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“We’ll get him back.” Marcus knelt in front of Jack. “This is my fault for pushing you. I promise you, I’ll find a way to fix this.”
Jack refused to look at his brother. “It’s not your fault. I fucked up. I chose you over him. I could have said no, and I didn’t.”
“You can’t just give up. You didn’t do anything wrong.” Marcus could argue all day, but the facts were the same.
“Didn’t I?” He finally looked his brother in the eye. “Was that someone else who went to meet Brant after Ed begged me not to go with anyone else?”
The silence that answered him was predictable. He grabbed Marcus by the shoulder and stood. His voice cracked. “I blew it. He said I made him hope, and I blew it. You can’t argue my way out of this one.”
* * *
Music vibrated through the floor from the victory party happening downstairs. Jack should be down there, celebrating with Marcus, not hiding in their room checking his phone every two minutes.
He scrubbed his tired face. Operating on no sleep sure didn’t make him feel like celebrating. One of the books Ed had bought him at the yard sale sat at the end of his bed, open, revealing rows of neat words. He ran his fingers over the page.
A pounding knock came at his door, followed by Brittany’s voice. “Make yourself decent, we’re coming in!” A second later the door swung in and Brit swaggered in, Nessa hooked to her side toting Marcus’s bag.
Nessa flashed him a small smile. “Someone was about to trip over this thing,” she said, patting the bag as she scooted to his brother’s side table and set it down. She knocked over the photo of his and Marcus’s dads grinning into the camera, and Jack tensed as she picked it up and studied it.
He looked away, focusing on Brittany, who cleared a spot on Jack’s bed and pinned him with a look. “Marcus is the next senior class president. You should be down there.”
His throat pinched as he swallowed. He owed it to his brother to suck it up and celebrate this success, and he would…. He just…. Fuck, it was harder to do than he’d thought. He still needed a moment to gather his wits.
A cell phone dinged, and Jack jumped, hope slamming into his chest.
Nessa, photo still in one hand, pulled out her phone, smiling as she read a message.
Nessa’s phone, not his.
Brittany caught his disappointment and rested her elbow on the box with Jack’s first addition books. “Still bad?”
He heard the sigh in his voice. “Eight messages, a dozen texts, and four emails and he still won’t talk to me. Time to raise the flag and surrender.”
It was over. Ed was gone for good. He winced at the pain and wished they’d leave him alone for a while.
Another text dinged, and Nessa shifted, sitting on Marcus’s bed, photo on her lap. “Jack?”
“Hmm?”
“Marcus says for you to get downstairs or I’m to drag you down by your boy parts.” She snorted and waved her phone. “His words.”
“Tell him I’ll be down in a minute.”
He slipped out of his shirt with the hole at the hem and rummaged in his dresser for a nicer one.
Brittany kicked off her sandals and climbed deeper onto his bed, spilling his tousled blanket to the floor. “Dude,” she said. “How do I get the old Jack back?”
He shrugged and put on the polo shirt he’d worn the night he and Ed had sneaked into his basement. Fuck. He could still smell Ed on him when he thought of it.
He yanked that one off and chose a gray one. Gray like his shitty mood. “You don’t.”
Brittany hauled in a handful of his shirt and looked Jack in the eye. “None of this quiet grunting shit. Spill. Let it out.” She smiled at him. “I’ve a good shoulder to cry on, you know.”
Jack’s lips briefly twitched. “Thanks, but I’m good.” He’d done enough of that with Ed to last him a long time.
“C’mon, then.” Brittany tugged his arm and glanced at Nessa. “Don’t tempt the girl to do what her beau told her. She’s still trying to impress him.”
Nessa finally held up the photo. “This is your room, but who are these two?”
Brittany twisted around and peeked over. She held out her hand, and Nessa gave her the photo.
Brittany sucked in a breath and looked carefully around the room and back to the photo. “Oh,” she said, angling the photo to match the spot where it had been taken. Then she looked up at Jack and said it again, longer. Realization mixed with pity as she finally understood why this place was important to him. Losing the bet and having to leave hurt, but losing Ed was a thousand times the pain.
