Page 104 of Tanner

“That’s not the same thing.”

“No.”

Tanner’s chest was tight enough to hurt. He paced across the kitchen and back again. The room wasn’t big. The floorboards creaked under the same spots they always did. The fridge hummed. Somebody’s dog barked down the street. Everything in the house was still the same, and none of it was the same at all.

“I signed it,” he said.

Miles put the spoon down beside the sugar jar. “I know.”

Tanner shook his head. “No, you don’t. You don’t.” He pressed the heel of his hand against his sternum and dragged in a breath that did nothing. “I signed it, and they took it away and wrote down tomorrow at two and Friday at eleven and a court thing after that, and you all keep saying it’s to keep her here, but that’s what people say right before they tell you it’s out of your hands.”

Miles leaned back against the counter. “That what happened before?”

Tanner gave a short laugh again. “Before?”

“When people with forms got involved.”

Tanner looked at him and then away. “They talk at you. They tell you what the next step is. They tell you it’s temporary or standard or necessary. Then everything moves and you’re the last one to know.” He swallowed hard.

Miles didn’t jump on it or push for more. “Alright.”

Tanner’s jaw clenched. “That’s it?”

“What do you want me to say?”

“I don’t know.”

Miles nodded once. “That’s the first useful thing you’ve said in five minutes.”

Tanner should have gotten angrier at that. Instead it knocked some of it out of him. He dropped into the chair he’d pulled out earlier and sat with his elbows on his knees, staring at the worn patch in the linoleum near the sink.

“I hate this,” he said.

“I know.”

“I hate needing help.”

“I know.”

“I hate that TJ saw me in there.” Tanner rubbed both hands over his face. “I hate that woman. I hate that she kept talking to me like I was a problem she had ten minutes to sort out.”

Miles carried one mug to the table and put it in front of him. “Coffee.” Tanner looked at it. “You don’t have to thank me,” Miles said.

That got the smallest huff out of him. “Thanks.”

Miles sat opposite with his own mug and gave Tanner a minute. He didn’t fill the silence. He never did when it mattered. That was one of the worst things about him sometimes. Tanner could get mad at speeches. He could push back against them. Sitting there with somebody steady and patient and impossible to shake was harder. Eventually he wrapped both hands around the mug and exhaled.

Miles waited until Tanner took one sip before he spoke. “We need to do one thing today.”

Tanner shut his eyes for a second. “I can’t.”

“You can.”

“I don’t want another form.”

“It’s not another form for them.” Miles took a drink from his own mug. “Doctor registration.”

Tanner opened his eyes. “What?”