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The drive through Birch doesn’t take long. I live on the outskirts, in a renovated farmhouse that I bought after college. St. Joe’s is close enough that if I want to, I can walk to service. Hell, Ihavewalked to mass a few times just to enjoy the weather.
“He told me I was becoming Cam.” I laugh bitterly, talking about our oldest brother. “Last week, when we met for a beer at Lucy’s Bar. He told me that if I didn’t find someone to make me happy, I’d end up walking in his footsteps.”
“Damn,” Casey whistles. “That’s quite the insult. Cam wouldn’t know how to relax, especially since that stick of his is shoved so far up his ass it’s almost funny.”
“How did Keegan end up the smartest out of all of us?” I bite my lip, wondering if there is an answer to that particular question, or if I’ll be struggling with the answer for the rest of my life.
“He had us,” Casey says as he pulls into the church parking lot. “He watched all of us fuck up our lives, and then made the opposite decisions from what we did.”
I can’t respond to that. Not for lack of words, but because Mom stands outside the old oak door that leads into the building, and I can see her trembling from thirty feet away.
Dad must be parking the car, because he races toward her just in time for Mom to collapse in his arms with a heart wrenching sob that tears right through to my soul.
Neither Casey nor I say a word as we leave the vehicle, ignoring every other person in the parking lot. Eyes trained on Mom, we get to her side and Dad hands her to us.
“Oh…” She cries as she clings to both of us. “My boys.My boy.” She falls apart in our arms, and there isn’t a damned thing we can do about it.
No one steps around us to go inside. No one approaches to offer their condolences. No one speaks a single word.
Even the noise caused by cars driving by pales in comparison to the sound of my mother crying for Keegan.
“Amy,” Dad says quietly as he pulls her back into his arms. “We’ve got to do this.”
She goes, her chest still heaving, her sobs still echoing through the air around us, and my heart breaks even more. I hadn’t thought it was possible.
“Let’s go, Patrick.” Mom moves for the door, still crying.
Casey takes one door, and I take the other. Together, we open them for our parents to walk through. For the first time, I look at the people there to pay their respects, and immediately lock eyes with Avery James.
In the millisecond that I have to absorb every detail about her, I do just that. She is wearing a long black dress that clings to every single one of her curves, and her hair is held back in a braid that falls over her shoulder. Her eyes, though, catch mine and hold firm. Even after I blink and walk through the doors following my parents, without looking back, she fills my mind, much like she always has. The pain I see there, for my brother, for my family, etched clear as day on her face. She isn’t alone, either.
“I saw Bria,” Casey whispers as we enter the chapel behind our parents.
Cameron stands there, a grim expression on his face as he holds out an arm for our mom to take. He escorts her to the front pew, where our priest waits for both her and Dad.
“She’s here with her brother and Avery James.” Casey keeps going like we’d been in the middle of the most important conversation ever. “I have to talk to her, before this is all over.”
Nodding woodenly, I clasp him on the arm and move to join our family.
“I’m serious, Carter. I can’t let her go. Not anymore.”
“Fight for her then,” I echo Keegan’s last words to him. “If you don’t want to lose her, do what Keegan said and fight for her.”
Time flies by after that. I remember sitting down next to my brothers. The sounds of people milling into the building. I even remember the shock on Casey’s face when Bria forces Cameron to move over so that she can take her place in the family pew. But I don’t remember a single word that our priest said during the introductory rites. I can’t hear which mass he speaks or the readings that our parents have chosen for Keegan. I don’t even remember the song the choir sang. The only words that echo in my heart, over and over again, are Keegan’s.
“Don’t turn into Cam, Carter. Sometimes you’ve got to break the rules,” echoes in my mind. Words I’ll never forget. Words I can’t erase. But Keegan broke the rules. He didn’t search his suspect before trying to arrest him. His mistake cost him his life. My hands clench into fists, and I try to keep control of my temper. Rules. Every single time a rule is broken, someone dies. First, LJ had died in college and now, Keegan. I’ll never break them. I know the price, and watching my mother fall apart in the pew drives it home for me. Rules aren’t meant to be broken.
“Keegan’s brothers would like to speak to you now, before we go in peace.”
Cam stands up and moves around Bria and Casey, who I see are holding hands.
“I’m not much of a speaker,” he starts. Then he closes his eyes and takes a shuddering breath. “Keegan was a little shit.” Cam flushes. “Sorry, Father.”
Our priest offers him a sad smile and nods.
“He was. He watched everything and everyone around him. He learned what to do, how to do it, and when to do it so that our parents didn’t see him screw up. But despite that, he joined us in service all the same. Keegan was the best of us. He was smarter than me, calmer than Casey, took more risks than Carter, and he smiled more than all of us combined. His life… cut too short, was full of everything I want to be.”
Mom bursts into tears again, and Dad wraps his arms around her.
