After shutting the stove off, I shoveled two fried eggs and four slices of bacon onto a plate. It was all I could find in Moon’s fridge, so it was going to have to do. The man didn’t even have any bread, so toast was out of the question. “Here, Star. Eat this. It’ll help you feel better.” I looked over at Moon, tilting my head toward his bedroom. “Can I show you something real quick?”
One of his eyebrows went up in question before a slow smirk started across his face. “How naughty of you, Officer Blake.”
“Officer?” Star looked up at me, her eyes wide. “I thought he was just some weirdo friend of yours. Not a police officer.”
Can’t say I’d heard that one all that often. I’d been called a lot of things, but weirdo friend had yet to be one of them.
“Could you just shut up and be a civil, nice human being for once?” Moon growled.
“Fuck no. I’m hungover. My brother has spent all morning being an asshole to me, trying to police my life. Oh, and then he brought an actual police officer into the equation. So, no, I can’t.”
I stepped closer to the couch, cutting Moon off from a rebuttal. “Okay, okay, let’s just take a breather. You eat, and Moon, come with me, please.”
He sighed and shook his head, but did as I’d asked. I followed him to his bedroom, letting the door shut behind me. Honestly, it was nothing like I’d expected. It was so…plain. No decorations, aside from a photo frame with what looked like his entire family, on his nightstand. The bedsheets were black, his blankets the same. I’d expected more color, or something far less boring, for lack of a better word.
Moon turned around, staring at me with his arms crossed over his chest. “What?”
I wondered if I’d ever see his tattoos again. They were mesmerizing, in a way. I only had the one, but I’d always been fascinated by the idea of them and the stories they told. What I really wanted was to see all of them and try to understand his appeal to each one—I wanted to see them for longer than a few minutes, and without someone else’s blood splattered all over them.
I led us further away from the door, just in case Star could hear us. “She’s okay.”
“Well, she could’ve been hurt.”
“I know.”
“Like, really hurt. What if someone had tried to do something to her while she was passed out or too drunk to say anything?”
“I know.”
“She won’t fucking listen to me, Emerson. That fucking terrifies me.”
“I know.”
“I don’t know what else to do.”
I slowly placed a hand on his shoulder and gripped it gently. “You answered her call, and you showed up in the way you could. You keep showing up, you keep supporting her, and eventually, one day, she’ll thank you for being there.”
He grimaced. “Will she, though? If something happened to her, I don’t know what I’d do.”
“Sure you do. You’d be there for her, and you’d answer her call. I had to learn a really hard lesson a few years back with my brother. I did everything I could think of to try to change his mind, to get him to understand and start thinking ahead, or even start thinking at all. He never did. But I answered every call, and I worried myself almost to death. All I could do was support him however I knew how, be there for him, and wait for him to figurehimself out.” I shrugged. “I couldn’t change him, just as much as he couldn’t change me. I had to let him make his bad decisions. I never enabled them, but I couldn’t make his mind up for him, either. I did everything right, and I made it very clear I was there for him. I went to hell and back for him. Ultimately, he had a journey, and he had paths laid out for him to take. I couldn’t force one path over the other.”
His face relaxed as he took in everything I was saying. His arms fell to his sides, and his shoulders came down just before he turned around and sat on the edge of his bed. “I’m sorry that you went through that with your brother. I guess I’m just scared of failing her. I don’t want her to know just how evil the people in this world can be just yet.”
Taking a seat right beside him, I sighed. “Yeah, the world is cruel. She’s going to find out one way or another. As decent humans and as siblings, our jobs are to support and protect. But we can’t be expected to shield them completely. That’s not within our capabilities. That’s not withinanyone’scapabilities.”
“I know you’re right. I just feel like the only way I can protect all of them is to shield all of them from everything awful and horrible. You know firsthand what I did to protect Elio and Crescent.”
“I do. I also don’t think you’ve taken care of yourself like you’ve taken care of them.”
He turned to me, his grimace falling back into place. “You don’t know shit about me. I’m fine, Emerson. I don’t need you to tell me whether I really am or not.”
I held my hands up in surrender. “I never said you weren’t fine. I just said I don’t think you’re taking care of yourself as much, or as often as you take care of your siblings. If you don’t take care of yourself, how can you properly be there for others?”
He made atsksound, looking away from me.
Instead of letting him avoid me, I turned more toward him. “I see it in your eyes, Moon. The exhaustion you carry. If you don’t give yourself time to rest, it’ll swallow you whole. Trust me, I would know.”
“You just know a whole lot, don’t you? You barely know me. I barely know you. Don’t give me some kind of speech right now.”
