The thing was, Trevor also needed his advice.
So while Ezra and Rhett returned the yard to its pre-cookout state, Trevor sat in the same stupid chair and watched them work. He’d tried to pitch in, but Ezra snarled with such fury, Trevor rolled his eyes and sat back down. Truth be told, he might not be able to lift one folding table right now, much less four or five hefted onto one shoulder the way Ezra and Rhett were doing. He shuddered and hunched up in the chair.
The various containers of food had been collected and put away, only tables and chairs remaining, which Rhett and Ezra carried to the detached garage. Rhett was one who didn’t believe in picnic tables as permanent yard fixtures. When the cookout ended, his yard became an unadorned space again.
“I’ve got to talk to Kelsey,” Trevor said.
“Okay,” Ezra said.
“But it can’t be just another conversation. It’s got to be more than that.”
“Okay.”
Trevor rolled his eyes. “Thanks.”
“Well, what’re you asking for?”
“Um…” Fair question, actually.
The two wolves kept working, and Trevor kept sitting. Inaction grated under his skin. He shoved to his feet.
“Look, Ez, I can help out—”
A snarl ripped from his brother’s throat as he barged straight into Trevor’s personal space. Ezra nudged him back, barely enough force to move a blade of grass. Trevor’s feet tipped out from under him, and he fell into the chair. His rib panged. His face burned. He ducked his head.
“You get up again and so help me I’ll knock you flat, Trevor. You’re not okay. You haven’t been okay for nine freaking years. Now stay in the chair.”
“Okay,” he whispered.
Carting armfuls of folding chairs, not needing to raise his voice, Ezra said, “So you want to plead your case with Kelsey.”
Sometimes the lack of one-on-one privacy at gatherings was annoying. Today it was a lifesaver to know Ezra had heard Kelsey confront him, didn’t need Trevor to explain why she had taken her leave hours ago with hardly a word to anyone.
“Something happens to me when I try to talk about it,” Trevor said.
“From what you told Malachi, sounds like you’ve been ashamed of it.”
Trevor bit his lip. His face must be bright red, and his scent would be no less obvious. He fidgeted in the stupid chair.
“Sorry, bro. Guess that was blunt.”
“Just a little.”
“Yeah,” Ezra said. The chairs clanged against each other as he made two stacks in the corner of the garage beside the tables. “Well, I get it though. We were proud pups, like you said. All about outdoing each other and whatever. I don’t know how we’d have dealt with the fading. Probably would’ve gotten scared, you know? If it could happen to you, it could happen to any one of us.”
“The old wolves always talked about it like…like a wolf would meet his mate in his twenties or so. Not before the first change. And they said we’d just know, same as they each did, but—but I was six. I couldn’t know.”
It was a new thought, something Trevor had been chewing on since Malachi had apologized to him, since it had occurred to Trevor that as pups the others truly had no way of seeing what he was going through. The older wolves hadn’t withheld information deliberately, but they’d conveyed it through the filter of their own experiences.
“They should’ve figured it out,” Ezra said, but knowing him, he meantI should’ve figured it out.
Rhett grunted, the first noise he’d made since this discussion started. He didn’t pause in his work, removing log seats from around the fire pit and stacking them between two peripheral trees.
“Water under the bridge at this point,” Trevor said.
“If you say so,” Ezra said.
Rhett had gone silent again.
