Page 86 of The Best Shot

“We’ll figure it out.”

She nodded, still facing the sink.

The water ran between us. Another plate dried. Another cabinet closed.

Then, lightly, “You really shouldn’t have taken someone else’s side over your brother. It’s good you’ve been there for CeeCee, but he’s blood.”

I watched her hands move through the water and thought about being a kid, standing where she stood now. Washing Shaun’s dishes while he sat in the living room with a controller in his hand, laughing at something on the screen.

Mama had dried beside me and told me he was tired. Practice had run late. He had homework. He needed a minute.

I understood, even then, that his tired mattered more than mine.

After Dad left, Mama seemed to think Shaun had lost more than the rest of us.

He needed more patience. More softness. More room. The last slice. The remote.

Her hand would settle on my shoulder, her voice soft and final.

Just let him have it.

Later, she’d tell me how proud she was. How mature I was for not making a fuss.

“You’ve always made it easier for him,” I said.

“For who?”

“Shaun.”

Her head came up, but she didn’t turn.

The water ran.

“I’ve always been fair,” she said. “I’ve always tried to be fair.”

“I know you think you have.”

Her hands stopped. “I love you both the same, Yasmine.”

I looked at the small wooden cross above the window. It had been there since before I could read, dark and polished smooth by years of kitchen steam.

“Is it because of what happened with Dad?”

She frowned at me.

“Shaun has always blamed me for telling,” I said. “Do you?”

I’d never forgotten my mother’s face when I told her. How she stood at the kitchen table with one hand on the back of a chair, staring at me like she’d heard me from very far away.

At ten years old, I didn’t know what I expected her to do. I just knew something bad had happened, and when something bad happened, you told Mama.

That was the rule.

That was supposed to make things better.

Instead, it split the house down the middle. Me on one side, Mama and Shaun on the other, and Dad completely gone.

The refrigerator hummed. In the living room, the low murmur of Shaun’s voice continued, patient and unhurried.