Chap. 11

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Sarah Campbell
*trigger warning*

"Who's your favorite?" I asked, hovering over Lizzie.

"Unca Joel!"

I began tickling her, and she screamed and thrashed around, begging for mercy.

"Who is your favorite?" I asked, pausing for a moment.

She stared up at me, confliction weighing in her eyes. "You?"

"That's right." And then I began tickling her again.

"Not fair!"

I laughed as I planted kisses on her cheeks, pulling her into my lap. "I love you munchkin."

She curled up in my lap, resting her head in the crook of my neck. "Wuv you too."

"Alright, Jace is down for the night," Meredith said, emerging from her bedroom. "And I see it's almost time for Lizzie's bedtime."

"No!" Lizzie exclaimed, jumping up out of my lap. "No bed."

Meredith chuckled, scooping Lizzie up in her arms. "How about Aunt Sarah puts you to bed, huh?"

"No bed."

"Okay, five more minutes," Meredith said, dropping her back down to the floor. "Finish your milk."

Lizzie curled back up in my lap, sipping on her milk as she watched Despicable Me play on the TV.

The back door opened, and Ryan walked in, followed by Joel.

"Unca Joel!" Lizzie called out, running toward him.

"What am I, chopped liver?" Ryan teased.

I exchanged confused glances with Meredith as Joel swung Lizzie into the air.

"Why doesn't Sarah go ahead and put Lizzie to bed, huh?" Ryan suggested, shooting Meredith a directed look.

Some shit went down. And I wanted to be in the know.

"No bed!" Lizzie whined.

Ryan let out a sigh. "Give me kisses, it's night-night time."

"No bed!"

"What if Uncle Joel puts you to bed?" Joel suggested, swinging her up onto his shoulders.

Lizzie let out an excited squeal.

"Give daddy kisses," Joel said, bending down so Lizzie was at his eye-level.

Lizzie did as Joel instructed.

"Kisses for mommy," Joel said, leading her over to Meredith.

"Night-night sweet girl," Meredith said, before kissing Lizzie.

"And kisses for Sarah," Joel said, leaning over and shoving Lizzie's face into mine.

"Night-night, Lizzie," I said, and she planted a wet one right on my lips.

Joel led her upstairs as Ryan collapsed in his usual armchair.

"I thought you were going out with a couple of coworkers?" Meredith questioned.

Ryan let out a long sigh, glancing toward the stairs and then back at Meredith. "I was. Until I got a call from Caden that Joel did it, again."

"You mean it?" Meredith asked, her eyebrows pulling together in concern.

"What's it?" I asked.

"Joel's been having some setbacks," Ryan informed me. "With wrestling season next week and his Coach riding his ass, it hasn't been treating him well."

"And so what did he do?" I asked.

But that's as far as the conversation got before Joel came back downstairs. "And she's out."

"That was fast," Meredith said, leaning back in her chair.

"A bedtime story from Mr. Unicorn and she was knocked out. You're welcome."

Mr. Unicorn? That was a new one.

He took a seat next to me, kicking his feet up into my lap.

"Think again," I said, shoving his feet off of me.

"And get those shoes off of my couch," Meredith ordered.

Joel glanced over at Ryan, and his jovial mood almost immediately evaporated. "I see the conversation got started without me."

Ryan offered a tight smile. "When I go out for a night with my coworkers and return with my brother, questions ensue."

Joel glanced toward me and then at Meredith. "You told them?"

"Not everything."

He shoved himself off the couch, heading toward the kitchen.

I exchanged shocked glances with Meredith, the two of us innocent bystanders in this unfolding saga.

"Joel!" Ryan called after him.

"Can't anything in my life be private anymore?" Joel demanded, bracing his hands on the kitchen counter.

"Jace and Lizzie are sleeping," Meredith hissed. "Volume control, please."

Ryan coaxed Joel back into the living room, and Joel took a seat on the edge of the couch, his body tense.

"I was going to suggest that you stay here for a couple of days," Ryan said, glancing to Meredith.

Meredith nodded. "You're always welcome here, Joel. No permission required."

"I don't need to be babysat," Joel muttered.

"Well your actions of late prove otherwise."

Meredith shot Ryan a frustrated look while Joel stared at the floor, his shoulders hunched.

Even I knew that saying things like that wasn't going to help improve the situation at hand.

"Well what about an alternative solution?" I asked.

Joel looked to me, his eyebrows raised.

"And what's that?" Ryan asked, leaning forward.

"Joel and I both live on campus," I pointed out. "Maybe we could have lunch together and meet up a couple of times a week, to study and catch up."

Joel nodded, immediately glancing to Ryan. "I'd rather do that than be watched like an untrustworthy child."

Ryan cleared his throat, glancing to me and then back to Joel. "Well, J, as of late you haven't proven yourself to be trustworthy."

Joel's jaw shifted, and he glanced away from all of us. "It was a mistake."

"And I want to believe that," Ryan encouraged. "We all do. But this mistake has happened too often these past few weeks for that to be your excuse."

Joel rose to his feet, and Meredith let out a long sigh. "Joel, please. We are trying to intervene before your parents have to."

I could see the wheels turning in Joel's head as he glanced between us, the indecision flickering across his face.

The last thing he wanted to do was involve my parents in anything having to do with his Bulimia. They would only hover over him, with the intention of love and protection, but it usually ended up leaving Joel frustrated and grouchy.

A version of Joel that none of us cared to be around.

"A compromise?" Ryan suggested. "You stay here for the remainder of the week. And then once wrestling season begins, you and Sarah can do your own thing. Just give me the rest of this week to ride out the storm."

That sounded reasonable. I glanced up at Joel to judge his reaction.

Joel bit his bottom lip as he stared at Ryan, contemplating his offer.

"What are you going to force me to do?" Joel asked.

Ryan and Meredith exchanged glances.

"Nothing that we don't do ourselves," Meredith said. "You're still free to do your workouts, to attend practice. We just want to make sure that you're doing things in a way that is beneficial to you."

Joel slowly lowered himself back down onto the couch, and I reached over and began running my hand along his back.

"Okay," Joel muttered, his eyes downcast.

"J, we don't want you to think that we're ganging up on you, or that we think negatively of you," Ryan said, causing Joel to glance up at him. "We're doing this for the exact opposite reason."

"It's because we love you," I said, offering him a smile. "And we want you to stick around for a long time."

Joel used the collar of his shirt to catch the tears building up in his eyes. "It's fine."

Meredith rose up and crossed the living room, wrapping Joel in a tight hug. "You're too much of a loveable goofball for us to sit idly by and watch you harm yourself. Understood?"

I didn't hear what Joel said, his words muffled by Meredith's shirt.

"Good. We love you."

She pulled away from him, wiping her own tears. "Now who wants a glass of wine? Because Lord knows I need one, just this one time."

~*~

Adam was actually on time for our meeting. And not only that but he brought cookies.

"I'm sorry, I thought I was meeting with Adam Watson today," I said, taking a seat across next to him.

He was seated in a grassy field outside at Vanderbilt, his hammock behind him.

"My mom made them," he said, shoving them at me. "Clearly she forgot I'm mid-season and don't consume processed sugar in the middle of the week. Hence why I brought them to you."

"You must be a joy of a son," I said, taking a bite of the homemade chocolate chip cookies. "Oh my God, tell your mom she's amazing and that she can bake me cookies anytime."

"I'll pass along the message."

"So you had your big win last weekend," I said, nudging Adam's shoulder. "How good did it feel?"

Adam just nodded.

"Well that's a letdown. Did something happen?"

"If I could remember, I'd tell you."

My eyebrows furrowed together in confusion, and I took another bite of the cookie. "Did you take a hit to the head?"

He didn't answer, instead just leaning back against his outstretched arms. "If you had a time machine and you could go back to any moment in your life, which moment would you choose?"

I pulled my knees up to my chest, resting my chin on them as I stared out ahead of me. "I don't know, that's a very thoughtful question that I'd have to put some thinking into."

I glanced toward Adam, raising an eyebrow. "Clearly you've thought on this. What moment would you choose?"

He was silent for several moments, and I thought he might actually say something deep and meaningful.

"I would go back to when Monsters Inc. was first released. I was super sick when my older brother, Michael, got to see it in theaters and he ruined the whole movie for me. So I would make him sick and then we both would have to wait."

"You can't be serious." I stared at Adam as he raised an eyebrow at me in question. "That's really your moment in time?"

"That's it."

"You're so full of shit," I muttered, shaking my head.

Adam just laughed.

"I would go back to the first moment I knew something was wrong with my brother," I said, staring straight ahead. "His Junior year of high school I caught him throwing up after dinner and he told me he was sick. I knew it wasn't true, but I didn't understand it so I didn't ask anymore questions."

Adam stared at me, wordlessly.

"If I could go back to that specific moment I might be able to eradicate the pain and misery that's followed him, that's followed us, for the last six years." I glanced over at Adam, who was still staring at me. "He doesn't think that I remember that, but I do. He says he's been suffering from Bulimia since he won a State Championship here at Vandy, but that's untrue. So that's where I would take my time machine back to, because now I know what I'd say."

"What would you say?" Adam asked, his voice almost inaudible.

"I would tell him that too many people love him to watch him to this to himself. I would say that the years of pain and misery aren't worth the here and now WORD. That you don't control Bulimia, it controls you. And that men can have eating disorders too. I would tell him that I love him just the way he is, and that there are better ways to handle cutting weight, that we could work on it together. That I'd do anything to help him, just so long as he promised to do it the healthy way. I'd say all of these things and then I'd make him listen to it from my brothers, from Caden and Ryan. I'd make him understand that there are other ways, better ways, so that I'd never have to see him in a hospital bed again. So that I'd never have to see him in a Rehab facility again. All of that could be avoided with a simple time machine."

Adam was silent for several moments, his eyes studying mine.

"It couldn't though, could it?" he asked.

"What do you mean?"

Adam picked his hands up, sitting criss-cross and resting his hands in his lap. "You could say all of these things to your brother, but you couldn't change who he is. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. You might've been able to stop him from guilt, from shame, but that would've only lasted for so long. He would've been sneakier, better at hiding what he was doing. You might not have found out about his disorder until it was too late then."

This time I stared at Adam in silence.

"That's why I can't go back to a significant point in my life with a time machine," Adam said. "Because it would be too painful. What would I change really? Everything is inevitable."

"So you believe that everything has a preset course, destiny if you will?"

"I don't know what I believe," Adam said, with a shrug. "I just know that if I didn't kill my brother the summer before my Senior year, he would've died on a later date, no doubt by my hand."

For the first time in my life, I was dumbfounded. I didn't know what to say at the confession, and Adam just stared at me in silence, waiting a few moments.

"That's how the universe works," he eventually continued. "It gives and then it takes away. And what's not meant to be here can't be saved by time travel or by wishing upon a star. It just wasn't meant to be."

"Adam, I know when we look back upon our own lives, our vision is twisted by our own points of view," I said. "It's easy to harshly judge ourselves and to see things not for how they were. I've only known you for a couple of months, but I don't think you're capable of killing your brother."

"Cold-blooded murder? No. Though sometimes I admittedly think about it with Michael because he annoys the living shit out of me. But accidental murder is another thing. And that I did do."

I felt my heart pounding in my chest. I hadn't been prepared for this today, not with the preset of chocolate chip cookies in a warm, autumn breeze.

I needed to approach this with the utmost precaution, taking this fragile subject one step at a time.

"What was his name?"

At first Adam didn't answer, and I wasn't sure that he was going to.

"Liam."

Michael, Adam, and Liam. It sounds like a wholesome American family.

"How far apart in age were you guys?"

"Michael and I are four years," Adam said. "And Liam and I were six."

That was quite the age gap.

"Liam had dirty blonde hair, you could tell it was probably going to turn brunette," Adam said, a smile pulling on his lips. "He had these brown eyes that practically lit up every time someone agreed to play outside with him. He hated video games and television, always wanted to be outside and was constantly active. He could never sit still."

"He reminds me a lot of someone I know," I said, reaching over and nudging Adam.

Adam let out a short laugh, shaking his head. "Nah, Liam was a better person than I was."

I doubt that.

"One time I found a spider in the bathroom and Liam cried when I killed it. I had to promise that the next insect, bug, creature, whatever it was that I found in the house that I would let it go outside, set it free to be with its family."

I couldn't help but laugh and Adam let out a soft laugh of his own.

"I loved that kid."

And with that Adam sobered up, glancing away from me.

"You can tell me anything," I said, my eyes focused on Adam. "Or you don't have to. It's your decision."

Adam didn't say anything for several minutes, his body tense and gaze focused away from me.

And then he turned to face me, his face stoic. "I was 17, Liam was 11. I let the kid ride in the front seat, mom hated when I did that."

He paused to take in a deep breath, and I reached over and began running my hand across his back, like I often did with Joel.

Adam jerked away from me, glancing toward me like I was a foreign species.

"Sorry," I apologized, bringing my hand back to my lap. "That's what I do with my brother, I thought it might help."

He cleared his throat, glancing away from me and then back toward me again. "Well... Maybe if you could do it again?"

And so I did, Adam silent for a few moments.

"I was clean, sober. The police report came back and said so. But I was tired. I'd had a long practice and Liam was talking my ear off, he was obsessed with dinosaurs and could name off every single one. And he was going on about the new Jurassic World movie that had just come out, the inaccuracies versus the accuracies. He was giving me the worst fucking headache. But I let him go on because he was so excited about it, and my dad never let him talk about this stuff because it annoyed him too."

I could sense where the story was going, and I knew it was up next because Adam paused, his shoulders hunched as he began to slightly hyperventilate.

"Cookie?" I offered.

And much to my surprise, he took a bite.

"Don't tell my Coach," he said.

"My lips are sealed."

He rested the cookie on his pant leg, glancing back toward me. "My memory is a little hazy, I hit my head pretty hard. All I know is that there were bright lights coming toward us, I must have swerved into the other lane. And then I was wrapped around a telephone pole, no damage to the other car. His account says that I came from nowhere and swerved at the last moment."

Adam took a swig from his water bottle, letting his head fall back.

"That was an accident Adam," I said, quietly. "Those happen all the time. And you can't blame yourself for that."

"I was in the hospital a couple of days. Some cracked ribs, a concussion, nothing too damaging. I walked away." Adam shook his head, glancing toward me. "That shit's not right, Campbell. I walked away from the accident that killed my brother."

"And it's never going to feel right if you keep blaming yourself, Adam. You were in an accident. They're named so for a reason. You lost control of the car and what happened afterwards you can't blame yourself for. You can't punish yourself for living."

Adam just let out a dark chuckle.

I retracted my hand, forcefully turning his shoulder so that he was facing me. "Listen. For some reason, you were given a second chance at life that day. And it wasn't so that you could drown yourself in alcohol and self-pity. You have the gift of life, Adam Watson, so use it. Not everyone is so lucky."

"Like Liam." His words were filled with bitterness, regret.

"Like Robin Williams."

Adam furrowed his eyebrows at me in confusion.

"Like Prince. And Michael Jackson. And Alan Rickman. Just to name a few. They're not longer here with us anymore either. But that doesn't mean we should spend the rest of our lives mourning what could have been. We still have the gift. And we need to take full advantage while we still can."

"I could never stand Alan Rickman's voice," Adam mused.

I couldn't help but laugh, and after a few moments Adam did as well.

"It was a nice pep talk, but I don't think it's that easy," Adam said, glancing up toward the sky.

"It never is," I said, finishing off my cookie. "All we can do is try."

We were both silent for several minutes, letting our conversation sit.

"I have a proposition for you," I said, turning to face Adam.

He raised an eyebrow at me in question.

"Let's make a bet."

"What kind of bet?" he asked, now turning so that he was fully facing me.

"Let's see which one of us can have the most enjoyable experience over the next week, before we meet again. It has to be something new, doing something we've never done before. And we have to be honest about it. So if it's a bust, we can't lie and say that it was the best experience we've ever had."

Adam slowly nodded. "Okay, fine. Deal. What's the wager?"

Good question.

"Okay, how about this?" Adam suggested, when I didn't say anything. "Whoever wins

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