"You were already arguing about where to live?"
"We considered it excellent communication," Richard said.
"C'était de l'entêtement", ai-je corrigé.
Pour la première fois ce soir-là, la tension s'est apaisée.
Seulement un instant.
Le sourire de Richard s'est estompé.
"Then my father got sick."
I frowned.
"I thought he was healthy."
"He was."
Richard looked down.
"Until he wasn't."
His voice became quieter.
"He collapsed at work."
I searched my memory.
Nothing.
"I never knew."
"You couldn't."
He rubbed a hand across his forehead.
"It happened the week before graduation."
Jordan leaned forward.
"You never told me that."
Richard shook his head. "He was diagnosed with an aggressive neurological disease. The doctors gave him months."
Stormy m'a tendu la main sans rien dire.
Richard continua.
"My parents had already lost everything keeping my younger sister alive when she had leukemia."
He looked at Jordan.
"By then she'd recovered, but the medical debt never did."
He gave a tired smile.
"We were drowning."
I listened without interrupting.
"My father begged me not to tell Doron."
My head lifted.
"Quoi ?"
"He said if I married you..." Richard's voice caught. "...I'd spend the rest of my life dragging you into debt that wasn't yours."
I stared at him.
"Il a vraiment dit ça ?"
Richard hocha la tête.
"He told me love wasn't enough if I couldn't give you a stable life."
I felt something inside me begin to shift.
"I argued with him."
"I told him we'd figure it out together."
Il riait amèrement.
"Il a dit que c'était exactement ce qu'il essayait d'empêcher."
Stormy whispered, "So you just...left?"
Richard looked at her sadly.
"I was 23."
"I thought sacrificing one life would save another."
He turned back to me.
"My father died eight months later."
He swallowed.
"Two months after the funeral, I came back."
Je le regardais.
"You came back?"
Il hocha la tête. "J'ai conduit à ton appartement."
Mon pouls s'est accéléré.
"There was a moving truck outside."
I closed my eyes. I remembered the day immediately.
"Then I saw a man carrying boxes into the apartment."
His voice had become almost a whisper.
"When he came back outside, he kissed your forehead."
I frowned.
"Richard..."
"Je pensais qu'il m'aurait remplacé."
Ma bouche s'est ouverte.
"C'était mon frère."
Il me regardait.
