Page 59 of Brazen Defiance (Brazen Boys #4)

RJ

T ime is just a construct, something manmade to divide reality into measurable bits—days, hours, minutes, seconds. Morning, afternoon, evening, night. Breakfast, lunch, dinner.

Arbitrary, all of it.

But digging into people’s pasts, finding their deepest secrets, weaseling into every nook and cranny of their lives, their finances, their dreams and desires, those have no need for arbitrary measures of time.

I eat when my stomach threatens to devour itself. I sleep when my eyes get so bleary I can’t see the screen any longer. I wash when Walker comes in and forces me to do so.

Vaguely, I remember Trish and Jade coming to visit me, but I wasn’t much of a host. Or even a brother.

Trish talked about her new YouTube channel, and Jade mentioned dad getting help for a gambling addiction that she didn’t know he had, and I didn’t feel worried, excited, relieved, none of that.

I felt annoyed that they were here, taking my focus from what I should be doing.

The only thing that sparked some emotion was that they’d brought me my bike in a borrowed trailer.

I might need that. And now I don’t have to go pick it up.

Smiling, I joined Trish in teasing Jade when she got moon-eyed and tongue-tied with Walker. I hugged Trish and wished her luck before she went back to school. It probably didn’t look like it, but I tried. I really did.

They didn’t stay long. Trish could tell my mind was elsewhere, so she gave me a weighty look that promised to dig deeper when Jade wasn’t around. I’ll pay for my cageyness, especially about Clara.

I said she was visiting her family. But I’m not the best liar, even after all my practice.

I’ve always just held my tongue when it came to the shit I didn’t want anyone else to know about.

But that won’t work for this, and I’ve never felt my lack of skill more acutely than under my sister’s questioning gaze.

Then they left, and I could get back to work.

It might have been days, it might have been weeks, but finally, Walker has had enough.

It feels like I passed out five minutes ago, my teeth fuzzy from too much Mountain Dew, when he shoves open my blinds and windows, noisily cleaning my desk.

In and out with bags of trash and recycling, piles of dirty dishes swept up in a clatter of ceramic and metal.

The smell of fresh cut grass and the hyper call of a chickadee add to the cacophony, forcing me to open my eyes.

“Are you up yet?” he asks.

“No.”

“Then get up.”

“Why?”

Walker strips my blanket off, rummaging through my drawers, throwing shorts and a shirt at me. “Get dressed.”

“I just passed out.”

He’s in my closet next, first one sneaker, then the other smacking against my skin. “Too bad. School starts in two days. You’re taking Jansen for a run. And then we’re having a long talk about how things are going to go from here on out.”

“I have too much to do,” I mutter, pushing my face into my pillow.

“You’re right. And not all of it is behind a screen. So you will get up. You will go for a run. You’ll take a goddamn shower, and then you’ll come to the kitchen and eat an actual meal. Understood?”

I squint at our resident artist. “Who made you boss?”

“Do you want the job?”

No. No, I don’t.

“That’s what I thought.”

I struggle into my clothes, slightly horrified when I get a whiff of myself.

Scrubbing my teeth clean, I look in the mirror and understand why Walker’s so pissed.

I look pale, weak, and exhausted. He’s right.

There’s more to the plan than what’s behind the screen, and I’m not going to be able to do my part if I don’t take care of myself.

But I hate dancing to someone else’s tune. I’ve been responsible for my own choices, for the stability of my family, since I was a teen.

I remind myself that this is for Clara, for our future, that this has been a team sport for years, but it doesn’t sit comfortably against my skin.

It takes a moment of self-reflection to admit to myself it’s because Walker is the one telling me what to do.

I’ve never taken orders from him or Jansen, except for what we get up to in the bedroom.

But looking at myself, I have to admit that I might have to. At least for now.

I didn’t play team sports. They never appealed to me.

But Trish loved soccer right until she graduated high school.

She always said that the best part of being on a team was that if you were having a bad day, the rest of the team was there to pick up the slack.

That when your teammate was having a rough go of it, you got your chance to step up.

And when everyone was revved up and rolling, it was pure magic.

We’re missing that magic right now.

Leaving the bathroom, I head to the kitchen where Walker waits with a giant glass of water, one of Clara’s granola bars, and pain meds, somehow knowing that I have a killer headache. Accepting the implied order, I force my mouth around the sweet crunch, downing the water and pills.

Walker vanishes from the kitchen, returning with Jansen, who looks even worse than I do. And guilt bites into the part of me that has already admitted I’m a shit teammate.

His hair is lank around his gray and thin face. The circles around his eyes are so dark they might as well be bruises, and his fingers are chapped and bloody, a curiosity that is explained by him slowly lifting his thumb to his mouth, teeth gnawing on what used to be a nail.

“Hey Jay,” I say, terrified when he takes a second to focus on me.

Walker gives me a heavy look, and guilt takes a bigger chunk out of me.

One reason we came back, one none of us said out loud but all acknowledged with silent glances, was convincing Jansen to get help.

And Walker's been managing this on his own while I’ve been diving into my own destructive spiral.

Because if I’m working, I don’t have to think about how empty the house is without Clara here. If I’m working, I can trick myself into thinking it will bring her back faster. I can pretend it’s a hell of a lot more temporary than it is.

I’m making headway. But when my primary tasks were as up to date as they could be, I found other work instead of helping. Checking on Bryce, continuing to catalog the pedos in the area, it doesn’t help her.

Helping Walker get Jansen back to something normal, that will help her more. Because if she saw Jay right now, she’d be just as scared as I am.

Walker holds a comb in one hand, a chunk of Jansen’s hair in the other, and starts tugging at the mess, straight from the crown.

“Shit, that’s not how you do that,” I grunt, pushing him out of the way. “Go find his brush.”

Walker leaves, and I offer Jansen a granola bar. He takes it and eats it, but the darkness isn’t just around his eyes. It’s in them.

“How much longer?” he asks.

Today’s Sunday. Which means Clara will be on campus on Tuesday. “You’ll see her in two days. Are you sure you’re up for it?”

He squeezes his free hand into a fist, and I start the kettle up, pulling down his teapot and not knowing what to do next. I’ve never made tea.

Walker comes back, and we trade places. I get Jansen to sit on a stool and hop onto the counter behind him, teasing the snarls out of his hair, then braiding it, the grease less noticeable once it’s contained.

Walker has the pot of tea ready, and I have another glass of water as Jansen drinks it on autopilot.

He sighs after he finishes a cup. “I will be.”

It takes me a minute to realize he’s answering my question. From almost twenty minutes ago. I shoot a glance at Walker, and it’s obvious that this has been his daily problem for the last few weeks.

“Okay, you two. Go. Move. Touch grass. Breathe fresh air. Don’t come back for an hour.”

Jansen trails me from the house, and I lead him down the path I first ran with Clara a year ago, over the Washington Avenue bridge, the Mississippi low this time of year, both of us silent as we move south with the water.

But after only twenty minutes, my legs scream at me, so I stop, sitting in a patch of grass.

Jansen flops down beside me, staring up at the clouds.

“How bad?” I ask.

Jansen’s lips twist, his body boneless, but his fingers dig into the soil. “Worst I’ve ever been.”

I figured. “Should we go to the health center? Get some meds or something?”

He doesn’t answer, and I don’t force him.

Eventually, he twists his head to the side. “I don’t know if I can right now. But probably. Maybe tomorrow.” He closes his eyes, his next comment barely a whisper. “I really wanted this to be a one-time thing.”

“We all did, Jay.”

A twitch in his cheek is all I get. We stay there until my stomach growls. Now that I’m not distracted by my work, it’s finally letting me know that I’ve been ignoring it.

“Ready to head back?”

Jansen sighs, staring back at the clouds. “Do you think birds get depressed?”

“I don’t know, man. Maybe.”

“I’ve always wanted to fly.”

“As long as you don’t go flinging yourself off anything without a plan to keep yourself in one piece. Clara’d kick your ass, but she’d have to get in line behind Walker, Trips, and me. You could take up skydiving or paragliding or something, though.”

He sits up, staring at his knees. “I really miss her.”

“Me too.” I want to keep my thoughts to myself, but Jansen needs this, an openness that I rarely allow myself.

So I force the words out, force myself to actually join this team instead of sitting beside it.

“I’m scared. It’s like I don’t know how to be myself without her.

Or more like she made me more than myself, and now with her gone, it’s like she took parts of me with her, and now I’m less than I was. ”

The mess of words makes no sense, but Jansen nods. “I was using her as a crutch. I don’t want to do that anymore. But everything is really hard.”

“Yeah.”

A bunch of girls run past us, the weight of their curious gazes pushing me to my feet, the need to get away from them stronger than it has been since I was a teenager. “A day at a time, Jansen. Let’s make it through today and worry about tomorrow when it comes.”

I hold my hand out to him, and he takes it, his grip still unnaturally strong for such a lithe guy. “A day at a time. Until we’re back together.”

“Until we’re back together,” I agree.