Pain explodes along my jaw when my brother hits me. I stumble, closing my eyes as I try to make sense of what just happened. It’s not until I see Elijah moving towards Farrah that my mind clears.

I lunge towards him, wrapping my arms around his torso and bringing him down to the ground. A console table smashes, and a lamp falls onto the floor. It shatters in a loud crash.

Elijah is wild. He punches and kicks and scratches at me until I can get a grip on his arms. I pin him down, and the two of us stop moving. Blood drips from a gash near my eye. I’m panting, and Elijah is still staring at me with pure hatred.

Finally, he shakes me off.

“Fuck you, slut,” he spits at Farrah. “And you too. You’re no brother to me. I’ll make sure both your names are dragged through the mud. You thought you were some sort of saint with that fucking Football School of yours? Ha!” He shakes his head and turns back to the front door. It shakes when he slams it, and I lay down on the floor on my back. I close my eyes and take a deep breath.

I’m exhausted.

I hear Farrah lock the door and then sense her kneel next to me. Her hands go to my chest and then my jaw. I wince.

“I’ll get some ice and some bandages,” she whispers. I can only groan in response. I hear her walk away and I open my eyes. I prop myself up on my elbows and survey the damage.

Farrah’s console table is destroyed. The lamp has smashed into a thousand pieces around me, and there are spots of blood all over the floor. I sigh.

Farrah reappears with a wet facecloth and a bag of frozen peas. She dabs at my face as I wince, and then places the peas against my jaw. She works quietly, bandaging my cut and then disappearing again to wash the facecloth off. I push myself up to my feet and walk over to the couch.

I sit down, sighing heavily.

Farrah sweeps up the damage. She’s not looking at me.

“Farrah,” I say quietly.

She makes a noise, but doesn’t look up. She turns her back to me and sniffles. Her hand goes to her face and I think I see her wipe a tear away.

I sigh.

Watching her like this hurts more than Elijah’s punch to my face. I drop the bag of peas on the coffee table and push myself up. Walking behind her, I wrap my arms around her and pull her close.

She shudders, sobs, and finally melts against my chest. She spins around and lays her head against me, and I hold her as she cries silent tears.

Placing her hands on my chest, she looks up at my face. I can see the pain in her eyes as she shakes her head.

“Jesse,” she starts.

“Shh,” is say. “It’s okay. It’s over now. I’ll deal with him.”

She shakes her head again, swallowing. When she opens her mouth, I don’t want to hear what she has to say. I can see the look on her face—she’s completely closed off. She’s hurt, and worried, and I know she’s retreating back into herself.

“Jesse, I don’t want to do this to you.”

“Do what to me?” I tighten my arms around her waist and lay a soft kiss on her lips. She whimpers, curling her fingers into my chest. “Do what to me, Farrah?”

“I don’t want to be the reason you and Elijah fight. I don’t want to be the one who tears your family apart.”

“You aren’t! You’d never be that!” If only she knew what a mess my family was! If only she could understand! “Farrah, listen to me. This thing between Elijah and I, it has nothing to do with you.”

“Tell me the truth, Jesse,” she says, stepping back a tiny bit more. The space between us is only a few inches, but it feels like a chasm that can’t be bridged. “Those things Elijah was saying, about the other women. About just trying to get back at him…”

I shake my head. “No. None of that was true. I liked you the minute I met you, and it had nothing to do with him.”

She nods. The tears are gathering in her eyes again and I pull her closer. She cries into my chest, and I hold her. Her head nestles under my chin and it sends a bolt of pain through my jaw, but I ignore it. Farrah is in much more pain than I am.

It feels like she’s slipping away from me. Even holding her in my arms, I can feel how frail and vulnerable she is. Seeing Elijah barge in like that shook something out of her, and I don’t know how to fix it. I hold her close and kiss the top of her head.

“Come on, Farrah,” I whisper. “Let’s go to bed. We can finish cleaning up in the morning.”

This isn’t the romantic evening I thought it would be. Farrah passes out in my arms, and I think it’s from sheer exhaustion. Between the ordeal at the restaurant and then Elijah barging into her apartment, I think she’s completely emotionally drained.

Me, on the other hand—I’m wide awake. Call it adrenaline, call it nerves, call it whatever you want. I can’t stop thinking about Elijah’s face. It was so full of bitterness and hatred. It was like I was seeing the real him for the first time since we were kids.

The last time I saw that face, he was holding a knife to my chest when we were just young teenagers. For twenty years, he’s kept that side of himself hidden, but now it’s making another appearance.

I hold Farrah closer to me and she mumbles something in her sleep. My heart hardens, and I know that I’ll do anything for this woman. Elijah is no longer my brother. He’s nothing to me.

Tonight, I realized that I haven’t meant anything to him for a long, long time. It’s time I accepted that, and stopped living my life tiptoeing around my little brother.