Luis’s eyebrows go up slightly at that, but he doesn’t comment. “So you’ve known him a long time,” he says. “You said since you were kids?”
“Yeah.” I swallow. “He’s… my stepdad’s son. We were thrown together when I was ten and he was eight.”
“And when you say ‘support for yourself’…” He trails off, leaving it open.
I exhale slowly. “He’s been through some shit,” I say. “Like… I don’t even have words for how bad. Abuse. Neglect. The kind of childhood you see in documentaries and think, ‘there’s no way that happens in real life.’ It does. And it happened to him.”
Luis is very still, eyes on my face. “And where were you in that?” he asks, gently.
“Waiting,” I say. “His dad didn’t know where his mom took him. Or what she was doing. Or that she had this assh—this boyfriend who liked hurting kids. We didn’t know any of it. Then his dad got the call when he was eight, and he just showed up and moved in… it was different.” My jaw locks for a second. “I’ve been… trying to catch up ever since.”
“Trying to catch up to…?” he prompts.
“To the damage,” I say. “To keep pace with it. Patch it. He’s got a brain that wants to kill him. I’m trying to outrun it.”
Luis doesn’t flinch. “That sounds exhausting,” he says quietly.
I let out a short, humorless laugh. “Yeah. You could say that.”
“How long have you been… doing that?” he asks. “Feeling like it’s your job to outrun his brain?”
“Since we were teenagers,” I admit. “We were always close, even when we were just… brothers. He’d come to me when he was overwhelmed, and I’d distract him, get him out of the house,and help him breathe.” I swallow. “It’s like his brain tries to eat itself alive. Panic attacks. Nightmares. There was even a suicide attempt.”
The word tastes like metal.
“And you were there,” Luis says. Not really a question.
“Yeah,” I say. “Not for the attempt. Nobody really knew, because he hid it from everyone. I remember the whole summer he just kept his wrist bandaged or wore long-sleeve shirts, which was so out of place given where we live.”
“How old were you then?” he asks.
“Twenty-one,” I say. “He was nineteen.”
“And you’re twenty-four now?” Luis checks the intake form.
“Yeah.” I nod. “He’s twenty-two.”
“So,” he says, “for at least a few years, you’ve been carrying this… responsibility. Of keeping him here.”
“Longer,” I say. “It just got… louder after the attempt.”
He nods slowly. “Tell me about last week,” he says. “What happened that made you decide now was the time to come in?”
I let my head drop back against the couch for a second, staring at the ceiling. “He had an away game,” I say. “Reno. I couldn’t go because of work. We talked about it and made a plan. He took his weighted blanket and my hoodie and said he’d text when they got back to campus.”
“His phone died on the bus,” I say. “He got back, crashed, plugged it in, and passed out. Totally normal. Totally fine. He did everything right. My brain just didn’t get the memo.”
“What did your brain do?” Luis asks.
“I waited for the text,” I say. “Didn’t come. Called. Voicemail. Called again. Nothing. And then I was in the truck. Driving to campus. Like if I didn’t physically see him breathing, something catastrophic would happen and it would be my fault for not checking.”
Luis is quiet for a second. “Was this the first time you’ve done something like that?” he asks.
“No,” I admit, “first time over something that… small. Usually it’s… he sends a weird text. Or goes quiet after saying he’s having a bad day. Or doesn’t answer when he’s actively spiraling. Then I go. This time, he was just… asleep.”
“How did it feel,” Luis asks, “when you saw him there? Sleeping under the weighted blanket, phone charging, totally okay?”
Like my knees were going to give out.
