Spring at the Lake
The forest is different in spring. Softer. Greener. Even Elias’s footsteps—usually sharp, heavy, a man forever bracing for a threat—seem almost lazy against the damp earth as he leads August down the familiar trail.
The boy walks behind him with that quiet, half-floating gait he’s always had, fingertips trailing through the ferns, brushing bark, nudging moss. The sun filters through the canopy in pale gold ribbons that catch on his white shirt, already speckled with dirt and pollen. He hums sometimes, in the smallest breath of voice. Eli never mentions it aloud, but he loves that sound—the unconscious proof that his brother is content, even if only for a moment.
They reach the lake just as the fog is burning off its surface. A sheet of glass. A flawless mirror. Only the trembling of insects disturbs it.
“Perfect,” Elias mutters, setting down the fishing pole he improvised from a broken broom handle years ago. He shrugs off his jacket, rolls his sleeves to his elbows. “If we’re lucky, we’ll get enough trout to last a few days.”
August is already at the water’s edge, crouching, touching the cool surface with his fingertips like he’s greeting an old friend. When he looks back over his shoulder, smiling that small, private smile of his, Eli feels that quiet squeeze beneath his ribs—the feeling he never speaks about, the one that is equal parts fierce love and aching dread.
“Can we swim after?” August asks softly.
“If the water isn’t too cold.” (It will be. They’ll swim anyway.)
They start with fishing. Elias casts. August sits beside him, knees pulled up, chin resting on them, watching the bobber with the kind of rapt attention he reserves for moon phases and unfamiliar insects.
“You’re not watching,” August observes, glancing up.
“I am,” Eli lies, eyes drifting to his brother instead. He always watches him.
They catch four fish. Enough for dinner and tomorrow’s breakfast. By the time the sun climbs higher, August has shed his shirt and shoes and is standing knee-deep in the water, shivering but smiling.
“It’s freezing,” Elias warns.
“Come on,” August calls, extending a hand. “You need to relax.”
Eli snorts, but he strips down and steps in. The cold is a punch at first—sharp, biting—but then August laughs, bright and unguarded, and Elias would endure icebergs for that sound.
They swim lazy circles. They dive beneath, emerging with dripping hair and flushed faces. At one point August floats on his back, eyes closed, pale chest rising and falling with the gentle sway of the water.
Eli watches him.
He’s so quiet when he floats like that… Like if I blink he’ll slip under and be gone.
A pebble hits his shoulder.
“Stop staring,” August mumbles without opening his eyes.
“Wasn’t staring.”
“Were too.”
“Was not.”
“Liar.”
Elias splashes him. August yelps. They devolve into a water fight that leaves both breathless and giggling—actual laughter, not the strained half-sound that sometimes escapes August when he’s overwhelmed.
For a moment, the world is only sunlight and water and the echo of that laughter over the lake.
The Walk Back
By late afternoon, their hair is nearly dry, their clothes damp but warm. Elias carries the fish strung on a line; August carries a bundle of wild herbs he insists will “make the fish taste like something that isn’t fish.”
It’s peaceful.
Too peaceful.
As they approach the cabin, Elias’s chest grows tight in a way he hasn't felt all day. Something about the long shadows spilling across the porch. The echo of their footsteps in the clearing. The scent of damp wood.
It tugs at old memories he tries hard—so hard—not to touch.
A boy of fourteen, carrying a bleeding, shaking child through the same trees. A hand clapped over a tiny mouth, whispering Don’t cry, Auggie, don’t cry, they’ll hear you— The sound of the back door slamming behind them.