“Because he loved me?”

He was going to be the death of me, this little kid. “Because he loved you,” I promised. I gulped and hoped and prayed that he couldn’t see the struggle written all over my face. Tucking the covers in around him faster than ever, I leaned over my favorite five-year-old on the planet and kissed his forehead, earning a kiss on my cheek in return. “I love you, poo-poo face. Sleep good.”

“I love you too, poo-poo face,” he said as I made my way toward his door, thinking about his words and grinning even as a tiny piece of my heart broke off.

“Tia, you can buy me socks if you want,” Louie added just as I made it to his door.

Maybe if I’d been expecting it, his offer wouldn’t have felt like a battering ram to my sternum followed by a nuclear bomb being detonated where my heart used to exist.

My legs went weak. Grief and something close to misery boxed in my throat, and with a strength I didn’t think I had in me, I turned to look at him without letting the tears burst like Niagara Falls out of my eyes and nodded. Goose bumps broke out over my arms. “I think your dad would like that. Goodnight, Lulu.”

“Night, dudu,” he called out as I mostly closed the door behind me, biting my lip and swallowing, swallowing, swallowing hard.

I pressed my back against the wall next to his door.

Oh my God.

Oh my God.

My nose started burning. My eyes began watering, and I gasped for air, for strength, for anything that could get me through the pain slicing through everything that made me, me.

How did it never get easier to know that life was unfair?

How did it never hurt any less to know I would never see someone I loved again? Why did it have to be my brother? He hadn’t been perfect, but he’d been mine. He’d loved me even when I got on his nerves.

Why?

I hadn’t moved a single inch when I heard Josh peep up, “Aunt Di.”

Fuck.

“You’re ready for bed?” My voice sounded cracked and splintered even in my own ears as I made my way to his room.

“Yeah,” he replied, the sounds of the bed creaking, confirming his statement.

Wiping at my eyes with the back of my hand and then pulling up my shirt to dab at them, I did the same to my nose and took a deep, calming breath, which probably didn’t do anything because I was three seconds away from bawling. But I couldn’t put off seeing Josh before he fell asleep. It was one of the last few things he still let me get away with every so often.

When I had myself about 10 percent under control, I forced a smile and stuck my head through the doorway. Sure enough, on the mattress was Josh and right alongside him was my third boy, Mac, with his head on his paws, one eye on me at the door. His tail swished right by Josh’s face.

“What story did you tell Lou?” he asked immediately, like he knew it had killed me inside. He probably did know.

“I told him the story about your dad and socks.”

A small smile crossed his lips. “I know that one.”

“You do?” I asked as I went around the edge of his bed to sit on the opposite side of where Mac was. I reached across to put one hand on the dog and another on Josh. If he already knew I was upset, there was no point in me hiding it.

“Yeah. He told me about it.”

I raised an eyebrow, slightly surprised.

Josh lazily raised a shoulder, those brown eyes gazing right into my own. “I had to use one of his socks one day when we went to the park,” he explained, his ears turning pink.

Those all too familiar tears stung the back of my eyes. He’d told Josh about it at least. Given him another memory I didn’t have to. “I’ve had to flip my underwear inside out a couple of times. No big deal. It happens.”

He gave me a horrified look that immediately had me frowning. “Gross!”

“What? I didn’t say it was gross you had to wipe your butt with a dirty sock!”

“That’s different!” he claimed, gagging.

“How is that different?” I asked, reminded of how many times I’d had this back and forth sort-of arguing with Rodrigo.

He was still choking and gagging. “Because! You’re a girl!”

That had me rolling my eyes. “Oh God. Shut up. It’s normal. It doesn’t make it gross because I’m a girl and you’re not. I’d rather be a girl than a boy.” I poked him. “Girls rule, boys drool.”

He shook and shivered, still supposedly traumatized, and I only rolled my eyes more.

“Go to bed.”

“I am,” he played around.

I grinned at him and he grinned right back. “I love you, J.”

“Love you too.”

I kissed his cheek and got a half-assed one in return. On the way out, I gave Mac a kiss and got a lick to my cheek that made me feel just a little better. Just a little. But not enough.

Sometimes I felt like a traitor for how much I loved them. Like I shouldn’t, because they weren’t supposed to be mine to begin with. Like I shouldn’t think they made my life better when the only reason they were mine, lighting my life up, was because of something awful.

My heart hurt. It ached. Throbbed. It was heavier than it’d been in a long time. Tears and some kind of shitty bodily fluids filled my nose and eyes and throat, and for a brief second, I thought about going into my closet to cry. That was the usual place I went to bawl my eyes out, ever since I’d been a kid. But the fact was, this house was old and my closet was too small. Just being inside with this weight made me claustrophobic. The kitchen, living room, dining room, and laundry wouldn’t work either.