Chapter 18: The Orange Box Cutter

My brother came home on Friday afternoon.

Our aunt's car pulled up in the drive at four, and he climbed out with a duffel bag, a sunburned nose and a red-shirts jersey two sizes too big.

He was fifteen, and he had grown an inch since June.

"Lainey!"

He dropped the bag on the lawn and hugged me hard, and I lifted him off the ground.

"You're heavy."

"You're old," he said.

My mother came out of the house in a yellow sundress, arms open.

"My boys and girls," she said. "Everyone's home for the Final."

She had texted me nine times that morning to be sure.

Her halftime tribute was the tenth text, and Nico had answered that it was built and waiting on his laptop.

It was.

It held one more file than she knew.

Gabriel shook my brother's hand on the porch and ruffled his hair.

My brother grinned up at him.

He had always liked Gabriel, who had taught him to trap a ball with his chest.

I watched it, and my stomach hurt.

That night my mother sent me to the garage for folding chairs.

She wanted fifty seats for fifty guests, and she wanted them set out in rows by morning.

I was dragging the third stack off the shelf when the door opened.

My brother stood there with his backpack on one shoulder.

"Can I talk to you?" he said.

"Sure. What's up?"

"Is something wrong with Mom?"

I put the chairs down.

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