I walked toward him, my legs unsteady. He met me halfway, and the hug he pulled me into was fierce. Almost too tight, his arms locked around me as if to ensure I was real.
Then he pulled back and hit me on the shoulder. Hard.
"Ow."
"That's for making Mom cry every night for three weeks." Another hit. "That's for making Dad look like he's aged ten years." A third. "And that's for not calling me."
"Tristan..."
"Sit down." His voice was cold. "We need to talk."
The waitress came and went. I ordered coffee I didn't want, just to have something to do with my hands.
Tristan sat across from me, arms crossed, jaw tight. The anger radiated off him in waves.
"I'm sorry," I started.
"You're sorry." He laughed, but there was no humor in it. "You're sorry. That's great, Tobias. That fixes everything."
"I didn't know what else to do."
"You could have talked to me." His voice rose, then he caught himself, glanced around the diner, and lowered it again. "Before the engagement. Before the wedding. Before you decided to disappear off the face of the earth. At any point in the last two years, you could have picked up the phone and said, 'Hey Tristan, I'm miserable, I don't want this life, help me figure out what to do.'"
"I didn't think you'd understand."
"No. You didn't think." He leaned forward. "You never do. You disappear into your own head and make these decisions alone, and the rest of us have to deal with the aftermath."
The accusation stung, mostly because it was true.
"Do you have any idea what the last few weeks have been like?" Tristan's voice was rough. "Mom barely sleeps. She blames herself, keeps saying she should have seen the signs, should have known you were unhappy. Dad's been calling in every favor he has, hiring investigators, threatening people, trying to find you through sheer force of will. And me?"
He stopped and shook his head.
"I've been lying to them. Watching Mom cry herself to sleep, seeing Dad age ten years in three weeks, knowing I could end their suffering with one sentence. But I couldn't, because I was protecting you. Do you know how that feels? Choosing between my brother and my parents every single day?"
"Tristan, I'm sorry."
"Stop saying you're sorry." He rubbed his face with both hands. "I don't want sorry. I want to understand why you didn't trust me."
The words hit like a blow. I opened my mouth, then closed it again. He was right. I hadn't trusted him. Not because he'd done anything to lose my trust, but because I'd grown used to handling everything alone.
"I didn't know how to explain it," I said finally. "I didn't even understand it myself."
"So you just ran."
"Yes."
"Without telling anyone."
"Yes."
"Without thinking about what that would do to the people who love you."
I had no answer for that.
Tristan was quiet for a long moment. When he spoke again, his voice was calmer but still hurt.
"Do you remember when you broke Dad's golf trophy? The one Grandfather gave him?"
