I hesitate, but only for a moment. “If that’s what she wants.”
“She does,” he says, sounding convinced. “Even if she doesn’t say it, I know she does. She wants to be here, even if we forgot about her.”
“We didn’t—”
“Didn’t we?”
He has a point. “There was nothing we could have done. You know that. Erica told us that. Unless there was evidence of abuse, she—”
“We have scars,” the Kid says. “Just because you can’t see them doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”
I sigh. “We’ll do our best, okay? That’s all anyone can ask of us.”
“I hate her.”
He’s not talking about Izzie. “You don’t,” I tell him. “Because you aren’t capable of hating anyone. That’s not who you are.”
He shakes his head furiously. “I am. I can. You don’t know that about me, and that’s okay, but I do. I hate her, Bear. I hate her for everything she’s done to me. To Izzie. To you. We could have—”
“We’ll have to take care of her.” And I’m not talking about Izzie either. “You know that.”
He feels like he’s thrumming, like everything under his skin is all electric. “We don’t owe her shit.”
“No. But it’s the right thing to do.”
“We—”
“Ty. You know it is. There’s no one else.”
“She wouldn’t have done the same for us. You know that.”
“All the more reason for us to do it. Because we’re better than that.”
“We don’t have to be.”
“We do. We will. We are.”
“I hate it. I hate her.”
I don’t know what else to say.
“Bear?”
“Yeah?”
“I think I’m going to be sad now,” he says, his voice breaking just a little. “Is that okay?”
“Yeah, Kid. That’s okay.”
He cries then. It’s quiet and soft, and it’s only a moment later that my neck is wet. The sky is streaking further, and there’s the first couple of stars appearing overhead. I watch them as a tear slowly slides its way down my cheek. It’s just one, but it’s more than I told myself I would ever give over her again. But it’s there, and I’m the strong one. I’ve always tried to be. Because I’m his big brother. For the longest time, I was all he had. It’s not like that anymore, and we’re being pulled in different directions. It was always going to happen one day—that’s the downside of inevitability. But it’s here now, and though we both know I’ll never let him go, I am going to have to take another step back. He’ll be within reach. Always. But it’s still another step away.
THE GREEN Monstrosity is quiet. It’s late, and everyone has gone home. Ty has gone home too. To Dom’s house. He was smiling and laughing by the time he left, and sure, we hugged a little harder than normal before he went, but Ben was on Dom’s shoulders, and Ty’s hand was in his when they walked down the path toward the front gate. The Kid looked back, just once, and that was it. He was gone.
Izzie’s asleep, but only after wrangling a promise from Tyson that he’d come back tomorrow. “Yeah, kid,” he’d said to her. “I’ll be back. We got stuff to do, you know?”
She’d rolled her eyes. “And then maybe you can get the rest of your stuff out of my room. There’s still a PETA poster on the wall. I don’t know how you aren’t embarrassed by it. I know if I were you, I’d be embarrassed. But I’ve never been a meatless wonder under the thrall of a terrorist organization that disguises itself by claiming to advocate for the rights of animals.”
“There’s three of them now,” Creed moaned in the background. “Why are they like this? I already got used to Bear and Ty, and now I have to do it again?”