21. Joseph
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
JOSEPH
The look on her face.
I will never forget the look on her face.
It's not anger. Anger, I could work with.
I could talk it down, wait it out, meet it halfway.
Anger means she cares enough to fight. This is worse.
This is Millie standing in a doorway, realizing that the person she trusted with everything cost her the one thing she wanted most. And underneath the shock, the betrayal, there's something that guts me completely.
Recognition.
Like a part of her always expected this. Like everyone she's ever trusted eventually proves her right for being careful.
I did this. I put that look on her face.
She turns and walks out of the room. Through the kitchen, past my mom who looks up with confusion. I hear her footsteps in the hallway. The front door opens. Closes.
For a moment, I'm frozen.
Every part of me wants to chase her down and explain. Tell her I didn't know. Tell her it was months before I ever knew her name.
But what do I say? That my sister called me crying at two in the morning, asking for help? That the last time she got like that, she ended up in a hospital for two weeks?
I panicked. That's the truth. I panicked, and I called the conductor, and I hated every word that came out of my mouth. But I said them because my sister was falling apart in front of me and I didn't know what else to do.
I didn't know Millie existed. I didn't know she was the one on the other side of that decision.
I'm not the kind of person who games the system. I don't use connections. I've never done anything like it before, and I've never done it since. But my sister was falling apart. I had to choose between doing nothing and doing something terrible.
I chose terrible. And when it worked, when Vivienne calmed down and stabilized, I let myself believe it was okay. Without even thinking about the consequences or what it would mean for the person who didn't get it.
I can't just stand here. I force myself to move.
To go after her. I take a few steps toward the door when Vivienne grabs my arm.
Her grip is too tight, fingers digging into my sleeve like she'll fall if I move.
Her other hand twists in the hem of her own shirt.
"Joseph. Where are you going? Are you going to go after her? It's not my fault, right?"
"Viv, I need to go talk to her."
"She heard what I said. She's going to hate me. She's going to tell the whole orchestra."
"She's not going to do that."
"You don't know that!" Her hands open in front of her, palms up, like she's laying the evidence out for me to see. "That's why when I heard the rumor that someone saw the result and it was her, I had to call you. She's good, she is. But she can't be better than me."
She presses a hand flat against her chest. "Not me, who's practiced most of her life. Not me, whose whole life is music!"
Her voice is getting louder, faster. "They just picked her because she's mute. They pity her." She turns away, then back, like she can't figure out where to put herself. "They somehow knew it was her behind that curtain."
A breath catches in her throat. Her eyes are bright and glassy, and her jaw trembles once before she sets it.
"The whole thing was rigged from the start. It was never fair!"
My stomach drops. Her paranoia is starting. The belief that feels absolutely real to her and has no basis in reality. In Vivienne's head right now, the world is conspiring against her, and the conspiracy makes perfect sense.
"Mei Mei, listen, that's not what happened. We can talk about this later, okay? But right now I need to go after Millie."
I walk toward the front of the house. My mom is in the hallway. "She left, Joseph. She just walked out. What happened?"
"Mom, I need to go."
Behind me, Vivienne follows, her voice climbing, her hands carving the air, every word coming faster than the last.
"Why is she taking everything from me? She was going to take First Chair, and now she's taking you, and this whole family is just letting it happen!"
"Vivienne, please-."
"She's a nobody! She's just some girl you got pregnant!"
Rupert, who's barely spoken all night, sets his cup down. The small sound of it is louder than it should be. "Vivienne." His voice is low and absolutely firm. "That's no way to speak about another person."
Something snaps in her face. Her eyes fill, and her hands start shaking.
"So you're all choosing her?! Everyone is choosing her over me!"
She's going into an episode. It's happening in real time. The acceleration. The volume. The way her thoughts are outpacing her ability to contain them.
"I'm always the problem. I ruin everything. I ruined the audition, and now I've ruined your relationship, and Mom and Dad probably wish I wasn't here."
"That is not true," Mom says. She moves toward Vivienne slowly, hands raised in front of her with palms open, the way you reach for someone who might bolt.
Her voice has changed too, gentler, lower, the voice she keeps for her hardest moments.
"Vivienne, look at me, baby. Look at me. That is not true."
"Then why are you all choosing her?!"
I stand there. Frozen. Torn in half.
Millie is out there. Alone. Pregnant. Hurting because of something I did. Every second I'm not going after her is a second she's getting further away, a second she's convincing herself that everything we built was a lie.
But Vivienne is right in front of me. Her eyes are too bright, and her hands won't stop shaking.
I've been here before. I've always been the one who calms her down.
The one who talks her off the edge. Mom tries, Dad tries, but it's always been me.
She listens to me. And if I walk out that door right now, I don't know what will happen to her.
I can't go after Millie.
I can't leave.
I can't do both, and the impossibility of it nearly takes me out.
"Viv." I keep my voice low. "Viv, look at me."
She stops pacing. She looks at me. Her mascara is running, her face is flushed, and she looks so young suddenly. And just like that, I'm back in the hospital room with her. Sixteen and hurt.
"I'm right here," I say. "I'm not going anywhere. Okay?"
"So you're choosing me?" Her voice breaks. Smaller now. Hopeful.
"I'm here because I love you and I care about you, Mei Mei."
She looks at me. The brightness in her eyes dims a little. She nods.
It takes a while. Mom sits with her on the couch.
Rupert makes tea. I stay close. Vivienne cycles through tears and apologies and more tears.
She's calmer now but fragile, the way she always is after the wave passes.
My mom strokes her hair and talks to her in that low voice, and eventually Vivienne's eyes start to close.
When she's finally still, curled against Mom with a blanket pulled up to her chin, I step into the hallway.
I take out my phone. My hands are shaking too.
Joseph
Please just let me know you're safe. Go home to the apartment. I'll stay at my mom's tonight so you can have space. Just please be safe.
I send it. I stare at the screen. No response. I stare longer. Nothing.
I put the phone in my pocket.
Mom and Dad help her to her old bedroom.
I watch from the hallway as Mom pulls the covers over her and smooths her hair back the way she's done since Vivienne was a kid.
Dad stands by the door, watching, making sure she's settled.
They leave the door cracked. The hallway light makes a thin gold line across the floor.
I go to the kitchen.
I sit at the table and put my face in my hands. The house is quiet. The clock on the wall ticks. I can hear Dad moving around, checking on Vivienne one more time. The sounds of a family that knows how to do this. We've done it before. A routine we had to learn.
Footsteps behind me. Mom appears in the kitchen doorway, looking tired, older than she did three hours ago. She sits across from me.
"Have you heard from Millie?"
"I texted her. She hasn't responded."
My own voice surprises me. It comes out hoarse, scraped raw.
She looks at me. The way she used to when I was a kid, and I'd come home from school pretending everything was fine, and she'd see through it in two seconds.
"You wanted to go after her."
"Yeah."
"Oh, Joseph." Her hand finds my shoulder. Just a little, but it helps.
"I couldn't leave Viv like that. You know what happens when she gets like this.
You remember when she was sixteen." I don't need to say more than that.
She's had episodes before and since, but that one was the worst. The one where she got hurt bad enough to end up in the hospital.
Mom was the one who found her. We don't talk about the details.
That day shook the family in a way we never fully recovered from.
Mom had nightmares for months after. So did I.
Mom's face tightens. She nods.
"You've always been like this, Jo. Even when you were little.
Always trying to hold everyone together.
When I was working those double shifts, and you were six years old, you used to make breakfast for both of us in the morning so I could sleep an extra thirty minutes.
Six years old." She shakes her head. "You've been taking care of people since before you knew what that meant. "
"Ma."
"And when Vivienne was diagnosed, you were in medical school, and you still came home every weekend. You still picked up the phone at three in the morning. You still sat in those hospital rooms."
"Someone had to."
"No. Someone chose to. You chose to. Every time."
I stare at the table.
"But now you have a baby coming, Joseph. You have Millie. You're building your own family." She pauses. "And I'm worried about you."
I look up.
"I'm worried that you think you have to carry everyone. Vivienne, me, your father, Millie, the baby. All of it on your shoulders. And one day it's going to be too much."
"I'm fine, Ma."
"You're not fine." She reaches across the table and covers my hand with hers. "Jo, you've always been the one smiling. Always. I'm convinced you came out of my womb laughing instead of crying. Every hard thing we've been through, you found a way to smile through it. You always smile."
Her voice drops. Her thumb brushes the back of my knuckles, slow, the way she used to soothe a fever. "But right now you're sitting in my kitchen, and I don't see it. I don't see the smile. What I see is a man exhausted, defeated, and it hurts me to see you like this."
I don't say anything. Because she's right.
"You can't save everyone, Jo. Not at the same time. And trying to will break you."
She's right. I know she's right. I've been treading water for months and calling it swimming. All my life, I've been showing up for everyone, and tonight I went under. I'm drowning, but I'm still trying to pull everyone else to shore, and there's no one pulling me.
"I'm scared, Ma," I say. And my voice cracks. "I'm scared I've already lost her. I've never met anyone like her. But I can't let Vivienne feel like I chose someone over her. I can't do that to her again."
Mom's hand tightens around mine. "I know you do.
That's who you are, Jo. You love big. You always have.
" She lets the words sit. Then she leans forward, close enough that I can see the lines at the corners of her eyes that weren't there a year ago.
"But loving two people doesn't mean you have to destroy yourself in between them.
Vivienne is our daughter. Your father and I are here.
We're not going anywhere. You don't have to carry her alone anymore. "
She sits back, the words landed where they needed to. Then, quieter: "Go text Millie. Make sure she got home safe."
I step outside. The cold hits sharp and clean, enough to wake me. I pull out my phone and text her again.
Joseph: Mills. Please. Just tell me you made it home safe.
Three minutes. I count every one.
Millie: I'm home.
Two words. That's it.
I close my eyes and lean against the wall. The brick is cold through my shirt, and I let it hold me up.
I go back inside. Mom is still in the kitchen, waiting.
"She's home," I say. "She's safe."
The relief on her face is instant. Her shoulders drop. She closes her eyes for a second. "Good. Okay. Good."
"Go to sleep, Ma. Get some rest."
She looks at me. "You should too."
I nod.
She doesn't believe me, but she goes anyway, squeezing my shoulder as she passes. Then it's just me, the slow tick of the clock, the cooling tea, and a house that feels, somehow, like it knows tonight broke open inside it.
I sit there. The quiet presses in.
I've always known what to do. In the OR, in a crisis, when someone's falling apart. I assess, I act, I fix. That's who I am. That's all I've ever been.
But now, I have no idea.