“Maybe,” Dad admitted with a nod. “But maybe not. And you’ll be better to her. You tend to safeguard something once you realize how precious it is.”
“I will.” Losing Willow wasn’t an option, and maybe I didn’t deserve her, but I was sure as hell going to earn her every day.
“Your mother told me once, ‘You’re free to make your own choices, but you’re not free from the consequences of that choice.’” His lips curved slightly before falling again. “Sullivan made his choice. Xander did, too. We all do. Every day. You’re no different. You have to love your choices, Camden, no matter what they are, because you have the freedom to choose.” He looked me in the eye. “Don’t waste them, either, because you never know when it’s the last one you’ll get to make. It goes faster than you think.”
He turned and headed down the hill.
“Dad!” I called out. “One thing has been bugging me.”
“What is that?” He paused but didn’t turn.
“The door in the mine. What was it there for?”
He shrugged. “Who knows. Your great-grandfather wasn’t exactly all there in the head.”
I huffed a small laugh and watched him walk away. We might not be a sitcom family, but at least he wasn’t shooting at me anymore.
My phone buzzed as I headed toward my Jeep, and I checked it with a grin.
Willow: Finishing up a design and then headed to your place.
Cam: Sounds perfect. I just need to run an errand. I’ll meet you there.
Willow: Love you.
I grinned. That right there was what my choices—the good and the bad—had earned me.
Cam: Love you.
I slipped my phone back into my pocket and climbed into the Jeep. There was one more choice to be made today, and it was Xander’s.
Ten minutes later, I rang the doorbell at my brother’s house. It was one of the newest buildings in Alba, go figure, all sparkling new, and the setting sun bounced off the gleaming windows, picture-perfect.
“Cam.” He answered the door, looking like nothing had changed. Like he wasn’t out on bail or facing ten years in prison if he didn’t plead it down. “Come here to gloat? I just saw the follow-up on Rose’s rescue on CNN if you want to revel in your glory.”
“You still don’t get it.” The manila envelope crinkled in my hands, and I was glad I’d only brought copies.
“What do you want?”
“About Dad—” I shifted my weight, at a loss on how to broach the topic.
“I’m still his guardian unless you want to take me to court again. Then again, now that this has happened to me, maybe you’ll get guardianship this time.”
I didn’t state the obvious—that he’d done it to himself.
“Dad doesn’t want to die. You know that, right? He just wants the choice. To him, that’s what makes life worth the living. Choice.”
Xander crossed his arms over his chest. “Well, I choose that he lives. And if you think that’s selfish, then I don’t care. I don’t want to lose my dad. I’m not going to be the son who lets it happen.”
“What if it were you?” I asked quietly. His eyes narrowed, and I continued. “What if you were the one who couldn’t make your own choice?”
“I don’t have to think about that. I’m thirty-one years old.” He shrugged.
“But if you did,” I pushed. “What would you want?”
“Are you asking if I’d want a DNR?”
“I’m asking you to think about it,” I said slowly, clutching the envelope, “because one day you might not have the choice. The ironic thing about you fighting Dad for his right to his own body is that you never stopped to ask yourself about the genetics.”
Xander froze.
“I did.” I shrugged. “When I realized that Willow was it for me, that I wanted marriage and kids and the whole domestic package, I started reading. Guess what, Xander? Dad’s form of Alzheimer’s is genetic. It’s a presenilin-one mutation.”
The color drained from his face. “So that means we could have it.”
“Sullivan did,” I announced, handing him the envelope. He refused to take it. “I got the results for all three of us the day of the hearing.”
“How?” He looked at the envelope like it would grow teeth and bite him, which was the most logical reaction I’d seen him have in a while.
“Mom kept all our baby teeth in those little memory boxes in her closet. Gross but useful.”
“You did this without my permission.” He glared at me, but there was fear in his eyes, stark and sharp.
“I did. But the lab doesn’t know that. The results are in there. Patients S, C, and A. Totally anonymous.” I waved the results again. “Don’t you want to know?”
“I don’t know.” He stared at the envelope.
“I could tell you. I read it.”
His eyes jerked back to mine, wide and furious. “Don’t.”
“Why? Don’t like to have your choices taken?” I asked. “I can make you feel better. I don’t have it.”
His lips pursed. “How does that make me feel better?”
“Other than knowing your little brother won’t be taken by early-onset Alzheimer’s?” I chided. “It should comfort you because no matter what that envelope says, I won’t be you. I’ll listen to you. I’ll give you the choices you won’t give Dad, because I don’t give a shit what people say or how I look to the world. I know who I am. I’ve made peace with my choices.”
I thrust the envelope at his chest, and he slowly took it.
“Make peace with yours, Xander.” His body tensed as I nodded, then turned around and headed back to my Jeep.
“You’re not going to tell me as some kind of punishment?” he called after me.
“It’s not my job to punish you, Xander. Not in anger. Not in jealousy. Not…ever. Read it. Don’t read it. That’s your choice, not mine.”
I already knew what it said.
…
A week later, Dad’s guardianship documents arrived at the mine. Xander signed everything over to me, so we just needed an appointment with the judge to make it official.
At the bottom of the stack was a signed do-not-resuscitate order.
Thirty minutes after telling Dad, who thanked me and promptly hung up, I pulled into my driveway, smiling at the fact that the lights were on, which meant Willow was already here.