ONE
CALEB
Do you know how hard it is to wake up every morning and pretend you have the perfect life and just go about it like the pain you carry inside doesn’t exist?
No?
I do. That’s my daily grind.
Wake up. Skip breakfast. Shower. Go to class. Basketball practice. Rinse. Repeat.
Keep the mask on. Don’t let them see the cracks.
Except now, I have someone other than my dad and stepmom on my case about everything.
Miguel.
My stepbrother. My everything.
It is easier to believe I deserved him at the cabin over Christmas—just us, the snow, his hands on me, the world shrunk down to a fire and a bed that smelled like him.
I can pretend we existed in our own little universe where stepbrothers weren’t a sin, where no one cared who I kissed, and where I wasn’t the guy with a brain held together by duct tape and denial.
Back here, it’s different. Back here, there’s Dad’s expectations, school emails, coaches watching my stats, and teammates who think they know me. I’m the golden boy with a scholarship, not the guy who got to fall apart in his stepbrother’s arms.
So I tuck all of that away and tell myself he deserves someone who isn’t a walking red flag, someone who doesn’t have to hide in the shadows with him.
I wakeup to the buzz of my phone and the soft blue glow of his name on the screen. Our late-night conversation is still open, the last messages a lifeline I keep rereading like scripture.
Caleb
I’m a fucking mess, like, all the damn time.
And a lot to handle.
Miguel
You’re my mess.
And I can handle you, Caleb.
All day.
Now go to sleep.
But I can’t fall asleep for another hour after his last text. I lie there and overanalyzed everything—every word, every pause. I tell myself he deserves someone who isn’t broken. Someone who can walk beside him in daylight. Someone who isn’t me.
The alarm blares again, and I roll out of bed. The dorm’s cold, a chill that bites under your skin even through the thick cotton of my UCSC hoodie. My roommate’s already gone, leaving behind the smell of cheap coffee and the faint thud of the bathroom door down the hall.
I brush my teeth until my gums ache, splash water on my face, and stare at my reflection. Red-rimmed eyes. Bruised half-moons beneath them. The kind of face that looks like it’s been awake too long.
“Pull it together,” I whisper.
The mirror doesn’t answer. It never does.
By the timeI make it to my first class, my chest’s tight enough that I can feel my pulse in my throat. My therapist reminds me it’s anxiety, not a heart attack, but that doesn’t make it feel less real.
Anxiety is a bitch.
