Most of the time when I’m upset or troubled, I go to my own room, shut the door, and work on getting my emotions under control in privacy. The privacy part is flexible; sometimes I let Joe in, other times Dad. Joe’s the one I usually vent at; he’s a good listener and goes a step beyond sympathy. He understands me so well that he knows what will (and won’t) help me calm down. Dad’s the one I talk to if I need some advice based on experience. He doesn’t tell me what to do, but he does make suggestions and offers views that I haven’t thought of.

But there are other times, when the only thing that will help me get my head on straight again is to just get as far away, and as fast, as I can. It’s as if the more distance there is between me and the uproar, the easier it is to think. Besides that, there’s a strangely powerful freedom about being able to go off somewhere and know that no one will be able to find me- that I won’t have to return until I make the decision to. It’s sorta like a weird version of hide-n-seek, except I’m both the hider and the finder. I hide myself away until I’m ready to be ‘found’.

This was definitely the latter time. I didn’t want to see or try and talk to any of my family until I got a grip on myself. The fact that Joe and Dad had both been aware of Mom’s favoritism and never mentioned it to me rankled badly. I could dimly see why they wouldn’t want to talk about it with me, but I sure could have used their understanding when I was trying so hard to figure out if her attitude was all my imagination or not.

Obviously not- how dumb do they think I am? Did they think not talking about it would make me not notice?

When I reached the end of Elm Street, I hesitated, realizing that I had no idea where to go. None of my ‘regular’ spots would do; I wasn't concerned that Mom or Dad would find me, but Joe might. He knew all of the places I went when I was upset, and while he didn't usually intrude on me, this might be an exception. So I needed a new place, somewhere I'd never gone before. I turned the thought over in my mind as I jogged towards Bayport proper, then decided to worry about it once I got to the other side of town. I slowed down to a fairly rapid walk as I reached the edge of town. Running down the sidewalks would attract too much attention. I passed the Marina and thought briefly of taking the Sleuth out, but discarded the idea. I wanted to sit and think, not concentrate on wind, waves, tides, sunken rocks and other boaters.

By the time I was halfway across town, I had slowed down a lot more. Bayport doesn’t take a lot of time to walk across- at least, not the downtown part of it. There’s at least twice as much suburban territory as there is urban, and easily four times as much rural as either. Still, eighteen blocks of busy streets, parking lots, office buildings, shops, and the two malls, takes a little time to get through. Especially since there’s a traffic light every fifty feet or so. Well- okay, fifty yards. Still, it can be a nuisance.

Bayport used to be bigger- it looks like a small city and used to have a city-sized population, but now it’s basically an overgrown town. Everyone keeps either moving down towards New Jersey or up nearer to New York City.

I had just paused for a Don’t Walk sign at one of the intersections when a car pulled up beside me and stopped. I hardly noticed; it was a right-on-red and the driver had the right of way. But this car just sat there, causing the one behind it to honk loudly. I looked over and took automatic note of the make and model: a black Honda Civic. Then the passenger rolled down the window and stuck his head out. A youngish guy, mid-twenties, sunglasses, dark hair, smoke drifting up from the cigarette in his mouth. He looked right at me, nodded briefly, turned to say something to the driver. I wondered if they were lost. The guy seemed to reach over for something- I thought he was putting out his cigarette. He turned back to me, leaned over as though to speak. And then, almost too quickly for me to understand what was happening, he stuck a handgun out of the window and fired repeatedly.

Straight at me.

I had no time to move, to react, to dodge. I felt the bullets hit, like hard punches against my body, staggering me. I felt myself stumble backwards, lost my balance, fell to the sidewalk and lay there. I couldn’t move, it was as though I had no strength, no will. The wind had been knocked out of me and all I could do was gasp in air and wonder how badly I was hurt.

The strangest thing was that at first, I didn’t really feel any pain. But after a moment, I became aware of a burning heat deep inside me. I’d never thought about it before, but of course bullets would be hot. I dimly heard screams and shouting, heard horns, opened my eyes - when did I close them?- in time to see the car screech around the corner. I saw the license plate, but my mind wouldn’t focus enough to register it. The intense heat began to fade, but there was sticky warmth all over my shirt. I felt very weak, but my arms seemed able to move a little. I wanted to know how bad it was, so I made an effort to push myself into a sitting position.

That was when the pain hit.

I tried to cry out, but only managed a groan as I fell back to the pavement. My whole body seemed to be cracking apart, tearing, twisting. Red-tinged blackness drifted behind my squeezed-shut eyes; every breath seemed to catch and tear me even farther apart.

“Frank! Frank- oh, God!” Someone gasping- someone I knew. I opened my eyes again, looked into Joe’s stricken white face. I started to feel scared- it had to be bad for him to look like that.

“I called the police, and there’s an ambulance on the way.” A man’s voice- a shadowy figure looming behind Joe.

“Hang on, bro, hang on...”

“Hurts,” I gasped, letting my eyes close again. “Hurts, Joe.” I felt strangely cold now, despite the heat all over my front. Fear? Shock, probably.

“I know, big brother, I know it does, but just hang on.” His hand was gripping mine, warm, strong, something to cling to and help me endure the pain.

“How-” I started to ask, and then couldn’t finish. I was so tired. I wanted to sleep. I couldn’t hear right, everything was all up and down and up again...wailing...strange. Someone was calling me, but I couldn’t open my eyes again, they were so heavy. There was darkness swallowing up the pain, but it was pushing me down and down and down... too deep to see... “Joe,” I thought, maybe said, and then everything stopped.

"So what do you remember?"

I turned my head and looked at Joe, shifting position slightly and then wincing as the ache shot through my abdomen again. I'd just been given my midday dose of pain medication, but it hadn't quite kicked in yet.

Joe was sitting in one of the plastic chairs beside my hospital bed, and he looked uneasy. Sunlight coming through the window on my left streaked through his blond hair and cast a bright square on the front of his light-blue summer shirt. His hand was resting on the back of my wrist, below the IV line that was taped into my vein. His hand was much browner than my own pale one, but it wasn't nearly as tan as it should have been during summer vacation. But that was no surprise, not when he'd been spending all day, every day with me while I recovered.

At least now he looked like he’d been sleeping at night. The first time I'd seen him- rather, recognized him- he'd looked awful: pale, red-eyed, rumpled and disheveled. Mom and Dad hadn't looked much better: Dad unshaven and tired, his usually calm face etched with worry lines; Mom lacking makeup, her hair hanging loose and her clothes wrinkled. For a while- a few days, most likely- they had been there every time I opened my eyes. I had wondered vaguely about that, but hadn't had the strength or words to ask questions, so hadn't tried. And by the time I was well enough to figure out that regular visiting hours had been suspended while I was hurt, there was no longer any point in asking about it, for the visiting hours were back in effect. So I didn't inquire.

What did I remember...? I remembered Mom coming in to spend her lunch break with me this afternoon and telling me she'd make a habit of it for as long as I was in the hospital. She had also called every two hours or so, to 'check in' on me. I remembered Dad dropping in twice so far today as his investigations brought him near the area. He'd said he couldn't predict very well when he'd be by, but he'd drop in as often as he could. And they'd both be here in the morning and at night each day, spending at least the first and last visiting hours with me, and probably breakfast and supper, too.

I remembered yesterday, how they'd both hesitantly talked about their work; how they didn't want to go while I was still in the hospital, but if Dad was going to find the man who'd injured me, he had to get busy on it as soon as possible. And Mom's vacation days were almost used up; we couldn't afford to have her taking unpaid leave. I'd assured them that I didn't mind if they weren't constantly there, and mostly I didn't. I would be fine, I didn't need to have them hovering over me all day, and they did have other responsibilities. Besides, Joe insisted on staying with me in case I needed anything and the nurses were busy...

And the days before that, when they had come in the morning and talked and left briefly to do errands and then returned to keep me company until night came... and before that, when they were constantly there...and before that, the confusion and struggling to understand and speak...and the darkness that came and went, full of bright, vivid flickers and incomprehensible noises...

"Frank?"

I blinked up at Joe. My brother remained a constant, but remarkably silent presence in my room. When Mom and Dad were there, they spent a lot of time talking to me; I didn't mind, but it still took some concentration for me to understand them and reply. I usually fell asleep very soon after they left, for all the thinking tired me out fast. The drug, they'd told me; the medication that I was being given to control the pain was making me sleepy, affecting my concentration.

That was why I was grateful that Joe seemed content to sit beside me and say very little. It troubled me sometimes that he was spending so much time cooped up with me; it was high summer and he ought to be out doing things, enjoying himself. But I knew that if our situations were reversed- if he was the one hooked up to the IV and the vital-signs monitor, and I was the one uninjured- I'd be at his side until he was well. Besides, I was glad he was there. It wasn't a very big room, but when I was alone in it, it seemed huge and empty...and dull.

Until now, I hadn't wondered much at what was happening. I'd been told I'd been injured and had had surgery and would be fine once I healed. It had been several days before I was aware enough even to recognize my surroundings as a hospital, and my curiosity had been strangely stifled. Now, weak and achy as I was, I wanted to know what had happened to injure me, how badly I was hurt, why, when, where...

“What do I remember?” I repeated at last, frowning a little at Joe. "Why?"

“If you'll tell me what you remember, I'll know what parts to fill in,” he explained quietly. "No sense in me telling you stuff you already know- it'll just tire you out to listen to it."

I regarded him for a moment, frowning, realizing what else was bothering me. He was so quiet, so still- it wasn't like him at all and the change in his personality worried me. He should have been his usual bundle of energy: fidgeting, pacing, talking, making jokes and smart remarks... I’d often teased that he needed to add a K to his name to make it accurate. “Good point. Okay,” I answered slowly. I closed my eyes and images swirled randomly through my mind. I struggled to bring them into focus. “I was...standing at a light,” I murmured. “It was red...and then...the car, the black car. There was a- a noise- a horn beeping, and I turned to look and there was that car by the curb, in the turn lane.” I frowned, trying to find the right words to match the images. I could see the car, the passenger. “He- the passenger, he looked at me and- and he nodded at me, like he recognized me. And then he turned away, like talking to the driver, and I thought he was putting out his cigarette.”

“Cigarette?"

“Yeah, he was smoking.” I could see the thin smoke curling into the air, remembered wrinkling my nose as the breeze brought a hint of the odor to me. “An’ then he...turned back around and he- he put the gun out the window and-” I opened my eyes and blinked at Joe. “He shot me,” I realized, baffled and suddenly shocked. “He shot me...I remember the gun going off and-” The ache in my gut seemed to have intensified. “I- he hit me, and I fell down...that was strange,” I added thoughtfully. “It didn’t hurt.”

“It didn’t?”

“No- well, not at first. Not till I tried to sit up. It was just weird- hot- at first. And then...I don’t really remember. Someone-” A man's voice speaking over my head. “Some man, talking about an ambulance, and- you were there!” So that was it? That was why he was so subdued? It did make sense, he was always quiet after a bad scare- but had it been such a short time ago? No- it had been days, several days; he should have got some of his spark back by now.

“Yes.” Joe squeezed my hand and I recalled how I'd clung to his hand when the pain invaded me.

“But what- happened?” I insisted, my voice sounding weary even to me. “I mean, why'd he shoot me? And when'd it happen? How long have I been in here?”

Joe sighed, looking down at the floor, then got up from the chair and sat on the side of the bed. The bedrail was down; the nurses only put it up at night. “The man who called the ambulance was Mr. Dalrymple, he was just coming out of the bank to go to lunch,” he began.

“Mr. Dalrymple.” I remembered him. We’d solved a case for him when he lived and worked in Lakeside. He still lived there, but now he managed our bank, Bayport Fidelity.

“Yeah. When the ambulance got there...you went unconscious as they were putting you on the stretcher. I rode in with you and they rushed you right into surgery, didn’t wait for parental consent or anything. I called the police, and then Mom and Dad- and I think they must’ve broken every speed limit in town, they got here so fast. But by then there wasn’t much they could do, except fill out the insurance forms. And- well, you know we’re similar types, so, um, I donated some blood-”

I squeezed his hand tightly and something that might almost have been a smile touched his face briefly. “Thanks, Joey,” I said quietly, and he got a bit red around the ears.

“You’d have done it for me, Frank. So anyway, we waited for a couple hours, and then the doctor came out and said that...that they had you on a ventilator, just to be safe.”

I felt my eyes widen, despite my fatigue. “I definitely don't remember that.”

“No, you wouldn’t, you were unconscious the whole time. For almost two days. But you kept trying to breathe by yourself, so they took you off it and put that old oxygen tube-”

I nodded, remembering the air tube that had been secured under my nose. The constant stream of air had dried my skin to where it itched terribly; the oxygen hadn't smelled very good, and the never-ending hiss had irritated me immensely. They'd taken that away several days ago, to my vast relief. I was looking forward to the time when the vital-signs monitor was unhooked and the IV taken out, and said as much.

“It won't be for a while. Not until your kidney heals.”

“My kidney?” I was starting to feel a bit unnerved; obviously I was hurt far worse than I’d thought.

“One of the bullets nicked it, they were afraid you’d need a transplant if it didn’t heal right. Dad and I are both down as potential donors- but I told ‘em they’d better take mine, it’s younger.” Joe tried another smile. “Only it seems it won't be necessary. The IV stays in till you’re ready to start eating again- when your intestines are in better shape. You got three bullets in there, and one in, um…” He blushed suddenly.

“I think I know what you're going to say,” I grumbled, embarrassed. I preferred not to think about the catheter that got emptied three times a day. The nurses might be used to that, but I definitely wasn't and it was embarrassing!

“And then the last one was near your stomach, right around your colon.”

I was quiet for a while, considering all that. “I guess I was lucky," I concluded after several minutes.

“You were, big brother. You really were.” Joe sighed. “Then, after they took you off the respirator and you started waking up, they found out they'd been overdosing you on the painkiller. Gave you something called 'aphasia', and-”

“Oh, is that why nothing made sense?” I asked, jolted. I recognized the term; it meant an inability to speak or understand spoken words. And maybe written stuff, too; I couldn’t quite remember. “It was the craziest thing, Joe. I couldn't remember how to talk and nothing I was hearing made any sense at all. I couldn't even figure out who anyone was, or where I was, or- anything! And the really weird thing was that I didn’t care one way or the other. I wasn’t worried or curious or even very confused. ‘So nothing makes sense- so what?’, to put it in a nutshell.”

Joe nodded, chewing on his lower lip. “No one thought to mention that you’re drug-sensitive, until you went two days straight without responding to anything,” he explained. “Then they started to get worried, did some double-checking, and reduced the dose. You're on twenty-three cc's now, but before they cut it back, it was around a hundred.”

“Holy crow. I’m having enough trouble thinking straight as it is, on this little dose,” I remarked wryly. “I musta been seriously stoned...” I trailed off and my brother, without waiting to be asked, picked up a cup of water from the table beside the bed and held it so I could sip through the straw. “Thanks,” I murmured after taking a long drink. I was allowed juice and broth now, but water was best for the thirst, and I had been thirsty a lot. “It was weird, when I started recognizing things,” I added as he put the cup down. “Some things just made sense all of a sudden, but some...like I recognized you right away, but it took longer to figure out what a 'doctor' was.”

Joe nodded again. “The reason it was so erratic was because they didn’t stop it and wait for it to wear off- you’d have been in an awful lot of a lot of pain if they had. They kept giving you doses- but smaller ones, so you were on a sort of drug roller-coaster.”

“Ohhh. So I’d remember quickly as it started to wear off, and then things got fuzzy again when I got another dose.”

“Right.”

It had been such a relief to be able to talk and understand again, though it had taken an incredible amount of energy to do so. I’d felt as though my head was full of concrete and my body made of lead, and I’d spent most of my time lying still with my eyes shut, answering questions in grunts or one-word replies. But that had been a few days ago. My strength still wasn’t anywhere near normal, and I had a feeling it would take a while to come back completely, but it was a great improvement from- from however many days ago it'd been. “So how long've I been in here?”

“Eight days now.”

“I don't suppose they've said when I get to go home.” I took a deep breath and noted that the flare of pain had vanished. Probably psychosomatic.

“No, but they want to start getting you used to sitting up and moving around first,” Joe answered slowly. “Walking, and eating-”

“You mean, other than liquid,” I said through a sigh. It would be a while yet.

“Yeah.”

Another long silence. I regarded my brother, noting his pallor and the way his free hand was twisting the sheet. His face was averted from me, and I felt a sudden rush of sympathy for him. No wonder he was still so quiet and subdued; no wonder he was staying with me constantly. I hadn't even known I was injured, but he'd seen and heard it all...waited and wondered and feared for me... I'd still be scared, too! Even after a week. “Hey, kiddo,” I whispered, tugging on his hand. “It's okay. I'm gonna be fine, you just gotta give me a little time. I'm sorry you had to go through all this-”

“It wasn't your fault!” Joe exclaimed, turning to me indignantly. “It was that gunman-”

“That's who Dad's after, isn't it?”

“You bet it is,” Joe agreed, straightening up. “They found the car abandoned in the long-term parking lot at the airport. Turns out it was stolen, but the guy it was stolen from thinks he might know who did it. Now if we could just convince Mom that this didn't happen because of a case-”

I didn't hear the rest. Mom- convince- a case-

Mom overhearing us talking with Dad in the study, learning that we edited the information we gave her, and her anger-

Mom's attempt to get me to talk Joe out of detective work, and her insistence that she wanted us not to take risks. The explosion of angry and hurtful words. Her denial of her obvious favoritism.

My dash from the house, down the street, hurrying through Bayport in search of a place to sit, undisturbed, and work though my painful emotions.

I laughed weakly, even though it wasn't funny, even though it made my abdomen ache again. “Lovely,” I snorted, bitterly amused.

“You okay, Frank?” Joe looked anxiously at me.

“And to think she goes on and on about how much danger our investigating gets us into. Meanwhile I nearly get killed walking down the street, trying to get away from a family brawl,” I growled. “I guess now we know what's really dangerous, don't we?” I took a breath and sighed it out, feeling more tired than anything but also pretty miserable. “And you didn’t remind me about it, either,” I added quietly, closing my eyes. I felt Joe’s hand tighten on mine. “Why not?”

“I- you didn’t say anything about it.” Joe sounded a little surprised and rather hurt. “So I thought you didn’t want to talk about it. Why else would you start with standing on the curb at the red light? You remembered that I was there; I figured you remembered why you were there, too.”

Defensive, but he had reason to be. I wasn’t being fair. “Sorry.” I opened my eyes and turned my head. “I guess I jumped to a conclusion. I didn’t remember the fight. Just the shooting.”

My brother’s expression relaxed a little. “And you think I’d keep it from you, on purpose?” he asked wryly, shaking his head at me.

“So’s not to start another fight- in a quiet zone, no less- the next time she comes to see me?” I returned. Joe grimaced.

“Well, I didn't think she'd yell, considering the situation,” he remarked, gesturing at the bed. “And you’re not up for much yelling yourself. But mostly I figured you’d talk about it when you were ready.” He paused, then added, “Though I noticed you two seemed to be getting along okay the last couple days. Wondered if you’d talked it out while Dad and I were elsewhere.”

I shook my head, then yawned. “Just forgot,” I murmured, closing my eyes again. Talking was too much of an effort; the pain drug was having its usual effect. I drifted into a doze, musing unhappily over the difference between Mom’s behavior towards me in general, and the attention and affection she’d given me over the days of my hospitalization.

Guess it takes getting shot half a dozen times before she’ll give me the attention she always gives Joe. Good thing it wasn’t him. She’d suffocate him in concern and attentiveness and tender loving care.

I sat on the side of my hospital bed, leaning back against the elevated mattress and pillows so the lingering ache wouldn’t gnaw at my abdomen, and watched the second-hand circle the clock face on the wall. It was nearly one-thirty on August fourth and I was waiting for my parents and brother to come pick me up and take me home.

After three weeks of treatment and recovery, I was at last being discharged from the hospital, and my mood was best described as tired and morose. The source of my fatigue was simple enough; I was still on the pain medication, and even at this greatly reduced level, it made me sleepy. My low mood, though, was a little harder to pinpoint. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to leave the hospital, for hospitals are not comfortable, homey places. They try their best to be, but the treatment always comes first and there’s a dreadful sense of impersonality about them. You’re always just one more patient there, seldom an individual, no matter how friendly you get with the staff. So I wasn’t unhappy to be leaving, but I wasn’t looking forward to going home. I should’ve been, especially after I’d spent so much time wishing I could get home. I wanted my own bed, my own room, my clothes- familiar things. I wanted to be able to do things, not be stuck in one room all day. And the food would be a lot better, and the noise less, and- a lot of other advantages of that sort. But the downside blotted all that out.

The downside was Mom.

It had been almost two weeks since Joe explained what had happened to me, since I’d remembered the fight in the study that had sparked my abrupt departure from our house. The argument that had, ultimately, nearly gotten me killed. Two weeks of getting used to eating again- first liquids, then semi-solid food, since I wasn’t ready for normal food; of carefully sitting up, then standing. Fighting back the pain and dizziness and weakness and gradually recovering the strength to walk around my room, then- slowly- up and down the corridor. The IV and catheter were taken out, the vital signs machine wheeled away, the reduced pain medication administered in pills instead of through the IV tube. Blood tests, X-rays, ultrasounds of my abdomen, more obscure tests on my kidney...all of it painful or at least very uncomfortable. And for every twinge and ache I felt, I blamed my mother.

I hadn’t blamed her for being angry at us. I would’ve been angry too, if I found out I wasn’t getting the full story from someone I trusted to tell me the whole truth. As Joe had said, it wasn’t quite a lie, but it wasn’t honest, either. And not just once, but repeatedly. And Dad had done the same. No- she had the right to be angry about that, even if she disagreed with our stated motive. We’d tried to explain that we hadn’t wanted her to worry; she’d retorted that the only ones we were protecting were ourselves.

That was one issue that was waiting to be resolved when I got home. I only hoped that this time, it wouldn’t involve a shouting match.

But Mom’s favoritism- and her bare-faced denial of it- that, I blamed her for. She, who’d come to me to ask me to persuade Joe out of investigating; she, who’d blatantly favored him with praise and affection and attention; she, who’d taught me to stand up to my wrongs and admit them instead of denying them…and who refused to admit any of her playing-favorites behavior despite how obvious it was... oh, I had problems with that! And the shooting- sure, the man had pulled the trigger, but I wouldn’t have been anywhere near his area if I hadn’t been so hurt and enraged at Mom that I couldn’t stand to stay in the house with her a minute longer.

If there’s one thing I learned from this, it’s how difficult it is to ignore someone when you're stuck in one room and they have constant access to it.

They’d noticed, of course- noticed how my mood dropped whenever Mom came into the room, how I hardly spoke to her and seldom acknowledged when she spoke to me. Well- Joe had noticed, anyway. He had been with me more than Mom and Dad, and he knew I wasn’t so silent and glum when it was just me and him, or if Dad was with us. I had a feeling, though, that Dad put my moodiness down to the effects of the pain medication. I had no idea whether Mom had even noticed my mood or not, nor what explanation she’d given it if she had. I wasn’t terribly interested in what she thought was wrong with me; I just wished she’d leave me alone.

How ironic. You spend years wishing she’d pay you more attention, and as soon as she does, you wish she wouldn’t. But then, all those years, she wasn’t ultimately responsible for you getting shot, either…

I wondered, as my eyes drifted closed, whether Dad had found the guy or not yet, and if he was an old enemy of ours- or Dad’s. It seemed sort of likely; Dad’s made quite a few enemies in his time, and we’ve got a bit of a list started ourselves. People do resent it when you get them into trouble, and amoral, vengeful, determined people are not exactly in short supply among criminals.

I was musing over that, half-asleep, when the door swung open. Joe was the first one in, as usual, and his smile looked ready to meet in the back. “Wake up, sleepyhead,” he teased me, coming to my side and smoothing my damp hair. “You look pretty good,” he added judiciously, tilting his head and regarding me with a satisfied air.

“They gave me a shower, and it’s putting me back to sleep,” I explained, smiling up at him.

“Well, get dressed and come home and sleep in your own bed,” he urged, helping me sit up straight.

“Sounds like a plan, and I would’ve done it sooner if you’d arrived sooner.” I stopped as Dad came in, then blinked as he closed the door behind him. Mom wasn’t with them?

Dad must have seen my puzzlement. “Your mother is grocery shopping,” he said, handing me a pile of clothes.

“Oh. Thanks.” I wasn’t sure how to feel about that. Relieved, yes, but the fact that grocery shopping ranked higher on her priorities than me getting released from the hospital made me feel pretty cross.

I’m not looking forward to this, I’m really not...

If I’d only known.

“She said she wanted to make your first meal at home special...and you’ve gotta admit, big brother, that making anything ‘semi-solid’ special takes a bit of shopping around,” Joe explained gently, reading my mind with his usual skill. Or maybe I looked as resentful as I felt.

“Oh! Yes, definitely. I’m still not sure exactly what ‘semi-solid’ is,” I agreed, losing some of my irritation and feeling kind of bad about leaping to a conclusion. “Same way I never could figure the difference between sweet and semisweet chocolate chips.”

Dad chuckled and rubbed my head, mussing my hair. “And much testing you did to try and figure out the difference, Frank. I’ll never forget finding you with those two bags open, taking first from one bag and then the other- and trying to persuade me it was a scientific experiment!”

“It was!” I protested, sliding from the bed and wincing a little as my feet touched the chilly floor. “I was doing a taste test!”

“Uh-huh. It never dawned on you to hold your taste test on a volunteer, did I?” Joe taunted, sliding his arm around me to help me walk to the bathroom. “You coulda saved yourself so much trouble, there was someone perfectly willing to help you out with it, but no- off you go and do all the hard work yourself.”

“Setting myself up for my lot in life, little brother,” I explained solemnly. I had intended that to sound like a joke, but there was enough truth in the comment that Joe and Dad gave me peculiar looks. I like to do things myself and dislike asking for help. It’s nice of other people to be willing to help me, and I don’t object to being helped; I just hate asking for it. Because then people feel obligated to do something, whether they want to or not.

Joe shook his head at me, then closed the bathroom door and left me to get dressed by myself. “Give me a holler if you need a hand,” he remarked through the crack.

“I should be okay.” And I was, though it took me about twice as long as usual to dress. Case in point...Joe’s ready and willing to give me a hand, but I don’t ‘give him a holler.’ I do it on my own. At last I stepped out of the bathroom, the ugly sulphur-yellow hospital smock in my hand, and moved slowly to the bed to drop it there. “Only one thing; I need my shoes,” I remarked to Dad.

“On the chair,” he replied as one of the nurses rolled a wheelchair into the room. Being wheel-chaired down to the discharge desk is standard procedure, and usually annoying, but this time I didn’t mind. The mere thought of walking through all the long hallways made me ache a bit. I could manage several ‘laps’ up and down the hall outside my room by now, but from here to the desk would be pushing it.

“Were you given his prescription yet?” the nurse asked. I knew her, of course; we’d shared several discussions about music in between various medical routines.

“Yes, we have it,” Dad said. “Tylenol with codeine,” he added to me as I picked up my shoes and sat down.

“Oh.” I leaned down to put the sneakers on and immediately changed my mind, sitting up with a gasp. I hadn’t done any bending over before, and hadn’t thought about how much it would hurt to do so. “Ow,” I remarked softly as Joe hurried over to me. He didn’t suggest that I let him help; he took my sneakers away from me, got them on my feet and tied them without a word. “Thanks,” I said, and he stood up and smiled through the concern in his eyes.

“Okay?” Dad touched my shoulder.

“Yeah, I just didn’t expect it to hurt quite so much.” I got up a little more slowly and sat down in the wheelchair. Dad rolled me out of the bedroom and I stifled a pang of almost-regret at leaving the place. Joe walked beside me, falling back or dodging forward every now and then to avoid running into people and things. We got to the elevator and down to the discharge desk fairly quickly, but had to wait in a line for a while. Seemed, from what Joe heard and relayed back to me, that someone was having an insurance issue.

“Hey, Joe,” I said thoughtfully after a while.

“Hmm?” He stopped fidgeting and looked at me. I hesitated, not sure how to ask the question.

“The guys- Biff and Chet and Tony and everyone-” My friends had called several times apiece while I was recovering, but hadn’t been allowed up to see me while my kidney was healing. The doctors had explained that they wanted to keep my contacts to a minimum, to reduce the chance of contracting some infection that might damage my kidney further- or even result in losing it altogether. I hadn’t argued.

“Yeah, I was gonna explain about that,” my brother began, flushing. “I told them I’d call and let ‘em know when you were cleared for non-family visitors, but I kinda forgot until last night.”

“Oh,” I answered slowly. So they hadn’t forgotten about me, just hadn’t known they could come in and visit. “Well, no sweat. They didn’t miss much visiting time- only two days. And between all the therapy and me constantly falling asleep, we wouldn’t have gotten much visiting done anyway.”

Joe looked relieved. “When I remembered, I did call,” he remarked, sounding a little defensive, and I could only imagine how much ribbing he’d taken for forgetting. “Told ‘em maybe it would be good to wait till you have some energy back before they dropped over to see you.”

“Drop over? But I’m leaving-”

“Come by the house, I mean. Give you time to get off the painkiller and actually wake up once in a while,” he joked, and I swatted his arm. “And when you’ve gotten used to solid food again, they want to do a big bash for you, if you don’t object.”

Joe knows better than to throw ‘a big bash’, or any sort of bash, without warning me first. I never did like surprise parties much when I was young, because I hated being the center of attention. Too embarrassing. But the celebration of my thirteenth birthday- when my parents invited everyone I knew to surprise me despite me telling them both repeatedly not to- totally killed any tolerance I might have had for being surprise-partied.

“I don’t object,” I replied cheerfully. “Pizza party?”

“Italian, anyway. Unless you’re having major cravings for French food?”

“Ah, too rich,” I demurred. “And the portions are always so tiny...”

Dad, behind me, laughed quietly. “That’s why. The richer the food, the smaller the portion.”

“And the higher the price. No thanks, Italian will do fine, at least for the moment. If I change my mind and want Mexican or something...or Indian...”

“Spicy,” Joe warned as we moved forward a few paces.

“Well, yeah. Either way, I’ll let you know.”

The drive home was swift, once we finally got out of the hospital; it was only half-past noon and at that hour of the day there was little traffic. I dozed off during the ride, lulled by the smooth motion of the car and the hypnotic sight of scenery blurring past the backseat window. Someone- probably Joe- shook me awake when the car halted and I was only marginally aware as he helped me into the house and up the stairs. I actually had to stop twice on the way up to my room. Going up the steps hurt more than I’d expected it to, and that, added to my fatigue, made it a real challenge. My legs were feeling very weak when I got to the top and it was a good thing Joe was beside me, to keep me walking straight.

When I woke up, the clock beside my bed read four in the afternoon. I was lying on my back; my bedroom door was closed and afternoon sunlight was glittering on my window. I blinked around in confusion; I didn’t remember falling asleep and I wasn’t expecting to just open my eyes and suddenly be at home. Then I remembered being discharged, the drive home, climbing the stairs- and smiled. It felt so good to be in my own room, in my own bed! For a moment I luxuriated in the smooth, firm mattress, the fat pillow, the cool sheet...and then I turned carefully onto my side and let my eyes drift over my bookshelves and computer desk, stereo- and Joe, sitting quietly in my computer chair, reading a book.

“Hey,” I said softly, and he looked up with a jolt.

“Hey yourself,” he answered, smiling at me as he pushed his hair off his forehead. “Sleep well?”

“I don’t even remember falling asleep,” I admitted. “Man, I missed this bed.” I took another contented look around the room and noticed that there were no gaps in my books or CD’s, despite the fact that Joe had brought me books to read and music to listen to, as a change from watching the hospital’s TV. “Oh, no, my stuff,” I groaned, sitting up. “I totally forgot to bring everything home!”

Joe’s eyebrows went up in surprise. “Don’t worry. Dad and I stuffed it all into the bags while you were getting dressed,” he explained, holding up several empty blue bags that were hanging off my bed frame. “I put everything back while you were asleep.”

“Oh! Aw, thanks, Joe.” I rubbed my face, trying to remember. “I guess this stuff’s knocking out my power of observation, too. I don’t even remember you carrying anything.”

“That’s ‘cause I wasn’t. Dad hung ‘em on the back of the wheelchair.”

“Ohhh.” I yawned, then stretched, carefully. It made me ache inside, but the pain passed quickly when I relaxed.

“Mom’s home, and she’s making seafood chowder, she figures that’ll qualify pretty good as semi-solid. And pudding, I think.”

“Sounds great.” I smiled in anticipation; Mom makes some of the best chowder in the state. “I dunno if I’ll be able to handle the clams, but the rest of it...”

“They do tend to be chewy,” my brother agreed. “But everything else’ll be as tender as anyone could ask for. You gonna be able to get downstairs? You had some trouble coming up.”

“I remember that,” I agreed ruefully, pulling my thoughts away from tidbits of shrimp and crab, potato and carrot and... “I didn’t expect it to hurt like that, but I guess I should’ve. Same way I should’ve expected it to hurt when I leaned over- uses some of the same muscles.” Mussels, and wild rice... “Man, I’m hungry already. When do we eat?” I added, laughing a little.

“It’s only ten after four!” Joe exclaimed, grinning. "Be patient." He put the book down, got up and walked over to the side of the bed.

“That's my line. Say, you’re getting taller again, aren’t you?” I asked suspiciously, looking up at him. He took it as a joke and laughed, resting his hand on my shoulder for a moment.

“I’ll go see if there’s anything in the way of appetizers. So will you come down, or eat up here? Mom already said it’s okay if you’re too achy to manage the steps.”

“Oh.” I gave myself a little shake, chagrined at how forgetful and disordered my thoughts were. “Um, let me think a minute.” I swung my legs over the bed and slowly stood up, feeling Joe’s hand return to my shoulder. Just in case, little brother? Don’t worry, I won’t fall- this time. “The thing with going downstairs is that I’ll have to come back up again.” I pressed gently against my belly, testing for soreness, and found a fair bit. Well, it was to be expected; a three-hour nap, even in my own room, wouldn’t have stimulated a sudden burst of miracle healing. “And I think I’d rather not try that again till I’m a little less sore.”

“Okay. I’ll tell her,” my brother said agreeably, and headed out the door. I followed him into the hall, but turned the other way, towards the bathroom. I got back to my room before Joe did and settled onto the bed again, this time sitting up. I still felt pretty foggy, but less sleepy, content to sit quietly and take in the familiar room- and to muse a little over how apprehensive I felt about being home. I wondered where Dad was, and whether Mom would come up to see me, now that she knew I was awake.

I was distracted from my thoughts when I heard Joe’s voice at the door saying, “Here’s your appetizer.” I looked over and smiled as he nudged into the room, a glass of chocolate milk in each hand. He handed me one and I took it with thanks. It tasted so good- the hospital milk was always skim, which tastes more like water to me than anything dairy. Joe settled back into my desk chair, putting his own glass on my desk, and picked up his book. I noticed at once that he hadn’t come sit right beside me, and was glad of it. Not that I disliked having him nearby- just the opposite- but I felt it was a good sign. It meant he was feeling secure enough about my recovery that the far side of the room was close enough for his protective feelings.

Besides, my bedroom isn’t nearly as unnerving a place as a hospital room, and it’s a lot more familiar. We both feel safer in here.

I took another drink of the chocolate milk, feeling my hunger subside, then slid off the bed again and moved to the bookshelf to find myself something to read. Joe glanced up and observed as I selected the ‘Alex Delaware’ book that I’d never finished reading and returned to the bed. It took me a while to find my place, but once I did, I quickly got lost in the story. I doubt that anyone alive ever could be quite as observant as that psychologist, but it does give me a goal to aim for.

Around quarter to six, with the milk long gone, my stomach started grumbling again. That’s one thing about liquids: the stomach deals with them very quickly and you get a lot hungrier, a lot faster, when you’re not eating solid food. You end up on a three or four-hour ‘feeding’ schedule. And the delicious smell drifting up from the kitchen didn’t exactly help, either.

Mom came up with the chowder at about five past six, just as I was starting to debate with myself about going downstairs after all. She put the bowl down on a pot-holder on my nightstand, then leaned over to give me a hug and a kiss. I forced myself not to turn away, but I couldn’t bring myself to hug her back. “Thanks,” I told her, picking up the spoon.

“How’re you feeling, honey? Sleep well?”

“I didn’t intend to fall asleep, but I feel pretty good,” I replied. “The stairs gave me some trouble, I wasn’t expecting that. But all my walking was on level floors,” I finished, only just realizing it myself. All that recovery and no stair-climbing exercises. “It’ll probably be easier in a day or two,” I added after a moment.

“I hope so. You take it slow and easy, all right?” As I nodded, she picked up my empty glass. “I’ll get you some more milk in a minute. Oh, and your father had your prescription, it’s on the kitchen counter. Let me know if you want it.”

“Okay,” I replied vaguely, shifting to sit on the side of the bed. I moved things around on the nightstand until it looked more like an impromptu table- if a bit lower than most- and then cautiously started eating. Joe put his book down, made some remark about the wonderful smell, and left. Mom soon returned with the refilled glass of milk (without chocolate) and a small portion of soft bread on a napkin.

“Try dunking,” she advised, putting the napkin beside the bowl. I thanked her again and she smiled and left. I went back to eating, savoring the hot, thick soup and wondering why nothing in the hospital had tasted half so good. I even managed the chunks of clam fairly well, chewy though they were. Everything else was very soft, not quite melt-in-your-mouth but close enough. The bread was still warm and had been buttered, and I enjoyed that very much as well.

She’s still paying me attention…maybe… maybe she’s feeling guilty about the fight. Maybe she’s finally agreed that she has been favoring Joe, and is trying to make up for being so indifferent to me. Or maybe it’s just ‘cause of the shooting.

I shrugged off the thought; time would tell, one way or another. Maybe it was a good sign; perhaps we could work this all out without everyone exploding again. I hoped so. I wasn’t strong enough to run out of the house, this time, if there was another eruption- or three.

I hate arguments in general, but fights where I’m involved aren’t quite as bad as fights where I have to watch or listen from the sidelines. At least if I’m involved, I have some effect on the outcome. I can’t control the argument, but I can at least influence it, and control myself as well. But when I’m an outsider, hearing the cruel and spiteful and unfair things that people will say to each other- when I’m watching a relationship disintegrate right in front of me- it’s awful. And the most frightening part is that nothing I do ever makes it stop. Especially in my family; we all have to burn out our anger before we can settle down and listen to reason. Even me, sometimes. Joe hates fights as much as I do, but he handles them better, on the whole. He reacts to them more or less the way he reacts to being badly scared or enraged in any other circumstances: he gets uptight about it in a major way, but when it’s over he shakes it off and is back to more or less normal within the hour. Usually less. (The only exception to this is when he takes it into his head to hold a grudge; those last forever and a day!) Meanwhile, I’m still tense and fretting and have to struggle not to make things worse by brooding over them. Those are the times when I really envy my brother!

When I finished eating, I gathered up the spoon, bowl and glass and carried them out of my room and down the hall. I paused when I reached the top of the stairs, listening as sounds drifted up from the dining room. Voices talking- Mom and Dad, and occasionally, Joe. Clinks and rustles, and once, a thump and an “Oops.” I heard Dad chuckle and Joe laugh, and tried to squash a feeling of loneliness, of being left out. I silently knelt, wincing, to place the used dishes on the top step, then got up and retreated to my bed, feeling discontent and rather divided. Maybe I should’ve made the effort and gone down. But would things be as relaxed and- and- I couldn’t remember the word. Camaraderie, or something like that.

Maybe they’ve gotten used to not having me around. Maybe if I was down there with them, it’d be all awkward.

That made an unfortunate amount of sense. I sighed, pulled myself up from the bed and went down to the bathroom again. When I got back to my room, I tried to continue reading my book, but ended up staring out the window at the familiar street and neighborhood. I watched the summer sun slowly edge down the sky and sighed to think of all the vacation I’d lost. At least it wasn’t like missing school; I didn’t have three weeks worth of homework to catch up on, nor would I have to face stares and murmurs and talk when I returned to classes.

That made me remember my friends, and my spirits lightened a little as I thought about the get-together they wanted to have for me. Then I wondered if anyone had gotten word to Callie, my on-again, off-again girlfriend. She was with her parents in California, visiting family and incidentally checking out whatever celebrities she might happen to run across. I couldn’t remember when she was supposed to get back, and was just debating a look at a calendar to see if I’d written it down, when Joe walked into my room. He was carrying a glass custard dish of chocolate pudding and a clean spoon.

“You okay, Frank? You look down in the dumps all of a sudden,” he said in his straightforward way, sitting down on the edge of my bed as I turned back to the window.

I shrugged. “Joe, did- did Callie ever call, or did anyone tell her?”

There was a significant pause before he answered me. Joe doesn’t have anything specific against Callie, but he’s wary of any girl I go out with. My first ‘girlfriend’, Susie Chambers, tried to use me as a cover for her heroin use and dealing when I was fifteen. Joe warned me several times that she was bad news; I arrogantly (and stupidly) dismissed him as ‘little brother being jealous’, no matter what he told me about her. Joe finally lost all his patience and went to the police, who kept tabs on her (and me) for a few nights running and soon arrested her. I’d been first furious, then shocked, then- finally- humiliated when they told me her first drug-related arrest had been when she was thirteen. And she was not the sixteen she’d pretended to be, but almost nineteen.

Ever since, Joe’s looked somewhat askance at my judgment where girls are concerned. Even he has to admit that Callie’s okay, though; she’s strong-willed and sometimes opinionated, and she likes to take Joe down a couple pegs whenever she can, but she’s as honest as the day is long, sensible, courageous and very patient. She’s also twice as pretty as Susie, easily; Susie went for the ‘bad-girl’ look- like wearing black all the time, wearing some very weird metal jewelry and dying her hair every week- while Callie’s fashionable (at least, I think so) without being too preppy.

“Yeah, she’s called a couple times.” I heard a clink as Joe set the dish on the nightstand and put the spoon on top of it. “But she kept getting the answering machine and not leaving any number to call her back with, so I couldn’t do much. Last night she called- around eleven- and I updated her. She was pretty upset, said she wished she could come right home and see you but there was no way her parents’d let her fly home and then stay home alone until they got back-”

“And you didn’t even think to mention any of this?” I turned to frown at him.

“Sorry,” he murmured, sighing. “It slipped my mind. Anyway, there’s your stuff.” He nodded at the dish and spoon and left, closing the door quietly behind him.

I draped my arms across the windowsill and rested my cheek on the back of my wrist with a sigh. Why I so often take my bad moods out on my younger brother is something I’ve yet to figure out; it makes me feel so wretched and yet I keep doing it. Joe certainly didn’t deserve to be growled at- he’s a little scatterbrained sometimes, but he does faithfully write down and deliver phone messages, which meant that Callie hadn’t left any specific message for me.

And isn’t it perfectly reasonable for him to be a little scatterbrained now, worrying about you day and night, always by your side, doing everything in his power to help you stay comfortable and recover? Look how nicely you repay him- with surly criticism. Never mind your parents didn’t clue you in, either- and Mom and Dad had far more opportunity to notice messages and convey them than he did- no, you take it all out on Joe…

I pushed myself off the bed, stood- wincing as I moved- and left my room to go apologize.

Joe’s bedroom door was partly open, so I didn’t knock, just gave it a little push to widen the entry and leaned against the doorjamb. He was sitting on the floor next to his bed, cross-legged, and looked up tiredly as the hinges creaked. I hesitated in the doorway, not too sure of my welcome.

“Joe, I-”

“It’s okay. I shouldn’t be so over-sensitive,” he interrupted me.

“I shouldn’t be such an asshole,” I countered, moving across the room and carefully kneeling beside him. He closed his eyes and sighed, then got up and helped me to my feet. We both sat down on his bed and I rested my hand on his arm. “Just because I’m on medication is no excuse for me to be all cranky and rotten to you, Joe. And it isn’t even that, ‘cause I was being pretty unpleasant even before I was on the painkiller.”

Joe looked a little puzzled. “When?”

“Oh, like when I snapped at you for teasing me, before we went up to Vermont. And I wasn’t any too easy to live with after we got back to Vermont from Canada- I was annoyed with Biff and Chet and you got some overflow from that. And I got all pushy with you before we left home, too, when you didn’t feel like explaining about your dreams. Not to mention-” I was counting off on my fingers when Joe interrupted me.

“Okay, okay,” he muttered. “You’ve been...more uptight than usual this summer. I guess I hadn’t sat down and counted- I try not to do that. Anyway, you did have reasons to be in a bad mood.”

“And no matter how low I feel, I always feel worse when I take it out on you,” I returned.

He sighed again. “That’s why I shouldn’t let it get to me, I can see how guilty you feel about it,” he answered, studying the carpet. “But I can’t just- brush it off and pretend it didn’t happen, either. It-” He hesitated, seeming to brace himself. “It makes me feel like I can’t do anything right...”

I chewed on my lip until enough of my guilt eased for me to talk. The last thing in the world that I wanted to do was trigger him into another bout of low self-esteem. “Joe, you’re the only one who has done things right for me,” I told him, putting my arm around him. “You- you’ve taken care of me, and I didn’t even have to ask you to, you just did. And I don’t think I’ve even said thank you once.”

“You have,” he retorted quickly. “Several times.”

That wasn’t much consolation. “Even so, thank you isn’t very much. I don’t mean to make you feel bad, and I know I shouldn’t get on your case for things that really aren’t your fault at all. Especially when you’re being so- good to me.”

He didn’t answer that, which meant he agreed.

“I didn’t want to come home,” I confessed after a moment. I owed him an explanation for my mood as well as an apology for it, even though I wasn’t too sure I wanted to talk about my feelings yet.

My brother turned to me with an astonished look. “But-?”

“I’m worried about what’s going to happen with Mom. We never exactly finished that argument, you know, and it’s gonna come up again- and I’m not looking forward to it. And...I wanted to go downstairs and be with you all- I could hear you all talking and wanted to come down and join in. But I thought about it and wondered if me being there wouldn’t just make things awkward. Felt like maybe you’d got used to me not being around and wouldn’t want to, to include me. It made me lonely. You- all three of you, not just ‘you’- sounded so...cheerful, without me... Egotistical, I guess,” I concluded lamely.

“Insecure, I guess,” Joe retorted, leaning against me. “No wonder you’re so down and grumpy. Feeling left out from your family is rotten. We were cheerful ‘cause you’re home, Frank. Believe me, the last couple weeks, it’s been Gloom City in this house. We’d go through whole meals without saying more than three words apiece. And laughing? Forget it.” He looked up at me earnestly. “Now that you’re well enough to be home, this place really does feel like ‘home’ again. It hasn’t.”

I sighed, gave him a faint smile and a tight squeeze, feeling a little foolish but also feeling a lot better. “Thanks,” I murmured. “Thanks, Joe- for everything. Aw, heck, I could say it a zillion times and it still wouldn’t feel like enough.”

“Once is enough for me,” he answered, smiling as I lifted my hand to ruffle his hair. “Say- did you really finish all that pudding so fast?”

“Hm? Oh, no, I didn’t even start on it.”

Joe regarded me in surprise, then grinned. “If you don’t want it...”

“Sure, I want it, but I had something more important to do, first.”

He looked puzzled briefly; I gave him a significant look and he suddenly blushed, understanding. “Oh...well, go eat your dessert before the thought of all that chocolate tempts me too much,” he ordered, gently pushing my hand from his hair.

I obeyed, feeling relieved, but one thought kept returning to haunt me.

One of these days, he’s not going to forgive me.

I didn’t know if that came from my own fears or if it was a logical conclusion, but either way it sent a cold chill through me. As I reached my own room and sat regarding the pudding dish, I mused on the thought and finally concluded it was a logical, if extreme, idea. Joe doesn’t handle unfairness or injustice well, and he’s utterly intolerant of anyone who betrays him. That meant my recent habit of snapping at him and taking out my frustrations on him was a double strike against me; not only was I bruising his feelings, I was betraying his sense of fair play. If I kept it up, his forgiveness would get more and more grudging, and in time I would hit the point of no return.

I shivered, resolved at all costs to cease such destructive behavior, and wondered rather bleakly if he still wanted my dessert. I had no stomach for it at all.

“Are you still trying to tempt me?”

I jerked my head up in surprise. “Huh? Oh-”

“Mom wants the dish, if you’re done with it, so she can run the dishwasher,” Joe explained from the hallway. “So stop sitting there looking like you’ve lost your best friend, and either eat it or give it away. But most especially, stop looking so miserable, okay?” he added more gently when I didn’t react. “It’s okay, big brother. Jeez, you tell me not to guilt-trip myself so much- take some of your own advice. It’s not like you make a habit of picking on me, and you always apologize when you do. You’re human, Frank, just like everyone else; you’re allowed to make mistakes.”

“I hate feeling like I’ve been unfair,” I explained, picking up the spoon and taking a tentative taste of the richly creamy chocolate. “I know how much you despise unfairness- and I do too, so when I do it-” I shrugged.

“Yeah, but what bugs me most about unfairness is when people won’t acknowledge it or admit that it’s wrong. Or when they do admit it but then go right back to being unfair. They say they’re sorry, but as soon as you forgive them, they act like it’s an invitation to go on and do it again. You don’t do that. When you catch yourself being unfair, you stop, and when you apologize, you mean it.” Joe canted his head, giving me his best ‘encouraging smile’ and I had to smile back. Then I set about finishing the pudding; my appetite had returned, my mood lifting as he set me straight.

“You’re right,” I agreed, between mouthfuls. “There is a difference. Thanks for the dose of perspective, bro- along with everything else. You’d do great on the debate team,” I added after a moment. “Very persuasive.”

Joe just grinned, waited till I had finished the pudding, and took the dish and spoon downstairs for me. I settled back on the bed, feeling about ninety percent better, and let my eyes close.

I am so lucky to have him for a brother.

Dad gave me a brief embrace, his expression lightening a little as he said, “See you tonight, son,” but the front door shut behind him with a bit more of a bang than usual. I caught a glimpse of the overcast sky and felt a blast of heat sweep through the room. The newspaper was lying on the table, as usual; I glanced at the weather section and saw that the temperature was supposed to hit ninety-five, with severe storms forecast for the afternoon. Not a very cheerful outlook. I folded the paper, then quietly helped myself to cereal and juice. After considering for a moment, I cautiously tried some scrambled eggs, figuring they fell into the ‘semi-solid’ category. Mom didn’t stop me; in fact, she didn’t even notice. She was reading another section of the paper, still frowning. The air of tension was strong and I felt uncomfortable, so I ate as quickly as I dared. The sooner I got done and back upstairs, the better I’d feel.

Joe trotted downstairs a few minutes after Dad left and grinned when he saw me. He took his spot beside me, heaped his plate, and started in, apparently oblivious to the mood hanging in the room. I finished eating long before he was, and against my better judgment, lingered at the table for the sake of company. He asked how I was feeling and I told him ‘Much better’; then he asked where Dad was and I explained that Dad had just left. After that, the only sounds were his utensils against his plate, the rustling of the paper, and the quiet clink of Mom’s coffee cup whenever she put it down on the table.

When Joe was done, we both took our dishes out to the kitchen, as usual. I saw Joe glance over his shoulder toward the dining room; his smile had vanished and I knew he’d caught on to the lingering air of tension. “I think they had a fight,“ I murmured in his ear, and he nodded, frowning. “Dad had that frustrated look, before he left.”

“Mmmm.” Joe nodded again and then we both went out to finish clearing the table. Mom ignored us as we took care of the dishes, but as we were heading for the stairs, she put down the newspaper.

“Hold it, both of you.”

I recognized the tone at once; it was the voice she uses when we’re in deep trouble. I turned to face her, feeling resentment stir in the midst of my dread. She obviously meant to bring up the argument, as I’d expected. And equally obviously, my hope that we wouldn’t get into another shouting match was badly misplaced!

“Let’s hear it.” Mom was eyeing us both with a grim expression.

Joe and I traded confused glances. “Hear what?” I asked.

“Don’t give me that! I’m not putting up with any more secrets, Frank.”

“What secrets?” Joe demanded, his voice as perplexed as his face.

“This case of yours!” Mom snapped.

“We’re not on a case,” I replied, bewildered. “How could we be? I’ve been in the hospital-”

“I know where you’ve been!” Mom cut me off. “I want to know about the investigation that put you there! Did you expect to just walk off and leave me in the dark yet again? It is a bit late to think about ‘sparing me any worry’, as you call your habit of lying to me. I thought I’d made it clear that I wasn’t going to stand for any more untruths and half-truths.”

For a moment, I just stared at her, unable to get my brain into gear. What a change from the kind and caring attention she’d been giving me in the last weeks! Joe gave himself a brief shake, then said curtly, “We’re telling you the truth, Mom, we’re not on a case. Haven’t been since we got home from Vermont. If we’d taken one, we’d have told you, like we always do.”

“I bet,” my mother retorted sarcastically. “Just like you always tell me everything that happens. You never keep anything secret from your mother, do you?”

“Mom-”

“Of course, why didn’t I see it? This was a purely random thing, someone just walked by and pulled out a gun-”

And now we know who Joe gets his talent for sarcasm from.

“Actually, that was almost exactly what happened, except it was a car that pulled up beside me and the passenger that started shooting,” I told her.

“And you expect me to believe that?” Mom shouted, standing so fast that I thought her chair was going to go over backward.

“I was standing at a stoplight!” I shot back, my voice rising. “I wasn’t paying attention, I had no reason to be alert or watch my back! I didn’t even get the license plate number- and you know I wouldn’t be that un-alert and clumsy if I was on a case! If I’d been expecting trouble, I would noticed it a lot sooner, and I would’ve gotten clear as soon as the guy stuck his gun out the window. He took me completely off-guard!” I paused to catch my breath, biting on my tongue to keep the next words in my mouth.

I might as well have said it. It was hanging so heavily in the air that the next thing Joe said was: “And he wouldn’t’ve walked out of the house if you hadn’t-”

“Shut your mouth, Joseph, don’t you dare try to lay a speck of blame on me for this!” Mom’s hand slapped down on the table-top.

“Why not?” my brother demanded, leaning forward, fists clenched, cheeks flushing red with anger. “You deserve it!”

Something clicked sharply in my mind. “So that’s it,” I muttered. “If you can make us admit we were working on a mystery, you can lay all the blame on that. Then you can say it never would have happened if it weren’t for all that horrid investigating. But if we weren’t investigating, you have to admit you were at least partly to blame for it all- and you don’t want to accept your responsibility.” I paused and looked straight into her furious eyes. “I wasn’t investigating a damn thing, Mother,” I went on curtly. “All I was doing was putting as much distance between me and you as I could, in the shortest possible time. And some ass decided to pull a drive-by shooting right where I was.”

Mom’s face went from white to red as she glared at me. “You wouldn’t have felt any need to walk out of the house if you’d bothered to listen and understand what I was saying to you!” she told me in a furious but very distinct voice. “I was angry at you for deceiving me about the danger you two put yourselves into! It’s your safety I’m worried about! And you somehow twisted my concern around to mean I was favoring Joe over you-”

“That is not what happened!” I shouted at her. “I wouldn’t have gone anywhere if it’d just been about us omitting stuff! I never felt right about giving you only part of the story, and you had every reason to be mad about it. But I didn’t twist anything! You’re the one twisting things! You’re pretending that argument was all about our safety, but it was as much about your rotten favoritism as anything else! It’s Joe’s safety that concerns you, you admitted it when you told me how worried you were that he’d get hurt- Joe, not Dad, and not me! You wanted Joe to stop taking cases, but you could care less whether I do or not! You don’t care about what I do, so long as Joe’s not in danger!” I pointed stiffly at my brother, not taking my eyes from Mom’s.

“Frank, you-”

“And you can’t deny that you favor him over me, either. It’s blatant! Anyone with functioning eyeballs can see it. You don’t have any problem demonstrating how much you adore him- and you don’t have any difficulty conveying how oblivious you are to me!” I could have given her a number of explicit examples, and I was deeply tempted to. But I knew that for every bit of guilt I flung in Mom’s face, I’d be inflicting an equal- or greater- amount of guilt on Joe. I couldn’t do that to my brother. None of it was his fault and he didn’t deserve to take the backlash. “I don’t think you have ever really loved me, but you wouldn’t come out and admit it. You just demonstrated it,” I concluded as calmly as possible. Which wasn’t very.

Mom’s face was pale again and her expression was a blend of disbelief and guilt. That pleased me. Then she straightened up and declared, “That is not true, Frank. None of what you just said is true.”

“Well, you’ll excuse us if we believe it anyway,” Joe practically spat at her. “You refuse to believe Frank wasn’t working on an investigation when he got hurt? Fine, we refuse to believe that we’re wrong about your favoritism. Besides, we’re used to drawing conclusions based on evidence, and you’ve demonstrated plenty of it.”

“Evidence, what evidence?” Mom cried out. “What in the world has made either of you think this way? You’re making these statements and you’re not even offering me any examples-”

“I don’t notice you offering any examples to the contrary, either,” I told her wearily. “You want me to think you care about me? Then you better give some thought to proving it.” Sick of the circuitous argument, I turned away and walked across the room. Silence seemed to blanket the entire house as I made my slow, aching way up the steps. The little creaks of the wood under my feet sounded terribly loud to me and I was grateful when I reached the quiet, carpeted hallway. I could hear my brother’s grimly angry voice drifting up the steps, but by then I was too far away to hear his words clearly. The sound cut off as I shut my door and lay down on my unmade bed.

How can she stand there and pretend she doesn’t favor Joe? How can she act like she’s got the same concern for me that she has for him? How stupid, how unobservant does she think I am? And how >dare she ignore the favoritism and act like it was all about us deceiving her? Ah, of course- that way she’s the wronged one and we’re the ones to blame for it. Call me a liar, will you? You’re the one lying, Mom; you’re the one twisting and evading and refusing to admit you’re wrong. At least we admitted it!

I wished there was something I could do to vent all the feelings that were piling up inside me; I felt like I was going into emotional overload. If I could just feel one thing instead of many... My primary emotion was anger, because I had always hated to be accused of lying, but there was a lot of frustration and indignation mixed in with it. And an incredible amount of pain. I turned over, rearranged the pillow, and tried to soothe myself with indifference. Tried to tell myself that it didn’t matter if Mom loved me or not; it didn’t matter if she favored Joe. What mattered was that Dad loved me, and Joe certainly did- two out of three was plenty, and more than some people had. I should be glad I was loved so much, instead of pining for what I couldn’t have. It wasn’t as if it was my fault. And there wasn’t anything I could do about it. I’d just have to accept it. That was what I’d been doing wrong, wishing I could change something that wasn’t mine to change.

It was a fine philosophy, but it didn’t help in the least. I wanted my mother’s love, and it hurt terribly to admit that I didn’t seem to have it. It did matter to me. But there still wasn’t anything I could do about it.

After a while I sat up and looked drearily around my room. Its familiarity suddenly seemed dull, confining. I wanted to be out of it, but I wasn't about to go back downstairs and deal with Mom- or with the stairs themselves. Besides, I was still fairly weak; even if I did get out of the house, the best I'd likely manage would be a walk around the block. But staying shut up in my room was a very uninviting thought. I was restless for some distraction, but in no mood to listen to music or try to read, and even the computer didn't tempt me. Finally I got up from the bed, sat down at my desk, and pulled out a sheet of paper and a pencil. I made sure the door was firmly closed, and then I started writing. I poured out all the 'examples' that were burning inside me that I'd wanted to fling in Mom's face; all the things I could think of that proved she cared more for Joe than I. All the things that I didn't want to say in front of him, knowing how miserable it would make him feel.

I stopped when I got near the bottom of the page, but the memories kept fluttering through my mind. Large things, small things- even petty things, some of them- but added together, it made a devastating whole. It wasn't my imagination, and it wasn't paranoid jealousy, though I had little doubt Mom would describe it that way. That, or say I was making mountains out of molehills.

I'll keep this, and next time she goes on about proof, I'll show it to her. Let her deny it then! This proves I'm not making it up- she'll have a hard time explaining it all away, or claiming I don't understand, or that I don't have any 'evidence'.

My thoughts wandered on in this vein for a while; it was nearly an hour before physical pain began to distract me from my miserable brooding. My stomach was all right, but the area just under it was beginning to ache- my colon, where one of the bullets had lodged. I grimaced, thinking of the eggs I’d eaten, and concluded they had been a bit too solid for my healing body to deal with. Then I remembered that my pain medication was downstairs; Dad had left it there the day before yesterday, when I came home. Joe had brought me a pill up last night when I needed it, but now I’d have to go downstairs to fetch it.

Not that I want to go down there- or anywhere else that Mom might be…

I heaved a sigh, got up from the chair, and moved reluctantly down the hall to the stairs. As I reached the top step, I hesitated. I could hear agitated voices drifting up from below and frowned, annoyed and suddenly apprehensive. Had they been arguing the entire time, or was it a rematch? Either way, I was unwilling to face it, and for a moment I stood debating with myself. Did I really need the painkiller that badly? After a moment, I concluded that- like it or not- I'd better get it. The pain wasn't too bad yet, but the longer I delayed, the worse it would get. I started slowly down the steps, bracing myself on the banister. The old, dry wood creaked a few times under my weight, but neither Joe nor Mom seemed to hear it. If I was lucky, I’d be able to slip into the kitchen for the pills and get back upstairs without being noticed.

Then Joe’s words became clear and I paused to listen, halfway down the staircase.

“If you feel more for one of your kids than the other, the very least you should do is treat them equally, not show one more affection than the other. Hold us both at arm’s length if you can’t show us equal amounts of love.” Joe sounded very cross. I closed my eyes, feeling a rush of gratitude. It was so like him to insist that Mom should be fair in showing her affection- or lack of it.

Never works that way, little brother, but it’s so good of you to try...

“But what I don’t get is, why? Why won’t you admit it? Why do you let him think there’s some terrible flaw in him that you just can’t forgive? Why won’t you be honest and admit that it’s something in you that makes you treat your own son-”

“He’s not my son.”

My eyes flew open and my legs gave out, dropping me rather sharply onto the stair beneath me. Pain seared up through my rear and my already-aching body protested, but I ignored it. I stared wide-eyed down the steps, as if I could somehow see Mom’s face and weigh her words.

Not her son-

There was silence downstairs; Joe must be as stunned as I.

I’m not her son? Then... that explains it. That’s why she doesn’t like me. That’s why I look so much like Dad and not like her; that’s why Joe and I are so close in age. She isn’t really my mother. Dad must’ve... But that’s insane! Dad would never cheat on Mom! But how else-

“What?” Joe’s question came out in a gasp. “What do you mean? Dad wouldn’t- he’d- he couldn’t!”

“I mean what I said.” Mom’s voice was low and rather tired. “Frank isn’t my son, or your father’s son. Or-”

Oh, no, no, don’t, please don’t-

“Or your brother, for that matter.”

I squeezed my eyes shut again and wrapped my arms around myself, my head bowing, my shoulders slumping.

Joe...my brother...my little brother...

It hurt worse than any physical pain I’d ever felt.

I’d rather be shot again. I’d rather die! God, why didn’t I just die? Why?

“He is!” Joe shouted, sounding more scared than anything. “What are you saying, of course he’s my brother!”

“Your father had a brother, a twin brother- your uncle Stanton. He was older than your father by about twenty minutes. I didn’t get to know him well until I’d been dating your father for nearly a year, because they lived in separate apartments. Fenton’s schedule with the New York police department was erratic at times, and it was easier for him not to worry about disturbing his roommate- his twin- at odd hours. And I think Stan resented me taking so much of your father's time, at first, and avoided me... When your father and I married, Stan was best man, and during the reception he met a dear friend of mine- my roommate from college, Phoebe Clark. They began dating, and got married two years later. Phoebe...almost exactly a year after their wedding, Stan and Phoebe had a child. A boy. They named him Franklin after Stan and Fenton’s father, your grandfather.” She paused. Joe was silent; I could imagine his stunned expression.

“Frank was just three months old when his parents brought him over to our home one evening. Stan and Phoebe were going to attend a concert. Your father and I had planned to go with them, but I wasn’t feeling very well, so we stayed home and looked after Frank- cancelled Phoebe’s babysitter. Stan and Phoebe...never came home. The concert hall caught fire, and they didn’t get out in time. The fire department soon discovered that the fire had been deliberately set. Your father- I thought Fenton would go mad, losing his twin like that. He worked on the case obsessively, it was the only thing he seemed to care about- except for Frank. Frank was the only thing that put any life into Fenton’s eyes. Six months later, Joe, you were born.”

“So you allowed him to keep Frank,” my brother hissed. “Because having him around helped Dad deal- no wonder Dad cares about Frank and you don’t.”

“I do care about him!” Mom protested. “Do you think I would have kept the child if I didn’t?”

“Did you adopt him?” Joe challenged.

“No, we didn’t. What point would there be? We were his legal guardians, and he was already family-”

“But not a son. Not a real son, like me, who had the misfortune to get born to you!”

“Joe!”

“What? Why do you think I should be glad to be the son of somebody as nasty as you? Someone who couldn’t be bothered to make a three-month-old orphan their legal son, even though you were his guardians- his only family! Was it because you didn’t love him, even then? Or were you hoping that after Dad got over his twin’s death, you’d be able to give the baby away?”

I forced myself to my feet, clutching the handrail. My legs were shaking so much I was afraid I’d fall, but I was determined to get back to my room. Nothing on Earth could force me down those steps now; I’d deal with whatever pain came rather than hear any more of Joe’s biting accusations and Mom’s feeble-sounding explanations. I had to brace myself against the wall as I trudged back to my room, and when I reached it and shut the door, I slumped down on my bed in relief. My head was spinning with wild emotions and fragments of voices. I lay down, pulled the pillow over my head, and wished with all my might that I would wake up from this nightmare.

Naturally, I didn’t.

I had never so much as dreamed that Joe’s parents weren’t mine. It was worse than a shock, worse than a struggle to understand; it made my entire life a falsity. I wasn’t who I thought I was, who I’d always been told I was. I felt as though all my sixteen years as Fenton and Laura Hardy’s son were being wrenched out of me, ripped from my grasp, reeling out of my control.

Stanton and Phoebe’s son… Fenton and Laura’s nephew…Joe’s…cousin. Not my brother. Not my brother! Oh, Joey!

I pulled the pillow off my head with a groan. Nothing could stop or negate or erase the truth, now that I knew it. I’d do better to face it than try to hide from it, but it hurt so much. It was bad enough to learn that our parents weren’t mine, that I was an orphan, that my entire life was a lie- but why did it have to cost me my brother, the person I most loved, as well?

He must be horror-stricken. Oh, he must be hating Mom as much as I do right now. No! Not Mom. She’s not my mother, they’re not my parents. My parents died sixteen years ago.

I felt a sudden, terrible yearning for my own parents to be alive. I wanted to know them, to know that they loved and wanted me- not like the woman I’d called ‘Mom’ all my ignorant life. But I couldn’t, and that was pain on top of pain. ‘Insult to injury,’ I thought dazedly, staring at the wall. But which was insult and which was injury, I couldn’t have said. I sat up, stared out the window at the overcast sky, wrapped the sheets around my inexplicably cold, shaking body, and tried to blank my overtaxed mind.

Naturally, my gift for blotting out my surroundings didn’t work- not now, when I needed it most.

The rest of the morning passed in a sort of haze. The pain in my abdomen increased, as I’d expected, but I did my best to ignore it. When the pain got too intense to ignore, I decided- perversely- that as long as my mind and body were both hurting, I might as well see if the physical pain might help blot out the psychological distress. Instead of ignoring the pain, I concentrated on it, willing it to distract me from the chaos in my mind. I quickly learned that pain is no replacement for calm meditation, and I soon grew tired of the misery I was putting myself through. I would have to take a pill. Feeling defeated, I forced myself to get up and make my painful way downstairs to find my medication. I deliberately didn’t think about what I’d say to Mom or Joe, aside from, perhaps, “Shut up and leave me alone.”

To my surprise and vast relief, no one was around. I didn’t speculate on where they’d gone or when they’d left, just looked for my prescription bottle. Finding it, I downed one of the pills with the help of a glass of water, then closed the vial and put it in my pocket. Then, on a whim, I opened the basement door and carefully descended the steps. I knew I’d feel better faster if I sat down and rested, but I stubbornly refused to do so. It wasn’t really perversity, this time; I just didn’t want to chance an encounter with her.

The concrete floor was chilly on my bare feet and the overhead lights shone bright and hard off the objects arranged in their spaces. I remembered how cluttered it used to be and how Mom and Dad had spent an entire weekend cleaning out a lot of junk and organizing the rest. The whole rear wall had the house and garden tools: buckets and sponges, car wax, house paint, spare light bulbs, a stepladder, furnace filters, bottles of nails and screws and a peg-board of carpentry tools. There was a workbench, too, with several clamps still fastened to it; I wandered over and hung those up where they belonged. The left side of the basement was the furnace-water heater-laundry area: the washer and dryer and ‘drip-dry’ clothesline were closest to the stairs and then there was a space between that and the big units. I’d always been wary of that corner when I was little. The furnace, particularly, had made what I considered very threatening noises, and one day I had summoned the nerve to peer into the wide crack in the side. The sight of the blue gas flames had given me a bad scare and for a long time I’d worried about the house catching on fire.

I leaned against the wooden worktable, and after a moment, pulled myself up to sit on the flat top. My body was still aching, but less fiercely, and the change in position helped. Sunlight warmed my back from the small, high window behind me and I felt myself relax a little. I looked over at the other wall, letting my eyes seek familiar things among the outdoor equipment. Not the sports stuff that we kept in the garage near the spare-parts shelves, but camping, hiking, fishing and even a bit of rock-climbing stuff. Coils of ropes and the tent; sleeping bags, wet-weather gear, fishing rods, tackle boxes... It wasn’t nearly as tidy as the workbench, but then it is pretty hard to stack such things neatly.

The sight of the gear brought memories rushing through my mind- all the times we’d used the stuff seemed to blur and tangle together, with bits and pieces standing out. Sometimes we’d gone as a family; other times it had been just Joe and I. Or, twice, just Dad and I. And a couple times it’d been the three of us, with Mom staying home.

I’d always been closer to him than to her. Now I knew why. And I’d always been closest to Joe- poor Joe, as ignorant as I, loving me for exactly what he thought I was. No secret, hidden background to dilute or erase his feelings. I wondered suddenly, frowning, why he hadn’t come up to tell me Mom’s revelation- why had he left? He couldn’t have guessed that I overheard...

Maybe he needed to think about how he’s going to tell me? Or maybe he’s giving her a chance to tell me herself.

That made my frown deepen. On the whole, I’d rather get significant news from Joe instead of Mom, and this was more than merely ‘significant’ news. I didn’t want her delivering me the truth in some cool, uninterested way, setting the record straight. Not that it really mattered, since that was how I’d gotten it anyhow-! Well, not really, I decided after a moment. She hadn’t been exactly uninterested or- or clinical when she told Joe about my parents. But that simple, blunt, flatly factual remark- “He’s not my son.” I swallowed and squeezed my eyes shut as her voice repeated in my mind.

Not her son. Stanton and Phoebe’s son.

A new thought dawned on me. I slid carefully down from the worktable, went to the stairs, and started climbing. It was a rough haul, and made the pain flare again, but I bulled on through and paused, panting, at the top. When I got my breath back, I made my way quietly to the den. I closed the door softly behind me and went to the bookcase that held the family photo albums. Taking the first one down from the shelf, I sank down on the sofa, placed the album in my lap...hesitated a long moment...and then, with a deep intake of breath, opened it.

I immediately realized that the photo albums weren’t arranged chronologically, for the first page had pictures of Joe, Dad and I on one of our ‘guy’ camping trips. Nevertheless, I paged through the book- just in case. It stirred a lot of memories, memories that now caused me considerable pain and left me wishing I could go back and un-hear that awful conversation. Ignorance really can be- well, if not quite bliss, certainly a lot less upsetting than enlightenment.

Three photo albums later, I finally found what I was looking for. The pictures were old and faded, some of them turning yellow, others beginning to crack. Some had been fixed to the pages with tape, and even that was turning yellow. I studied the faces intently, recognizing my much-younger grandparents- at least that’s still the same!- and Gertrude. And two young dark-haired boys. The farther I went, the more the family aged, until my grandparents were more like I remembered them and my father and his brother were in their late teens- or perhaps early twenties. The pictures were less faded here, and as I studied them I felt a sudden sense of bemusement.

You hardly needed to go looking, Frank- they were twins! Identical twins! That’s why you look like Dad... like Fenton...because you look like his identical brother, your real father.

It wasn’t a completely pointless exercise, though, because a few pages later, I saw the twins with their girlfriends, or fiancées. I actually pulled back the plastic and took the picture out, studying my mother Phoebe very carefully. All I could really tell was that she had dark hair. She was squinting- the shadows indicated she was looking into the sun- and she was several inches shorter than Stanton. But taller than M- than Laura. Maybe that’s why I’m taller than Joe...

Then I encountered the wedding pictures.

My father, Stanton, really did look exactly like the man I called Dad; if I hadn’t known better, I would have thought it was Dad marrying a different woman. A closer look at the best man changed that half-thought notion, and then I turned my attention to Phoebe. She was smiling up at her new husband, her whole face alight with happiness. I studied her for a long time, wondering briefly if there was any Hispanic or Mexican blood in her- my- family. Her black hair brushed her shoulders and her dark complexion was heightened by the white dress. I still couldn’t tell the color of her eyes, but I would have been willing to bet they were dark brown. I wondered what she’d been like. Cheerful? Moody? Fun-loving? Strict?

Sighing, I turned the page and flipped past shots of the reception. If my real parents had lived, would they still be married? Would Phoebe have tried to dissuade me from Stanton’s profession? What had that been, anyway? Was he something safe, like a banker or lawyer? Or had he been a detective, too? Was that why Dad worked mostly solo- had he and his twin planned to be partners, the way Joe and I were?

So many questions. I flipped a few more pages, ready to shut the book- and then froze with a gasp.

Phoebe- holding a baby-

Holding me-

She was sitting in a hospital bed, in a soft-purple robe, looking down at my infant self with a weary but tender smile. And Stanton, my father, was hovering near, looking both amazed and proud.

My heart pounded and my eyes stung as I slowly turned the pages. My parents- holding me, feeding me, playing with me...holding my fingers and smiling at me, wearing expressions of pride and happiness. I stopped at one picture...my parents looking down at their baby son as he slept in his crib, both oblivious to the photographer, their faces so full of love that I couldn’t bear it. I slapped the cover of the album shut, dropped it on the floor, buried my face in the sofa cushions, and tried very hard to cry softly- so no one would hear me.

It was the sound of the phone ringing that woke me from an unexpected sleep. I lay still for a moment, disoriented, and heard someone pick up the living-room extension.

“Hello? Oh, hi! Ah, no, I’m sorry, not right now. He’s resting.”

I moved one hand to rub my eyes, becoming aware of a weird discomfort. Not in my stomach; in my leg. I was lying on my side, on the study sofa, and there was a distinct ache in my upper thigh. Turning over, I touched the spot and realized I’d been lying on the prescription vial in my pants pocket. My neck ached from the position I’d fallen asleep in, and I rubbed it gingerly.

“Yes, certainly. All right, Chet- no, no trouble at all. Oh, fairly good, considering. Yes, he’s still moving pretty slowly, but he’ll be back to normal soon enough.”

Dad’s voice. I must have been way out of it, not to hear him get home!

“Sure, I’ll let him know. ‘Bye.”

I sat up and carefully stretched some of the stiffness from my body. Then my gaze fell on the photo album. It had fallen to the floor while I slept, and some of the pictures had slipped out. I got down and picked them up, then went about trying to get them back in their proper places without looking at the pictures any more than was necessary. Somehow I’d gone from wanting very much to see them, to not wanting to see them at all. I hadn’t anticipated the effect they’d have on me. It was while I was doing this that I heard the front door open. A moment later I heard Dad’s voice as he greeted Joe, and Joe’s reply. Then there was the sound of feet hurrying up the stairs, much more noisily than usual. So all this time, Joe had been out of the house- probably struggling with what Mom had told him. And now he was back, and-

“Dad, have you seen Frank?” Joe sounded like he was calling down from the top of the stairs.

“Isn’t he in his room?” Dad sounded both surprised and a bit alarmed.

“No!” Joe’s footsteps came pounding back down the stairs. “Nor in mine, and the bathroom’s empty. Where in the world could he have gone?” There was real fear in my brother’s voice.

“Well, wherever it is, it won’t be far,” Dad said steadily. “But we’d better have a look around.”

I sighed, got up from the sofa, limped over to put the photo album back on the bookshelf, then made my way to the den door. I didn’t really feel like facing either one of them, but I couldn't stay hidden away when I knew they were so worried about me. I opened the door and said, “I’m right here.” My voice came out sounding more sleepy than I expected, but that was all to the good.

Dad and Joe were both standing near the front door, Joe’s hand on the knob; Dad was saying something about calling someone. At the sound of my voice, they both turned sharply and then relaxed visibly. Joe hurried over to me, relief flickering over his face; Dad- my uncle- followed more slowly. “What were you doing in there?” my not-father asked, smiling.

“I came down a while ago to get my prescription,” I explained, patting my pocket with one hand and closing the den door with the other. “Then I went in to read and wait for it to work- I didn’t feel like climbing the stairs again. And then I fell asleep. I woke up just now when the phone rang.” I glanced at Joe, who had paused beside me. “And if that hadn’t done it…”

“Sorry,” he murmured. His look of relief had changed to one of anxiety. “If I’d thought you were asleep, I woulda been quieter.”

“I know.” I patted his shoulder. “Where’d you go, anyway?”

“Just...out.” Joe took a breath, then let it out uncertainly and turned to his Dad. “We had another argument this morning, Mom and us. She thinks Frank got hurt because of a case, and she was really mean about it and wouldn’t believe us when we told her we weren’t working on anything.”

“And then she was denying that she’s ever shown favoritism, again,” I said bluntly.

“She’ll probably tell you how rude we were, ‘cause we told her that if she didn’t believe us about the case, we didn’t have to believe her about her being all equal,” Joe remarked, a scowl crossing his face.

“In other words, one good denial deserves another,” I muttered. Denial- there was a lot of that in the family!

“I see.” Dad- Fenton- sighed. For the first time, I noticed he was holding an envelope, and wondered vaguely if it was a threat. He tended to get a lot of those. “I tried to tell her last night that you two were neither working with me or on your own, but she didn’t seem convinced. Where is she, by the way?”

Joe and I traded a glance and both of us shrugged. “Haven’t seen her since breakfast,” I replied honestly. Heard her, yes. Seen her, no. “But then I haven’t exactly seen anyone. I wish this stuff wouldn’t keep putting me to sleep,” I added, shaking my pocket so the pills rattled in their vial.

“Cut ‘em in half,” Joe suggested, his expression turning sympathetic.

“Maybe. Or maybe I should skip ‘em and take something over-the-counter.”

“It’ll be another day or two before ordinary pain relief will have much effect, Frank. But your brother’s idea isn’t a bad one. Try cutting one in half, and if it doesn't help quite enough, take the other half. Spacing it out a bit might help with the drowsiness.”

I was nodding when I heard a car pull into the driveway. A strong urge to flee gripped me; the last thing I wanted was to face her and I moved to the stairs as quickly as I could. “Oh- who was the phone call?” I remembered to ask, pausing to look over my shoulder at my- uncle.

“Ah, that was Chet. He wanted to check in, see how you were doing and talk about that get-together.” Dad smiled at me. “Your welcome-home dinner.”

“Oh, right. But we can’t do that till I can eat solid food again. Just having eggs this morning made for problems.” I grimaced and started up the stairs as fast as I was able. I was relieved when Dad didn’t try to stop me, or remind me that avoiding Mom wasn’t going to solve any of the problems between us.

I know I won’t be able to avoid her forever. Sooner or later- tonight at dinner, tomorrow at breakfast, sometime- I’ll have to look at her, talk to her. And sooner or later, I’ll have to let them know what I heard. But not now!

I heard the front door open as I reached the top step, and sped up my pace to get down the hall to my room. I heard her greeting Dad as I closed the door very quietly behind me, shutting out the sound of her voice. Let her think I’d been upstairs all along, if she even cared enough to wonder. I sat down on the side of the bed to get my breath and reflected that moving around was was still not very comfortable or easy. The pain pill took care of most of the discomfort, but dulled me with fatigue. Not taking the pill meant I was in pain, but it didn't leave me feeling like I'd run a mile instead of climbing twelve steps. I decided to give Joe's idea a try; half a pill might give me a perfect balance between discomfort and fatigue. Not too much of either.

A soft tap on the door distracted me and I wasn’t at all surprised when Joe pushed it open and came in. He carefully closed it behind him and I braced myself as he sat down beside me. I had a feeling I knew what was coming. "What's up?" I asked neutrally as he fidgeted.

"I just didn't want to be down there. I'm still furious at her for this morning," he grumbled. "Acting like we were lying...it's like she's going paranoid or something. Like just because she thinks or wonders something, or thinks there's a chance of something, that means it must be true, because she thinks so."

"Like her thinking is what makes it true and anyone who says different can't possibly be right," I clarified.

"Like that," he agreed, kicking the side of my bed. "I wonder what'd happen if she decided to believe the Earth was flat. Probably tell everyone Columbus was some kind of con man."

That was a bit of an exaggeration, but I didn't argue. Joe tends to exaggerate when he's nervous. And I was pretty sure I knew what he was nervous about. It's no light thing, telling your brother that your mother's disowned you. For a moment, I wondered if I ought to ease his mind and bring it up myself. Then I wondered if admitting my inadvertant eavesdropping would be wise or not. He'd probably be upset that I'd heard any of the discussion- including his own vicious remarks, even though they had been directed at Mom. I lay down on the bed, wondering what I should do, and almost didn't hear Joe asking if I was all right. "I'm- okay," I answered at last. "I think maybe I will start chopping these pills in half- thanks for the idea." Reminded, I pulled the vial from my pocket and put it on my nightstand.

We remained in my room for about an hour, talking about nothing in particular. I was jumpy and keyed up, and Joe didn’t seem to be feeling much better than I was. I’d never felt so awkward with my brother before and it was an unpleasant feeling. He didn’t notice that I kept staring at him, but that might have been because he was having trouble meeting my eyes at all. I knew there was no logical reason for him to have changed physically, but the shock of knowing the truth about my parents was so strong that it seemed impossible for there to not have been some outward change. How could he still look exactly like he always had when everything was so different? I also started to feel a little resentful, as it became obvious that he wasn't going to 'enlighten' me, after all. I wondered rather irritably what he was waiting for, why he didn't just get it over with. Part of me longed to just get everything out in the open, let the consequences start. But I dreaded the thought of what would happen once it was out in the open. It’s one thing to start something when you know where it’s going to end; it’s another thing entirely to unleash something nobody can see the end of.

Guess I can’t blame him for not having the nerve to tell me, since I don’t have the guts to tell him that I already know.

And then the opportunity evaporated as a call from downstairs summoned us to come and eat. Joe’s reaction to that was a word he ought not to be using- at least not in the house- but I didn’t reprimand him. I wasn’t looking forward to the meal, either, and not just because I was getting tired of ‘semi-solid’ food.

This is going to get ugly.

It did, and it was my own fault.

The table was already set and the food on, which surprised Joe and I a little- that was usually our chore. Mom and Dad- or whoever they were- sat down as we came in, and for a few minutes it was the usual ‘pass your plate over’ routine. I didn’t try to eat any of the casserole. Instead, I sipped my milk, attempted the mashed potatoes in the hopes they’d give less trouble than eggs had that morning, and mused about liquid supplements. Mom nearly scolded me for not eating, but then stopped with a guilty look and hurriedly left the table. After about two minutes of loud activity in the kitchen, she came out carrying a bowl of heated-up puree of vegetables and beef. She gave it to me and I thanked her, but I had trouble eating it. It looked too much like baby food, and I wasn’t terribly hungry anyway, even though I'd missed lunch.

It was Dad who triggered it, near the end of the meal. Till then things had been neutral, with him talking a bit about his case and her mentioning average, everyday stuff- things she’d done at work and chores that needed doing around the house. The uproar of the morning went unmentioned; I had the feeling that was waiting in the wings for later in the evening. Joe was as silent as I, neither of us caring to contribute anything beyond a ‘yes’ or ‘no’, and eventually a prolonged silence fell. Dad looked at my half-full bowl- everyone else’s plates were nearly clean- and asked, “Not too hungry, son?”

I could have just said No, but all of a sudden I decided to put an end to it. “You shouldn’t call me that,” I remarked quietly, poking the remainder of my potato-hill with my fork. “Seeing as I’m not.”

Dad’s fork fell with a clatter and there was a moment of complete silence. I didn’t look up, but I could feel three shocked, horrified gazes burning into me.

“Frank...” The man who’d called himself my father sounded stunned, his voice weak. “How- who-?”

“I might have known,” Laura said bitterly. “Trust you to run to him at the first opportunity, Joseph, and-”

“That's right, blame the one who's not guilty!” I shouted, turning on her with a savagery that astounded even me. "That's your solution to everything, isn't it? Someone else's fault, never yours! But you can't squirm out of this one, because Joe said nothing to me about it. Not a word! He wasn't the one who said, He's not my son!" I mimicked her voice. "He’s not your father’s son. He’s not your brother." I had to stop and catch my breath as the pain of the last statement rolled over me again.

Little brother...

“Laura-!” Fenton’s voice came out in a shocked whisper. “How could you?”

She had gone white and her hand pressed against her throat, her gaze darting between me and her husband. "You- but- I didn't..."

"Don't tell me you didn't! I was coming downstairs to get my medication and I heard! I sat there on those steps and listened to every word you said about me and my real parents!” I pointed fiercely at the staircase, glaring at the wide-eyed woman, rage overwhelming my grief. "You never wanted me, never, you just got stuck with me when circumstances went out of your control! And then you lied to me!” I spun to face Fenton, for he was trying to interrupt. “Every damned day of my life, you’ve let me live a complete lie. From the day I was old enough to understand English!” I paused as something else occurred to me. “You know, you’re a fine one to accuse us of lying to you,” I growled, turning on my aunt again. “You’ve deceived me and Joe every day- for sixteen years! And you have the absolute gall to scream at us for telling most of the truth?”

Joe’s bowed head snapped up; his blue eyes were full of misery, but his mouth was tight with anger. “You’ve got a real good point there, brother,” he told me grimly. “And you are my brother, no matter what anybody says. Maybe not by birth, but by choice and blood.”

I met his intense gaze, his words soothing me slightly. By choice- yes; if choices meant anything at all, he was who I’d chose to be my brother. Maybe it didn’t mean anything legally, there might be a different label for us now, but it wouldn’t change the relationship we’d had all our lives. As long as he felt like my brother, filled a brother’s place in my heart, that was what he would be- what I would call him. But by blood-?

Then I remembered: the blood he'd donated to me in the hospital.

Yes, I have that much left. I haven’t lost him. He’s truly my brother, my blood brother.

But then- if he was my brother- what did that make his parents, to me? How could I call them Mom and Dad now? Yet- how could I not, and still call Joe my brother? I pushed the puzzle aside; we could work through that some other time. He was my brother, and the thought strengthened me.

“You lied to me, too,” I accused my real father’s brother. “And you didn’t care enough to adopt me as your ‘real’ son. Did you.”

“S- Frank, we- I-” he stammered, then let out a breath and closed his eyes, rubbing them with his finger and thumb. “We were appointed your legal guardians, Frank. And we did consider adopting you. But-”

“But, you didn’t.” I bit down on the rest of my remark- ‘What stopped you- knowing you’d soon have a honest-to-goodness kid of your own?’- stood up from my chair and started to walk towards the stairs. Then I stopped, turned about, and stalked out the front door. Maybe the guy who shot me would be hanging around, waiting for a better chance. And maybe this time, he’d have decent aim.

I didn’t really want to die, but it took me a long time to reach that conclusion.

I walked, too lost in my own angry misery to notice where I was going and how tired I was getting. When my legs started to feel unsteady, I sat down on someone's lawn and rested; when I felt stronger, I got up and kept walking. Away. Anywhere, so long as it was away from that house and that man and woman. A little while later I had to rest again, and sat down right where I was. I was vaguely aware of streets and stoplights, traffic and buildings, and the faint smell of salt water, but I didn't pay much attention to any of that. I was also aware of sidelong glances from people passing me- most people don't sit down on the curb to take a breather- but I ignored those. When I could, I got up and went on again.

I lost track of how many times I stopped and rested and got up and walked again, but I did notice that my rests were getting longer and longer, without making much difference to my fatigue. I tried to ignore the fact, but when I started stumbling over rough spots in the pavement, I admitted to myself that I had to stop soon, before I collapsed. Halting, I looked around and took in my surroundings. I was over a mile from home, on the far side of Bayport proper, heading into the suburbs between us and Southport. The sensible thing to do would be to find a phone booth and call to tell Dad or Joe where I was, but I didn’t feel like being sensible. And what was so sensible about seeking out acrimony and confrontations and half-truths, anyway? Home wasn’t a haven for me anymore; it was the source of all my problems. I’d be an idiot to go back there.

Of course, that didn’t leave me with many prospects of where to sleep.

I sat down on the curb to rest my shaking legs and tried to decide what to do. I could call some of my friends, maybe, but then I’d have a lot of explaining to do. I wondered if my family would call in a missing persons report on me or not. Sighing again, I noticed the ache in my gut and felt rather relieved that my painkiller vial was still in my pocket. I was wondering if all this walking was good or bad for me- and concluding that it hardly mattered- when a car pulled up beside me. As I looked up, fully expecting to see the man with the gun taking aim at me again, I noticed in passing that the sky was growing dark. I wasn’t afraid, I was too tired and depressed to feel any fear. So when I found myself gazing into my father’s worried eyes and recognized the family car, I simply stared back at him, mildly surprised and relieved. I hadn't, I discovered, really wanted to get shot again, after all.

The next thing I knew, Dad was crouched in the street before me, asking if I was hurt. Then the other door slammed and Joe came racing to my side- always running, where did he get all that energy from?- and knelt on the curb, his hand smoothing over my shoulder. They were both asking questions too quickly for me to follow, so I just sat there feeling somewhere between glad and irritated that they'd found me.

“I almost wish he’d killed me,” I remarked to Joe when he finally quieted down.

That, of course, set off a new round of jabbering questions, but then Dad hushed Joe and asked, “Who? When?”

“The guy with the gun, in the car,” I replied, surprised. “When he shot me.”

“Oh.” Dad looked relieved. “I thought you meant now, tonight.”

I snorted, the irritability breaking through my half-numb fatigue. “Listen to him,” I told my brother. “He hears me wish I was weeks dead and all he can say is he’s glad it didn’t happen tonight. Why not tonight? Three weeks ago would be better, though,” I went on, turning to face the man, whose relieved expression was fading into a sort of appalled sorrow. “Then none of this would’ve happened. For that matter, last year would’ve worked just as well...if you get right down to it, it would’ve been better if I’d died in the fire with my parents.” I glanced back at Joe, fondly. “Then you wouldn’t have to miss me.”

“Frank, I- I just meant that I’m glad you’re not hurt,” Dad protested. “We’ve been looking for you for the past two hours, worrying the whole time that you’d end up in the hospital again, or worse.” He took a breath, let it out in a sigh, and added, “It’s getting late. Come get in the car and we’ll go home.”

“I don’t want to go home,” I told him bleakly. Besides that, I was not all too sure I could stand up. Joe slid his arm around my shoulders and I leaned against him, wishing I was as healthy and strong as he was. Then I could have walked farther, too far for them to find me. “I hate it there- every time I go home, things just get worse and worse.” Was that really me talking? Calm, logical, old-for-his-years Frank Hardy making such a petulant, emotional overstatement?

“I know,” my brother murmured as Dad sighed again. “But you’re tired and need to rest, and your bed’s the best place for that. Besides, your painkillers are there. Remember how you put them down on your night-table while we were talking in your room? And you look like you could use one.”

I frowned, patted my pocket, and discovered that it was empty. “Forgot about that,” I admitted, feeling defeated. They’d take me home whether I wanted them to or not, rationalizing it as what was best for me physically, if not emotionally. And I didn’t have the energy to deny them. In fact- “I don’t think I can stand up. It hurts.” The result of that statement was my father and brother carefully helping me to my feet and guiding me the few steps to the car. I lay down across the back seat and closed my eyes. The gray of the evening seemed to fill my head and I hardly felt the car move as Dad drove home.

How I got into the house, up the stairs, and into the bedroom is still beyond me; I have no memory of it. I do recall making a tremendous fuss when someone tried to tuck me in bed, though. I pushed and slapped at the hands that were trying to keep me in bed, nearly falling to the floor when I got up, but I persisted and managed to get out of the room on my own. Joe tried to turn me back when I got partway down the hall, but I pushed him aside too and got into the bathroom without further interference. I had to go, bad.

It wasn’t pleasant. In fact, it hurt worse than it had in the hospital, so much so that I sank my teeth into my hand to keep from yelling. ‘That’s what you get for eating solid foods,’ said the little voice of logic in the back of my brain. I didn’t pay it much attention, except to admit the validity; I was too busy getting my breath back and being glad that, despite all the pain, there was no blood. When I got out of there, someone helped me back down the hall to my room. This time, I didn’t protest as I was covered up, and when Joe gave me the pain pill, I took it with relief. The grayness came back with a vengeance, turning black almost at once, and I gratefully floated away from the pain and misery.

“Are you ready to listen to me?” my ‘father’ asked quietly.

I was sitting on my bed, elbows on the windowsill, wondering if it was worthwhile to trudge downstairs and get a bowl of cereal. It was late enough that I was unlikely to encounter her- it was nearly eleven- and I was pretty sure I’d heard a car depart as I was waking up, over an hour ago. And since Dad was here, it was certainly Mom who had left. Still, it didn’t seem worth it. My hunger was an abstract thing, not seeming to belong to me. Even the thought that I should eat and be done before she came back wasn’t making much impression on me. At the sound of Dad's voice behind me, I looked around from the window briefly, shrugged, and turned to gaze back out at the dripping, overcast day. I couldn’t tell if my emotional apathy was due to the events of last night, or if it was the result of the discussion I’d had a little earlier with Joe.

Joe- pale and red-eyed and looking like he'd hardly slept- had come into my room soon after I woke. Tripping over his words in his rush to speak, he'd attempted to apologize for the revelation I’d overheard the day before. I’d hushed him quickly and bluntly, telling him to quit blaming himself for things he had no control over and never even suspected. Then I’d held him close for a few minutes, feeling a sort of respite from my wretched emotions. “You’re my brother,” I murmured. “No matter what the law or anyone else may label you, you’ll always be my brother.”

That rather unfortunate remark, meant to reassure him, had led us into an incredibly complicated and frustrating discussion. With much difficulty, we’d finally agreed on three things. First, what you called someone was not as important as how you felt about them; we might technically be cousins, but we felt like brothers. That conclusion didn’t take long to arrive at, but the next one took some debating. It was that, although feelings were most important, labels did matter. Joe was disinclined to admit that, but I pointed out that if labels didn’t matter, he wouldn’t have been nearly so upset about Mom saying I wasn’t her son. I also gave him a bit of first-hand demonstration by calling him ‘sis’ until he conceded the point.

The third thing was the most complicated and got us both rather upset: after my ‘sis’ demonstration, Joe told me flat out that under no circumstances was I ever to call him ‘cousin’. Not even jokingly. I doubted it would ever feel like a joke to me, but wondered at his vehemence. “I don’t have a cousin,” he told me firmly. “And I never will have one. I have a brother, and if he tries to disappear and replace himself with a cousin, he’s due for a sharp surprise. My cousin doesn’t exist, and I’ll act accordingly.”

When I asked why, he replied- somewhat less grimly- that he was afraid my penchant for being accurate would override my feelings. “I don’t want to run the risk that you’ll get more interested in being legally accurate than emotionally accurate,” he said, with some justification. For I had been about to point out that this left me with a bit of a problem: how could I call him ‘brother’ and yet call his parents ‘aunt and uncle’? It seemed awfully misleading, not to mention confusing. But I wasn’t sure I wanted to call them ‘Mom and Dad’ anymore, either. Calling him cousin, while still feeling brotherly towards him, would have been the simplest solution. Then we’d all have the correct labels, for the first time in our lives. But I kept my mouth shut on the remark, for we’d just agreed that it wasn’t labels that mattered most. It was how we felt about each other. And we’d already proclaimed that we were brothers and always would be- by choice and by blood- so changing my mind would be a bad idea indeed. Especially if it meant Joe would shun me. I’d just have to decide what I was going to call my legal guardians, never mind what confusion it might engender.

Having worked our way through that very emotional conversation, I lay back down to rest while Joe went to do some of his chores. After a while, I heard rain pattering on the window and sat up to stare out at it, half-mesmerized by the gray sheets whipping sideways in the strong wind. Fifteen minutes later, Dad tapped on the door, wanting to talk to me. I wondered vaguely if that letter he’d gotten yesterday was a new case. If so, he wasn’t doing much about it, for he was wearing his work-around-the-house clothes: old pants and a shirt with paint splatters on it. Probably doing some of the chores Mom had mentioned at dinner last night.

“You said last night that we’d deceived you all your life,” Dad began, and I heard the door click shut behind him. “I wanted to explain that.”

“Explain it?” I repeated, almost contemptuously. Oh, this ought to be good.

“Yes.” The foot of the bed sank as he sat down. “I can understand why you feel lied to, but believe me, there was no deception involved, Frank.”

I glared at him. “You hid the truth from me and you say there was no deception?”

Dad hesitated. “No deliberate deception. Tell me, have you given any thought to why I call you my son, instead of my nephew?”

“No.” I paused, thinking about that. “You didn’t want me to know. You didn’t want to have to talk about my father.” After all, my real father was his twin- had been- and losing him... I felt a sudden, traitorous sense of sympathy; how would I feel if I lost Joe? But then why would Dad want me around at all, to remind him of his dead twin? Maybe his sense of duty had prevented him from passing me off to someone else.

Dad shook his head. “I call you my son because, in my heart, you are my son,” he said simply. “I was there when you were born, Frank. I was the third person to hold you, after your parents. I loved you from the beginning, and the more time passed, the deeper it grew.”

I was not expecting such a statement and didn’t know how to handle it. For a moment, all I felt was a profound disbelief, a sort of cynicism. That was his reason for not telling me my true parentage? Because he--perceives me as his own?

“I never thought of it as deceiving you, Frank; just the opposite. When I say ‘son’ to you, it may not be the exact truth, but it is how I feel towards you. To me, you’re as much my son as Joe is. I’m not interested in the legal definitions and terms. They may be technically true, but they don't allow me to- to convey my feelings accurately. I couldn't love you more if you had been born to me- and I can't count how many times I've wished that you had.”

There was a long silence as I tried to take in that astounding statement. He felt the same way towards me that Joe and I did towards each other- that the truth was more in how we felt than what we called each other. And I- how did I feel? My anger and cynicism struggled against this overwhelming feeling of love and acceptance; I turned away so he wouldn’t see the tears filling my eyes. “But you never adopted me,” I whispered. Dad slid closer to me, laid his arm across my shoulders.

“That was something we debated for a long time, Frank. And in the end, we decided- not that it wasn’t necessary, but that it would be better for you. We wanted you to grow up with real parents, not to feel the uncertainty and insecurity that some adopted children feel. We never wanted there to be a question in your mind that you belonged to us.”

“And didn’t that work out well!” I choked. “You should have told me! All my life, I wondered what was wrong with me! What I was doing, or not doing, or saying, or behaving- what in the world was it that made Mom not love me! Nothing ever worked, Dad- good grades, good behavior, doing extra chores, being polite and helpful and not complaining and- and none of it mattered, none of it made even the slightest difference!” I stopped, panting for breath.

“Oh, son...” Dad groaned and held me close. “Oh, my dear boy.” A moment later, I felt another hand press against the back of my shoulder, and reached up to grip it tightly. Joe’s touch and presence were far more comforting to me than Dad’s well-meant hug, for Dad had known the truth about me. And he’d known Mom didn’t care for me as a mother should, yet he’d done nothing to solve either problem. He said he loved me, and it seemed he did- his behavior over the years argued for that- but he could have saved me so much misery just by telling me the truth.

It took me a while to calm down, and when I did sit up, I continued to hold Joe’s hand. “You should have told me,” I repeated quietly. “Especially when you saw how she was treating me. You didn’t have to pick between truths; you could’ve told me about my parents and about how you felt. You made my decisions for me, never gave me a choice.”

“Frank, we did what we felt was best. Maybe we were wrong, and if it hurt you, I’m truly sorry.” He was opening his mouth to say more when we heard a car pull into the driveway. I turned quickly to look out the window. Yes- she was home. A moment later, the front door opened and we heard Mom calling Dad’s name. “I’m upstairs,” he called back, and I spun around to glower at him. “In-”

“She’s not coming into my room.”

Dad sighed again, gave me an awkward pat, then stood up and moved to the door. “You know, you’re going to have to talk to her sooner or later,” he said, sounding patient but not happy.

“Later, preferably.” Which wasn’t what I wanted to say, but it was the thing that would make him leave quickest. The last thing I wanted to do right then was get into a debate about whether I ‘had’ to talk to her or not.