Page 42 of The Sound of Him

“He wants to help,” I tell him, because that’s what it always comes down to in the end. All Keaton has ever wanted to do is fucking help.

“He wants to help too much. He has to fuckingstophelping. Kid’ll give his goddamn life if someone asks nicely enough.”

There’s no arguing that. It’s a problem. One we’ve yet to figure out how to solve. “But cutting it off makes it worse, remember? We’ve tried that.”

“Mm.”

“I told him if you let him go with Travis, that needs to be the end of it. I told him itneedsto be for closure.”

“He agree?”

“He did.”

“You believe him?”

I huff. “I believehebelieves it.”

“For fuck’s sake.” There’s a sound on his end, like a muffled thump or clunk. “The two of you are going to be the death of me.”

“Hey, what’dIdo?”

“You enable.” There’s another sound, higher pitched. Glass against marble counters. Apparently when they talk to me, these brothers are driven to drink. I’d take it personally, but they were plenty dysfunctional before I ever came into the picture. “Goddamnit, Ace. I don’t like it.”

“I know. I’m sorry.”

“No, no, don’t do that. Stop.”

I mentally stumble a little. “Stop what?”

“I have it written on a sticky note on my desk. I’m not supposed to let you apologize for things that aren’t your fault.”

I’m pretty sure my eyebrows have never climbed higher on my forehead than where they likely are right now. “You do?”

“It’s something I’m working on,” he grumbles, not sounding at all happy about it.

“You… are?”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“But-”

“Kid, don’t do this to me. I have two brothers and one of them is a goddamn nightmare. You’re supposed to be the easy one. Let me be… brotherly. Accept the touchy-feely moment and put me out of my misery by letting us move on, yes?”

I stare at the computer screen in front of me without really seeing it.

I knew Kellan loved me, in his own way, but it was the stray cat kind of love. It was just a fondness. Just an off-shoot of Keaton’s love for me.

Or I thought it was, at least.

Keaton and I already established that we see each other as brothers, but Kellan? Really?

“You still there?”

“Yeah. Yes. Sorry.”

“Stop apologizing.”

“Right. Okay.”