Brooke & the Crowells

I don’t wake up so much as surface.

Like my body’s been treading water all night and the alarm is just the moment my lungs decide they can’t hold it anymore.

The room is dark. Not cozy dark. The kind where everything feels the same distance away. The same threat. My phone sits face-down on the nightstand like it’s ashamed of itself.

I lie there anyway and listen.

The refrigerator hums. A car passes outside, tires hissing on wet pavement. Somewhere in the apartment, a pipe ticks as it cools. The building settles around me one small sound at a time.

Then, from the next room, Evan coughs.

It’s small. Dry. Not the lung-ripping kind. Not the kind that sends me sprinting barefoot down the hall. Just a reminder.

He’s here.

So is the clock.

I sit up and swing my legs over the side of the bed. The floor is cold through my socks. My toes curl like they’re trying to hang on.

My brain turns on the way it always does when I’m scared. It doesn’t cry. It doesn’t plead. It starts stacking everything into a list.

Kettle. Shower. Calendar. Work.

Survive.

The kitchen smells faintly of dish soap and the cheap lemon cleaner I buy on sale because I like the lie of it. Lemon says fresh. Lemon says clean. Lemon says this isn’t a tiny apartment where the walls are thin and the bills are thick and my brother’s lungs keep asking for things we can’t afford.

I fill the kettle and set it on the burner. The click of the ignition is too loud in the quiet.

While it heats, I open the cabinet and stare at the mugs. There are only two that matter. Mine, chipped on the rim. Evan’s, with a faded cartoon spaceship from when he was little and believed in later.

I take mine. Habit.

I flip my phone over.

The notification waiting for me is not Dean’s name.

SOUNDVIEW HEALTH FINANCE.

My stomach drops so fast it feels personal.

I stare at the screen for one stupid second like ignoring it might change the words.

It doesn’t.

I swipe.

“Hello,” I say, and my voice is already too polite. Like politeness is armor. Like if I’m nice enough, the world will hesitate before it takes what it wants.

“Ms Merritt?” The woman’s tone is professional, neutral, pre-packaged. “This is Soundview Health billing. I’m calling regarding the specialist deposit for Evan Merritt.”

Of course it’s about Evan. Everything is about Evan.

“Yes,” I say. “Hi. I’m aware.”

“The deposit is due by nine a.m. to maintain the appointment,” she continues, like she’s reading off a script taped behind her eyes. “If it isn’t confirmed by that time, the appointment slot will be reassigned.”

Reassigned.

Such a clean word for something that feels like a hand closing around my throat.

“I understand,” I say automatically.

There’s a pause. The kind that invites begging.

I don’t beg. Not out loud. Begging just teaches people where to press next time.

“I’m working on it,” I add, and I hate how much it sounds like a promise I have no right to make.

“Do you have an estimated time the payment will be submitted?” she asks.

I look at the kettle. Not even boiling yet. Little flecks of air starting to move at the bottom like time is mocking me with small, ordinary steps.

“Soon,” I say.

Another pause.

Her voice softens by a fraction. Not kindness. More like she’s seen this story before and knows how it ends.

“I do need to advise you,” she says, careful, “that we can’t hold the slot without confirmation.”

“I know.” It comes out sharper than I mean. My throat burns. “Sorry. I’m sorry. I know.”

Apologizing is reflex. I hate that too.

“It’s fine,” she says, and we both know it isn’t. “If you submit the payment through the portal, please ensure you receive a confirmation number. Without that, it won’t be considered received.”

“Okay,” I whisper.

“Is there anything else I can help you with today?”

Help.

I almost laugh. It would come out wrong.

“No,” I say. “No, thank you.”

“All right, Ms Merritt. We’ll look for your confirmation by nine a.m.”

The line clicks dead.

For a second I stand there with the phone still at my ear, like if I wait long enough the world might call back and apologize.

It doesn’t.

Somewhere in the back of my head, a bright, fake loop of hospital hold music keeps playing anyway, a jingle I don’t remember hearing this morning but remember from every other call that sounded just like this.

The kettle whistles, sharp and impatient, and I flinch like it’s an alarm.

I pour water into my mug and watch the steam rise. My hand shakes just enough to make the surface shiver. I curl my fingers tighter around the ceramic until the tremor is something only I can feel.

I open the hospital portal because hope is a habit I haven’t broken.

Appointment: Confirmed

Status: Pending Deposit Verification

Deposit Required By: 9:00 AM

The clock in the corner of the screen says 6:12.

Two hours and forty-eight minutes.

Plenty of time, if time came with money attached.

At the top of the page, the partner logo sits in neat blue. SOUNDVIEW HEALTH in clean letters. CROWELL FOUNDATION in smaller ones under it.

For a second the screen blurs and I see a kitchen table instead. My dad’s work bag. A thick folder with that same foundation name on it. His tie loosened, his voice low when he told my mom, Make copies of everything. Don’t trust the originals.

I was seventeen. I thought he was being dramatic.

Now I know better. Around the Crowells, money doesn’t just solve problems. It buys obedience.

I blink the memory away before it can open further.

I close the app and carry my tea down the hall.

Evan’s door is closed. I stand outside it with my knuckles raised, because some part of me still wants permission. Like he’s not my brother. Like he’s not the only person on this planet I’d bleed for without thinking.

I knock once, soft.

“Yeah?” His voice is rough, sleepy, annoyed in a way that makes me weirdly grateful. Annoyed means he’s breathing on his own.

I push the door open.

Evan is propped against his pillow, trying to look casual about the fact that his body is unreliable. His hair sticks up in one stubborn corner. His face is thinner than it should be at twenty-two, cheekbones too sharp under pale skin.

When he looks at me, his eyes are too awake.

“You got the call,” he says.

Not a question.

I paste on a smile. Loosen my shoulders. Make my voice light. Like I can fool him. Like he hasn’t lived inside this with me for years.

“What call?” I say.

Evan doesn’t even blink. “Brooke.”

He says my name like a hand closing around my wrist. Like he can feel me trying to pull away from something we both know I can’t escape.

I sit on the edge of his bed. The mattress dips and our shoulders touch for a second. Two people in a small room. Not a crisis. Not a countdown.

“It’s fine,” I tell him. “It’s just paperwork.”

“Paperwork has never made you look like you’re about to bite someone.”

I huff a laugh. “That’s my face.”

“That’s not your face.” He nods toward my hands. “That’s your hands.”

I look down.

My fingers are clenched in his blanket so tight the fabric wrinkles under my grip.

I let go slowly, like that’s a choice and not a failure.

“I’m handling it,” I say.

Evan’s mouth tightens. “You always say that.”

Because it’s true.

Because if I don’t handle it, no one does.

He reaches for my hand anyway, warm and steady. I let him take it because this is the only place I’m allowed to be soft.

“You don’t have to do this alone,” he says quietly, like a secret.

I swallow.

“I’m not alone,” I lie. “I have you.”

His eyes flicker. He knows exactly what I’m doing. He lets it slide anyway. Forgiveness wrapped in silence.

“You’re going to be late,” he says, changing the subject for me.

“I’m never late.”

“That’s not what I mean,” he murmurs.

I squeeze his fingers once. Promise. Plea.

“Drink the water,” I tell him. “Eat the yogurt with the blue lid. Not the one you keep pretending you can’t see.”

“You label yogurt now,” he says, deadpan.

“I label everything,” I say. “It’s my kink.”

Evan snorts. The sound loosens something tight in my chest for one heartbeat.

I stand before it can turn fragile.

“I’ll be back at lunch,” I lie.

He watches me like he knows and forgives me for that too.

I check the pill organizer on his nightstand even though I checked it last night. I scan the room the way my brain insists on scanning everything. Water within reach. Inhaler where it belongs. Phone charging.

Then I leave.

The hallway outside our apartment smells like someone’s coffee and someone else’s burnt toast. The elevator is slow. The ride down feels like it’s taking time I can’t spare.