Chapter 44
CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR
MIA
Islow the car to a crawl as I pull into the cul-de-sac I grew up on, the tyres crunching over loose gravel. The house looks the same, down to the faded blue door and the worn welcome mat Mum refuses to replace because it’s not that bad, Mia.
Everything feels the same, but yet nothing is. It’s weird and disorientating.
I haul my bag out onto the curb and take a second to steel myself before heading up the path. It’s not just the appointment looming tomorrow, it’s the tone in Mum’s voice when she called. Tired. Frayed. Like she’s been holding up the sky on her own for too long.
The door flies open before I even knock.
“Mia!” Mum pulls me into a hug so tight I can barely breathe, and for once, I don't complain.
“Hi, Mum,” I whisper into her shoulder.
Behind her, Ben leans against the doorframe, arms folded, his trademark easy grin a little tighter than usual. “You made it, Squirt.”
“Don’t call me that,” I mutter, dragging my bag inside.
“No promises.” He ruffles my hair as I pass. It doesn’t matter that I’m in my twenties now and he’s nearly thirty years of age. He still treats me like the baby of the family.
Once I’ve dropped my bag at the bottom of the stairs, I make my way into the lounge and sink down into the sofa, feeling the weight of the last few months press down all at once.
Home always does that to me; peels back the layers until I’m just a kid again, sitting in this same spot, pretending the world was small enough to be safe.
“How’s Dad?” I ask, even though I’m scared to hear the answer.
Mum sighs as she moves toward the kitchen. “Same. Worse, maybe. He’s been forgetting little things. Where his keys are. What day it is. Got confused about the kettle last week… swore he didn’t know how to use it.”
Ben’s jaw ticks, like he’s holding back words.
I wrap my arms around myself. “And he agreed to the tests?”
Mum nods. “Reluctantly. But yes. Tomorrow morning.”
The silence that follows is heavy, like storm clouds settling over us.
Ben breaks it with a forced grin. “Right, so, Chinese takeaway or pizza? Mia, your pick.”
I manage a smile, grateful for the out. “Pizza. Extra mushrooms.”
Ben groans. “Disgusting.”
“Don’t be a child,” Mum says, smacking him lightly with a tea towel.
And just like that, we slip into the old rhythms; the teasing, the bickering, and pretending everything’s fine. But I feel the cracks under the surface with every beat.
That night, long after Mum’s gone to bed and Ben’s retreated to the guest room, I lie awake staring at the ceiling of my childhood bedroom.
The posters of old bands still peeling at the corners, the wardrobe door doesn’t shut properly, and the radiator clanks every ten minutes like it’s alive.
I used to think a monster lived in it when I was little.
I flip onto my side and grab my phone.
Mia: You awake?
The three dots pop up almost immediately.
Dylan: Always for you. You okay?
I hesitate, then type.
Mia: Can I call?
Before I can overthink it or he has a chance to answer, I hit the dial button.
Dylan picks up on the first ring. “Hey, beautiful.” The sound of his voice breaks me. Tears well up before I can stop them.
“Hey,” I manage, my throat tight.
There’s a beat of silence like he’s giving me room to breathe.
“You’re not okay,” he says gently.
“No.” I swipe at my eyes. “I don’t think I’m ready for this.”
“You don’t have to be ready. You just have to be there.”
“I know but,” I bite my lip hard, willing the tears to hold back. “He’s not the same. He’s already not the same.”
Dylan’s breath hisses softly over the line, like he’s hurting with me.
“I watched him tonight,” I whisper. “He forgot Ben’s name for a second. Just blanked. My mum tried to cover but I saw it. He’s slipping away and he’s still right here.”
“Mia,” His voice is raw. Rough. “If I could take this away from you, I would.”
I close my eyes, soaking in his sound, it’s the steadiness I can’t find in myself right now. “I don’t know how to help him,” I say. “I can’t fix this.”
“You’re helping just by being there.” He pauses. “You always show up for the people you love.”
Something twists painfully in my chest. “Dylan…” I whisper, and there’s a canyon between everything I want to say and what actually comes out.
“I love you,” he says, so simply, so surely, like it’s a truth he carries.
The tears spill over now, hot and unstoppable. But still, I can’t say it back. I’m too afraid of needing him this much. Too scared of what it means to let someone in all the way. When I stay silent, Dylan doesn’t push. He just breathes into the phone, slow and steady, like a lighthouse in a storm.
“You don’t have to say it, baby,” he says finally, voice thick. “I know. I know you feel it.”
I squeeze the phone tighter, my heart breaking in a way I don’t know how to fix. “I miss you,” I whisper.
He lets out a shaky laugh. “Miss you more.”
We stay like that, connected by a fragile thread of words until I finally drift into a restless sleep, phone clutched tightly in my hand.
The morning comes too fast. The house hums with quiet tension as Mum packs a bag and checks the paperwork for the appointment. Ben sits at the kitchen table, pretending to read the back of the cereal packet but not fooling anyone.
Dad comes downstairs in joggers and a T-shirt, blinking sleepily at us all like he knows he’s the centre of gravity but doesn’t know why. “Big day?” he asks, voice uncertain.
Mum pastes on a bright smile. “Just a check-up, love. Nothing to worry about.”
He nods, looking vaguely reassured, but when he catches my eye, there’s a flicker of something else. A shadow. A crack. And I realise with a jolt that he knows. Somewhere inside, he knows he’s losing pieces of himself.
It guts me. Rips the air right out of my lungs.
But I smile too, because that’s what we do.
We love him enough to lie. “Well, I’d better get dressed then,” Dad says as he heads back upstairs.
We all breathe a little sigh of relief, relief that he’s not putting up a fight.
Nor has he questioned why both of his adult children are now back home, and more importantly, accompanying him to the appointment.
He appears in the kitchen ten minutes later with his work suit on, his top button done up, and adjusting his tie. This is the man I remember. Put together and in control. My heart cracks a little.
“Come on, Dad,” I say, grabbing his coat. “I’ll sit with you.”
He grins like a kid being offered a prize. “My favourite girl.” Ben rolls his eyes behind him.
And I let him. Because for a little while longer, we can pretend. We can pretend I’m not the one that always disappoints him. We can forget he hates that I didn’t follow the path he’d so carefully laid out for me.
We can imagine that all of this is not happening to our family.