Chapter Four
As Brent began to wake, his head heavy, he realized he was lying on top of something lumpy. He vaguely remembered passing out on the couch with half a bottle of champagne in his stomach, but he didn’t remember…
Oh. The lumpy thing under him was Riley.
Brent cracked one eye open, straining to perform even that small feat, and saw Riley’s face just inches from his own. Riley was fast asleep, apparently not bothered by having Brent’s entire weight on top of him.
He was tougher than he looked. In the right light, Riley was practically ephemeral. Around Brent’s height, but delicate all over.
Brent had been the same when they were younger, thin and long-limbed, but he’d grown out of it. Riley had grown into it. The look suited him, and he wasn’t exactly skinny, he just tended to dress in loose, comfortable clothes that made him look smaller than he was.
Too tired to do anything else, Brent closed his eyes again and let his head fall on Riley’s shoulder. It wasn’t the first time they’d fallen asleep on the couch together, and it probably wouldn’t be the last.
Brent hoped it wouldn’t be the last. He wished he could get Riley to hang around more. Especially now that he was right on the verge of being alone almost all the time.
Not that he begrudged Emily the chance to go to a good school. She’d worked hard, and she deserved it. He’d just miss her. They’d been a family of two for almost eight years now, and Brent was used to that.
No one liked change, but he suspected he liked it less than most people. Change was never anything good in Brent’s life.
The sound of the top stair creaking startled Brent out of his thoughts. Emily must have been coming down.
And he was still lying on top of Riley.
Shit.
Brent tried to climb off him carefully, hoping not to hurt him—ideally, not to wake him, so no one would be any the wiser.
Naturally, his foot slipped as he was getting up. Brent fell back onto the couch, body-slamming Riley, and then sliding off onto the floor, hitting the back of his head on the edge of the coffee table as he rolled off.
Brent’s head spun, his vision blurring briefly as Emily came around the corner.
That hadn’t gone like he’d planned.
Nothing was going like he’d planned lately.
Riley sat bolt upright on the couch, blinking as if he’d woken from a year-long coma.
“Did you have to knee me in the balls?” he asked after a moment.
Brent blushed all the way down to his collarbones. He hadn’t meant to hurt Riley, especially not like that.
He opened his mouth to say something—an apology, or an explanation, or anything—but his brain still wasn’t awake enough to manage a coherent sentence.
“Emily is eighteen,” Riley said. “She’s allowed to know that balls exist. I think it’s important that she knows to go for them if any boys give her any crap.”
“I already know,” Emily responded.
“Good girl.” Riley beamed at her. “Don’t even hesitate. They’ll live. Your safety is more important than anyone’s testicles.”
“I won’t,” Emily promised.
Brent squeezed his eyes shut for a moment, forcing them to focus when he opened them again. He had a headache, and his stomach wasn’t necessarily happy with him, but he was okay.
Riley was apparently okay enough to be handing out self-defense tips, and Emily wasn’t stupid enough to get drunk with her idiot brother and his best friend.
She also wasn’t old enough, but Brent wasn’t so naive that he thought teenagers didn’t drink. He remembered being young. He remembered Riley pressing a bottle of beer into his hand for the first time when they were seventeen, sitting out under the stars and feeling so grown up, the whole world stretching out in front of him.
Life hadn’t gone like he thought it would then, either.
“I’m making pancakes,” Emily announced.
Riley made a tiny, childlike sound of delight. “You’re my favorite Morrison right now.”
Brent snorted. He didn’t mind losing that title to Emily. He knew Riley loved her like the doting uncle he’d been acting as practically forever.
It was good to be confident that if something happened to him, Emily would still have someone. Riley would look out for her. He’d promised as much before, and Brent had no reason to doubt him.
“I need a minute before I can stand,” Brent said.
The crushing weight of Rose leaving him didn’t seem quite so crushing this morning. He remembered sitting on the couch and crying his heart out, Riley rubbing his shoulders and telling him everything would be okay, that it was okay to cry, that he needed to grieve before he could heal.
Riley, as usual, had been right. The world felt lighter this morning, minus the pounding headache.
“I’m gonna eat all your pancakes,” Riley said, springing up from the couch as though he hadn’t drank the other half of the bottle of champagne.
Maybe he hadn’t. Maybe Brent had managed to drink more than he thought.
As decisions went, it probably wasn’t the worst. It had given him the freedom to cry, and he needed that.
Brent eventually hauled himself off the floor, following Emily and Riley into the kitchen.
He watched Emily gather ingredients, Riley offering pancake tips as she did so, the two of them laughing and joking back and forth. If nothing else, this had been a reminder that he was lucky to have them.
Even if neither of them were going to be in his life every day from now on, he was still lucky they were there at all. No one had a better best friend or little sister. Not as far as Brent was concerned.
That was enough. He needed to be more grateful for what he had.