𝐆𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐄

[𝟑𝟔] 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐂𝐫𝐚𝐳𝐲

"A-Abel? That's him? That's Abel?"

Before Calista can say anything, Abel does.

"Why's Mr. Rieder here?" A worried look crosses his face and he frantically continues. "Is something wrong? Is Grace okay? Where is she, is she hurt?"

I almost start crying again at how much he seems to care for someone he has hardly any memories of.

"Grace is okay," I say, swallowing the lump in my throat. His eyes snap to mine and he furrows his eyebrows. I stand up from my seat hesitantly, glancing at Sam for some reassurance that this is all okay. That I'm all okay and shit like this happens every day.

I hold my shaking hand out to him, offering a small smile. "I'm okay."

Abel's lip starts to tremble as he looks me up and down like he can't believe what he's seeing. His eyes meet mine and I notice that his are completely blue, unlike mine, Calista's, and Evie's.

"You're..." he trails off at a loss for words as a tear rolls down his cheek. He looks back at Calista as if he still can't believe this is all happening.

If I'm being quite honest, I can't believe this is happening either. This is all just so surreal. How did I get here? How did this all just happen so quickly? I swear one minute I was in middle school counting calories, then at the blink of an eye, I'm sitting here in front of the brother I didn't know I had.

"Yeah, I think so," I joke, trying not to sound like I'm going to fucking start bawling my eyes.

He smiles so widely, pulling me into the tightest hug I've ever been given. I laugh, wrapping my arms around his waist as he sobs into my shoulder.

I frown, patting his back, "Hey... I'm not all that great, you know."

"I'm sorry." He sobs. I pull away gently, watching as he wipes his eyes. Smiling softly, I take a moment to observe his features. I don't know how I didn't notice the resemblance when he walked in.

His hair is almost the same color as mine but it looks darker. I noticed that about Ray and Spencer, too. Ray's hair is the same color as mom's, and dad has light brown hair. Meaning that Spencer just has a darker variant of mom's hair color. Maybe it's a guy thing.

Or maybe they have more secrets

Abel's pretty tall, too. I envy his height. I've always been the shortest amongst kids my age, which especially made me feel insecure. I'd always been small but curvy. And being short and curvy was more like being small and stubby in my eyes. I wish I was as tall as Abel, then I'd have an excuse to always have my head in the clouds.

I continue to admire how pretty of a man he is. His jaw is sharp and his eyebrows thick, but tamed. His hair is untamed though, much like mine. But it does look like he tried to make it look good, maybe gel it down. Still, though, it's sticking up in more directions than I can even comprehend. I could imagine him in college, drawing girls in like a magnet.

"We look so similar, you know that?" It comes out almost like a whisper, like I didn't mean to say it. He flashes me a small smile, nodding.

"Y-you should see the pictures of us when we were toddlers. Like twins, almost."

I look up at Calista hopefully. "Can we look at them? The pictures?"

She grins and nods in the direction of the living room.

There's a part of me that's scared to actually look at the pictures of a life I didn't know I had.

Calista and Abel know all about this. They've probably looked through these hundreds of times and admired little me while I was at home playing dolls with Ray, unaware of their existence or place in two-year-old me's life.

For whatever reason, I keep pinning the blame on myself like I should've known or something. It all feels like it's my fault; like I did something.

Of course, I'm completely aware that all of this has nothing to do with something I did, but, still. I feel overwhelmingly guilty.

Regardless, it isn't that big of a deal. Things happen, people make decisions. And while I desire to control all that lies beneath and in front of me, I shouldn't worry about things that happened years ago, no matter if they are currently impacting me.

I'll forget about how I felt about this whole thing sooner or later, so what's the point of overthinking.

I inhale only to exhale as I take a seat on the couch between Calista and Abel.

The rest of the time there, we discuss memories and thoughts. Wishes and fears we missed out on sharing over the last fifteen-sixteen years.

I learn about my birth father, my grandparents, my lineage. You know, everything that people need covered when they meet their biological family after years of being lied to.

All sarcasm aside, it was good. The whole time I had the almost irresistible urge to cry. I forced a nice smile though. There was nothing to cry about.

Well, maybe there was but I'd much rather ignore anything like that than acknowledge my feelings. Only psychopaths do that shit.

And stable people... which I, unfortunately, am not.

❛❜

As soon as we get home, dad leaves again. He says something about work but I was too concentrated on keeping my breathing even to care where he was going.

And as far as I could tell, he was in too much of a hurry to care if I was listening or not.

"Don't walk with your arm around me."

Sam scoffs, pulling me closer. My yelp is muffled when he pulls me somehow farther into his side. I shove him harshly and throw my purse on my bed as he shuts the door behind us.

"Why are you being so mean to me?" He grumbles, pulling his shirt over his head. "God, it was hot," he mumbles.

I ignore him and take off my bottoms, yanking on my pajama shorts. Sam tosses his shirt over my head and it covers my eyes. I leave it alone in spite though.

He chuckles, peeling the shirt away from my head. "You're just going to continue ignoring me, then?"

Again, I ignore him as I change out of my top and into one of his sweatshirts. I can appreciate the lack of little screaming voices telling me to stop changing in front of him.

"Really, Grace?"

Rolling my eyes, I pull my hair back into a crappy excuse of a ponytail.

I want to talk to him but I have zero energy. It's not like I expect him to immediately grasp that today was a big day and I'm drained. But I wish he could take a hint.

"What did I do?" He insists, walking around me and in front of me.

Nothing.

"Fine, okay, I'll stop grabbing you when we're walking if you hate it that bad."

I move past him and into my bathroom to brush my teeth.

"Grace-"

"Stop!" I yell, shoving him hard in the chest. " God, Samuel! Just give me a second!"

Slamming the door in his face, I continue my nightly rituals. I let out a shaky breath as I wash my face.

I swallow hard, wiggling out my fingers and rolling my tense shoulders back.

Everything is so fucking weird to me right now. I got back with my boyfriend, I came home to visit dad so I could meet my birth mother and bio-siblings... what?

I wipe at my face with a towel, blinking back tears.

Sighing, I open the bathroom door and walk around Sam, continuing toward my bed.

"Gracie," he tries.

"J-just leave me alone right now, Sam." I croak, wiping under my eyes and getting under the covers. I turn on my side, staring at the empty wall straight ahead.

I remember always wanting to put something there. Photographs of friends, maybe some cheap yard sale painting done by a ten-year-old. But obviously, I never got to it.

Perhaps it was because, by the time I realized that spot was too empty, I felt too empty to care about doing anything about it.

Honestly... I assumed I'd be gone by now. I figured that if relapsing didn't kill me, then I would've just ended up doing it myself. The quick way. It wasn't like I wanted to die, but it wasn't like I had a particular interest in living either.

Mom and Spence were gone, dad was falling apart and Ray was acting like nothing was happening. Like it had always been just the three of us.

I'd always figured that if I were to have offed myself that she'd have done just the same. Ignored that it was happening. And dad would've been too wrapped up in a football game that he wouldn't have noticed until the cops showed up telling what was left of my family that I was dead.

Sometimes I wonder if that part of me is gone. If that little part of me that doesn't want to be here is still chilling on my shoulder, waiting to crawl back into my brain at any given moment.

I hear Sam from across the room as he makes his way toward the bed. He gets in on his side of the bed but turns and scoots closer to me.

"I... stop it." I attempt to move away from him but he's already spooning me.

"I'm sorry you don't feel good, my love. I wish I could make you feel better. How can I make you feel better?"

"Just stop, okay?! I don't need you!" I shove him again and he sits up.

"You need somebody, Grace!" He snaps, shocking me. I recover quickly.

"No, I don't! Okay?! I'm not in the mood, Sam!" I snap. He doesn't get it. He doesn't get that sometimes I don't want to talk myself out of a bad thought. Sometimes I like to feel it.

I don't like the idea of always being so happy but I also hate the idea of constantly being depressed. As weird as it sounds, I need moments like these to balance it all out.

"Well, you haven't been in the mood since we got home!" He snaps back at me, tugging my body around so we're looking at each other. I yank my arm out of his grasp and sit up so our eyes are level.

"Don't touch me! Don't ever touch me like that!"

He chuckles humorlessly, "Well, my bad, Grace! I won't touch you, okay? Not like we're dating or anything, you know."

"Stop it, alright? I don't want to fight, Sam!" I beg, moving to lay down. He presses me back against the headboard and touches our foreheads, his eyes searching mine.

"Just talk to me, Gracie..." he pleads, frowning down on me. I sigh, giving him the only words I feel that he needs.

"I don't always want to discuss what's going on in my head, Sam. It's crazy in there and sometimes I want to keep the crazy to myself." I lean up and press a soft kiss to his lips, pushing his hair out of his face. "I'm sorry."

"Baby, look at me." He tilts my chin up when I attempt to look away. "If you have the... crazy, then so do I. We're a team, Gracie. What's mine is yours and vise versa. If you've got it, so will I. Hell, I want it. I want everything that comes with you and your gorgeous self, Grace. But, if you don't want to talk about it, that's absolutely okay. Just recognize that there is a difference between not desiring to talk about it and completely ignoring that it's even there."

A sob escapes my lips and I wrap my arms around him, pulling him down against my body. "I'm sorry, Sammy."

He shrugs, hugging me close. "I'm sorry I raised my voice at you, baby."

"Me too."

"I love you, my Gracie."

"I love you most, my Sammy."

I can only imagine how uncomfortable he was for the rest of the night because we ended up falling asleep like that, holding each other. We even awoke in the same position.

I feel bad for not trying to talk to him. For so long, all I wanted to do was talk to somebody. And now that I get the chance to open up without judgment, I shoot down the opportunity.

He deserves better. I could never be what he needed.