on. If I didn’t have my fraternity, if I didn’t have Prisha—” He stops suddenly, like her name is a lump in his throat threatening a sea of tears. “I just mean,” he continues, his face paler, “if I were constantly thinking about Mom the way Fitz is, I’d be a wreck. I wanted to show him how to search for fun, for happiness, because he deserves those things. Sometimes I can’t sleep because I’m worrying what his life will look like when everything with Mom is . . . done.”
I register the pause, the euphemism. When everything is done. I’m seven years old for a moment, in my family’s apartment in New York, overhearing my parents discussing my abuela’s health and why we needed to return to Massachusetts.
Lewis goes on. “I guess I take it too far sometimes,” he says ruefully. “Go out too often, flirt too much, get too drunk. But it’s . . . an escape.” His chest heaves.
I run through the things I could say. I could offer blanket sympathies, empty encouragements to keep talking. Or I could push him to face this head-on, even if it’s harder. “I think Fitz feels you don’t care about him because of all the fun you’re having,” I say. “Because you have this other life. This perfect job.”
Lewis looks up, raw with wounded incredulity. “I know he thinks that,” he says. “He just told me.”
I open and then close my mouth. I thought Lewis stormed from Fitz’s room because he was overwhelmed with the news of their mom’s symptoms. It never occurred to me it was because they’d fought.
“I fucked up,” Lewis chokes out. “I thought he’d imitate me, not resent me. I didn’t want to put my stress on top of his. So I hid it. I hid how desperate I’ve been to get the kind of job that can support our whole family—regardless of whether it’s something I care about or not. I hid where I really want to be next year. Because if it were up to me, I wouldn’t be moving to New York, not when I could be in San Francisco with my girlfriend. I’m only staying on the East Coast for my mom.” His voice is gathering volume now. “I hid my sacrifices because I hoped I could help Fitz have a normal life. Now he hates me. My mom’s sick, my brother despises me, and the girl who made everything bearable is moving to the other side of the country. I’m going to be alone.”
Tears tumble from his eyes. He raises his hand to his face, his grief garishly out of place in the hotel hallway.
His words touch bruises in me I’ve tried to ignore for too long. I’ve fought loneliness on this trip. I’ve wrestled with the lurking suspicion nobody in my family really supports the future I want. I’ve come out of those fights more hurt than I knew.
I reach for Lewis, putting my hand on his shoulder. “Lewis, you’re not alone.” I’m not expecting my own conviction. “Not even close.”
He doesn’t contradict me.
I gesture toward his and Fitz’s room. “Fitz is in there,” I say. “I think you have to tell him what you told me. Tell him everything. He needs you, and you need him.”
I wonder if it’s the kind of thing only a close friend could say, or only a complete stranger. While I don’t have faith in predetermined paths or destiny or mystic workings of the universe, I wonder if, in some improbable way, I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be. Maybe the fact of our joining up into this instantaneous, unlikely group will be important for Lewis and his brother. Maybe it will for me too.
Lewis looks up, and he’s worked whatever magic he uses to hide his wounds. His expression is stony, and determination is starting to flicker into his reddened eyes. He nods.
“Go,” I say.
He hesitates. I wonder if he’ll try to put this off, if he’s too proud to bring this emotion to his brother.
“I’m really glad Fitz met you, Juniper,” he finally says.
“Yeah,” I say, holding Lewis’s gaze. “I’m really glad I met him too.”