Chapter 19

When I get home, I don't want to be alone, so I end up going back to my parents' house. Gary is still there anyway, and I want to see my dog.

I walk in. Henry and the girls are in the kitchen, having a snack.

"Where are Mom and Dad?" I ask.

"I think they're in Dad's office," Sage says.

"Thanks."

I don't stop to talk to my brother and sisters, even though I probably should.

Instead I walk down the long hallway to Dad's office. I reach my hand to knock, but then I stop when I hear Mom's voice.

"Everything will be okay, Bryce. One way or another."

Then a choking sob.

And it didn't come from my mother.

My father…is crying.

I'm not sure I've ever seen or heard my father cry in my entire life.

I should leave. Give them their privacy, but my feet stay glued outside his office door.

"I don't know what I'll do without him," my father says through another sob.

"You'll move on. For your family. For your children. You have four children who need you, Bryce."

"Joe has two children who need him," my father counters.

"I know, baby. And I know how much he means to you."

"I've known him since before you were born," Dad says.

My mother doesn't respond. She's probably hugging him, stroking his hair, as he cries.

My big strong father, reduced to tears by the illness of his best friend.

Dad and Uncle Joe are brothers-in-law, but I've always known they're so much more than that. They're close like Brock and I are close, only they share no blood between them.

Then my mother's voice again. "He'll fight it. You know Joe. He'll fight this with everything he has."

"One percent, Marjorie."

"Who says Jonah Steel won't be that one percent? He's my big brother too, Bryce. This is killing me just as much as it's killing you."

"I know, baby."

But my mother doesn't break down. This is her big brother, and she stays strong for my father. My father—who's always been the strong one. For her, and for Henry, the girls, and me.

When they've been quiet for a few moments, I knock.

"Who is it?" Mom asks.

"It's me, Mom. Dave."

A few seconds later, she opens the door. "Dave? Did you need something, sweetheart?"

"Just wanted to talk to you guys."

Mom places herself between me and Dad. "Your father is…"

A throat clear from my father. "It's all right, Marjorie. Let him in."

I walk in. My strong handsome father's eyes are sunken and sad and bloodshot.

"You okay, Dad?"

He takes a deep breath in. "I will be. Mom and I are just having a hard time dealing with Uncle Joe's illness."

"Yeah, I am too."

Mom hugs me.

"It's funny," I say. "I was telling Jesse about how the only catastrophe we've had in this family—before all of the current shit, that is—was Aunt Ruby's breast cancer. We caught it early, and she made a complete recovery. Ava and Gina are now getting annual mammograms, so if anything happens, they will catch it early too. We were so lucky with that."

"Absolutely," Mom says.

Dad just nods.

"And somehow now, it's like the gates of hell have opened, and the four horsemen of the apocalypse have galloped all over our family."

Dad and Mom both just stare at me.

Finally, Mom says, "That doesn't sound at all like my David."

"I'm still in here," I say. "Just seems like the wheel's on the bottom right now for the Steel family."

"Listen, son," my father says. "I'm taking this hard. I can't hide that from you, and I don't want to either. You know I don't have any siblings of my own, and Joe was more than a friend to me. More than a brother-in-law. Other than your mother and you kids, he's the most important person in my life. I always thought we'd grow old together, sitting on the back porch, smoking pipes—even though we both hate tobacco—and talking about the good old days. But you remember what you've been taught since you were a kid. Remember that you can find gratitude in everything."

"Are you finding gratitude in this?" I ask him point-blank.

He shakes his head and sighs. "I admit it's difficult. But I am grateful for the health of you, your mother, your brother, your sisters. It's bad enough that Joe has to go through this, but if it were one of you…" He shakes his head. "I don't know if I could survive that."

Mom kisses the top of his head. "You would survive it, Bryce, just like you've survived everything else in your life. Because that's who you are. You're a survivor." Then she looks at me. "We all are, Dave. Your father and I, along with your aunts and uncles, tried to give you the perfect childhood. We kept the truth about our family secret so that your childhood could be idyllic."

"It was, Mom."

"Yes, it was." She frowns. "But we ultimately did you a disservice, I think. Training you to think nothing could ever go wrong. That's not how life is, and we're certainly seeing that now."

"I don't begrudge you any of that," I say. "You did what you thought was right at the time."

"Melanie and Ruby were against it. They didn't think we should keep it from you. I look back now, and I wonder why we didn't listen to Melanie." She sighs. "She's a psychiatrist specializing in childhood trauma. We should've been listening to her. Because the problem with secrets, Dave, is that they always come back to haunt you. You just never know when."

"I know," I say. "It must have been damned hard for Uncle Joe to stand there this morning and tell us all of this."

Dad nods. "He's the strongest man I know."

I cock my head. "Stronger than Uncle Talon? Than Donny? Dale?"

Dad nods. "Uncle Talon and the boys went through something so horrific that they can't help but be stronger for the experience. But Joe has carried things—burdens—all these years so his brothers and sister wouldn't have to. I've helped him carry those burdens, ease it for him."

"What are you talking about?" I say. "Are you saying there's something no one else knows?"

"No, that's not what I mean. I…" He chokes back a sob.

Mom rushes to him and rubs his shoulders. "Bryce, honey." Then she turns to me. "Did you need something else, David? Because I think your father and I need to be alone."

"No," I say. "I have a lot of questions, but they can wait."

Mom takes my arm and leads me out the door. "He'll be okay."

"I know. But what about you? This is your brother, Mom."

She nods, swallowing. "I know. I love all my brothers with all my heart, and I can't stand the thought of being without them. But I have to be strong for your father right now, and later, he'll be strong for me. That's what marriage is about, Dave."

My mother's beautiful face is tense, and her eyes heavy-lidded. She's carrying my father right now, something I've never seen. It's always been Dad carrying her when she needed it. I have new respect for my mother. I see a strength in her that I didn't know she possessed.

I give her a hug. "I understand."

Then I leave the office and rejoin my brother and sisters in the kitchen.

Angie and Sage are quiet, which is not unusual for Angie but is for Sage.

Henry's fixing a sandwich at the counter.

"Hey, bro," I say.

"Hey yourself."

Henry and I aren't overly close. We're very different people. He's much quieter than I am. But we're brothers, and we know that.

"You want a sandwich?" he asks.

I'm not hungry, but I nod. "Yeah, I suppose I should eat something."

"That's what I've been telling the girls." He takes two plates over to the table and sets one in front of Angie and the other in front of Sage. "Eat."

Angie and Sage both adore Henry. Something about the oldest kid, the older brother—and he's always treated them more like his own children than his sisters. Big brother to a fault.

Henry fixes a sandwich for himself and for me, and we join our sisters at the table.

I take a bite of my roast beef sandwich. Steel beef, the best beef ever, and it tastes like sludge right now. Even on Ava's homemade bread.

We don't talk, and when we're done, I rise. "I'm going to get Gary and go home."

"Yeah," Henry says. "I was thinking about heading back to my place, but I don't want to leave the girls alone."

"Yeah, Henry, please stay here," Angie says.

"I will, sis. Don't worry."

Neither of them asks me to stay.

That's okay. But I'm not sure I want to be alone either. I was hoping Maddie would spend the night, but she's acting weird.

Everyone's acting weird.

And I just have this huge feeling of foreboding.

Maddie told me this afternoon that the Steels were built on a solid foundation.

But more and more, I feel like the house of cards is about to fall.