5. Noah

"Cut it out, you two."

I aim a death glare at my dad. Of course, I"m getting roped into the blame here. Like I have anything to do with Lane"s pissy mood over our room assignments changing. If anything, it should be his mom that he"s mad at, not me. She"s the one that questioned why I wasn"t in the athletic dorm with the other scholarship athletes and called to have it corrected. I didn"t ask her to. Hell, I didn"t even know she was going to call. I was perfectly happy with my dorm placement, because… Hello, co-eds.

Miah, of course, laughed his ass off when I told him I wasn"t going to be staying in the party dorms after all. He said it was karma I deserved for being such a shit about it. To be fair, I rubbed it in his face pretty hard.

Don"t get me wrong, there are definitely perks to staying in the athletic dorms. The rooms are set up more like an apartment with separate bedrooms, a small kitchenette, sitting area, and full bathroom—which is probably the biggest perk. Lugging my shit back and forth to a communal bathroom that is shared between a hundred other dudes didn't really sound great. I'm thankful not to have to wear shower shoes or risk flesh-eating bacteria or something equally nasty. Although, the risk might have been better than getting stuck living with my asshole stepbrother.

I"m not happy about it. It wouldn"t have been my choice. It wasn"t my choice.

But he"s acting like a huge fucking baby about it and it"s really putting a damper on move-in day.

Lane drops what must be a box of lead weights onto the floor in the bedroom he's claimed as his own—without consulting with me, shocker—and then pushes past me on his way out of the room. I nearly drop the duffle bag and full hamper of bathroom supplies Hannah packed for us and aim another glare at my father.

"I"m not the one that needs to cut it out."

"Give him a break. He"s going through a rough time."

"I"ve been giving him a break for four years, Dad. If you want to scold someone, talk to him—he's the one that's probably going to break in and murder me in my sleep."

He sighs, sounding as tired as he looks. He didn"t have to come, but he and Hannah wanted to be here to help us move into our first college dorm. Poor Hannah had a terrible migraine this morning and wasn"t able to come with us, but wouldn"t stand for Dad to miss it. I wonder if her migraine has anything to do with the way I saw her come up from the basement in tears last night, and the sobbing I heard through my parents' door last night. But it's not my place to ask.

"He"s got a lot going on right now. You know about the church bust."

My exasperated sigh and eye roll are admittedly immature, but I'm so sick of hearing about this. "That was weeks ago."

"Yeah, well. There was more to it than we knew."

The dark circles under his eyes are suddenly a lot more noticeable, and there are frown lines etched on the edges of his mouth. I don't know that I've ever seen my dad like this before. It makes me pause and let go of some of my anger.

"Are you alright?"

He releases a heavy breath. "Just tired. The detectives are trying to get Hannah and Lane to testify, and she's really stressed out."

I remember the day the detective came to our door, right after Lane and I got back from soccer camp. My dad made me leave the house with him to go pick up dinner, and when we got back, both Lane and Hannah had disappeared to their rooms. We ate without them, and the next day, they both pretended like everything was normal.

"Why would they need to testify?"

"It wasn't just a church, Noah. It was basically a cult, and a lot of terrible stuff went down. Hannah's struggling with it. And we're worried about Lane."

Oh damn.

My chin tilts down, and I take a moment to study the ground. Hannah has been part of our family since I was eight years old. She's always seemed so infallible to me. The only time I ever saw her so much as shed a tear was the day she told me she had a son my age. I never asked too many questions, because I didn"t want to pry. I didn"t like seeing her upset.

"Lane seems like his usual self," I say, because I can't think of anything else to say.

It's not like I can tell my dad that whenever I notice Lane getting worked up, I force him to jack off so he'll calm the hell down rather than talk to him at all. Not that it'll happen again. He made it pretty clear he didn't want to do that anymore. So maybe he'll be even more of a joy to live with. Great.

"Look, it's not my place to say anything. Just… cut him some slack. I know you two don't really get along, but I also see how you look out for him. He's lucky to have you, even if he doesn't know it yet."

I avert my eyes and try to will away the heat rising from my collar. If he only knew how I was looking out for him.

"I didn't know it was like that," I say. "I just thought he was weird."

"Oh, he"s weird alright, almost as weird as you. Difference is, he has a good reason."

He gives me a bear hug, and despite being taller than him, I feel like a child in his arms.

We jump at the thud outside the door before Lane pushes into the room. He gives me a suspicious look before nodding politely at my father and dropping a few boxes on the kitchen counter.

"I think that"s everything," he says.

My dad nods and gives him a fatherly pat on the shoulder. When we walk him out, he pulls each of us into a hug and tells us he"s proud. I don"t even have it in me to be jealous when he takes Lane aside and speaks to him quietly, giving him a stiff hug and pat on the back. Knowing that Lane's been more stressed than usual puts things in perspective.

I have to keep reminding myself of that when Lane and I stand side by side and wave as my dad gets into his truck and drives away. As soon as he"s out of sight, swallowed by the traffic moving in and out of the athletic dorm parking lot, Lane drops his smile and gives me an angry glare before stomping inside.

When I make it back to the dorm, he"s unpacking the kitchen. I move to the sitting room to set up the TV and game console, but Lane's glare burns into the back of my head the entire time.

"What is your problem?" I blurt.

Maybe I should care more that his childhood bullshit got aired out on national TV. And yeah, that sucks that he grew up in a freak show. But his life has been fucking perfect for over four years now. He has no reason to be so pissy today.

"You," he spits out. "You"re my problem."

"I"ve done literally nothing to you."

"Today."

"What?"

"You"ve done nothing to me today. How long is that going to last, Noah? I meant what I said. That isn"t happening here."

"I haven"t looked at you twice since graduation, and you know it. In fact, that"s probably why you"re wound so tight right now. What"s wrong, little brother? You have blue balls because you can"t get off without me telling you what to do?"

"W-what? No!"

"I"ve been nothing but nice to you since the raid, dude. And patient as fuck, because I know you"re going through some shit." He blanches at the mention of it, and it makes me irrationally angry to see him upset. I'm the only one allowed to upset him. "You told me to stop, so I stopped. I"m not some kind of creep predator. I only did it because you liked it. Because you needed it. If you think that any of that did anything for me, you"re dumber and gayer than I thought you were."

"I'm. Not. Gay," he says through clenched teeth, seething.

"I don't fucking care!" I feel bad for pulling the gay card, but the more I try to rationalize my behavior, the worse it sounds. It's time to deflect and get away from here. "We're barely an hour into being roommates, and I'm already sick of your bullshit," I say, putting the electronics down and backing away. "I"m going to unpack my room so you don"t have to look at me not being an asshole."

A little over half an hour later, there"s a tap at the door before Lane pokes his head inside my room.

"You care if I put some of my books on the shelves out here?"

No wonder those boxes were so fucking heavy. I should have realized he'd bring his entire library.

"No, I don"t care," I tell him, and return to setting up the desk that"s set into its own little alcove of the bedroom.

"She got us the same comforter set," Lane says, nodding at my bed with his chin. He looks a little embarrassed at the fuzzy soccer ball throw pillow with a blue N stitched onto it that I"m pretty sure she stitched herself.

His mom made sure we have everything we need for what is essentially our first apartment, down to couch covers so we could make the space our own. Everything is our school colors of black and white, and there are an embarrassing number of soccer balls on everything, but I kind of love it.

"Hannah is pretty fucking fantastic," I say. For some reason, I want him to know how much his mother means to me. She"s never treated me like anything other than a son and she's been the only mom I"ve ever had. If not for knowing she had a long-lost kid already, I probably would have called her mom, but it never felt like my place. Odd, considering she's spent more time being my mom than his.

He nods and shuffles his feet a bit, still standing in the doorway. "Uh, Scott is pretty great, too. Quiet."

"He"s always been like that. It"s not you or anything."

"It doesn't bother me. I appreciate it, actually. Makes me more comfortable."

One side of my mouth gets away from me, and I grin against my will.

"Well, at least we have separate rooms. You won't have to look at or hear me too much, so I don't make you uncomfortable."

"At least there"s that," he agrees with a wry smile. He backs up, but pauses and takes one step further inside my doorway. "I"m sorry I"ve been less than friendly," he says, and I"m impressed at my ability to hold back my scoff. It"s like the simple apology is painful to him. "There"s been… I don"t know. Stuff. I guess."

So eloquent.

I nod, silence stretching out between us, and I want to say something, but I don't know what. I want to remind him that I'll leave him alone, but also let him know I'm here if he changes his mind.

"I"m here if you need me, bro." I wince when the words come out sounding as suggestive in a way I didn't intend for them tol. In no way should any sentence with the word ‘bro' be suggestive.

He doesn"t get mad again, just hums noncommittally and leaves, pulling the door shut behind him. I sag against the wall and huff out a deep sigh.

How long before this isn"t so awkward?

"Duuude," Miah says, too loudly. "How excited are you to be rooming with your grouchy ass brother?"

"He"s not my brother," I counter, my voice not much lower than his. I don"t know why I feel the need to make that abundantly clear to the rest of the team, most of whom are already seated for our team meetup.

Athletes move in before most of the student population, so not everything on campus is running like it will when the semester officially starts. There"s only one cafeteria open on campus right now, but it's just pre-made sandwiches and cut fruit at this point. Which is fine, but the team wanted to get together for something more and this place is supposed to be a local favorite for pizza and subs.

"That good, yeah?" He laughs at my pained expression and then gets distracted, arguing with another player about how many pizzas we should order.

When I glance up from my menu, Lane is watching me with an unreadable expression. Did he hear me? Is he upset about what I said? It"s not like it isn"t true. Our parents being married doesn"t make him my brother. His mom is the only mom I"ve ever known, since mine died when I was three. But Lane didn"t come along until later, and our relationship was strained from the start. Not only because of what happened that first summer at camp, but because of how freaking weird he was. Although I"m beginning to understand more about why he struggled so much with normal social graces. His mother had dropped hints here and there about the environment he grew up in. And my father made sure that I not only understood that he comes from a different situation, but also that I shouldn"t bring it up.

Like his name. He'd always been called Isaiah, then my dad got a text message the day Hannah picked him up saying he wanted to be called Lane. I knew nothing about him aside from that he grew up super religious, and that he changed his name. They never talked about him much until the day Hannah got the news that her dad had died. There was a flurry of emotions and activity that I didn"t quite understand, and a lot of calls to lawyers. A few days later, my dad and Hannah sat me down and told me that my long-lost step brother would be moving in.

I raise my eyebrows at the grouchy ass in question. You"re staring, I mouth. He looks away, and I notice how uncomfortable he seems. He hasn't engaged with anyone from the team at all. I think of what my dad said, and my shoulders drop. I should at least try.

When I drop into the seat across from him, he seems wary, casting his eyes around to the rest of the table. He sat two empty spaces away from anyone else at the very end of the table. I"ve noticed one or two of our new teammates try to talk to him, and while he wasn"t rude by any means, he isn"t exactly throwing off welcoming vibes.

"Taco. Pizza." I say with a flourish, throwing a menu down between us. His eyebrow quirks and he pulls the menu towards him. He stares at it incredulously. "I mean, it"s pretty genius. How did we never think of it before? The two best foods on the planet, in one. If that"s not a gift from God, I don"t know what is." That gets a chuckle out of him, and it feels like an accomplishment.

When he first moved in with us, there were a lot of foods he"d never tried before that blew my mind. How does someone go fourteen years without ever trying pizza?! He had a really strange reaction when he tried it the first time. It was clear that he loved it. He moaned and everything before pulling back and staring at it like it had spoken to him. Then he put it down and politely excused himself.

It took almost six months for Hannah and my dad to convince him it was okay to enjoy food. I listened from around the corner while Hannah had to explain that not everything that tasted good or felt good was evil, and that she believed pleasure was a gift from God, not a trap to test us.

I think me eating three times as much pizza as I normally would, and being probably a little too expressive over how good it was, is what finally broke him. The first time he ate more than two slices, I promised to introduce him to my absolute favorite food—tacos.

It"s about the only thing we"ve ever bonded over. Well…I like to think the, uh, supervised self-love was a bonding exercise, but he might not agree.

There"s an awkward silence after we agree to share the taco pizza and give our order to the pretty waitress that is so obviously flirting with Lane it"s almost sad when he ignores her. I don"t think he"s shooting her down; he"s genuinely unaware that he"s being hit on. I almost make a joke about needing to be more direct, but stop myself before the words can come out of my mouth.

"Look, man… I"m sorry," I blurt.

He looks up at me with confusion.

"I thought… I don"t know what I thought, okay?" I thought you liked it. I thought you needed me to get you out of your head. I thought it gave me the upper hand in our fucked up dynamic. I thought controlling you would make me feel better about myself. "I didn"t think you hated it, or that I was actually forcing you into anything. It never should have happened in the first place, but it certainly shouldn"t have continued. It won"t happen again."

Lane looks around nervously, obviously worried someone might overhear our conversation, but none of them are paying attention to us. His eyes narrow. "It won"t?"

"Never," I promise. "I don"t want you to be uncomfortable living with me."

His expression is indiscernible. Maybe he doesn"t believe me? The fucked-up part of my brain that actually enjoys tormenting him thinks maybe it's disappointment on his face. But that"s ridiculous.

Our pizza comes and we eat in silence after I watch him close his eyes to pray. I get one big smile from him after he takes his first bite of the combination from heaven, and it feels like I just scored a winning goal.