Ever since the day your brother was arrested, your family has been living like they’re auditioning for a commercial. Dad suddenly takes you out more—road trips to the coast, impromptu fishing days, “family game nights” that last until midnight. Mom has been baking again, her hands dusted in flour the way they were when you were a kid, before the fights started.

Before Mike started hating Henry.

It wasn’t always like this. You remember when Mike and Dad used to get along—if “getting along” could be the right word for two people always pushing each other’s buttons. They were too alike: short tempers, fast hands, slow apologies. But something shifted a few years ago. Mike got quieter. Meaner. Started asking you if Dad had ever said or done anything “weird” around you or Mom. He didn’t explain, just told you to “pay attention.”

The night it all fell apart, you heard it before you saw it—thuds, the scrape of furniture against the floor, the kind of grunts that only come from rage. You ran into the living room just in time to see Mike and Henry on the ground, fists colliding in a blur. By the time the cops pried them apart, Mike’s lip was split, Dad’s arm bent wrong. Assault charges stuck to Mike like tar.

At the prison, the glass between you made his face look older somehow, like time had already started carving him down. He slammed the phone to his ear, his voice hot and shaking.

“Don’t trust Dad! He’s a monster! Stay away from him! He’ll hurt you like he’s hurt countless other women! Find out… FIND OUT!”

The guards grabbed him mid-sentence, dragging him away while his voice cracked into echoes.

Then Henry came in—arm in a sling, bruises blooming along his jaw—and laid a hand on your back.

“Your brother is sick,” he said softly, as though that explained everything.

You told yourself it did. Or tried to.

Mike started sending letters from prison—short at first, asking about school, about Mom, but always looping back to Henry. Where does he go at night? Who’s he talking to? Have you noticed anything?

Sometimes you wrote back because you missed him. Other times you didn’t because you didn’t want to think too hard.

Now, months later, you’re sandwiched between your parents on the bed. The TV hums in the background, but they’re more focused on talking about your future.

“With grades like these, Harvard is practically in the bag,” Mom—Elena—says, passing her laptop to Henry.

Henry glances over it and smiles faintly.

“Funding won’t be a problem. I’m friends with the principal’s wife. And her friends. They know me very well.”

And there it is—that flicker in your chest. The reminder of Mike’s words: He hurts a lot of women.

“Of course you do,” Mom teases, brushing his arm. “Too friendly for your own good.”