She sucks in a breath.
“She and my dad have been to less games than Blake and he’s fucking dying.”
“He’s—”
“His lungs are shit. His heart is failing. His kidney values suck. My brother isn’t going to live to be eighty. Hell, he might not even make forty, we all fucking know it, and?—”
Her hand settles on my back as I suck in a breath, trying to swallow down the lump in my throat.
“He had a great night tonight,” I rasp.
“We all did,” she whispers when I can’t find the words to go on. “And now they’re here, doing…” A sigh as the volume increases further. “Doing that.”
“Ruining it.”
“Yeah.” I blow out a breath. “I need to get out there. Blake?—”
Needs me.
She’s going to steamroll him and my dad will be his usual detached self and then it’ll be months before I see him and?—
“You deserved more than they gave you.”
The air in my lungs freezes and I turn to her. “Come here.”
No hesitation before she steps into my arms. That trust heals another piece of me and I wrap her tight, inhale that soft floral scent of her, listen to her slow and steady breathing.
A minute of peace.
A moment of quiet before I face the shit that always cuts me deep.
Then we’re breaking apart, but Kylie doesn’t let me go completely.
Her fingers wrap around mine.
And then we’re walking down the hall.
The light’s on in the kitchen and I might have been amused at my brother foraging for a middle of the night snack and leaving the remnants on the counter—a box of cereal, the milk, a bowl and a spoon—if not for the pair standing beside him.
“I cannot believe you went behind my back,” my mom is shouting, leaning over Blake, her finger in his face.
God, he hates that.
And my dad just standing there?—
Fuck, but I don’t know what’s worse.
The shouting, the bullying, the smothering care…or the complete dissociation, even at two in the morning.
“I didn’t go behind your back!” Blake shouts back. “I told you I was coming no matter what. You just tried to pull your usual crap so I wouldn’t be able to.”
That doesn’t surprise me.
“It was dangerous,” she snaps. “You might get sick!”
Blake’s face is red, his jaw painfully set. He reaches for the bowl on the table, but she brushes his hand away. “And you shouldn’t eat that crap?—”
“Mom,” I begin.
