Mentally I’m already on the plane, fuck all of it, I want to see him so bad, I don’t care about anything else.
‘Don’t you have class?’
‘Yes but—’
‘And y’all have a game tomorrow. You’re the captain, you can’t let the team down just to come see me.’
‘How do you know we have a game tomorrow?’
‘’Cuz your schedule is online, fucklenuck. You’re in the UK, not Outer Mongolia, but I bet they have the internet there too.’
Who knew I’d be dreaming of the day my little brother calls me a fucklenuck?
‘It can’t be that long until you head home for fall break, right?’ he says. ‘Are you coming home for Thanksgiving?’
‘I’m not sure.’ I’m still reeling at the fact we’re having this conversation at all. I have no idea what I’ll be doing in November, if I’ll even still be enrolled here. ‘They don’t have Thanksgiving here so I might not be able to get away.’
‘Christmas then. Be here before you know it, according to Mom. Reckon I’ll be out of the chair for good by then, might still need a walker for a few months but I could even be back in school after the holidays.’
A fresh swell of tears spills down my cheeks but happy ones, bittersweet anyway. We’re talking again and he doesn’t hate me.
‘Sorry you’re not getting more time off,’ I say, and he laughs. ‘But think how popular you’ll be when you go back. You know what they say, chicks dig scars.’
‘Even when they’re on your back and your butt?’
‘Especially then.’
He yawns and I do the mental math on the time difference. It’s only eight there and Chris has never been a natural morning person.
‘I’ve got to go,’ I tell him. ‘Promise me you won’t say anything to Mom and Dad? At least not until I get home.’
‘Dad’s in New York all week, some legal conference thing.’
He says it like it’s no big deal, but Dad has been spending more and more time away from the house. Not since summer, but for the last couple of years. Once Chris goes off to college, I wonder what will happen to him and my mom.
‘Mom went to the gym. She joined that fancy new one, out on Route 21? Right by Fightertown. Goes almost every day.’
This is a new development. Mom is hanging out at a gym nextto the Marine base? Maybe Dad isn’t the one I should be worried about after all.
‘Will you call me after you pick up the W tomorrow?’ he asks. ‘I was looking for the local channel to watch you play but I couldn’t find a damn thing.’
I manage a smile at the thought of his scouring the web, the assumption that we’re going to win.
‘College sports aren’t the same over here as they are at home. No cameras, no mascots, no cheerleaders.’
The gasp of horror that echoes down the line really does prove he’s feeling better. Chris has had a thing for the Dallas Cowboys Cheerleaders since before he could walk.
‘You could get someone to livestream it for me? Like that time I FaceTimed the Georgia game for Mom?’
‘I’ll see what I can do, I promise.’
‘’Kay.’
There was a time when I thought growing up with a little brother was a massive pain in my ass. Always tagging along, always screwing up my plans. Now I can’t keep him on the phone long enough. When he yawns again, I know it’s time to stop being selfish, but I wait for him to end the call. God knows I can’t be the one to do it.
‘I’m gonna go back to bed,’ he says. ‘I have PT this afternoon.’
‘Sounds good, bro.’
