Page 5 of Coming Home

"There are two place settings, and you drove forty minutes across town on a Wednesday just to plate my dinner." I walked up to the island but refused to sit. "What else do you call it?"

"Being your sister." She set the tongs down with a sharp clack. "You're skipping meals. Don't bother lying to me, Ralph. I checked your fridge yesterday—it looked like a graveyard for good intentions. And Mom called me twice today, fully convinced you're surviving on protein powder and spite."

The mention of our mother lit a short fuse on a day that had already taken too much out of me. I marched past her and yanked the stainless-steel fridge doors open just to prove a point. In fairness, she was right. It was pathetic. A few untouched containers of nutritionist-approved meal prep, a bag of shriveled grapes, and half-empty bottles of electrolytes.

I slammed the doors shut. "I eat fine."

"Ralph."

"I said I eat fine, Athena!" The words tore out of me before I could pull them back. "I don't need you, or Mom, or anyone else pacing around my life like I'm already an invalid. I'm competing. I'm going to win. And everybody needs to stop building wheelchair ramps to a cliff I haven't even jumped off yet."

She didn't back down. Not an inch. She'd never once been intimidated by my size or my titles or my voice, and the foot of height I had on her had never once mattered.

"Nobody in this family gives a damn about the medal, Ralph!" Her voice stayed low, but her eyes were burning. "Not me. Not Mom. Not a single person who actually loves you cares about a number printed on a scoreboard. You are the only idiot alive who thinks his expiration date is stamped on a podium."

"That's real easy for you to say when it's not your life disappearing. I'm losing⁠—"

"Losing what?" She stepped into my space. "Your eyes? Yeah, Ralph. We know. We've been watching it happen. We've been sitting in those sterile waiting rooms, googling experimental surgeries, crying in our cars after your appointments while you walk out looking like a stone statue." Her voice broke, a sound she didn't try to control. "You think you're the only one mourning this? You think this is just your private war?"

I froze, my palms flat against the cold marble, pressing down so hard my fingers ached.

"I rearranged my entire life for you." Her voice dropped. "I moved across town. I screen your calls when reporters dial the wrong number. I drive here three times a week to cook food you won't touch and sit across a table from a brother who treats me like I'm the enemy." She wiped her nose with the back of her hand. "I keep a packed overnight bag in my trunk, Ralph. Every single day. In case you call and you need me. And you never call."

The tears came fast. Hers. They ran down her face and she didn't hide them. Just stood there in my kitchen and made me watch what I was doing to her. My little sister, crying over a brother too stubborn to let her in.

The only sounds left were the refrigerator and my own breathing.

"I'm leaving!" Athena wiped her face with the sleeve of her sweater, grabbed her keys off the counter, and walked past me toward the foyer. Her shoulder clipped mine. Hard.

"Dinner's on the stove," she said without looking back. "Eat it or don't. I'm done fighting you tonight."

The front door shut behind her. The sound died. Just me, the smell of her cooking, and two plates I didn't deserve.

I dragged a hand down my face and it came away wet. I swiped it off with my knuckle, hard enough to hurt, like I could erase it if I was fast enough.

The kitchen was too big. The house was too big. Everything I'd built to prove I'd made it now just echoed.

My phone vibrated in my pocket. I pulled it out and blinked at the screen until the name resolved.

Theo.

I pressed it to my ear. "Yeah."

"You good?" He could hear it in my voice. Fourteen years of swimming together, of sleepovers at his family's house. The man could diagnose my mood from a single syllable.

"Fine."

"You sound like hell, man."

"Theo. Don't."

"Alright, alright." I heard the familiar background noise of his life—the rustle of papers, the creak of his desk chair, his daughter babbling somewhere in another room. "Listen, the fan video from the trials is still making the rounds online, but the ESPN interview did what it was supposed to do. Shifting the narrative. We'll see how the press handles it over the weekend."

I rubbed the bridge of my nose, right where the dull ache of the tumor usually parked itself. "Good. Thanks."

"It's under control. We've handled worse." He paused, and when his voice came back, it was warmer. Heavier. The business partner was gone and the friend had walked in. "You eating?"

"Why is everyone running the same playbook on me today?"