Will’s big-brother mode was nearing dangerous levels. “Melissa. You told me you called them already.”
“A little white lie. I knew you’d overreact.” She brushed her hair back from her face, wincing a little as Will lifted her into her chair. “I don’t need them, I’m fine. It just scared me when I fell. I didn’t mean to ruin your night.”
“Ruin my—are you kidding me?” Will stood upright, raking his hands through his hair. “This is madness. I knew you shouldn’t live alone.”
Charlotte backed slowly across the kitchen as the facts began to snap into place. His close relationship with his sister. His doting on her, the weekly cookies, the sense of responsibility. His putting his life on hold for years. Melissa was handicapped, and for some reason, he’d taken that burden upon himself.
Melissa’s phone call made sense now. The last thing Melissa said before Will had interrupted them the other day in the bakery was, Will hasn’t told you?
No, he hadn’t.
The question was—why?
“Will, listen to yourself. What are my options? A group home? I’m fully capable of taking care of myself. You’ve renovated this entire house to be wheelchair friendly.” She grinned. “Just apparently not that particular spot.”
Will wasn’t laughing. “It’s not funny. You could have been hurt.”
“But I wasn’t.” The humor drained from Melissa’s face, and she threw her hands up. “What do you want? For me to live like you—terrified of every possible what-if?”
Will opened his mouth, then shot a glance at Charlotte as if remembering she was standing there. “Let’s talk in the living room, please.”
Charlotte couldn’t decide if she was grateful for the reprieve or offended that she wasn’t included.
Melissa mouthed I’m sorry at Charlotte and rolled herself toward the door. “Answer my question, Will.”
Their voices muffled as they relocated to the living room. Out of sight—but not out of earshot. Charlotte couldn’t help it. She pressed against the side of the door frame and listened.
“If being terrified of what-ifs keeps us all alive and safe, then yes. That’s just fine with me.”
Silence filled the living room. And then Will brought down the hammer. “I can’t handle any more of these phone calls, Mel. I’m moving in.”
“You’re what?” Melissa spoke the same words, in the same tone, that Charlotte mouthed silently to herself from the kitchen.
“I’m moving in. This wouldn’t have happened if I’d been here. Nothing would have ever happened if I’d been there!”
“Will, don’t overreact.”
“I’m not. I should have done this a year ago.”
“Things are different now. You can’t move in with me.” Melissa’s voice lowered, but not enough. “You have a life—a life you deserve to have. You have a girlfriend!”
“Not anymore.”
Charlotte’s heart skipped a beat, then thudded back to life with all the finality of a door slamming. Slamming on her future. Her hopes.
And in that moment, she knew the answer to her own question.
He hadn’t told her about Melissa because deep down, he hadn’t expected to be around long enough for it to matter.
He didn’t mean it.
The words flew out of his mouth, hard and flippant and so foreign he didn’t recognize his own voice in them. He ducked his head, covering his face with his hands as the pressure of the last several years settled hard. Like Atlas, holding the weight of the world. What had he become? He was standing in his sister’s living room—the living room he’d renovated for her, the living room she’d worked hard to decorate and make her own afterward, to make normal, to make cheerful—yelling at her.
All while verbally disowning the only other female who had ever brought joy to his life.
“Will.” Melissa’s voice, calm and even, brought him back from the ledge as it’d done a hundred times before. Maybe a thousand. “Will, sit down.”
He obliged, mostly because of his guilt, partly because he knew she hated people looking down on her—literally or figuratively.
She wheeled closer to him on the couch. “You can’t fix me.”
“I know. I know.” Why did she have to keep reminding him of the obvious?
“So stop trying, big brother. You know I love you, but you have to quit trying.” She reached across her lap and grabbed his hands. “You have an amazing woman in that kitchen right now, and if you don’t get your head out of your you-know-where, you’re going to lose her.”
“I don’t want to lose her.”
“Then let me go. You can’t hold her hand if you’re still holding mine.” She pointedly looked down at their clasped hands resting on his knees.
He squeezed tighter. “You’re my sister.”
“And I have my own life. I’m fine, Will. I’m happy. And I’d be even happier if you’d settle down already and quit being Free Willy. Save all of us a little drama.”