“I didn’t think you’d actually come!” Her voice cracked on a sob.
He rocked under the force of her words. Of course she hadn’t. Why would she? He had done nothing but avoid them and let them down for years. Why would she expect him to change?
Except she didn’t know about Avery. About his big smiles and hopeful eyes. About how Linc wanted to be the kind of person Avery thought he was. If he could be that person for Avery, then he would have to learn to be that for his sisters too.
A minivan honked. They were standing in the middle of the parking aisle. Lilah flipped the driver off, and he honked again, leaning on the horn this time. Linc put an arm around her shoulder and led her toward the cars so the van could pass.
“I’m sorry. Hey. I’m so sorry.” He pulled her close.
“No, you’re not. If you were sorry, you would have come back sooner. We needed you.”
Fuck.Filthy sludge clogged up his guts while his baby sister sobbed in his arms in the dark parking lot.
“She was there. She was there on the stretcher and she wasn’t moving, and the paramedics wouldn’t let me go with her. And Dad’s dying and I thought she was dead too. And if she died, then I’d have no one. I’d have the boys and no one. I’d be all by myself, Linc!” Her voice was high and her words were barely understandable, but every single one of them was like a punch. He ached. His throat, his eyes. He held her close and whispered how sorry he was over and over.
Eventually, she pushed back. Her face was puffy, and her hair was stringy. She brushed it away from her cheeks and sniffed. “Sorry.”
“No.” He shook his head. “This one’s all on me.”
Her laugh was short and hard. “Well, not all of it. Not Lacey’s diabetes or Dad’s cancer. But my makeup is ruined, and that’s definitely your fault.”
He hugged her again, and she squeezed him back. He should tell her. The apology was incomplete if she didn’t understand why he’d stayed away. But she was staring up at him with cautious hope, and he couldn’t be responsible for making it vanish.
“I like your hair,” he said.
“Thanks.”
He stayed in the parking lot until she got the car started and drove away. The old Ford had one wheel well completely rusted away, and the muffler sounded like it had about as long to live as—
“Fuck.” He wrapped his arms around himself, but it didn’t help.
Avery. Still no messages from Avery, and Linc needed to talk to him, now more than ever. But his call got sent to voicemail right away again.
Back in the hospital room, Lacey and his dad were dozing. His sister’s eyes flickered open as Linc walked in, and she smoothed down the blankets and fought a yawn, embarrassed to be caught unguarded.
“Everything okay?” she said.
Nope.He settled into the empty chair closest to Lacey and took her hand. “Yeah. Everything’s fine.”
Lacey sighed. “She told you, didn’t she? About him?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s a pretty shitty deal.”
The thing Lacey hadn’t said, that day on the phone when she’d called to say their dad had turned up, was suddenly made obvious in the way their dad hunched against the back of his chair. In the occasional wheezing cough pestering him, even in his sleep. In the way that he was a fraction of the man he had been, like he was being consumed.
“They making you stay here overnight?” he said, because the question was easier than talking about the giant cancer-ridden elephant in the room.
She snorted. “Yeah. For observation, they said. I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. You didn’t know?”
She glanced away but let him keep her hand. “How was I supposed to know? I felt like shit, but I always feel like shit. That’s what happens when you have two kids and two jobs.”
Another punch. “I’m sorry. For not being here.”
“Yeah, yeah.” She didn’t smile. “I can see the mascara stains on your shirt that weren’t there before. I know she’s scared, but I’m not going anywhere.”
