He steadies me and nods.Go.
And I do. But I leave another piece of my heart behind, and every step I take away from Sol crunches and grinds with the weight of words unsaid. Words I can’t see clearly, but maybe he can.
Maybe he wants to stop.
A thought I’m sure I’ve had before, but it hits harder as I reach Skylar and get my hand to the front door before he can.
Fuck. My head hurts. Not a physical pain, but a phantom, psychological wrench that I need to boot from my skull before it sends me to my knees.
Somehow I manage it. And lucky Skylar, that means he has my whole focus. “Where are you going?”
He gives me a flat look. “Don’t do this.” Smother him. Infantilise his emotions when he needs some fucking space to work through them. “I don’t need it.”
“You shouldn’t be alone.”
“Says who?”
“Mal.” I take my hand off the door, letting him know I’m not going to physically fight him on this. “I promised I’d be there for you and I can’t do that if you run out on us.”
Metaphorically.
Literally.
Skylar’s in the clothes he wears when he goes with my brother on the marathon tabs Mal needs to keep his mental health in check. It’s healthy for Mal. For Skylar, it can descend into something else and I’m not scared to go there with him. Can’t be when I’ve seen the consequence of him spiralling with my own fucking eyes.
I see it againnow. See him drop so fast even Mal couldn’t catch him. The sound of him hitting the floor still lives in my bones. But how do I tell him without making him feel like I do when I come round from a seizure and see the tear tracks on Sol’s face?
Skylar doesn’t love me like I love Sol, but we’re the family he chose. And that’s why I make a deal with the devil. “Come eat with us. Then I’ll run with you wherever you want to go.”
18SOL
The running.
It becomes a thing. I live in fear of the day Jack can’t go and it falls to me instead.
I don’t own trainers. Don’t own shorts or joggers, or anything remotely breathable that wouldn’t having me looking like I was tripping my nuts off and dancing through the streets. And look, I’d die for Skylar. For Mal. And for Jack, I’d do it twice. But I’d rather bargain with the Ankow than run.
Or pull nets till my hands are bleeding and raw and hand the profits to an amiable loan shark. Because that’s how the next few weeks of my life play out. Rinse and repeat. And with radio silence from Mal, it’s beginning to feel like we’ve stepped back in time. All of us scrapping to survive and burning out in the process.
“Did you lock the gym?”
I shut the fridge, resisting the temptation to dodge Skylar’s sharp gaze. “Yup.”
“Why?”
“So you don’t sneak in there while Jack’s not looking.”
Skylar’s temper rises like a snake about to strike, violence coiling where you can’t see it unless you know him.Iknow him.And I feel his fury testing its cage. See his tight jaw, the muscle ticcing in his cheek. Sense how he glares past me, measuring what outcome of this conversation he can live with to get what he thinks he needs.
And maybe if we were alone, I’d find myself on the losing side of this stand-off. But Oscar’s here, cooking dinner, and I have Aras in my arms, a literal human shield between me and frustration that’s been building in Skylar all week long.
He backs off and leaves the kitchen.
I wait for a door to slam, but it doesn’t happen. For whatever unspoken reason, none of us have shut a bedroom door since Mal left. Not that it makes much difference to Skylar’s brand of self-harm. An open bedroom door doesn’t stop him losing every meal in the bathroom. Or working consecutive night shifts on the inexplicable rush of an empty stomach. I wonder if that’s why he’s worked only days this week when I happen to know he was due a run of nights before Mal went away. If he’s done something I’ve never known him do before and adjusted his schedule for his own wellbeing.
For Jack, more likely.So he’s not alone when I have to leave tonight to earn the money to pay for my dad’s mistakes. But I cling to the remote possibility Skylar might have done this for himself. Because I need him to be okay as much as I need Oscar’s solid warmth when the rest of us waver.
He’s cooked roast chicken tonight, with braised cabbage and caraway seeds, buckwheat cooked with sautéed onions on the side. Lithuanian comfort food, Kuznatov style. I don’t know if Skylar’s going to eat it, but I’ve picked my battle for one day. This one is all Oscar’s.