Page 123 of Beautiful Scars

I’m gasping for breath. “I know.”

He shakes his head, blood sliding off his face and dripping all over the carpet. “We watched that fire. In the garden. We made a promise, never again. Never three. Three is a very fucking dangerous number. Only two. It was me and you. Me and you. Two halves of a whole.”

“That was a long fucking time ago, Cole. We were kids.”

“We were brothers!” Cough. Splutter. “We’re brothers. You’re forgetting that.”

Meisie’s beside me, handing me the box while she pries it open. “I’m not forgetting anything.”

I rip the packet open with my teeth before pulling the cap off the needle and spitting it out. “It’s going to feel better, mate. Alright?”

He nods his head as I sink the needle into his bicep.

“What are you doing?” Sarah whispers.

I hadn’t even noticed her behind me.

“Diazepam. He’ll feel better when he wakes up. Grab his legs.”

I stand and take him under the arms while they take a leg each. Between the three of us, we manage to get him on the bed.

“I’ll clean him up,” Sarah offers. “I’m so sorry for—”

“Nah, don’t be daft,” I tell her. “And don’t be sorry, either. Go downstairs with Meise. Teach her how to make a decent cup of tea.”

Sarah tries to smile but she’s too shaken to manage it.

“Come on,” Meisie coaxes her, trying to reach her arm around her shoulder and then giving up and taking her hand instead.

I pull one of the pillowcases off and use it to wipe Cole’s face so I can see what I’m dealing with.

He’ll feel better in the morning on the inside, but outside’s going to hurt for a while.

“Stupid fucking bastard,” I tell him, even though he can’t hear me. “Made a rare old mess of my carpets. And that face. You’re going to ruin my wedding photos—Sarah will have your balls for earrings.”

I talk to him like that for ages.

Imagining having a brother who I could talk like that too.

A brother who would laugh at me. And I’d laugh at him. We’d laugh with each other. Share a beer. Share a joke.

Fucking lighthearted.

And not damaged beyond help.

Maybe that would be us in that parallel universe Meisie was talking about.

“You okay?” she asks.

I take one last look at my brother and then stand up from the bed, turning around to face her. “Aye.”

She shakes her head, and then lowers her chin, pointing at me. “You’re going to have a black eye this weekend.”

I let out a breath. And that breath turns into a laugh, not missing the irony that I was just saying that to Cole, wishing he could have laughed at me worrying about such fucking nonsense. “Think of the photos.”

Meisie clicks her tongue three times, like she’s trying to scold me, and for the second time tonight something inside me shifts. Cracks.

And just like that, I’m in the parallel universe with her. Where peaches aren’t just a juicy fruit, where nightmares make two broken as fuck people fit together, and where you have to be lighthearted because it’s the only way your heart will ever survive it.

“I made you a cup of tea,” she says. “You coming down?”

I cross the room and pull her under my arm. “I still don’t trust you with hot drinks.”

She laughs, cautiously. Testing the waters to see if it’s alright to laugh again after what just happened. Then she looks up at me. “Smart man.”