Chapter 8 His Brother’s Keeper
HIS brOTHER'S KEEPER
Six weeks is long enough for your body to forget the immediate aftermath, but not nearly enough for your brain to let anything go.
Six weeks is also exactly how long it takes to turn a trauma ritual into a routine.
I wake before the alarm, always, because the punishment for not doing so is a dream about Cap’s last words or the wet, red halo that spread under his head on the ice.
I brush my teeth with the bathroom door open. I dress in the dark because Ash is never late and I refuse to be the guy who shows up second, not even for him.
The gym opens at five, but we get there at 5:04, every time, because Ash needs the extra four minutes to “decompress” and because I can’t face the idea of the machines being empty, the room sterile, the world too quiet.
The way the weights clang and rattle is as close as I get to church. I like to think Ash feels the same, but he never says it. We don’t really talk about feelings. Not yet.
Today is a bench day, and Ash is already stretching out on the mat when I arrive.
He’s wearing the old Huskies hoodie, the one that looks like it’s never been washed, and a pair of navy shorts that ride up whenever he does leg lifts.
I watch him for a minute, just a minute, because I like the way his calves knot under the skin, the way the vein jumps in his forearm whenever he adjusts his grip.
“Morning,” he says, voice rough as sandpaper.
“‘Sup,” I grunt back, and rack my own bar.
If anyone’s watching, it looks like two guys who barely know each other, who happen to show up at the same time and nod out of mutual athletic respect.
In reality, we know every inch of the other’s body, or at least what’s visible. We spot each other, hands ready at the bar, fingers ghosting just above the knurled steel.
When I lift, he counts, voice low and steady, never encouraging, just factual: “Five. Six. Seven. C’mon, D, don’t be a bitch.”
I rack on eight. He helps, just barely, but enough for our knuckles to brush, and for a second my arms go numb.
We switch.
His set is tighter, more controlled, but by rep six he’s fighting for it, and I can see the way his abs clench, the way his jaw goes tight enough to snap teeth.
“Push,” I say.
He does. Gets to ten, then slams the bar back with a grunt that’s half pain, half satisfaction.
“Beat you again,” he says, grinning.
“Form doesn’t count if you arch your back,” I say, but he knows I’m lying.
We finish the workout. We don’t towel off. We don’t stretch. We leave the sweat to dry on our skin, proof that we’re still here, still breathing, still in the fight.
The coffee shop is three blocks away.
It’s a micro-roaster in Capitol Hill, run by a guy who wears more eyeliner than my sister and has the hands of a concert pianist.
I like the place because nobody there gives a shit about hockey, or us, or the fact that six weeks ago we were on the front page of every major paper in the state.
Ash orders for both of us. “Two blacks, one with two sugars, one with one. And a cheddar-chive scone,” he says.
The barista nods, barely glances up. I watch Ash’s hands as he pays. He fumbles the change, a dime skidding across the counter. The tremor is less than it was a month ago, but it’s still there, a residual aftershock in the nervous system.
“Take the window?” I ask.
He shrugs, but heads that way. We always do.
He sips his coffee, stares at the people walking by in the rain. It’s classic Seattle, gray on gray, but there’s a weird kind of peace in it. The city feels smaller, like a snow globe that only shakes if you make it.
“You sleep?” he asks, eventually.
“Four hours,” I say. “Better than average.”
He nods. “Dreams?”
“Nothing memorable.”
He grins, “Liar.”
I want to say, “You’re in them,” but I don’t.
He tears off a piece of scone, chews, and says, “You see the group text?”
I shake my head. “Muted it.”
He pulls his phone. “Apparently, O’Doul and Raz are doing a poker night. Team only. Coach said ‘no media, no hangers-on, no drama.’ You in?”
“Yeah,” I say, even though I hate poker and hate O’Doul’s apartment more. “You?”
He shrugs. “It’s something to do.”
We sit like that for a while, watching the world be normal. Every so often, Ash glances at me, like he’s waiting for me to say something.
I want to ask him if he thinks about the shower incident, if it was just a fluke or if it meant something.
Instead, I break off a chunk of his scone, dip it in my coffee, and make a face at him. He rolls his eyes, but he’s smiling.
Eventually, we walk.
It’s part of the routine now.
We don’t go anywhere in particular, just make a loop around the waterfront, down to the edge of Elliott Bay, where the wind slaps salt spray in your face and the seagulls look like they’re plotting a coup.
Ash walks with his hands jammed in the pocket of his hoodie, head down.
I match his pace, close but not touching. Every so often, he’ll nudge me sideways, just to see if he can knock me off the curb.
I let him, because the alternative is feeling nothing.
At the pier, we sit on the cold concrete and stare at the ferries.
The water is dark and ugly, but the boats look perfect, white and clean, like they haven’t been touched by the shit world outside.
He’s quiet for a long time.
Then, “You know what I miss? Pre-game warmups. When Cap would blast that fucking country music and make us skate laps until half the team wanted to quit.”
I laugh. “He said it built character.”
“He said a lot of things.”
Ash’s voice goes quiet. “I keep expecting him to text. Like, I know he’s dead, but my brain still… waits for it.”
I nod. I get it. Some mornings, I wake up and expect to see Cap’s face at the rink, yelling at me to “move your ass, Webb.”
Ash takes a breath, looks at me. “You think it gets better?”
“No,” I say, honest. “But you get used to it.”
He chews that over. Then, softer, “I’m glad you’re here.”
I feel it like a punch, right below the ribs. “Me too,” I say.
We sit until the cold drives us back to the car. He rides shotgun, feet up on the dash, humming tunelessly to whatever shit song is on the radio.
I watch him, careful, and wonder if he knows how much I want to reach over and grab his hand.
I drop him at his place. He pauses, keys in hand, and says, “You want to come up? Got a new PlayStation.”
I almost say yes. I want to say yes. But I have therapy at one, and if I’m late Dr. Sharma will give me the look.
“Rain check,” I say. “Poker night?”
He nods, fake casual. “Yeah, poker night.”
He steps out, slams the door, and for a second I watch him in the rearview, hoodie up, hands deep in pockets, walking fast like he’s trying to outrun something.
—
The next day is a blur, cardio and therapy and the brutal monotony of pretending to be a functioning human being.
By evening, my legs are shot, and the only thing I want to do is eat peanut butter out of the jar and fall asleep to the sound of rain on the window.
Instead, I get a text from Ash, “u coming or what.”
The “what” is new. The old Ash would have just sent the emoji, maybe a single letter. I text back: “on my way. bring snacks?”
He replies, “already did. u bring the muscle.”
I smirk, but it’s real, and it hurts my face a little because I haven’t smiled that hard in weeks.
At O’Doul’s place, the usual suspects are already half-drunk, chips everywhere, cards sticky with beer and regret.
The walls are plastered with old Steelhawks photos, half of them with Cap front and center, grinning like an idiot.
Ash is in the kitchen, pouring shots. He waves me over, pours one for me, then clinks our glasses together.
“To Cap,” he says.
“To Cap,” I echo.
We down them, and the burn is sharp, but it’s better than the alternative.
O’Doul bellows from the living room, “Webb! Get your ass in here and lose me some money!”
I flop onto the couch next to Raz, who’s already lost his shirt and is down to a team-issued tank and what look like swim trunks.
Ash slides in on my other side, close enough that our knees bump. He smells like clean sweat and cinnamon, which I don’t understand but don’t question.
The game is bullshit. Everyone cheats, nobody cares.
The point is not to win, but to keep the noise level high enough to drown out the parts of our brains that want to think about what comes next.
Halfway through the first hand, there’s a knock at the door.
O’Doul gets up, muttering, “If this is another Jehovah’s Witness, I swear to god…”
But it’s not. It’s Caleb.
Cap's younger brother. The cops had cleared him early, phone records placed him at a study group in Pullman the whole night, backed up by one of his classmate who swore he never left.
He stands in the doorway, hands jammed in his pockets, hair matted under a Seahawks beanie, eyes rimmed in red.
For a second, nobody says a word. Then Ash, who’s always faster on the uptake, stands and says, “Hey, man. You want in?”
Caleb shrugs. “Never played.”
Raz, always the bleeding heart, waves him over. “Sit. We’ll teach you.”
He does, perching at the edge of the coffee table like he expects to be kicked out any second.
O’Doul deals him in. “You ever play Go Fish?”
Caleb cracks a smile. “Yeah.”
“Same concept, but with more drinking and less dignity.”
Ash gets up, brings a soda for Caleb, sets it down like a peace offering. He sits back down, but now there’s something different in his posture. He’s on, alert, ready to referee if the team gets too rough.
We play three hands. Caleb wins two, which Raz says is “beginner’s luck” but everyone knows is bullshit.
After a while, the jokes slow down, the energy dips, and the room gets heavy.
O’Doul tells a story about Cap’s first fight in juniors, how he took a punch to the face and spat blood on the ref’s shoe. Everyone laughs, but after the echo dies, nobody says anything for a long time.
Caleb looks at the floor. “He used to take me to the rink at night. Just us. He’d tell me, ‘If you can beat me at face-offs, you can have my car for a week.’”
I nod. “He was full of shit, you know.”