“I couldn’t explain it to him right,” he murmured.
“Hm?”
“Last night. I couldn’t make him understand. So I thought it would be better just to leave now. Get it over with.” He shook his head. “But now I’ve made it so much worse when all I wanted was for—all I wanted to do was not be a burden on them—”
“It’s going to be okay,” I said.
“She stole,” he replied.
“Sorry?”
“My mom. She stole money from her job.” A slow blink. “A lot. Over … years.” He swallowed. “If you don’t steal that much … and if you pay it back … you might not even have to go to jail. But she just … it was too much, for too long. We couldn’t pay it back. Sold everything we could but there was just … no way.”
I didn’t speak.
“She told them she did it ’cause she wanted us to have a better life. But that’s not … you can’t shortcut your way to one, can you? It doesn’t work like that.” A beat. “I always had everything I wanted. Fucking … video games and sneakers and shit, I never thought about … I never thought. I just lived my life and maybe if I’d …” His eyes went liquid. “I never questioned anything. I was selfish. And I didn’t learn anything at all, I just kept on being selfish. With everything. Especially with you.” He shook his head. “I’m sorry, Soph. I should never have come here in the first place. Shouldn’t have made friends, shouldn’t have gotten involved—”
“It’s not selfish to want people in your life who care about you.”
His mouth twisted. “I won’t let myself be anyone’s responsibility ever again. That’s the only way to be sure. That you’re not making things worse for everyone you love.”
It was quiet.
“Sounds lonely,” I said.
He looked up at me, eyes shiny. “But safe.”
I shifted my gaze to the IV stand next to August’s bed, followed the path of the clear tubing. When I spoke, it was carefully. I wanted to get this right.
“It hasn’t done you super well so far, has it? You’re on your own for like half a day and you fall into a basement.” A pause. “I mean, as far as metaphors from the universe go, it’s pretty heavy-handed.”
His lips twitched.
“I don’t know a whole lot about … anything,” I said, “but I feel like in general … it’s probably okay to need people. And to let yourself be needed by them too.” I swallowed. “It’s not just one-sided, you know. After Ciara—” I shook my head. “After my sister’s accident, I started babysitting Cadence. Every Tuesday. They had just moved in. Heather needed a babysitter, and I needed … something to help me get through to the next week. It worked both ways.”
He blinked, moisture gathering at the corners of his eyes. “I’m glad they were there for you.”
“So am I,” I said. “They’re here for you too.”
He shook his head. “Nobody needs me, though.”
“Cady needs someone to order pizza in funny voices. She needs someone worthy of the pink bunny quilt, which she obviously thinks you are. Harper needs someone who will look every time she points at something. They both need someone who can read to them in … the worst Scottish accent imaginable.”
He smiled the faintest bit.
“You help Heather out. You make her laugh. And Kyle …” I looked away, swallowed. “I think he’s probably really happy for the chance to know his brother.”
It was quiet. August looked toward one of the machines, marking his heartbeats with gentle beeps.
“It sounds good when you say it like that,” he said eventually.
“So let it be good.”
He was about to speak when Kyle reappeared, followed by a doctor and a nurse. They checked August out again, gave him some more medication after he numbered his level of pain, said they would be back to check in again in a little bit.
“And then we can see about getting you discharged,” the doctor said.
Kyle’s phone buzzed when they left.
“It’s Heather again,” he said. “I’m gonna—” I nodded, and he stepped out.
It was quiet for a bit, until August murmured: “I feel weird.”
“You look weird,” I replied automatically, and he smiled, a bit wobbly.
“You’re funny.”
“That was pretty elementary stuff.”
“No, you are.” He swallowed. “That’s what I like about you. One of the things. There’s lots of things.”
“You can tell them all to me sometime.”
“Would you let me?”
“Yes.”
He blinked once, twice. “I think they gave me the good stuff, Soph. I feel weird.”
“That’s okay. Just enjoy it.”
He smiled a little, shut his eyes. Extended the palm of his hand toward me, and I took it.
forty-eight
We left the hospital late that night—past midnight. The rain had lightened to a drizzle, but the roads were slick, each set of passing headlights casting a glow.
August fell asleep on the drive, propped up carefully in the back seat. His ankle and wrist were splinted, his arm hung in a sling. He would have to go back to the hospital in a few days to meet with an orthopedic doctor and get a hard cast put on his ankle.
Kyle was quiet as we drove. I had never seen him look so tired.
“I’m sorry,” I said after a while. There had been so much waiting around at the hospital, but I hadn’t said it to him, hadn’t been able to make myself say it. Maybe I was a coward, because it was easiest when Kyle couldn’t look over at me, when he had to keep his eyes on the road. “I took August to Megan’s house the first time. I showed him how to get in. We should never have gone there.” What if it had happened then? What if Brit had fallen through too? What if we all had? “It was really stupid.”
“It was.” He nodded. “But I’m just glad everyone’s okay.”
His gaze darted to the rearview mirror, then back to the road, and for a little while the swipe of the windshield wipers was the only sound.
“I got in an accident when I was in high school,” Kyle said eventually. “We were driving out in one of the fields and flipped the truck. I was banged up, but nothing too bad. I’d never seen my dad that mad, though. I thought … at the time I thought it was because of the car, but I get it now. How scared he must’ve been.” A pause. “I didn’t know, before having the girls, but it’s like a piece of you exists outside of yourself. It’s the most amazing thing, but also, just like … terrifying.” He adjusted his grip on the steering wheel. “I know I’m not, like, his parent, I know that, but …” He shook his head. “Growing up, I knew my dad would do anything for me. Felt like he always had my back, like he could literally fix anything. I’m not saying I can be that for August, that I even know how. But he should have … as close to that as I can be. He deserves that.”
I thought about the drive home from the party. I could hear Brit’s voice, talking to August as she drove. Telling him about Ciara.
I looked into the back seat now and wondered if there was any chance that August was awake. That he could hear what Kyle was saying.
But August’s face was relaxed in sleep.
“You should tell him,” I said, and then shook my head, because I could say it better: “I know you don’t owe me anything, but will you tell him? Please?”
“We owe you a lot, Soph,” Kyle replied. “And yeah. I will.”
* * *
The house was all lit up when we arrived, the front door open so we could see a rectangle of living room through the storm door, Heather moving inside.
Flora burst out of her house when we pulled into the Conlins’ driveway, Brit close behind.
Heather came out too, holding Harper, who was crying. Cady followed, standing on the front stoop, despite Heather’s instructions to stay inside.
Flora ran and hugged me, and Brit hovered behind, her arms folded, her mouth in a tense line.
“Is he okay?”
Kyle opened the car door and gently shook August’s shoulder.
“Buddy?”
August blinked blearily.
“Hey, we’re home.”
He nodded. “Where’s Soph?”
“Here,” I said, my voice sticking in my throat.
Kyle and Brit helped him out of the car and into the house, navigating into the living room and settling August on the couch.
“No one would go to bed,” Heather told me, bouncing Harper up and down while she wailed. “Everyone wanted to see Uncle August and no one wanted to sleep.”
Cadence’s face was full of worry. She stood at Heather’s side, clutching a sheaf of construction paper. “We drew you pictures,” she said, when August was situated.
“Thanks, Cady.” He took them with a lopsided smile, laid them on his lap, and leafed through them one-handed. “These are great.”
“I think it’s way past bedtime,” Heather said, shifting Harper around.
“Will you read to me?” Cadence asked August.
“I will,” I said, holding out a hand toward her. “August needs to go to bed too.”
Cadence looked up at me, brown eyes big and tired.
“Come on.” I wiggled my fingers. “We can read a chapter of Pooh.”
She nodded, took my hand, and we went inside. She settled against me, and it was only a couple of pages before she fell asleep.