“You were six inches taller and furious.”
“You were my little brother.”
“Exactly.”
Silence.
The older biker who had followed them remained ten yards away.
Close enough for safety.
Far enough for privacy.
The boy leaned against the pickup.
The giant biker looked toward him.
“His mother?”
The younger brother’s expression changed.
“She died four years ago.”
The older brother went completely still.
“What?”
“Cancer.”
The giant biker looked as though he had been struck.
“No.”
“Yes.”
“You never told me.”
“I almost did.”
“Almost?”
“I wrote.”
The older brother swallowed.
“Did you send it?”
“No.”
“Why?”
The younger brother looked at him.
“Because by then I had spent thirteen years convincing myself you didn’t want to know anything about my life.”
The giant biker looked toward the ground.
“She was good.”
“Yes.”
“She hated me.”
“She hated everybody the first hour.”
That pulled a broken laugh from the older brother.
The younger continued.
“She didn’t hate you.”
“After our fight?”
“She thought we were both idiots.”
“She was probably right.”
“She usually was.”
The giant biker rubbed his beard.
The younger brother looked toward his son.
“When she got sick, he was four.”
“She died the week after his fifth birthday.”
The older brother’s face tightened.
“You did that alone?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
The younger man smiled sadly.
“Because you told me not to come back.”
The older brother closed his eyes.
There was nothing useful to say.
No defense.
No clever explanation.
He had been angry for a week.
His brother had carried the sentence for seventeen years.
The boy called:
“Dad?”
The younger brother turned.
“Yeah?”
“Are you fighting?”
He and the giant biker looked at each other.
The older brother answered:
“Yes.”
The boy frowned.
The older man continued.
“But we’re staying.”
The younger brother looked at him sharply.
The boy considered.
Then nodded.
“Okay.”
He climbed into the truck.
The younger brother looked toward his older brother.
“That sounded practiced.”
“It wasn’t.”
“Good line.”
“Don’t ruin it.”
For the first time, both smiled at once.
The giant biker looked at the truck.
“You married after leaving?”
“Two years later.”
“Why wasn’t I invited?”
The younger brother raised an eyebrow.
“You told me never to come back.”
“Wedding invitations can travel.”
“You would’ve come?”
The older brother opened his mouth.
Stopped.
“Probably not.”
“Exactly.”
“That doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have invited me.”
The younger laughed.
“You are still impossible.”
“So are you.”
They stood in the road beside an old pickup arguing about an invitation to a wedding fifteen years gone.