I clinked mine against his. “To the brother who chose family when blood failed us both,” I said.
Later he asked if I regretted any of it.
“The trial,” he clarified. “The lawsuits. Cutting them out.”
I thought of Brandon in Spider-Man pajamas years ago, clinging to my leg. I thought of hospital monitors. I thought of the courtroom. I thought of him alive and free across the table from me now.
“I regret staying quiet for thirty-five years,” I said. “I regret thinking love meant accepting poison with a smile. I do not regret cutting them out. I regret that it took almost dying to do it.”
Brandon nodded, eyes older than his age. “I get it now,” he said. “Family is not who you are born to. It is who would protect you.”
He was right.
Every morning I stepped onto my balcony with coffee and watched the sun rise over a city that no longer felt like something happening to me. Cars moved along the streets like threads stitching the day together. Somewhere across town Brandon laced his shoes for a run.
And I knew one thing with absolute certainty.
I gave Brandon a real home.
The others chose their path.
