Page 39 of Catcher

That damn parking lot.

The way she looked at me as if I wasn’t already broken beyond fixing.

My decision to fly home, back to a place I don’t belong anymore.

I drag a hand down my face and push off the door, moving through the apartment in the same controlled rhythm I started the morning with, except now everything feels heavier, slower, like I’m walking through something thick.

I strip off my cut, toss it over the chair, and turn on the shower hot enough to burn. Steam beads on the mirror until my reflection disappears. The heat rinses off sweat, grime, and the stink of the bar, but it doesn’t touch the rest of it. That never washes off. I stay under longer than I need to, head tipped forward, hands braced on the tile, letting the heat beat down on the back of my neck like it can knock something loose inside me.

Eventually, I shut it off, dry myself, and get dressed without thinking.

Sleep comes in pieces. The kind where you close your eyes and the dark fills up with faces and sounds, and you wake up already tense as if you’ve been fighting in your dreams.

When my alarm drags me out, it feels like I never really went under.

The airport is smaller than the ones I’m used to. Quieter, less rushed and chaotic, with none of that constant push of bodies moving in every direction.

Mercy Lake, Minnesota, feels different the second I step off the plane. The air is cooler and cleaner, not heavy like New Orleans with no wet heat clinging to your skin, no sour mix of booze and piss baked into the sidewalk. It smells like trees and pavement that haven’t been drowned in last night’s bad decisions. This place breathes slower, as if it’s got time and isn’t running from anything.

I adjust my bag over my shoulder and walk through the small terminal, boots echoing faintly against polished floors, eyes taking in the familiar without letting it hit too deep.

Everything I left behind is still sitting where I dropped it, or close enough that my body recognizes it before my head can argue.

I step outside, the crisp air hitting my face, and pull my phone from my pocket. There’s only one number I dial, and it rings twice.

“Yeah?” his voice comes through, steady, familiar.

I don’t say anything for a second, then take a breath. “Hey, brother. I’m at the airport. Could use a ride.”

There’s a pause.

Just a beat as my brother processes the fact that I’m back in our hometown. I can hear a warm smile in his voice as he says, “On my way,” before the line goes dead.

I lean against the metal railing near the pickup area, watching two cars roll in and out, engines idling, people greeting each other with smiles and easy conversation.

It feels… distant. As if I’m watching something I don’t quite belong to anymore. Truth is, I don’t.

Thirty minutes later, a truck I’d recognize anywhere pulls up with my brother behind the wheel. He hasn’t changed much. Still looks the same way—solid, confident, easy in his own skin in a way I never really was. I toss my bag into the truck bed, open the passenger door, and slide into the cab.

“Damn,” he says, looking me over with a half grin. “Didn’t think you’d actually show.”

I huff out a breath that might pass for a laugh. “Didn’t either.”

“Good to see you, man,” he mutters.

“You too.”

He puts the truck in gear. The drive starts quietly. Not uncomfortable but… easy. The kind of silence that doesn’t need filling.

“So,” he says after a minute, pulling out onto the road, “Mom and Dad know you’re here?”

“No.”

He glances at me, one brow lifting slightly. “Figured.”

I look out the window, watching the trees blur past, the familiar stretch of road leading back into a life I walked away from years ago. “Didn’t want to say anything,” I add. “In case I didn’t make it.”

He nods once, not pushing for more of an explanation.