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“Are you okay, Max?” I wondered.
He ran his hands through his hair and groaned. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I have no idea if I made the right decision moving back here to be closer to Holly and the baby.”
“I know, man.”
“No, you don’t, Luke,” he grumbled.
I narrowed my eyes. “Really? Staying in Blue Creek with a pregnant girlfriend? Living with Mom when you don’t want to?” I challenged him. “I don’t think anyone knows more than I do.”
He shook his head. “Maybe about living with Mom,” he agreed. “But Holly and I are different than you and Emme were.”
“I should fucking hope so.”
“I actually want to be with her,” he said. “And I want to be a dad to our kid. I want to make it work and be a family.”
I was taken a little off guard, but I nodded.
“I don’t want my child to grow up without a father,” Max added.
That I understood. I was twenty when our dad died, but Max was only fourteen.
“I just hope that I’m doing the right thing,” he said.
“Why wouldn’t you be?”
“The job in New York, the one I turned down to move back here,” he started, “paid twice as much.”
“But it’s a thousand miles away.”
“Exactly. That kind of money that could set this kid up for anything. But…”
“But you wouldn’t be around.”
“Exactly,” he confirmed. “I just hope I made the right call.”
Max grumbled again and tore through a few of his moving boxes, looking for something. Finally, he found it. A picture of Holly’s sonogram in a frame. He positioned it proudly on the nightstand.
“You did,” I assured him.
I clapped my youngest brother on the shoulder and left him to settle into his room. Into his new life.
On the way out to my truck, I ran into my mother. I was hoping not to have a long, drawn-out goodbye, but clearly, she wanted to talk.
“Can’t wait to get out of here, huh?” she asked.
“It’s not that, Ma.”
She smiled. Like, actually smiled. Not just pursed her lips together in a judgmental way.
“I know you’re anxious to get your life started, Luke,” she said. “I’m excited for you.”
“Really?”
She nodded. I believed her.
“Thank you, Luke,” she said.
“No problem.”
