“I have before. A few times. Look, It’s not like I have some deep relationship with her,” he said, his tone somewhat apologetic. “Obviously she never raised me. I’m closer to my stepmom. But I’ve visited a few times. My dad took me. He knew it was important for me to go, and I wanted to know who my mother was.”
“What was that like? Seeing her?” Colin asked, as he headed to the fridge to grab sodas. It was a natural instinct—invite someone into your house, offer a beverage. Maybe he needed one normal moment in the midst of this madness.
Marcus bit the corner of his lip, then answered. “She’s…” He let his voice trail off, searching for words. “She’s emotional, and she’s not really—”
“She’s fucking crazy. You can say it.” Ryan heaved a sigh. Colin handed out the sodas then clapped his older brother on the back. Ryan had been hit hardest by their mom’s incarceration, since he’d held onto the hope she might be innocent for so much longer than the rest of them had. It was only fitting that he’d be the one to voice the descent Dora had taken behind bars. “She’s losing her mind.”
Colin snapped his fingers as more puzzle pieces lined up. “Ry, that must be why she spiraled,” he said, like he was the detective now, figuring out the clues. “That’s why she started going crazy. She killed the father of her children, went to prison with another’s man’s kid in her, hid that child, and had the baby in prison. No wonder she’s gone off the deep end.”
“Prison alone would be enough, but add in the other things and she probably never stood a chance at staying sane,” Ryan said sadly, cracking open the soda can.
That familiar action jarred Colin—the three of them drinking sodas at his kitchen table. This was the definition of surreal—the trio parked at the same table where he’d eaten his free-range eggs this morning, a slice of avocado on the side. Now, he was chatting with the instant brother who’d fallen from the sky and into his life this afternoon. And yet, he hadn’t just appeared out of nowhere. He’d been skirting the perimeter. “Why are you here now, Marcus?” Colin asked. “Why did you want to let us know who you are?”
Marcus gulped. “I wanted to…” He broke off then dropped his head in his hands.
Colin’s instinct to help kicked in. “Hey. What is it?” he asked softly.
“I feel so stupid,” he mumbled.
“Don’t feel that way, just tell me. Tell us.”
Marcus raised his face. Glanced away. Swallowed. Looked back at them. “I just feel so disconnected sometimes from my family. I love them, but I feel like I’m not part of them. Like I’m not part of anything.” He levelled his gaze with theirs. “My dad and I don’t always see eye to eye, and my stepmom tries to include me, but she’s busy with my little sisters, and I just felt like I was grafted onto their family. Like they were all just stuck with me. They had no choice but to take me.” His voice turned colder, but sadder, too, as he added, “I was nobody’s choice.”
Colin’s heart ached for the kid. His family had been blasted to pieces, but he’d always felt tethered to his siblings and his grandparents. “Is that why you were following us?”
Marcus nodded, a confession in his dark brown eyes. “I wanted to see what you guys were like. That probably sounds stupid, but once I moved out from home this summer, I just couldn’t stop thinking about it. I didn’t lie to you about why I went to Shannon’s. I’m part of the Protectors, and I went to Shannon’s street as part of a patrol. But also to keep an eye on her. And since I knew your names, and found out you volunteered at the community center, I started going there to hang out.”
Colin’s breath caught as he processed this new detail. Marcus had been stalking them, but not to cause trouble. Rather to see what the Sloans were like. To gather intel. Colin had no idea if he’d have done anything differently in Marcus’s shoes. “You knew who I was when you came to my math tutorial?”
“I did,” he said with a nod, and a brief smile formed on Colin’s face. He couldn’t deny that he admired the hell out of the way Marcus said those two words—I did. Because he owned it. He owned his actions. He stood by the fact that he’d been spying on them. “I wanted to know if you all seemed…well, cool.”
Colin turned to Ryan, whose expression had softened. The initial shock in his blue eyes had been replaced by something else. Concern, maybe? That was certainly what Colin felt. This kid had been left unanchored in a crazy world, born in the strangest of circumstances, told to keep secrets. All he wanted now was a connection.
“Did we? Seem cool?” Ryan asked, a playful note in his voice for the first time since this conversation had started.
Marcus laughed lightly then gestured to Colin. “Well, you’re the only one I talked to. And yeah, I think you’re cool,” he said. “And I think it’s cool that I’m good at math, like you are.”
“Me, too,” he said with a smile.
“You need to meet Michael and Shan. They’re pretty awesome as well,” Ryan added.
“I’d like that.”
Colin wasn’t ready to invite the kid over for Christmas dinner, nor to break out the family photo albums. He wasn’t going to take him out for an ice cream and a pizza. But he didn’t intend to show him the door either.
He did what he knew was best. Speak the truth.
“Look,” Colin said, moving his chair closer to the table. “I don’t know what to say. I’m floored. I mean, part of me feels like you were tricking me by talking to me while knowing what you knew.” He chose bluntness. His mantra. His mission. No more lies; no more secrets. “But on the other hand, I get it. I probably would have done the same. You had a shitload of stuff to deal with, and now I get why you made that comment in the car yesterday about not knowing it was me who was going to be driving.”
“I didn’t want you to think I was taking advantage of you. Of the fact that we’re…” The careful words came out awkwardly, like he was afraid again to say “brothers.”
“That we’re…” Colin stuck on the word, too, then pushed past it. “That we’re brothers.”
That sounded so immensely weird. Even stranger without Michael and Shannon being there. He’d call them in a few minutes and invite them to share this bizarre moment. Then he remembered where he was supposed to be right now. At Elle’s match. Looking at the time, he realized it was probably almost over, and a small bout of frustration coursed through him. He’d call her soon, too, and explain why he’d missed the match, and surely she’d understand. There was no doubt in his mind that she’d not only be cool with it, but she’d be keen to hear this news. Probably excited, in a way, that one of the boys she watched out for had done something brave.
Because that was what Marcus’s appearance here today was. Yes, it was weird and bizarre and shocking. But at the core, Marcus was downright brave.
“I’m sorry to just spring it on you. There’s not really a handbook for introducing yourself as the long lost brother. Or a Hallmark card. I was trying to figure out what to do and say, and then you talked to me in the hall at the center,” he said to Colin. “That’s when I realized I needed to get my act together and just man up and see you and introduce myself. That’s what Elle helped me with.”
The house went silent. His ears rang with that name, and a chill ran down his spine. “What did you just say?”
“Elle helped me,” Marcus repeated, as if this was no big deal.
When it was a big fucking deal. A huge deal.
“Elle? Elle at the center?” he asked, as if there could possibly be another Elle.
Marcus nodded enthusiastically. “I’ve been talking to her since the beginning. She’s been counseling me. She’s kind of amazing.”
That definitely described her.
Kind of amazing.
But for the first time ever, other words popped into his head. Words he’d never associated with her before. Words he didn’t want to associate with her.