This is fear with a lid on it.
The bathroom door down the hall is shut now. Quiet. Nothing spilling out from behind it. But the air still feels…wrong. Like something happened in there earlier that the house hasn’t recovered from.
I tell myself I didn’t hear anything.
I tell myself I didn’t stand outside the door on my crutches, useless, while her voice cracked through the wood.
I tell myself a lot of things.
The front door opens near dusk. Cold air rushes in, carrying the smell of fast food and winter and the kind of normal everyone pretends is still possible.
Cameron’s voice fills the entryway immediately, loud on purpose. “All right, we got subs and fries because Pops refused anything green, which honestly is on brand.”
Pops laughs quietly behind him, but he sounds tired from what he’s done today.
Cameron steps into the kitchen with the bags and starts unpacking like this is normal. Like this is just another night. Like he isn’t watching Pops with a careful, tight focus that he thinks no one notices.
Pops follows him, slower than Cameron. He’s got a blanket draped over his arm like it’s become part of him. The living room lamp catches his profile and makes him look smaller than he has any right to.
Cameron glances at me, where I’m posted up on the couch, leg elevated, ice pack balanced. “You survive PT?”
“Barely.”
“Better than being knocked on your ass, I guess,” Cameron says, like surviving is the goal and not the bare minimum.
He shoves a drink toward me, and I catch it awkwardly.
Cameron smirks. “Graceful as ever. No idea how you became so good at catching a football.”
“Shut up, dick.”
He grins, and for a second, the house feels lighter. “Hey, Slo! Dinner is here.”
Pops settles into his chair with a careful exhale. His hand goes to his temple again, quick and automatic. Like he thinks if he does it fast enough, no one will clock it.
I do. Cameron does too. We just don’t say anything.
Not yet.
We eat around the kitchen island, wrappers crinkling, fries going cold too fast. Cameron talks about his last basketball practice like it’s life or death, and Pops humors him, asking questions, teasing him about his minutes and his shot selection and the fact that he still refuses to ice his knees.
“I’m twenty-one,” Cameron argues. “I’m invincible.”
“You’re stupid,” Pops corrects.
Cameron lifts a fry like it’s a toast. “Same thing.”
Pops chuckles, but it fades quickly. He presses two fingers to his temple again, and this time he winces like the light hurts.
I set my food down. “Pops.”
He looks at me. “What?”
“You okay?”
He’s quiet for a beat too long. Then he smiles like he can charm the concern right out of me. “I’m fine.”
Cameron’s jaw tightens. “You’ve had a headache for, like…three days.”
