{Cary}

Kadee's hand was as soft as a flower in his curled fingers. When they came up the driveway, Mel was pulling weeds in the front flower bed, and Cary loosened his fingers so Kadee could pull away. She didn't. Mel got to her feet, brushing dirt off her knees, and Cary felt so big standing there with Kadee holding his hand that his head practically brushed the sky.

"Hi, Mrs. White," Kadee let him go to give Jon's mom a hug. "I hope you don't mind—I kind of invited myself over and then stayed to help."

Mel's gentle smile touched them both, and Cary's face warmed. "Of course not. How are you, Kadee?"

Cary busied himself tidying up the tools and throwing a last clump of weeds on the pile. He heard Kadee say, "I'm okay. It's a weird time for me—finding out who my real friends are."

"Ah." Mel said. When Cary straightened, he found Mel smiling right at him, like she understood more than Kadee was saying. "I'm sure Cary appreciates your help with the girls. Would you like to stay for supper?"

Kadee checked his face, and he lifted the corners of his mouth, hoping she would say yes. Her dimple showed and her eyes sparkled. "I'd love to."

Kadee made Jon's parents laugh as they prepared dinner together. She spent time listening to Bea's stories and gave Tabitha tips for her hair. It was like someone had brought the sunshine back into the room. Family dinner had been tense all summer, often ending in a blow-up or freezing silence between Jon and his dad. Cary took his time eating, wanting to prolong the pleasure of hearing her bubbling conversation. Once, when the girls were telling their parents about their ice cream adventure, Kadee reached over and touched his hand just for a moment. He glanced at her and her warm, brown eyes crinkled in a smile just for him.

There were a dozen reasons to stay wary, but those reasons were starting to feel like rules for relationships with other people, not Kadee. He felt his chest opening with a creak of disuse to let her warmth and energy lift his own spirits. He thought of their conversation on the walk and realized he felt good about the things he had said. He still often thought of his father mocking him for how few words he had, how unintelligent he sounded—but he'd been able to put his thoughts into words with Kadee, and that had felt good. It didn't seem as ridiculous as it had when she'd first suggested they try something together.

After supper, Bea persuaded them to watch a movie with her in the family room. The couch was too small for the three of them, so Bea snuggled happily next to Kadee, and Cary sat on the floor with his long legs stretched in front of him. Animated woodland creatures sang and frolicked while Kadee's calf brushed his arm.

Bea started playing with his hair, as she often did when they watched TV together—smoothing it down, working her small fingers right into the thick tangle and unknotting it piece by piece. Cary's breathing slowed and his body relaxed under her gentle attention.

"Can I have a turn?" Kadee asked. She shifted, settling herself on the couch behind his shoulders.

Her fingers combed through the hair on the back of his neck, then kneaded the muscles that joined his skull to his shoulders. It squeezed a sound out of his chest and he drew his knees up, clasping them to steady himself.

There was a puff of air against his ear as she leaned in the speak to him. "Does that feel okay?"

He nodded, not trusting himself to speak.

Her hands were too small to circle his neck, but strong enough to make a dent in the tension he often carried in his body. She slowly worked on the big, bunched muscles in his shoulders, digging the tightness out. He made himself breathe deeply to help the pain release. When she started to stroke the heels of her hands up the long muscles along his spine, he had to put his face against his knees, shivering deep in his stomach. Every stroke sent a wave of sensation up to the top of his scalp, down to his fingertips and tailbone, like he'd never felt that part of his body before. It felt like she was finding every muscle, every inch of skin that had worn a bruise and making it sound its story under her fingers.

Cary clasped his hands on the back of his neck and held tight while his breathing shook and his back rippled and released. He was having trouble staying present—his body was a chorus that demanded a hearing. He'd given it what it needed to function and mend, but he'd thought of it like an object, like something that didn't matter or feel, and now under the kind attention of Kadee's hands it wouldn't be silent any longer.

"You're super tight back here," Kadee said. "Am I hurting you too much?"

"No." His voice was muffled against his knees and he realized his face was wet. Tears were coming out with every stroke across his back, dripping from his eyes onto the living room carpet. It was too late to cram those back inside and lock them down—the whole mess was coming out under Kadee's fingers.

{Kadee}

She was only half paying attention to the movie, absorbed in the pleasure of working the knots out of the muscles of Cary's back. Dinner with the Whites had left her with a feeling of satisfied fullness that she hadn't experienced in a long time—maybe at a Christmas years ago, when both her siblings and her niece and nephew had filled their parents' home for the holidays.

Cary's shoulders were bunched and tight, but she could feel his muscles shivering and releasing as she worked. She'd done this enough times for her athlete boyfriends to know where to dig in her thumbs and stroke her hands to make them feel super good and relaxed. She let her hands slide under the collar of his shirt to rub the muscle on his shoulders without the seam getting in the way. Just touching him gave her a thrill—feeling the heat of his skin and the peel of his sunburn, being close enough to study each detail of the whorl of hair at the back of his neck.

She was startled when he surged to his feet abruptly and left the room without a word. She had her hands mid-air, where she had lifted them when she felt him start to move. She dropped her eyes to the screen, returning her hands to her lap and squeezing her fingers. A minute or two passed and he didn't return.

"Bea?"

The little girl was leaning sleepily against the couch arm, her thumb in her mouth. "Mm-hmm?"

"Do you think Cary is okay?"

Bea's eyes went to the hallway and she took her thumb out of her mouth, tucking her damp hand under her arm. "He hadda go cry. He doesn't like to do that with people."

Kadee stared at her, her own face stinging. "He was crying? Why?"

Bea sighed, her eyes drooping tiredly. "I dunno. Cary has a lot of tears inside. He doesn't let them out like he should and then they all come out at once. Ker-splooey." Her fingers made little explosions in front of her closed eyes. "Dadda says be gentle with him like he's got a broken bone. He doesn't have a real broken bone anymore, but something in his heart—is broken like that. So lots of soft hugs is what I do. For his medicine." Her face creased. "Ima tired. Can you put me to bed?" She held up her arms.

Kadee was barely strong enough to lift her and carry her to her room. "You should brush your teeth," she said gently, setting Bea down in her bed.

"In a minute," Bea said, snuggling into her pillow and putting her thumb back in her mouth. Kadee stroked her hair, pretty sure she would be asleep in that time. She pulled the blankets up and tucked them around her, then shut the bedroom door softly behind her.

She stood uncertainly in the hallway—which room was Cary's? She knocked on a door and tried the handle—it revealed a toilet and tub, and towels hanging crookedly from the rack. She knocked on the next door and tried the handle. This time, Cary looked up from his drawing book. He was in the corner of his bed with his knees drawn up, and his eyes were red-rimmed.

"Hey." Kadee tried a smile. "Bea fell asleep, so..." Cary had dropped his eyes and she couldn't see his face anymore under his wave of hair. "Are you okay? You kind of left in a hurry."

He let his breath out slowly, putting his hands over his face. "Come in and shut the door."

She did that, her heart skipping a beat. The room was so small she had to stand against the door to keep an arm's length from the bed. The smell of boy intensified: sweat and athletic shoes and laundry soap—and in Cary's case, the sharp smell of wood shavings. Pencils were laid out on top of his neatly made covers, and as she turned her head to look around she realized the wall beside her was plastered with drawings, from floor to ceiling.

The intensity of their lines and shading captured her and she turned to look more closely. She immediately recognized they were part of Cary's graphic novel—in the centre, at the height of her head, was one of the only coloured illustrations: a boy against the wall in a blood-red room. The other pictures fanned out and around from this one. She would have loved to take the time to look at each one more closely, but she wasn't here for drawings; she was here for the real boy sitting against the wall in his bedroom.

He was watching her—she was better at guessing now and thought the hard line of his mouth meant he was unhappy and maybe afraid. She decided this was as close as she should come, and leaned against the door, playing with the end of a purple streak of hair.

"Did something happen—or did you, like, just need to pee?" She made one side of her mouth dimple at him, but she didn't feel much like joking. Bea was right—he had obviously been crying.

He dropped his eyes, sketching a few more lines on his drawing before he spoke. "Got triggered."

Her eyebrows drew together. "What does that mean?"

"It's hard to talk about." His voice was low.

"Take your time." Kadee watched him sideways, one eye on the drawings beside her. "I don't have anywhere to be."

He fiddled with his pencil as he picked his words. "It's like... shit that happened—is in my body still. I never let myself feel it then. It was so messed up, and I was just a little kid." He cleared his throat, rubbing the side of his face. "So now stupid stuff can bring it back up—like a loud sound or a—a touch and I'm there, feeling all the things I should have felt."

Cary ducked his head, swallowing with a soft sound. "Like, I think I never felt my back." Kadee's hand flew to cover her mouth. "He...beat all this rage into it and I just—made my body not move and not cry until my legs...me, I couldn't hold up. All the muscles that did that for me—when you were...I felt them. How they're not stone, like I made them to be." He shut up abruptly, and she saw him make himself small.

She felt the press of her nails against the skin of her lips. "I didn't even think." Her voice cracked a little. "Did I hurt you? Do your scars still—?"

He shook his head once, hard. "They're just—ugly skin."

She closed her eyes a moment, running her fingertips over the skin of her arms. "Skin can feel pretty amazing," she said softly. "I didn't know that could happen—I'm sorry."

He let out a long, shaky breath, slumping back against the wall and meeting her eyes with his eyelashes still thick with tears. "It felt so good, Kadee. I didn't know I could feel so good."