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September fifteenth. The anniversary of Mom and Dad’s accident. I knew it would be a hard day for him, but I didn’t anticipate exactlyhowhard. I called a few times. He didn’t answer.

I should’ve known then it would be a lot more than “hard.”

I drove to his apartment after work. I had a key, so I could’ve let myself in, but as it turns out, I didn’t need to, because the door was unlocked.

And Gideon was on the bathroom floor, with a needle still in his arm.

I thought he was dead. For the second-worst ten-second stretch of my life, I was completely sure my little brother was dead.

He wasn’t, though. His pulse was weak but there. I called 911 and rode with him to the hospital. Then I sat in the waiting room for two days straight while they pumped him full of Narcan and intubated him until he could breathe on his own without aspirating vomit into his own lungs.

When he woke up, I told him this was his last chance. It was either rehab or I was done. I couldn’t keep doing this. I couldn’t keep finding him half-dead and putting him back together, just so he could fall apart again.

He said okay.

I drove him here the next morning.

“So what about you?” Gideon asks, nudging my knee with his. “What’s going on in your life? Still working for that asshole boss?”

I hesitate and decide that, as good and stable as he may look right now, he’s still nearly in his recovery and doesn’t need to hear the full, gory details of my last saga. “Actually, I got transferred. New position.”

“Oh, yeah?” He arches a brow. “That’s good, right?”

“It’s… different.”

He waits for me to elaborate. When I don’t, he nudges me again. “Different how?”

“Just different,” I say, looking anywhere but at him so he won’t call me a liar. “Still figuring it out.”

“You’re being weird,” he observes. He tilts his head. “Is something wrong? Is the new boss a jerk, too?”

“No! No. Well, I mean, maybe, I don’t know yet. He’s just…” I trail off, in search of words that do not exist in the English language or any other language with which I’m familiar. “He’s a lot,” I finish lamely.

“A lot of good or a lot of bad?”

“Jury’s still out.”

Gideon frowns. “You’d tell me if something was wrong, right?”

“Of course.”

“Because I know I’m in here and I’m supposed to be focusing on myself or whatever, but you’re still my sister. I still worry about you.”

I reach over and pat his hand. “I’m fine, Gid. Really. Just tired.”

He doesn’t look convinced, but he lets it go for the time being. We talk about other things, like his roommate, a former Wall Street guy who snores like a chainsaw and a leaf blower had a very loud baby.

“They feeding you okay?” I ask, since Mom’s not around to ask that question herself.

“Better than okay,” he promises. “The chef here used to work at some fancy restaurant in the city. Yesterday, we had salmon with this lemon butter sauce thing.” He kisses his fingers like a cartoon Italian chef. “Incroyable.”

I laugh. “Good. You need to eat.”

“I know, I know.” He picks at a fraying hem on his hoodie, eerily similar to the way I was toying with that loose thread on my coat when I was in Lukas’s car last night. “Hey, Rae?”

“Yeah?”

“How much does this place cost?”