too many glasses of wine and too many hours paging through photo albums, looking upon happier times when bills, debt, and back taxes could not and did not intrude, she relented. She, Kira, and Betty met at her house the next morning. "We'll get him back for you, Deed," Betty assured her. "Even if we have to drag him by the scruff of his neck."

Meanwhile, Chaz, Lou, and Howard went over to Drew's house. Being a Saturday, Drew was dressed only in a robe and slippers when he answered the door. As soon as he saw his father, he sagged. There was only one reason for Pop to be here. "Go away," he said. He started to close the door, but Lou shot his arm out.

""We need to talk."

"There's nothing to talk about."

"Oh, yes there is."

Drew opened his mouth to protest, but Lou boldly shoved his way in, and Drew had no choice but to step aside and let him in...or knock his old ass out, and he wasn't about to throw hands at his old man. Howard and Chaz, more timidly than Lou, hesitated, then followed. Charlotte was cooking breakfast in the kitchen, the smell of bacon and eggs heavy on the air. "Where's Angellica?" Lou asked.

"She stayed the night at Suzy Carmichael's house," Drew said.

"Good," Lou said, "that means I don't have to watch my language." He gestured to the dining room table. "Sit your ass down."

The five of them - Lou, Chaz, Howard, Charlotte, and Drew - sat at the table with plates of food and steaming cups of coffee. Lou took a sip from his mug and smacked his lips. Draw watched him tensely, then made a circular motion with his hand. "Go on, ream me out, I know you've been wanting to."

"You're damn right I have," Lou said. "First of all, I'm embarrassed by what you did to Didi. Helping her like that then throwing it back in her face. That's low even for you."

Drew went to say something, but Lou cut him off. "Shut the hell up. You don't help someone then throw it back at them. You'd be better off just not helping them at all."

Drew's eyes flicked ashamedly to the table and Charlotte looked uncomfortable. "Yeah, okay, maybe I shouldn't have done that," Drew said. "I got a little carried away. Even so, Stu -"

"I know goddamn well what Stu does and I'm gonna talk to him too. That doesn't change the fact that you spit in Didi's face because Stu hurt your feelings or some damn thing."

For the first time, Chaz spoke up. "You should really bury the hatchet with him, Drew. This isn't worth ruining your relationship with your brother."

Next to him, Howard nodded quickly. "Yeah, it's really not."

"He and Didi called Angellica a brat," Charlotte said, "that's not something I can just for -"

"She is a goddamn brat."

Drew gaped. "Pop!"

"It's true," Lou said. "She can be sweet as apple pie, then the next minute she's pushing Chuckie around like a red-headed stepchild."

Chaz uncomfortably rubbed the back of his neck.

"That's not true," Drew said.

"Like hell it isn't. Everyone says the same thing."

Drew looked at Chaz and Howard for help. "Do you guys think Angellica is a brat?"

They exchanged a knowing glance, and Drew looked from one to the other as though they were stark raving mad. "You do."

Howard shrugged. "She can be kind of a brat."

"Yeah, a little bit," Chaz added.

"You spoil her too much," Lou said, "and you let her get away with murder."

"We don't do either of those things," Charlotte said, then, "Do we?"

"You do," Lou said. "That's not the point, though. The point is that you two need to make up with Stu and Didi. Just like they need to make up with you. Once we get Stu back here, I'm gonna talk to them just like I'm talking to you. Then I want all of you to get together and apologize."

Across town, Betty and Kira stood outside Stu's door. "Remember," Kira said, "be gentle. This is a very delicate matter."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Betty said. She balled her fist and pounded on the door.

A moment later, the handle rattled and Drew appeared in a white T-shirt and boxer shorts, his wallet in his hand. "That was -" he cut off when realized who it was. "Oh...you're not my breakfast pizza."

"No, we're your friends and we're worried about you," Betty said. "Can we come in?"

"Well, I -"

In unconscious imitation of Lou, Betty all but plowed Stu out of the way. Kira came in behind her and her step faltered.

The room was a disaster. Dirty clothes, empty pizza boxes, crushed beer cans, and other, less namable debris littered the floor. "Whew wee," Betty said, "this place is a wreck. Looks like a Mexican lives here."

A deep frown touched Kira's lips but she didn't say anything. Kira was very anti-racist and Betty liked to tease her by being as racist as humanly possible. She made a game of it and declared herself "the winner" if Kira got upset and yelled at her or stormed off.

"Did you come by just to insult my housekeeping, or do you have a reason to be here?"

Betty crossed her arms, threw back her shoulders, and puffed out her chest. She did that every time she wanted to "establish dominance over a man." Stu favored her with a blank stare as she said, "We're here to bring you home."

"By talking," Kira clarified. "We just want to make things right with you and Didi."

Stu sank onto the edge of the bed. "I don't know if that's possible."

"Why not?" Kira asked.

For a moment, Stu was silent. "Because I'm a fuck up. Everything she and Drew said is right. I'm a failure as an inventor, I'm a failure as a husband, I'm a failure as a man."

"Oh, bullshit," Betty said. "You're not a failure as a man. At least you weren't until you walked out on your wife and children."

He sighed. "I didn't walk out, I just needed a break."

"Yeah? Well, you've had a week, Jack. How much longer is this pity party going to last?"

Kira cut in. "What Betty means to say is: You've suffered some setbacks and your career hasn't gone the way you hoped it would. That's life. There's nothing wrong with that. You held on and held on and didn't realize you should have let go. That doesn't make you a failure, it makes you human. Sometimes we can't see when and where our lives need a course correction until we take a step back."

"And you took your step back," Betty said. "Didi's been alone with the kids for a week worrying herself sick that you're not coming back."

Stu hung his head and let out a groan. "I'm coming back," he said at length. "I just…" he trailed off and ran his fingers through his hair. "I'm embarrassed. She's right, I had my head up my own ass and acted like a child. She was scrounging money to pay bills...and begging from that bastard Drew...all while I was downstairs in the basement twiddling my thumbs."

"You were desperately trying to make your business work," Kira said. "You put all of your focus into that and missed the forest for the trees. It happens to everyone now and then."

Stu stared down at his feet for a long time. "I guess. I just feel like a total scumbag. I-I'm afraid that Didi thinks less of me."

In an uncharacteristic display of affection, Betty squeezed his shoulder. "She doesn't, Stu," she said softly, "she misses you. And so do the kids."

Stu nodded.

"You gonna come home now?"

"Yeah," he said, "I am."

Didi was in the kitchen and enjoying a cup of coffee while Tommy napped when the front door opened and closed. A moment later, Stu appeared at the threshold, and she tensed. His eyes darted to the floor and he looked like he wished he was invisible. "Hey," he said.

"Hi," Didi replied after a stricken moment. It had been two hours since Betty and Kira embarked on what Betty called Operation Fugitive Slave Act (to needle Kira), and Didi was almost certain that they would fail; Stu would stay gone and her marriage would break all the way.

For a moment, Stu stood in the doorway, then came in and sat at the table. Awkward silence wrapped itself around them and for a long time, neither said anything. Stu shifted in his seat, rubbed the back of his neck, and took a deep, fortifying breath. "I'm sorry," he said. He couldn't meet her eyes so he kept on looking at the table, as though it were the most interesting thing he had ever seen. "You were right. About everything. I did have my head up my ass and I was ignoring everything."

To hear him take responsibility both hurt and gratified her. He finally understood cold, hard reality. He understood that she needed him to get a job and help her...he also understood that his dream wasn't going to come true. Now she felt bad for all the things she said to him...because he finally got it. "I know you love inventing, Stu, and I don't want to take that away from you. We just can't afford for you to not work. You can do it in the evening when you get home and...and if you get a contract or something...we can talk, but right now -"

He nodded. "You're right. And I was wrong. I realized that even before I left...and I was ashamed." He tried to continue, but shrugged instead. "I ran from the blinding light of truth because I didn't like what I saw."

Didi reached across the table and took his hand. "But then I grew up and decided to stop hiding from my problems." He brushed his thumb over her knuckles.

"I missed you," Didi said.

As if on cue. Tommy toddled in. How did he keep getting out of the playpen?

"We missed you."

Stu picked up his son and sat him on his knee. "I missed you guys too," he said. "Now, to find a job…"

Two days later, after a dressing down from Lou - he told Stu to stop being a bum and thrashed Didi for bringing Angellica into an argument where she didn't belong - Drew and Charlotte came over. It was late evening and they sat in the living room over coffee, Lou present to "kick an ass if I gotta."

Uneasy silence held sway, everyone too timid to make the first move like freshman at a school dance. Finally, Didi cleared her throat. Someone had to break the ice and it was going to be her. "Drew, Charlotte, I want to apologize for what I said about Angellica. It was wrong of me and had nothing to do with...our disagreement."

Drew sighed. "And I'm sorry for outing you that way. It was pretty awful of me to throw that back in your face and...I'm ashamed that I did it."

"You're not wrong about Angellica," Charlotte said. A flicker of pain crossed her face and she clutched Drew's hand. "She can be...difficult. We realize that now."

Next, Drew looked at his brother, or rather, slightly off to his right. "Stu...what I said was terrible and I didn't mean it. I just…"

"Don't worry about it," Stu said, "I didn't mean it either. I just wanted to hurt your feelings."

Drew chuckled. "Same here."

"Now hug," Lou said from his chair.

"Pop," Stu said, "we don't -"

Lou stipped off his belt and started to get up.

"Okay! Okay!"

They all stood and shared a big group hug.

And though at first Didi thought it was a little weird that Lou wanted them to punctuate their apology with an embrace, she understood why.

It made for a happy ending to a not so happy story.