Chapter Text
May
Ryland is soaking wet and shaking when he first hears the sirens. A towel presses gently against his head in short strokes and wipes the hair off his forehead. He sniffles and hunches further into one of his brother's hoodies to fight against the cold night air. Court told him to wait inside on the couch with Colt, but Ryland refused. He wanted to be where Court was, even if it meant freezing to death.
There's not much to say. Well—there's lots to say, only Ryland can't think of a way to word it. Doesn't know if it's worth the effort. As the sirens grow louder and the faint glow of red and blue light up their street, Ryland knows things will never be the same again.
Court is calm as he tries his best to dry Ryland off. He's careful around the cut on his little brothers cheek. His own hands are bloodied still, barely washed off in the bathtub water as he drug Ryland out of its depths. Who knew something as shallow as a bathtub could end up being so dangerous? He looks over his shoulder to try and catch a glimpse of the living room where a quiet buzz of the TV penetrates the silence. Without seeing him, Court knows that Colt is curled up into the corner of their old, saggy couch watching the first thing he could find.
"It's all gonna figure itself out," Court tells Ryland just as the police cars pull up to their driveway. He leaves the towel to hang over Ryland's head, shadowing his vision. "I promise."
Ryland doesn't have the time to say anything in return. Everything happens in a rush. The police take Court away from him swiftly, shoving him into one of their cars on the street. One officer brushes past Ryland to get inside the house, he's not sure why, maybe to look at the mess they've all made, while another one crouches in front of him.
"Hey, kiddo," she says, keeping her voice low and soft. Not kind. Ryland doesn't look at her. "Do you have any family we can call?"
"Dad's in the bathroom," he says.
She nods. "Anyone else?"
Mom left last year and hasn't talked to them since. She said she would, promised to call or write, so Ryland checked the landline every day for messages and stuck his face in the mailbox every Friday after school. Both are empty.
He feels a presence behind him and jumps, twisting his neck to see who it is as his shoulders rise to his ears. Colt stands behind him with a blank face. Ryland relaxes at the sight of him. He looks down to see him fiddling with a small notebook their mom left behind.
Colt offers the book to the police lady. "Here," he says. "I think we have an Uncle."
The boys are ushered inside to their shared bedroom, far away from the bathroom, by another police officer. He stays with them but doesn't talk much, only tells them that they're waiting for a guardian to come and take care of them. Ryland doesn't know if anyone will show up. They've never met with other family members before. For ten years, this has been it. Him, Colt, and Court. Now, Ryland can hear the police car pull away from their driveway, taking Court somewhere that won't involve them.
Colt presses his face flat against the bedroom window. "Where is he going?" He asks the police officer.
The police officer sighs. "Off to our office, kid. We just need to talk to him."
Just talking, Ryland thinks with a nod. That's okay. Talking can be good. Court will tell them what happened and he'll be home by tomorrow morning, ready to take him and Colt to school.
"He was helping," Colt says. He turns from the window and stares, glassy-eyed, at the officer. "He was—he…he was just helping."
The police officer tilts his head and crosses his arms over his chest. "It looked like a lot more than just helping."
It takes hours, but eventually an old car speeds its way in front of their house. Colt and Ryland both jump from the bed and press themselves up against the window to see who it is. A tall man stumbles out of the drivers seat and is immediately bombarded by the police stationed outside. There's not many of them anymore, only the one who keeps an eye on the twins in their room and two others they haven't spoken to. The man flails his arms in the direction of the house and tosses his wallet at one of the officers. A moment passes, then he's let through and into the house.
Ryland and Court stand in front of their bedroom room and wait.
It opens, and standing there is someone they've never met before. He looks an awful lot like their mom, if their mom had a moustache and wore patterned ties. Golden hair, tanned skin, blue eyes. A lot like them, too, and like Court.
"Oh, wow." The man swallows loudly, hands switching between dipping into his pockets and rubbing at his neck. "You guys are so big now."
Colt takes a half-step forward and puts himself in front of Ryland. "Who are you?"
The man points at himself. "Me? What? I'm your Uncle Holland." He says it like it's self-explanatory, but when they don't say anything, he explains further. "Your moms brother? I met you guys when you were just, so tiny. Whatever, it doesn't matter. I'm here to take you two home."
They spend half a week stuffed inside a tiny motel with a single bed that's clean enough to be slept in. The other bed is covered in dark stains that arent' fully dry, and Uncle Holland sweeps Colt away before he can throw himself onto the nasty mattress.
It's a strange couple days. Ryland doesn't say much. He's afraid that if he opens his mouth, water will flood in and choke him. But that's okay, because Colt seems to know what he wants to say whenever Uncle Holland asks them a question. And when professional people come to their motel with papers and big words the twins don't understand, Uncle Holland knows enough to get through the boring meetings.
He brings them out to a diner on their last night in the motel. Uncle Holland orders a beer and grabs two lemonades for the boys, alongside greasy plates of breakfast for dinner.
"What happens now?" Colt asks halfway through his meal.
Uncle Holland stares at him for a second, still chewing. "Well," he says, and clears his throat, takes a swig of his beer. "Those ladies the other day gave me some papers to sign that say you guys are my responsability now. So, you'll come home with me and we'll get into a school or something."
"What about Court?"
This time, Uncle Holland stops chewing. He puts his fork down on the table and reaches into his jacket pocket to take out a pack of cigarettes. Flipping it open, he picks one, puts it between his lips, and lights it with the ease of a man who lives off the habit. Ryland coughs when the smoke blows in his direction.
"Your brother did something very bad—"
"It wasn't bad!" The words burst from Ryland's chest without regard for inside voices. It's late, and there's not a lot of people in the diner, but the workers behind the checkered counter look at their booth with raised brows. Ryland shrinks in on himself. "It wasn't bad. He didn't do anything wrong."
"He did a lot wrong, doesn't matter what his reason was," says Uncle Holland. "They're going to put him on trial for it and see if he'll be charged as a kid or an adult. After that…" he shrugs and waves the hand with a cigarette between his fingers. "Anything could happen. Come on, eat up, I want to get out of here early tomorrow."
Ryland can't sleep that night. He listens to Uncle Holland snore on his side of the bed and feels Colt twitch against him, legs kicking out sporadically. Ryland is pushed to the very edge of the bed and stares up at the popcorn ceiling. There's a couple little faces in there and he wastes his time trying to count them all. It's either that, or think too much about what's happened. About the water and the primal fear that clawed it's way into his chest. About how weird the bath water tasted when he screamed. About how every sound was muffled and warped until, suddenly, strangely, everything was silent. About how his vision blacked out and he thought the last thing he'd see was the chipping paint at the bottom of the tub that he always thought looked like a penguin.
He bolts upright in bed, heart pounding so loud it swallows the entire world. He wants Court to hold him and tell him it's going to be alright. He'd take Colt doing it if it meant any chance at comfort. Ryland's eyes fall to Uncle Holland, a man he's only met a couple days ago and hasn't spoken to much. A man that, apparently, is now in possession of him. Like his dad was. The idea of waking anybody up gnaws at him with a fear he used to only associate with going on planes. But he needs something. Anything.
Crawling carefully over Colt, Ryland wriggles himself between his brother and his uncle. Warmth presses against both sides of him. Nobody moves to grab him or hold him close, but being stuck between two bodies is good enough for now. Ryland lays his head on Uncle Holland's shoulder and squeezes his eyes shut.
June
Uncle Holland's a queer. It takes Colt about a month to figure it out, and when he does, he makes a blanket fort on the top bunk and invites Ryland inside to tell him. They've been put in the room across the hall from their cousin Holly's, so they keep their voices low in case she can hear them.
"How do you know?" Ryland asks. His face is cut in wobbly shapes of light and shadow from the flashlight held beneath his chin.
Colt picks at his bedsheets. "I saw Mr. Healy hug him last night. Mom said you only do that with someone you really like."
She's told them a lot of things about what it's like to really like someone. She's said that it makes you want to hold hands and hug them all the time and spend every second of the day with them. She also said that it makes people emotional, both happy and sad, and sometimes even angry. Liking someone seems like a lot of work, but one time Colt held a girls hand and it felt pretty sticky. He hasn't seen Mr. Healy and Uncle Holland hold hands yet, but the hug was weird.
He's never seen two grown men hug before. Not like that. He and Ryland can hug because they're brothers and brothers do that, that's what Court said when they'd been called weird at school. But grown men? Court never said anything about that.
Ryland's face scrunches. "Lots of people hug."
"Yeah, but they hugged. Like, for a long time."
"How long?"
"Five seconds."
Both boys go quiet for five seconds to see how long it really is. One Mississippi, two Mississippi, three Mississippi, four Mississippi, five Mississippi. Wow, yeah, okay, that's a long hug.
"What if Uncle Holland was just sad?" Ryland asks. "Mom said sad people need hugs."
Mom said a lot. Colt thinks it was to make up for their dad not saying a lot. When mom said nothing, that's how he knew he was in trouble, the same way he knew he needed to shut up when his dad started talking.
"We could investigate," Ryland suggests when Colt doesn't have anything to say. "To make sure."
Investigate is a word Colt learned in his detective books. A thrill runs through him at the use of it—because of course Ryland would use it first. They can be detectives together, like Uncle Holland is. Use some of his equipment—a spy glass, binoculars, a cool coat—and go on a hunt for clues.
Game on.
First, they play a round of statues in the morning before both men go to work together. They leave Holly in charge even if she's only three years older than them. Uncle Holland said they don't have the most active case right now, but they have something small that takes up some of their mornings in an office space the twins have never seen. Cousin bonding time, he'd said cheerfully the first time he left them alone with Holly.
Clashing pots and pans ring out from the kitchen. Uncle Holland is slamming cupboard and cursing under his breath, shirt partially unbuttoned and hair a mess. He might've forgotten that the twins were around—he's been doing that lately—to let Mr. Healy come so close to him. They freeze where they're stuck together on the couch, eyes wide as they stare.
"What's wrong now?" Mr. Healy asks him as he leans his shoulder against the fridge.
"This kitchen's a nightmare," Uncle Holland complains. "I can't find anything. All I want is to make some pancakes and I can't even find the thing for it."
Mr. Healy raises his brows. "The thing?"
"Yes, the thing. The pancake thing." Uncle Holland makes a lot of wild gestures in the absence of his word. "You know what I mean."
Apparently, Mr. Healy does know what he means. With a calmness Colt isn't used to seeing in adults, Mr. Healy walks behind Uncle Holland and places a hand between his shoulder blades. He reaches up into an open cupboard and pulls out a small pancake grill. The whole time, Uncle Holland watches Mr. Healy move.
"You mean this thing?" Mr. Healy asks as he sets the pancake grill down on the kitchen counter.
"Yes." Uncle Holland shoves the grill where he wants it. "Jesus, you know this place better than I do. You should start paying rent."
"I buy the groceries," says Mr. Healy. "Sayin' 'thank you' wouldn't kill you."
"I think it would, actually."
Holly's door opens down the hall, and while they don't jump away from each other, Mr. Healy turns around to face the open space of the living room. Colt and Ryland quickly duck their heads into the book in Ryland's grip, knocking them together in their haste.
"Ow," Ryland complains. "Get your fat head away from me."
"Get your fat head away from me," Colt snaps back.
"Get your own insult."
"Get your own face."
"Boys." Uncle Holland's voice cuts through their bickering. "Don't fight in the mornings. You know that's only okay in the afternoon."
Later that night, they convene under Colt's blanket and decide that a hand on Uncle Holland's back isn't enough evidence. Lots of people touch each other like that. A pat on the back, a clap on the shoulder, a hand on the side to move someone in your way.
Over the month, Colt and Ryland do a lot of sneaking around. More like Colt does the sneaking around because Ryland is too scared to do it. When Holly is busy talking on the phone with her friend, Colt dips into Uncle Holland's room and sees a well-made bed and two side tables. There's only a glass of water on one, but there are lamps on both. He snoops through the drawers and finds a face-down picture of Uncle Holland with his arms around a pretty woman.
So, Uncle Holland likes girls. That's good. There's nothing else in the room, and Colt leaves to tell Ryland about the picture.
"What about the other room?" Ryland asks.
He forgot about it. There's lots of doors in this house, but Colt has only seen three of them be used outside of his and Ryland's room. Uncle Holland's door, Holly's door, and the bathroom door. But there is an extra one next to Uncle Holland's that he's pretty sure is meant for Mr, Healy. They don't really know because Uncle Holland has their bedtime set to nine-thirty, and whether Mr. Healy stays after that or goes to his own home is a mystery.
One they don't have the time to solve. Holly hangs up the phone and finds them in the living room.
"Sarah's coming over," she tells them. "If you want to watch movies with us, you can."
It's an easy distraction from their investigation, and for a few days they drop it altogether.
They find out the truth on accident. Mr. Healy and Uncle Holland are out late, and Holly is laying on her bed with her door cracked open in case the twins need her. Colt is busy trying to make origami from a book he borrowed from Holly while Ryland reads a new book. Crumpled up wads of paper are scattered across the floor, all of them failed attempts at a frog. Finally, on his last attempt, he gets the shape right.
"I did it!" Colt holds up the paper frog for Ryland to see. "That's so cool. He jumps, too, watch."
He doesn't end up jumping very far, but Colt really likes his frog. Ryland barely looks.
The sound of the front door opening catches Colt's attention. Surely Mr. Healy and Uncle Holland will appreciate his origami frog more than his dump brother does. He rushes out of the room and nearly skips down the hall in his excitement. With his uncle's name on the tip of his tongue, Colt never gets the chance to say it as all his air is punched out of his lungs.
Uncle Holland and Mr. Healy are kissing. Like, really kissing. The kind they do in the movies Holly and Sarah like to watch. Uncle Holland is laughing into it, stumbling on his feet, drunk, while Mr. Healy firmly guides him away from the front door. Colt's mouth drops open.
They stop kissing for long enough that Uncle Holland can throw his jacket off on the dining room table, and as he turns to go back to kissing Mr. Healy, his eyes catch Colt's.
"Shit," Uncle Holland shrieks. "Shit. Shit—what're you—isn't it past your bedtime?" Colt doesn't say anything. Lamely, he holds out his origami frog. "No, yeah, that's very cool. Cool paper thing." He shoots a panicked look at Mr. Healy.
Mr. Healy doesn't look so scared. He gives Colt a warm smile and pats Uncle Holland's waist. "I think it's time we all had a talk," he says. "You, too, Ryland."
Looking over his shoulder, Colt sees Ryland with his head poking out of the door. Colt tries his best to tell Ryland with only his face what he just saw, and Ryland might get it but the message is sloppy. The boys are invited over to the couch while Mr. Healy drags two chairs from the table into the living room. He guides a suspiciously quiet Uncle Holland into one of the seats and sits himself down in the other one.
"Are we in trouble?" Colt asks. A quiet grown up like Uncle Holland means a mad one. "Ryland didn't see anything."
"No one's in trouble," Mr. Healy says. "Don't worry about that. There's just something your uncle wants to tell you."
Uncle Holland runs a hand over his mouth. He smells like alcohol. His hands are shaking and his eyes don't know where to look. The twins haven't know their uncle for very long, but already they know how weird it is for him to have nothing to say.
So, Ryland says it for him. "You're a queer."
Uncle Holland squeezes his eyes shut. "Don't say a queer, honey, just say you're queer. It's rude."
"Sorry," he apologizes. "You're queer."
"Okay, great, conversation had. Let's all go to bed—"
Mr. Healy puts a hand on Uncle Holland's knee to keep him in his chair. "Come on, be more honest than that. When your uncle and I say we're partners, we don't just mean for business. Do you understand that?"
Kind of. The twins nod. Ryland puts up his hand, and when Mr. Healy nods at him, he asks, "Is that allowed?"
"Not yet."
"Are you also our uncle?"
"We haven't gotten there yet."
"Can I tell people?"
"No."
"Who would you tell?" Uncle Holland asks. "You don't have any friends."
"What about the girl in your drawer?" Colt asks. "I thought queers didn't like girls."
At that, Uncle Holland sucks in a breath. His hands shake as he runs them through his hair, and his eyes glaze over. "How do you know about that picture?" He asks.
Even though he doesn't know why, suddenly he's embarrassed about sneaking into his uncles room. It hadn't occurred to him that it was a bad thing to do, but Uncle Holland doesn't look happy.
"We had an investigation," he says quietly, like if the words go unheard they can all forget about this and move on. "And I went into your room and found a picture."
"First of all, that's all kinds of shitty," Uncle Holland says. "Second of all, I'm a little bit proud. Mainly, though, that's a shitty thing to do. If you want honesty, then fine, let's get it all out there. I had a beautiful wife that gave me a beautiful daughter. My wife died a year ago because I was an idiot, and now I'm here with Healy. I like anything."
"Me, too," says Mr. Healy.
Ryland raises his hand again. "Are you happy?"
Uncle Holland looks down at his right hand as if he's looking for something. His chest puffs with a small, contained laugh before he looks over at Mr. Healy, who is already staring at him.
"Yes," says Uncle Holland. "We're happy."
"Okay."
"Okay?"
"Mom and dad weren't happy," Ryland says, like it means something. He's not sure why he said it, but he can't take it back.
Colt nods once. "I'm okay that you're happy."
From the hall, Holly speaks out. "Can we go to bed now? I've already watched you cry over Mr. Healy."
Uncle Holland jumps. "Jesus Christ! Can you all stop appearing out of nowhere? It's awful. You're multiplying and I don't like it."
"It's past all of our bedtimes," says Mr. Healy with a gentle finality the house has learned to listen to. "We can have a happy family breakfast tomorrow, how does that sound?"
Sounds good to everyone.
Uncle Holland ushers the twins into their room and presses a kiss to Holly's head as he passes her by. He makes sure they get changed and brush their teeth before tucking them into their beds.
"Goodnight, you guys," he says. "Don't go in my room ever again, unless you're dying."
"Night, Uncle Holland," the twins say in chorus.
"That's so freaky."
He closes the door and Colt doesn't waste a second in kicking off his blankets and hanging half-off the railing to peer into Ryland's bunk.
"I told you," he brags.
Ryland throws his book at Colt's head. "Shut up."
August
A new school means learning the rules of a new playground.
Colt thrived in the classroom icebreakers that their teacher, Miss Kelly, had set up for them at the start of the day. She called it word association, so when she said a word, the kids would scream out the first thing they thought of. If they said the same thing as another student, they got a point. Colt got five whole points! The most points in the entire class. Ryland only got one.
Thriving inside the classroom is different than thriving outside of it. The playground has unspoken rules that nobody wants to explain to new kids. These are things they've all grown up with as they've gone to this same school together for years now. Back at home, it was obvious that Colt ran the monkey bars, but here? That's someone else's territory.
The entire playground is packed with kids. There's a long line for the swings and a bunch of groups playing Horse on the cement court. Ryland presses his shoulder to Colt's. Their school didn't have this many kids. The only thing Ryland likes about school is the learning because he's a loser that likes boring things. Despite that, Colt makes it his mission to keep Ryland away from being the lonely kid in class with no friends. That doesn't change just because they're in LA now.
As the twins march past the bright blue playground, hoping to make it to the swings before the bell rings, a brown haired boy hangs upside down from the monkey bars.
"Hey!" The boy calls out. "Are you clones?"
Colt blinks at the boy. "What?"
The boy waves his hands around at them. His hair almost hits the ground and his face is slowly turning red as he swings back and forth from where his knees are hooked onto the bars. "Which one of you is the real one?"
"I'm older," says Colt.
Ryland shakes his head. "No, I'm older."
"Nuh-uh."
"Yuh-uh."
"Court said I was born first."
"He's lying."
"I'm bored," the boy announces. "You guys are new, right? I'm Tom."
The twins introduce themselves, and Colt takes a second to look at the crowd on the monkey bars. A couple of the others kids try to hang upsidedown like Tom is, while the rest of them stay seated on top. One lonely kid is trying and failing to swing herself across. All of them pay attention to Tom in some way. Like the little kingdom Colt used to have at his old school, where he ruled the parts he wanted because he knew how to make people laugh. In that kingdom, Ryland was safe, and Colt was happy.
Doing it again shouldn't be so hard. He can play nice with this Tom guy and get an early in.
"Wanna play grounders?" Colt asks Tom.
"Not it!" Tom slams his hand against his nose.
Colt rushes to copy him like the rest of the monkey bar kids do. Everyone looks at Ryland, who was too slow in touching his nose. Grumbling about how unfair it is when he isn't as quick as his brother, Ryland squeezes his eyes shut and counts to ten. Everyone on the monkeybars drops to the ground and races for a better spot on the playground.
They learn that day that Tom is a very bad loser.
October
Two things happen: Colt gets popular, and Tom sticks around.
The three of them aren't in the same fifth grade class because this school is big enough to have two full sized classes for each grade, which blows Colt's mind every day and makes it easier for Ryland to avoid Tom. But Colt keeps inviting Tom over after school, and even when he doesn't Tom still finds his way into their lives. He'll talk all the way to Mr. Healy's car and wave when Ryland slams the door in his face.
"Mr. March, do you have a favourite twin?" Tom asks the second time he stays for dinner.
"Mr. Healy, watch how fast I can run. Watch. Watch. Mr. Healy, watch," Tom demands when he comes over on a Saturday. "Mr. Healy you're not watching."
Tom stands very close to everybody and demands to be in everyone's business. He'll read Holly's magazine over her shoulder and stare at someone's snacks until they give him some. He's always around and obnoxious and annoying and Ryland wishes they'd never met him him because he's taking up all of Colt's attention. Even when Tom isn't around, Colt is bringing him up. It's gross.
Ryland is already down one brother, he doesn't need someone else coming in and taking Colt away, too.
There's a moment when Tom is over at the Healy-March house when Colt goes to the bathroom and leaves the two of them alone. Instead of playing with them, Ryland has been trying to work on his homework and ignore the distractions of two loud, rambunctious boys. He thinks that maybe with Colt gone, he can have a real moment to focus on the math sheet in front of him, but Tom has others plans.
"Do you ever do anything fun?" Tom asks from his spot on the floor.
Ryland ignores him.
"Ryland. Ryland. Are you deaf? Ryland. Ry-Ry."
A shot to the heart. "Don't call me that," he snaps.
Tom perks up. "Ry-Ry? Why not?"
He doesn't want to let Tom in on any family workings. Telling him any history means letting him in and watching him grow roots. He doesn't need to know that Court used to call him Ry-Ry on the worst of nights, when he couldn't sleep because their dad had hurt him so bad no position was comfortable. A soft name, said under his breath, one that made him feel so small and protected.
It doesn't feel good when Tom says it.
"I don't like it," Ryland says.
"But I like it," Tom decides. "Do you ever do something that isn't homework?"
"I read books."
"Comics?"
"Real books."
"Ew, boring." Tom scrunches his nose. "Movies? Sports? Games? Anything?"
"I like doing things that teach me something," Ryland says, fingers curling around his pencil.
Tom throws his head back and sighs. "You're not even a fun nerd, you're a lame nerd. This is why nobody plays with you at recess, Ry-Ry."
"I said don't call me that."
"Ry-Ry—"
Ryland's hand reaches out to grab the closest thing to him—a hardcover book—and throws it at Tom's face. With unexpectedly fast reflexes, Tom ducks out of the way before it could hit him. His head pops back up, his eyes wide with surprise, as he stares at Ryland.
It's not fair that someone can call him something that's only meant for Court to say. And he asked Tom not to, he tried using his words, but words don't work. Not with his dad, and not with Tom. Anger boils his blood and burns the inside of his stomach. Keeping his pencil in his grip, Ryland throws himself off the bottom bunk and storms past Tom's stock-still body, forcing the door open and nearly knocking himself over when Colt is on the other side.
"Woah—Ryland?" Colt's voice is barely a sound in Ryland's ears as he stomps his way to the front yard.
Throwing himself down on the lawn, Ryland stabs the pencil in the dirt, lays on his back, and crosses his arms tight over his chest. Hot tears well in his eyes as he stares up at the bright blue sky. None of this is fair. None of it feels good. Court is gone because Ryland isn't strong enough to stand up to their dad, and Colt is the only one making friends at their new school, and Ryland is alone and angry and sad and—and every emotion under the sun.
Ryland doesn't know how long he lays there for, letting himself grow cold in the fall breeze, but eventually Uncle Holland comes out to see him.
"It's a little late for tanning, honey," he says.
"Go away."
"Don't think I can do that. It's a little suspicious to have a ten year old boy laying on my lawn and not moving. The neighbours might call the cops and get idiots involved." He waves his hands around. "Lots of work. I'll join you."
Grunting and groaning, Uncle Holland lowers himself onto his back next to Ryland and knocks their shoulders together.
"What's wrong with you?" Uncle Holland asks.
"Tom's a jerk," Ryland complains through a pout.
"Ah, yeah. I can't believe that guys like him are what we're looking at for the future," says Uncle Holland with a shake of his head. "Y'know, I'm worried for Holly being involved in shit like that, but it's good you know they're not nice guys. Makes one less lecture."
"I don't like him, but Colt does. He's always around and he doesn't stop talking and he called me a lame nerd."
Uncle Holland clucks his tongue. "What a jerk."
"I know!"
"Healy and I can fight him for you," he offers, "for fifty bucks."
"I can fight him for free."
"Atta-boy."
Sniffling, Ryland rubs his forearms across his eyes to get rid of any evidence of just how sad it made him to hear the name Ry-Ry again. He rolls over onto his side and presses himself against his uncle, wriggling in closer when Uncle Holland lifts up his arm and welcomes him in for a hug.
"I'll kick Tom out before dinner, how's that sound? Then let's ban him from coming over for a week," Uncle Holland says.
Ryland laughs. "Can we ban him for a month?"
"And deal with Colt's sulking? No dice, honey, your brother is a monster."
"A week is okay."
They lay there for a while, talking about nothing and everything. It's the first time that Ryland has felt like he can be okay with his uncle, even if he is a little weird. So what if Colt has Tom? Ryland has this. For right now, it's enough.