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ONE
Heath
“You didn’t haveto do all of this,” I tell my brother, Patrick, as we head up the front walk to the cabin that he bought for me.
“I wanted to. Besides, it will be nice to have you so close by. Brennan is so excited to have his uncle back in the States.”
I force a smile to my lips as he turns and grins at me. He unlocks the front door as I try to navigate the two porch steps with my cane.
“We can put a ramp in if you need. This was the only place that I could find in town that didn’t have a ton of stairs either inside or out,” he says as he opens the front door.
“It’s great. You really didn’t have to do all of this. I could have found my own place.”
“It’s alright. What’s the point of having a bunch of money if you can’t spend it on the people that you care about?”
Patrick studied computer science in college. He created his first app when he was like nineteen. Then after he graduated, he created a few more for the state of California and public transportation. He hit it big and has been set for life since he was just twenty-five.
That ended up working out though when our oldest brother, Caleb, and his wife were killed in a tragic car accident. They left behind their only son, Brennan, and since I was overseas in Afghanistan, Patrick was the only one who was able to take him.
I came home for the funeral and to make sure that Patrick and Brennan were going to be okay together before I went back to duty. I tried to come back to help out as often as I could but I didn’t have a ton of downtime.
I was in the Navy for ten years, and a Navy SEAL for the last five of that. I had planned to retire from the SEALs, but a bad blast had me medically discharged early. A piece of shrapnel hit my sciatic nerve and had me out of commission for the last six months. I’ve been in a VA hospital since I got back to the States and was just released yesterday.
When I walked out, Patrick and Brennan were there waiting for me and they brought me back to Honey Peak, Michigan. That was where they had moved to after Caleb died. They needed a fresh start and the little town of Honey Peak was just the place.
“We have you set up on the first floor,” Patrick says as we head inside.
The house is actually really nice. It’s a two-story cottage a few blocks off of Main Street on a quiet street. It’s also right next door to Patrick and Brennan’s house.
The house has dark hardwood floors and the walls are all painted a pale green. It looks like the walls were just painted and I’m sure that Patrick had the house spruced up before I got here.
“The kitchen is back to the left,” he says, pointing past the living room to where I can just see the kitchen sink and a fridge. “Then the bedroom and bathroom are right down that hallway.”
I look straight down the hallway in front of us and see a few open doors.
“Looks nice.”
“There are more bedrooms and bathrooms upstairs, but with the cane and nerve damage, I figured that you’d rather be down here.”
“Yeah, it will be easier to have it down here.”
“There are two bedrooms downstairs. Actually, the master bedroom is down here, so I set up that one for you.”
“Thanks.”
Patrick heads into the living room and starts to fluff some of the pillows on the couch.
“I’ll help you get set up here and then I have to go get Brennan from school.”
“And to see your girl,” I say, and he just smiles.
He’s been dating Brennan’s teacher since they met at a parent-teacher night a few months ago. They had initially decided to wait until Brennan wasn’t in her class anymore to start seeing each other, or at least that’s what he told me, but I have my doubts. He’s been sneaking away to see her every chance that he can get.
“Maybe,” he admits and I crack a smile.
“I’m good here if you want to go.”
“Are you sure?” he asks and I nod.
