Milán
I stop at the half-open door of Rory’s bedroom. He’s sitting on his bed, feet perched on his desk chair, eyes firmly on the science textbook he has balanced on his chest.
Nothing about his room says a teenager lives here.
It’s neat to the point of impersonal. There are no pictures or posters on any of the generic, light gray walls.
No plants on the windowsill. No books on the shelves.
No photos. No trophies. The only things that give any indication that somebody lives here are Rory’s backpack stashed in the corner and his art supplies by the window.
I’m one to talk. My stuff is mostly still in boxes, piled in the corner of my own room.
I don’t want to care about the fact that Rory’s room looks less personal than a prison cell at this point.
And yet, surprisingly, I find that it bothers me. It feels like more failure when it comes to him, and there’s already plenty of that to go around, all achieved in the course of a mere three months. It’s actually pretty impressive if you think about it.
Anyway.
Here goes nothing.
I give the door a cursory knock and wait until Rory looks up from his book.
“I ordered dinner,” I say.
He puts the book down and sits up.
I take one more look around the room.
“You know, if you want to paint the walls, we can do that,” I say.
He takes a startled look around like he’s never even paid attention to his surroundings before he meets my gaze.
“Why?” he asks in a perplexed tone.
I shrug. “It’s your room. I figured you might want to make it your own. It’s a bit sterile right now. No real character. We can change that, though. Maybe get some frames, and you can… put up some of your drawings?”
He takes one more look around. Slower this time, like he’s considering it. There’s something in his eyes. A flash of wistfulness. He shuts it down in the next moment.
“This is fine,” he says.
I think about that wistfulness for another moment.
“If you ever reconsider…” I say.
His chin juts out. “I won’t.”
“Okay, but—”
“It’s not like I’m here to stay.”
We both eye each other warily for a few seconds before Rory looks away, gets up, and stalks past me into the kitchen. I follow him wordlessly. We plate the food in silence and sit down to eat.
Rory pokes his noodles with his fork for a bit.
“Sorry,” he mutters to the noodles.
Life would be so much easier if somebody would give me a script with the right things to say.
The silence stretches to the point where I’m desperate to break it.
“Where did you learn to draw?” I finally ask. I figure there’s a fifty-fifty chance on what happens next. Either he answers, or he scoffs and leaves.
He jerks his head up and blinks rapidly at me.
Silence.
More silence.
“Babysitters.” He shrugs one shoulder. “They showed me some stuff.”
He says it all slowly and carefully, weighing every word before he hands it over to me.
This is personal.
This is valuable.
Don’t fuck it up.
“What do you draw?” I ask.
He pokes his noodles some more.
“Just stuff,” he mutters.
“Too personal?” I ask lightly.
“Too weird.”
I raise my brows at him.
“Not weird weird.” He scowls at me, leans back in his chair, and crosses his arms over his chest. “It’s just a book.”
I wait.
“With sketches,” he adds. “About stuff. Life. Stuff that’s happened. In my life.”
“Like a journal? Only in pictures?”
He gives me a nod that’s still careful, but not so outright reluctant anymore.
“I used to keep a journal when I was still playing tennis,” I say. “The more common written variety of a journal. I can’t draw to save my life.”
“Drawing is a skill. You can learn it.”
“Probably, but with very little talent it requires a lot of effort, so I’ve never been motivated.”
“Aren’t you supposed to set a good example? You’re supposed to be all, ‘hard work is like planting seeds in the ground and watering them with drops of sweat, but the blooms make it worth it in the end.’”
A startled laugh escapes me, and then I’m grinning at him. “Very poetic.”
He smiles back, and for a moment it looks like what a smile on a kid’s face should look like. There are no shadows in his eyes.
Something warm moves through my chest.
That smile? That carefree, real smile? It makes me feel things. Something melts inside me. It makes me enjoy this conversation we’re having. With this kid. My little brother.
Suddenly, I don’t know what to say anymore. Not that I’ve ever been an expert on how to talk to Rory.
We both finish our dinner. He pushes his plate away.
“I’ve got to finish my homework,” he says.
He takes his plate to the sink and puts it in the dishwasher, then comes back and picks up my plate, too.
“Thanks,” I say.
He nods.
Once he closes the door of the dishwasher he sends me another look and then points toward his room.
It’s my turn to nod.
“Don’t stay up too late,” I say, and for once it doesn’t sound completely unnatural coming out of my mouth.
He rolls his eyes at me and walks out.
I look after him.
I don’t know what my role is in his life. A guardian in name, but I’m still not sure what that even means or what it should look like when done right. A brother. It doesn’t feel like I’ve even begun to earn the right to that title.
Everything I do seems to be a “one step forward and two steps back” type of situation. Little rises followed by massive falls.
Do you want to be his brother?
I don’t think I’ve properly asked myself that question so far. Until now, I’ve been operating under the stubborn assumption that I’m only here for now. That I will do what I promised Aiden and help, and then I’m gonna get back to my life.
But can I? What kind of asshole would that make me to set out to win Rory’s trust and then dump him like a hot potato?
It would make me Gerard. I would repeat history, only somehow make it even worse.
I clutch the back of my neck and squeeze my eyes shut.
Not that I know how to do that anyway. Gain his trust.
Trust takes time.
Jordan’s voice is clear and strong in my head.
I take a deep breath.
“Baby steps,” I mutter to myself. Both for me and Rory.
Maybe I don’t have to have it all figured out right this second.
Maybe for now I just have to accept that the fact that I’m trying is a step in the right direction.
Jordan pulls the door open and smiles at me and Rory.
“You made it. Come in, come in.”
We step past him into a hallway of his Prospect Heights townhouse.
It’s one of those classy homes with clear history, built sometime around the nineteenth century, and it probably has things like high ceilings, fireplaces, dining alcoves, and original hardwood floors.
Nothing like our apartment in a new development where all the apartments are almost identical to each other, like they’re mass produced.
I let out a low whistle. “Nice,” I say when I look around.
Jordan chuckles. “Dad’s house. I’ll pass on the compliment.” He rests his hand on the banister and calls out, “Theo.”
There’s a thump and then the sound of footsteps before Theo appears on the stairs. He jogs down and stops next to Jordan. He sends Rory a cautious smile and a “Hey.”
“Hi,” Rory mutters, more to his feet than to Theo.
I glance at Jordan, who’s biting back a smile.
“The ball was on the patio last time I checked,” he tells Theo. He nods and goes to get it. Once he’s back, Jordan glances at his watch. “Five thirty,” he says. “Meet you two back here in an hour and a half? We’ll take care of dinner in the meantime.”
He raises his brows at me.
“Sounds good,” I say.
“Yeah. Whatever,” Rory says when I lightly elbow him in the side.
A few seconds later we’re watching Theo and Rory walk down the street, both carefully maintaining the five-foot gap between the two of them.
I glance at Jordan. “You think they’re going to be okay?”
He throws one more look at the street before he closes the door. “It’s one of those things where you have to trust the process.”
“Or… go and spy on them?” I offer.
Where did that come from?
Once again, I’m startled by my own anxiety for Rory. Once again, I’m standing here, crossing my fingers that he’ll be good and do good and have fun, and I don’t know why I’m like this. It’s… I don’t recognize myself. Who is this stranger?
“A decent idea.” Jordan looks thoughtful. “But before we do, let’s place our bets on who’ll come out on top when they inevitably start punching each other again.”
I scrunch my nose. “That’s a no on the spying, then?”
He laughs and throws his arm over my shoulder as he starts to steer me farther into the house. “Come on. I promised we’d make dinner.”
We end up in a large kitchen that seems to take up the whole of the back of the first floor, where evening sunlight paints the walls golden.
One wall is lined with matte black kitchen cabinets.
There’s a kitchen island separating the dining area from the rest of the kitchen, and a set of sliding doors lead from the kitchen to a small, fenced patio, with one door slightly ajar, letting in the crisp fall air.
Jordan opens the fridge and gives the insides a quick once-over.
“I was thinking chicken enchiladas?”
I nod and roll up my sleeves. “Put me to work.”
He starts taking ingredients out of the fridge and lining them up on the counter.
I go to stand next to him while he moves.
He turns the oven on and pulls out a drawer filled with rows of spices and bottles of oil.
He picks out a few and puts them on the counter, too.
Every move is easy and practiced, like he’s done this a thousand times.
He probably has. A well-balanced, successful adult. The good dad.
My lips quirk up while I watch him.
That? Not exactly a chore, by the way.
He’s barefoot, dressed in a pair of worn, ankle-length jeans, a white tee, and a loose navy shirt with rolled-up sleeves and the buttons undone thrown over it.
And when he bends down to grab something from the lower shelf of the freezer?
Fucking damn.