Chapter 28 #2
They left. The front door closed behind them, and I was standing in a backyard I didn't belong in, holding a plastic hockey stick, while a seven-year-old demanded I keep playing.
So I kept playing.
Sarah called us in an hour later. She'd recovered from earlier and had transformed into a suburban general, commanding the kitchen with the efficiency of someone used to feeding a family on a deadline.
"Joel, you can set the table if you want. Plates are in the cabinet by the fridge. Owen, wash your hands. Lily, off your phone."
I set the table. It was a strange relief to have a task, something concrete to do with my hands. I counted plates, laid out silverware, folded napkins into neat triangles because that was how I'd been taught at sponsor dinners and I didn't know any other way.
Lily appeared at my elbow. "You fold them like that?"
"Is there another way?"
She picked one up and set it under the fork without folding it at all. "We just put them down."
My neat triangles were precise and identical, the kind of thing that belonged at a sponsor dinner. Hers belonged on this table.
"Noted," I said, and unfolded the rest.
Red and Derek came back just as Sarah was pulling a casserole out of the oven. The meeting was written on Red's face before he said a word: the careful blankness, the tension in his jaw, his eyes fixed somewhere past all of us.
Derek went straight to Sarah, murmured something against her hair. She nodded and squeezed his arm.
Red stood in the doorway of the kitchen, his good hand hanging at his side.
I crossed to him before I could talk myself out of it and pulled him into a hug.
He went rigid. We were in his brother's kitchen, and Derek was right behind him, and this was not how Red had planned to do this.
But I didn't let go. I held on, one hand on the back of his neck, the other flat between his shoulder blades, and after a few seconds he stopped fighting it.
His forehead dropped to my shoulder. His good hand fisted in the back of my shirt.
We stood like that while Derek moved past us to Sarah, while the kids' voices carried in from the other room, while the casserole cooled on the counter. I didn't say anything. I didn't know what to say. But I could do this. I could hold him up while he figured out how to keep standing.
When he finally pulled back, his eyes were dry but red-rimmed.
"It was bad," he said.
"I’m sorry," I said.
Dinner was loud in the way family dinners were supposed to be loud.
Owen talked through the entire meal about his hockey game in the backyard, how he'd scored a hundred goals, and how his goalie was terrible.
Lily corrected him whenever his numbers got too outrageous.
Sarah kept the conversation moving, filling silences before they could settle.
The casserole was too salty, and the vegetables were overcooked, but it was the best thing I’d eaten in weeks.
Red picked at his food. He answered questions when asked and laughed at Owen's jokes, and did a decent impression of someone who was fine.
Under the table, I put my hand on his knee. His fork stopped moving for a second. Then he covered my hand with his, briefly, before pulling away.
After dinner, the kids went to bed, and Derek and Sarah retreated to their room. The house went quiet in stages, footsteps overhead fading into silence, until it was just me and Red on the couch in the living room.
He'd be sleeping here tonight, on the pull-out, while I took the guest room he'd given up for me. Another way he'd refused to let me take care of him.
Red's eyes were on one of the photos on the wall, one of his dad in a Lobos sweatshirt, grinning, holding a tiny version of Red on his shoulders.
"He worked at a tire shop," Red said. "Twelve-hour shifts, six days a week.
We couldn't afford hockey. Couldn't afford any of it.
" He was quiet for a moment. "He came home one day with a bag of used gear.
Most of it didn't fit right. The helmet had someone else's name scratched out on the back.
" His finger traced along the edge of his knee.
"I never asked where he got it. I was too excited to ask. "
I stayed quiet and let him sit with it.
"He was a good dad," Red said. His voice cracked on the last word. "He really was."
My hand twitched toward him, but there was still tension in the air, the residue of earlier.
"I'm sorry," I said. "About the couch."
Red turned toward me. "What about it?"
"I was trying to make it easier. I shouldn't have."
Red's eyes dropped to his bandaged hand. He flexed his fingers experimentally. The gauze had come loose at the edge, unraveling where it wrapped around his palm.
"Can you help me with this?" he asked.
"Yeah. Where's the kit?"
"In my bag."
I found it and came back. Red had shifted to face me, his hand resting on his knee. I sat down closer than before and took his wrist, turning it gently.
"Does it hurt?"
"Not much. Just tight."
I unwound the old bandage slowly, keeping my touch light. The skin underneath was healing but still angry, the surgical site pink and puckered.
I cleaned the area with antiseptic and dabbed it dry, then wrapped fresh gauze around his palm, around his wrist, tucking the end under so it would hold.
When I finished, I didn't let go. His fingers curled against my palm, and I held his hand in both of mine.
"I'm going to tell Derek," Red said. "Tomorrow, probably."
"Do you want me there?"
Red nodded and leaned his head against my shoulder. "Stay with me for a while? Before you go to the guest room?"
"Yeah." I pressed my cheek against his hair. "I can do that."
We sat like that until the house went dark around us, not talking, just breathing together, while the photos on the walls watched over us.