Chapter 49 Caleb #2
“I feel like we’re in a snow globe,” I say quietly. “Minus the snow.”
“Minus the tiny children shaking us for fun,” Miguel adds.
“That’s debatable,” I say. “You’re extremely shakable.”
He snorts.
We’re not touching at first. Our shoulders are a few inches apart, hands resting between us on the comforter. It feels… spacious. Like there’s room for both of us and all our thoughts without crowding.
After a while, he turns his head to look at me. “What’s happening in there?” he asks softly, nodding toward my forehead.
I consider lying. Then I remember the deal, the net, and the safety plan crinkling in the pocket of my hoodie draped over the bedpost.
“Mixtape,” I say. “Side A is ‘holy shit, this is beautiful.’ Side B is ‘What if you fuck it up? What if you slip again? What if you waste it?’”
He hums. “Honest,” he says. “Volume on Side B?”
“Five,” I say. “Maybe six when I future-trip.”
“Okay,” he says. “What’s the volume on ‘I don’t want to slip’?”
The question sits there for a second.
I think about the night in the bedroom. The pills. The blur. The way his face flashed through my head like a warning light. The treehouse plan showed up in that mess like a glitch.
“Higher,” I say slowly. “Seven? Eight?”
He nods, letting the answer hang between us. “That’s important,” he says. “We should name that more.”
“I’m scared,” I admit. “Of… all of it. Being this happy. Getting this view. It feels like I’m tempting fate. Like the universe is going to see me enjoying myself and go, ‘Oh, absolutely not.’”
Miguel snorts quietly. “The universe doesn’t give a shit about us,” he says. “Which is depressing but also… kind of freeing. This trip isn’t a reward or a test. It’s just… a thing we’re doing. On purpose.”
I roll my head to look at him and his face is half in shadow, half lit by fairy lights. He looks tired in the way humans get tired, not in the way that makes my heart stop. There are faint lines at the corners of his eyes that weren’t there when we first met. I feel weirdly proud of them.
“Are you scared?” I ask.
“Yeah,” he says immediately. “Absolutely terrified.”
“Of what?” I press.
Letting out a slow blow of breath. “Of you slipping again,” he says.
“Of me missing it. Of us being up here and something going sideways and suddenly I’m recreating the worst night of my life, but with more pine cones and fucking raccoons as EMTs.
” His throat works. “Of going back and having everything feel… normal for, like, a week, and then your brain sucker-punching you again.”
Guilt spikes, sharp and stupid. “I’m sorry,” I blurt, even though I know I’m not supposed to apologize for existing.
Miguel groans softly. “We just talked about this,” he says. “You don’t have to say sorry for my feelings. They’re mine. You can say, ‘That sucks,’ and ‘I hate that for you,’ and ‘Thank you for telling me,’ but you don’t have to carry it.”
“I’m trying,” I say.
“I know,” he says. “And I appreciate it.”
Silence again, but this time it’s less heavy. My brain starts to drift toward school because apparently that’s what it likes to torture me with lately. “Have you thought more about… the team?” I ask, voice small. “About me going back? Or not?”
He makes a face. “I’ve thought about you going back in a way that won’t kill you,” he says. “But it’s your call. Always.”
I stare at the square of sky and the star has been joined by two more. “I keep thinking about how they’re going to see me,” I admit. “The guy who vanished mid-quarter, who had The Incident, who had the ambulance whisk him away. The guy who tried to check out early.”
Miguel winces. “Yeah,” he says. “That’s… probably going to be part of how some people see you. For a while. Humans are nosy. And you for sure have some gossipy bitches on the team.”
“I don’t want that to be my whole… thing,” I say. “On the court. In class. Even in my own head. I don’t want ‘attempted suicide’ to be my primary stat.”
That makes him shift closer, finally closing the distance so our shoulders brush.
The contact is a quiet anchor. “Then we keep building other stats,” he says.
“Good teammate. Solid shooter. Guy who brings snacks. Dude who survived and went to therapy and now knows more about DBT than half the counseling center.”
I huff out a laugh. “We’re circling back to ‘IOP summer school’ again.”
“Exactly,” he says. “You did extra credit in staying alive. That’s not nothing.”
I swallow. “I’m scared of… disappointing everyone,” I say. “You. Mom. Dad. Dr. K. Coach. The team. Like if I don’t go back, I’ve wasted all this talent and money and time. And if I do go back and I’m worse than before, I’ve proved everyone right who thought I was a risk.”
Miguel is quiet for a long moment. I can almost see him running through a Luis-informed script in his head.
“What if we decouple ‘staying alive’ from ‘playing basketball’ for a second?” he says. “Like, survival is the baseline. Non-negotiable. School and sports are… electives.”
“That’s blasphemy,” I mutter, but a tiny part of me is thrilled.
“You can go back part-time,” he says. “You can play in a rec league, not for the school. You can take a medical leave and come back when you’ve had more time to heal. You can decide not to go back and let me worry about things and still be worth oxygen.”
I blink up at the skylight. “Sounds fake,” I say.
“Pretty real from where I’m lying,” he says. “You’re allowed to figure it out one semester at a time. One season at a time. You don’t have to commit to your entire future while we’re literally in a tree.”
“That’s very wise,” I say. “Therapists really are rubbing off on you.”
Caressing my face, he smirks. “I’m multifaceted,” he says. “Hot, wise, great with wiring.”
“And extremely humble,” I add.
“Obviously,” he says.
We lapse into quiet again. The wind picks up, brushing past the treehouse and making it creak, just enough to remind me we’re not on the ground. My stomach flips once, but it passes.
“Do you… regret it?” I ask before I can stop myself.
He turns his head. “Regret what?”
“Us,” I say. “All of this. The stepbrother thing. The Halloween and Christmas vacation thing. The… almost dying thing. Would your life be… better? Easier. Safer. If you had not fallen in love with me when we were teenagers?”
He exhales slowly. “Easier?” he says. “Probably. Safer? Maybe. Better?” He shakes his head. “Not even fucking close.”
The answer lands so hard I feel it in my ribs. “You say that now,” I murmur. “You haven’t seen me try to parallel park on a cliff yet.”
That makes him snort. “I saw you survive your own brain trying to kill you,” he says. “Everything else is a side quest.”
“I’m scared of slipping,” I say, because at this point, we’re just laying out all the cards.
“Of going home and slowly letting everything slide. Missing one appointment. Then two. Skipping group. Stop journaling. Letting the volume creep up until it’s screaming again and I’m too tired to tell anyone. ”
Miguel shifts, nodding. “I’m scared of that too,” he says. “But we have more guardrails now. Not just ‘Miguel freaks out and kicks in a door’ guardrails. Actual… team rails.”
I picture them, one by one. Mom, arms crossed, unapologetic about calling me out.
Dad, with his envelope and his “investment in my continued existence.” Dr. K with her annoying worksheets and her gentle, relentless “let’s look at that.
” Luis with his legal pad and his “you’re not God, Miguel.
” The group circle. The raisin. The safety plan on the fridge.
The copy in my bag. The copy in the glove compartment.
“We’re not doing this alone,” I murmur.
“Nope,” he says, popping the p. “Much as my inner martyr would love to take the starring role, we’ve got an ensemble cast.”
I choke out a laugh. “So what, this trip is opening night for a new season?” I ask. “Season Two: Less Dying?”
“Terrible title. But yeah. Something like that.”
The sky through the skylight darkens from navy to ink. More stars appear, faint but stubborn. The trees creak and whisper. My body sinks into the mattress.
We end up drifting closer until our legs tangle and my head finds the spot on his chest that fits like it was built there. His hand slides into my hair, fingers gentle. Under my ear, his heartbeat is steady.
“Volume?” he murmurs one more time.
“Three,” I say. “Maybe two-point-five.”
“Nice,” he says softly. “Mine’s like… four. But manageable.”
“We’re in range,” I whisper.
“We’re in a tree,” he corrects.
“Both can be true,” I say.
I listen to the wind and the waves and the stubborn beat of my own heart refusing to quit. I think of the kid I was, standing in a parking lot staring up at a secondhand treehouse in someone else’s yard, wanting.
I think of the hospital ceiling full of holes.
Then I think of this one—wood and sky and faint stars—over my head instead.
“I’m scared,” I say into his shirt.
“Of the animals?” he says, hand smoothing down my back. “Me too. I feel like I’m gonna wake up as the starring role in some kid movie where the birds are forcing me to sing.”
“I’m glad we’re here,” I add, so quiet I almost don’t hear it.
He kisses the top of my head. “Me too, hermoso,” he says. “Me too.”
For once, the sentence doesn’t feel like a lie.
I fall asleep to the sound of trees and his breathing, and when the waves of panic lap at the edge of my mind, they’re smaller.