Chapter 2: It’s like your someplace else
The smell of coffee was the first thing Joseph registered, bitter and necessary. Early morning light, the pale, clean kind that only exists over water, slanted through the kitchen window, cutting the lingering shadows from the night before. He moved quietly, the routine of measuring grounds and pouring water a small anchor in the unfamiliar stillness of the house. Outside, the ocean was a vast sheet of hammered silver, calm for now.
Footsteps on the stairs, heavier than Laurel’s. Jeremiah appeared in the doorway, his hair sleep-tousled, wearing a pair of old sweatpants. He blinked at Joseph, leaning against the counter as the coffee machine gurgled its last breaths.
“You’re still here?” Jere asked, his voice rough with sleep.
Joseph reached for a mug from the cupboard, the one with a chipped handle that had always been his. “Yeah. Why wouldn’t I be?”
“I thought you’d have left. Gone back to Harvard.” Jeremiah padded to the fridge, pulling out the orange juice and taking a swig straight from the carton.
Isabel came down then, her footsteps lighter on the stairs. She was dressed in soft-looking leggings and an oversized sweatshirt, her hair a loose braid over one shoulder. She gave them both a tentative, morning-soft smile and curled into the corner of the living room couch, pulling a blanket over her lap, listening.
Joseph poured his coffee, black. The heat of the mug seeped into his palms. “This is more important.”
Jeremiah shoved the juice back and shut the fridge door with a little more force than necessary. “Dude, you have to go back for your bio finals on Monday.”
“No.” Joseph took a sip, the scalding liquid a focused pain. “I’m not leaving. We’ll take care of it.”
“Take care of what? Arguing with Aunt Helen? Joseph, you have to go back to med school.” Jeremiah’s tone was shifting from confused to frustrated, his playful demeanor sanded away by the stark morning light.
“I don’t care.” The words were out, flat and final, before Joseph could temper them.
Jeremiah stared at him. A laugh broke out of him, sharp and disbelieving. “You don’t care? Joseph, you have to go back or you’ll fail your class. How are you gonna become a doctor if you fail out of med school?”
A muscle jumped in Joseph’s jaw. He looked past his brother, out to where the dock pilings were dark against the brightening water. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Seriously?” Jeremiah took a step forward, his hands gesturing abruptly. “You’re really going to stand there and say that? After everything you’ve worked for? You just ditch it to play house defense?” He shook his head, his expression hardening into something like disgust. “You really don’t give a shit about anyone but yourself.”
The words landed, precise and brutal, in the silent kitchen. Jeremiah didn’t wait for a reply. He turned and walked out, the screen door slapping shut behind him with a sound like a crack.
Joseph didn’t move. He looked at the floor, at the sun-faded linoleum pattern his mother had always said she’d replace. The hurt was a cold, spreading stain beneath his ribs. He concentrated on the weight of the mug in his hand, the solidity of the counter under his other palm.
From the couch, Isabel got up. The blanket whispered as it fell. She walked into the kitchen, she poured a cup, the sound overly loud in the quiet. She leaned against the counter opposite him, blowing softly on the steam.
“So the house is really for sale,” she said. Her voice was quiet, not pushing, just stating it. It was an offering, a different thread to pull on than the one Jeremiah had just severed.
Joseph’s grip on his mug tightened, his knuckles paling. He stared at the dark liquid, watching it tremble. “Yeah it is and Jere doesn’t even care.”
“Of course he cares,” Isabel said, her voice low and steady. “But he cares about you more.”
He looked up then, and the raw fracture in his gaze made her breath catch.
“I got a call from Laurel yesterday. She asked me to come here. Last night I saw that stupid sign and pulled it out of the ground and threw it in the garbage.” He said it fast, the confession torn out of him. “Seeing that sign was like losing her all over again. And I didn’t want that for Jere.”
She looked at him, truly looked, past the defensive posture and the sharp words. She saw the boy who had thrown himself into med school to fix things that couldn’t be fixed, who was now standing in this kitchen looking utterly shattered.
“I’m gonna use my trust as a down payment for the house,” he said, the declaration hanging in the air between them. “I’ll talk to one of my mom’s financial guys.”
“Oh.” The syllable was soft, a release of breath. She hadn’t expected that. The scale of it, the finality.
“I didn’t mean to worry anybody. I’m handling things.” He put the mug down with a definitive click, turning away as if the conversation was over. “You, Jere, and Laurel can leave if you want.”
She shook her head, a quick, firm motion. “You’re not the only one that cares about this house.” Her voice gained strength, weaving a thread of steel back into the morning. “We’re all staying.”
The morning stretched into an uneasy stalemate, the house partitioned by silent agreements and old wounds. Joseph disappeared into his father’s old study, the click of the door latch a final sound. Isabel heard the muffled rumble of his voice, a one-sided conversation with some financial advisor that sounded more like a plea.
Laurel made pancakes nobody finished. Jeremiah didn’t come back for lunch.
The day bled away, the bright morning dissolving into a humid, gray afternoon that promised rain. The sound of the waves turned oppressive, a constant reminder of the clock running out on a place they all thought was timeless.
Later, Jeremiah came back just before dark.
He’d walked the beach for hours, the salt spray doing nothing to cleanse the bitter taste of the morning’s argument. He went to his room, the chaos of his arrival still evident in the suitcase spilling clothes onto the floor. He grabbed a fitted sheet from the linen closet, its crisp cotton smelling faintly of lavender.
Trying to fix a bedsheet, he wrestled with one elastic corner, only to have another pop free. He growled in frustration, yanking at the fabric. Failing, he let the sheet go slack and laid down on the unmade bed, staring at the water-stained ceiling.
The door was open. Isabel paused in the hallway, hearing the struggle. She leaned against the frame. “You think someone would’ve invented an easier system.”
Jeremiah didn’t look at her. He draped an arm over his eyes. “If I wasn’t so fucking tired I’d probably leave tonight.”
She walked in and sat down on the edge of the bed, the mattress dipping under her weight. She didn’t touch him. “Mom would always fix everything up before everyone got here.”
“Yeah.” The word was hollow. “It feels different without her here.”
“It does.” He picked at a loose thread on the quilt.
“I’m still so pissed at Joseph.” His arm came down, his brown eyes fixed on the ceiling fan, motionless. “What is he even talking about with the whole house thing? Using his trust? That’s for med school. That’s his life.”
She looked at him, at the genuine confusion and anger etched into his features. He wasn’t calculating; he was just hurt. “I think it’s for real,” she said softly.
“Shit.” He mumbled the word, finally closing his eyes and lying completely still, surrendering to the exhaustion.
“You’re just gonna sleep on it like that, aren’t you.”
“Yeah.”
She got up, headed for the door, giving him the space he seemed to need.
“Hey, Isabel.”
She looked at him from the threshold. The fading dusk light from the hall window cut across his form on the tangled sheets.
“Yeah?”
He kept his eyes closed. “I don’t know what went down between you and Joseph. But I know it can’t be easy being here.” He let out a long breath. “I’m glad I don’t have to do this alone.”
The sincerity in his tired voice was a physical warmth in her chest. She smiled, though he couldn’t see it. “Yeah,” she whispered. “I’m glad I came too.”
“Night.”
“Night.”
She went to her room, the silence of the hall feeling heavier after his confession. The day’s tensions were a live wire under her skin, humming with unresolved current. She changed into a black bikini, the air in the room still and warm, and wrapped a thin linen towel around her waist.
The house was tomb-quiet. She padded barefoot down the back stairs, through the screened porch, and out into the deep blue twilight. The pool was a rectangle of liquid obsidian, lit from below by its lone, murky light. The air was cooler here, carrying the dense scent of chlorine and night-blooming jasmine.
She dropped the towel on a lounger. The concrete was still warm from the day’s sun under her feet. She dove in.
The water was a shock, a silken, cool envelopment that swallowed the world’s noise. She kicked, surfacing with a gasp, pushing her hair back from her face. The night sky was a deep velvet, the first stars pricking through.
When she rose, she saw Joseph sitting there on the side, his feet in the water.
She hadn’t seen him when she came out. He was just a darker shape in the gloom, still as a statue, watching the disturbed surface of the pool settle around her. Water dripped from his calves into the black.
He didn’t move. He was just watching her, his expression unreadable in the low light. She treaded water, the gentle splash of her movements the only sound.
He looked at her. “Do you still pretend you’re in the Olympics?” he asked.
“Uh, no. Not anymore.” She said, treading the water, feeling suddenly self-conscious.
“When you swim, I don’t think you’d notice if the house was on fire.” His voice was low, almost absorbed by the water.
She looked at him, his hands braced on either side of the ledge, shoulders tense. “You’re so into what you’re doing, it’s like you’re someplace else.” He said.
“That’s what I like about it.” She said. She didn’t wait for a reply. She dove back under, swimming a strong, clean freestyle to one side, needing the water to blur the sharp lines of his presence.
Joseph watched her, the efficient cut of her form through the dark water. Then he looked away, up at the house. His chest hurt, a tight, aching pressure. He got up, heading inside without a sound, water scattering from his legs onto the warm concrete.
She swam back to the other side. When she resurfaced, gasping for air, he was gone. The space where he’d sat was just empty wet stone. She floated on her back, staring at the stars, the chlorine burning faintly in her nose and the back of her throat.