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Quaid pulled his keys from his pocket. If he didn’t start for home now, it could be after midnight before he got back to the office. “I want his name. I’ll pay him off so he doesn’t come after our mother, who would have no idea how to protect herself. I might be able to get your car back or at least negotiate for him to take it off your bill.”
He was so sick of having to save his brother.
“I can do this. I’m not trying to get out of it,” Paul insisted. “I need time. I have the money but it’s invested in property, and that takes time to sell.”
“Your house is worth three million. Where did the other seven go? It can’t all be acting lessons.” He was floored by the fact that his brother had wasted everything their parents had given him.
“I was never good with money the way you are. I like enjoying my life. Sue me.” Paul’s expression turned sullen, and he moved to the passenger side of the car.
“Oh, I wish I could, brother.” Quaid opened the door and slammed inside, forcing the seatbelt over his torso before turning the car on.
“I didn’t mean to run through it all. I thought I would do better than I have,” Paul admitted quietly. “Everyone always told me I could be a star, and then things went wrong. I did spend a lot while I was high. I know you think I don’t have feelings, but you can’t imagine how much I regret putting Mom and Dad through that. I suppose you can’t understand because you were always the perfect child.”
“Don’t turn this around on me.” He wasn’t going to sit here and listen to Paul whine about how easy he had it. “I didn’t have it any easier than you did.”
“You were handed the career you wanted.”
“You think I wanted this? I’m not complaining. But it might shock you to know that it wasn’t exactly my choice. I was basically told what I would do. You had choices.”
Paul was quiet for a moment as Quaid pulled onto the street. “You could have said no.”
“Really?”
“Yes. It’s a powerful word. You say no and then don’t do whatever the thing is you don’t want to do.”
“And then when Dad died, I would have left the whole town with no one to look after them.” He wasn’t properly explaining himself. He wasn’t sure why he was explaining at all, but the least he could do was be precise. “I didn’t mind law school. I enjoy the job, I do. I wouldn’t change the course of my life, but you pretend like it wasn’t hard work or that I never wanted to be anything except what I am right now. You pretend like I never had a single dream.”
“Well, I suppose I didn’t think you did,” Paul replied. “What did you want to do?”
He wanted to write, and he did write.
He wanted someone to read what he wrote and enjoy it.
He wanted to walk into a bookstore and see the world he’d always had inside his head being shared with others.
He wanted to make a lot of money off books so he didn’t have to spend every second of every day working, and he could travel and see the world and fictionally murder people in international settings.
“It doesn’t matter.” Telling Paul would only give him a weapon to use when he needed it.
Paul fell silent and the miles rolled, the night flowing around them.
“I’m not the same asshole I was in high school.” Paul leaned his head against the passenger-side window.
“You just had sex with a married woman, you’re on the run from a loan shark, and you lied about why you came home.” He was exactly the same.
Paul sighed. “I didn’t know... I’m not going to win with you, am I?”
“There’s nothing to win because we’re not playing a game,” Quaid replied, turning down the long drive that took them home.
“No, we’re not. I spent a long time thinking we were, that we were competing.” Paul sat up as they approached the circular drive in front of their house. “Every class I ever took I had to deal with comparisons to my brother. I wasn’t as smart or as athletic as Quaid. So I tried to be more artistic, more charming. But we don’t have to do that anymore. We can just be ourselves.”
His brother seemed to be working out something, and Quaid wasn’t sure he liked the sound of it. Paul’s voice seemed to gather excitement as he continued.
“We don’t have all those expectations. We can enjoy being brothers.”
“I’m not enjoying myself.”
“Because I never gave you step eight.” Paul sat back, a hand on his head like he’d made a true revelation. “I never made amends to you.”
