He laughed. “Yeah, I get it. I have a younger sister too. She’s—” His attention shifted to Sheri. “Wow. You look incredible.”

  “Thanks,” she replied, bypassing me so she could kiss her man.

  “Since your brother’s back, we can go out another time if you want to catch up with him.”

  “He’s not staying,” she replied.

  “I just came to get some things,” I confirmed.

  “Oh. That’s too bad. Well, we should at least switch movie times so you two can hang for as long as you’re here.”

  “Really?” Sheri said.

  Nick nodded. “I would do that for my sister.”

  A shadow drew my attention past Nick.

  Mom appeared outside the doorway, a grocery bag in each hand. She dropped them both onto the cement, practically throwing Nick aside to get through the still-open door and throw her arms around me.

  CHAPTER 13

  “Ben!” Mom cried, nearly knocking me over with the force of her affection. “You’re home!” She squeezed me tight, holding onto the hug as I returned the embrace. “You said you might come and here you are.”

  “Mom,” I said. “Can’t…breathe…” I feigned the extent of my inability to gather oxygen as she quickly let go and stared up at me.

  “What happened to your neck?” she asked

  “What?” I replied. The collar of the flannel went high enough to hide most of the bruising on my neck, but somehow she still noticed some small mark that must have been showing in the break. “It’s nothing. Just a little bruise.”

  “You’re still feeling okay?”

  “Pretty good,” I replied.

  A big smile split her face. “I’m so glad you’re back. I tried talking more to Doctor Haines, but since you’re twenty-one, he would only say so much without your consent. I’ve been doing a lot of research online though. I think I found a doctor in Texas we can visit for a second opinion. He’s got an impeccable reputation for diagnosis and treatment of—”

  “Mom,” I said, waving my hand and cutting her off. I shook my head. “I’m not staying.”

  “What? Ben, you’re sick.”

  “I’m worse than sick, Mom,” I answered. “We both know that. And I’m not living the rest of my life, however long that is, hopping from doctor to doctor, doing chemo or whatever else they want while turning into a shell of a man to get a few more months or years out of my life.”

  Her lip quivered. “But—”

  “Mom, I’ve already been to see the best doctor available. There’s a small chance the tumor can be surgically removed, but it’s small, and I have to go back right away to even have a chance at the treatment.” I wasn’t going to tell her the doctor was a medibot in Head Case’s sickbay and the surgeon was already dead. I hated lying to her, but considering Sheri’s unsurprising reaction to the truth, there was no point in telling it again.

  “That’s where you’ve been? You went to see another doctor?”

  “In part, yeah.”

  ‘“He told me he bought a spaceship,” Sheri said. “But I’m pretty sure he’s just being a dork like usual.”

  “A spaceship? Ben, do you ever get your head out of video games?”

  “Nope,” I said, smiling.

  “Well, what’s this doctor’s name? Where is he located?”

  “I saw the flyers on the kitchen table,” I said, ignoring the questions I didn’t want to try to answer. “I appreciate your worry, and I’m sorry I didn’t get in touch with you sooner. I didn’t have access to a phone.”

  “Because there are no phones on spaceships?” Nick said, amused.

  It amused me too because he had no idea he was speaking the truth. “Bingo!” I said, channeling Keep. I laughed along with him, which got Sheri and Mom to laugh too.

  “Have you eaten?” she asked since I had mentioned the kitchen. “I can order your favorite pizza.”

  “I don’t have time,” I said. “I need to pack some clothes and head out.”

  “You said Matt was with you?”

  “Not right now. He’s waiting for me at the hotel near the airport.”

  “Which hotel? You should call his father and let him know so he can talk to him.”

  “Why? Is Jack worried?”

  “I imagine he must be.”

  Matt’s father probably realized Matt was gone. How much he cared was debatable, but I didn’t believe it would be much.

  “If Matt wants to talk to him, he knows the number,” I said. “I’m just going to get my stuff.”

  Sheri didn’t trail along behind me this time, but Mom did. “Ben, what’s the doctor’s name again?”

  “Gyer,” I replied, realizing she would just keep asking. I opened my dresser and started grabbing clothes by the handful to stuff into the duffel. “He’s French.”

  “Oh. You went to Paris? How did you hear about him? How did you afford that?”

  “Matt paid for it.”

  “Matt? On a waiter’s salary?”

  “His mother passed away recently,” I explained. “She left him an inheritance. I didn’t know until he told me he wanted to spend some of it trying to help me get better. He paid for everything.”

  “His mother? I didn’t think that bitch remembered he even existed.”

  “I know, right? It’s a pretty wild story.” I turned around, fighting not to choke up at what I was about to say. “Mom, after I go, I don’t know what’s going to happen, but I won’t have access to a phone again. If the surgery doesn’t work, even if it does. You might not hear from me again.”

  “What?” she hissed in disbelief.

  “If you don’t, I need you to know it isn’t because I don’t want to talk to you or that you did anything to push me away or anything like that. It will only be because it just isn’t possible.”

  “Ben, I don’t understand.”

  “I love you, Mom,” I said, fighting to keep my voice from cracking. “I’m grateful for everything you’ve ever done for all of us. I know you don’t want to say goodbye already but, this is probably goodbye.”

  I couldn’t hold back the tears any longer. Neither could she. But she didn’t fight against what I said. She just nodded and accepted it. “I love you too, Ben. And I’m lucky to have such great kids. All of you are a gift to me. If this is goodbye, I want you to know I’m proud of the man you’ve become. I’m proud of how you’re handling everything that’s been put on your plate. I’ll always be proud of you.”

  We embraced again, and cried a little.

  “Ben,” Sheri called out from the living room.. “There’s someone here looking for you.”

  I looked past Mom, not that surprised to see Keep standing there.

  “Who is that?” Mom asked, glancing back at him.

  “He’s with Doctor Gyer,” I replied.

  “He looks seedy. And why are you two wearing the same clothes?”

  I opened my mouth to reply, frozen as she went out to meet him.

  Keep smiled as she approached, looking comfortable and confident. “You must be Ben’s mother. He didn’t tell me you were beautiful.”

  The statement probably would have stopped most mother’s dead in their tracks. Mom was having none of it. “You can’t sweet talk me, Mister…”

  “Jones,” Keep said. “David Jones.”

  “That’s French?” she asked, glancing back at me as I finished stuffing my duffel. Keep could take care of himself, and if he couldn’t he would get whatever he deserved.

  “No. Why?”

  “You tell me why,” Mom said.

  Keep’s smile shifted but didn’t vanish. He glanced at Sheri. “And you’re the equally beautiful sister, correct?”

  “Ben’s sister, Sheri,” she said, blushing.

  “Oh, I thought you were Mrs. Murdock’s sister. My mistake.”

  “You didn’t answer my question, David Jones,” Mom said.

  “Mom,” I snapped, moving into the room. “Why are you giving him such a hard time?”

  “Because he looks like a creep,” Mom said. “I want to make sure he’s not taking advantage of you.”

  “He isn’t,” I said. “I promise.”

  “Why isn’t he French?”

  “Doctor Gyer is French,” I said. “His clinic is in France. That doesn’t mean all of his employees are French, especially the contractor he hired to look after me.”

  Mom thought about it. She was too smart for her own good. “You know, Ben, none of your story makes any sense. If you were in France for treatment, why did you come back here just to pick up some clothes? And why couldn’t you call me from France. I’m pretty sure they have phones.”

  “Bennie, why are you lying to your mother?” Keep asked.

  “What?” Mom and I both said at the same time.

  “There’s no treatment in France,” Keep said, to my chagrin. “And I don’t work for Doctor Gyer.”

  “I see,” Mom said, glaring at me.

  “I work for your son,” Keep added. “I’m part of his starship crew.”

  Her jaw went slack. “You’re part of the crew of his starship?”

  “I see where he gets it,” Keep said. “That’s right. We need to go, Bennie. We’re on a tight schedule.”

  “Hold on,” Sheri said. “What kind of joke is this, Ben?”

  “It’s not a joke,” Keep said.

  “Yeah, sure it isn’t,” Nick chimed in. “A starship? Next you’ll say there’s life on other planets.”

  “I think that goes without saying. Why else would someone need to own a starship?”

  “Ben,” Mom said. “What’s really going on?”

  “I didn’t buy a starship,” I said.

  “See,” Sheri scoffed.

  “Matt did,” I finished. “But we’re co-owners. Fifty-fifty. And there is life on other planets. A lot of planets. It’s pretty unbelievable. Anyway, we don’t have time to explain everything. I really shouldn’t have stopped here at all, but I wanted to see you one last time and say goodbye.” I wrapped my arms around Mom. In her stunned state, she was slow to reciprocate, but she did.

  “This is crazy,” Sheri said.

  “Tell me about it,” I agreed, putting out an arm to invite her into the hug. She didn’t resist, joining us in the embrace. “I don’t know if I’ll be back, Sher. Thanks for being a great sister.”

  “Thanks for being a great brother,” she replied.

  “Ah, what the heck,” Nick said, throwing his arms over us from the outside. He looked at Keep. “Are you in?”

  “I’ll be waiting outside,” Keep said. “Don’t take all night, Bennie.”

  He left the apartment, giving me my moment with my family. And Nick.

  “I don’t understand any of this, Ben,” Mom said as we finally separated. She had tears in her eyes again. So did Sheri. Hell, so did I.

  “All you need to know is that I’m happy,” I replied. “And I have a chance to survive. But even if I don’t survive, I'll have had a chance to make a real difference in people’s lives. More than I ever would have had here.”

  “If that’s the case, then I wish you only the best out there, Ben. I’m going to miss the hell out of you.”

  “I’ll miss you too, Mom. You too, Sher. If there’s any way I can get back in touch later, I will. I promise.”

  Mom hugged me again. “Stay safe, Ben.”

  “I’ll do my best.”

  “Bye, Ben,” Sheri said.

  “Bye Sher.” I gave her another quick hug, eying Nick. “You have a sister, so I don’t need to tell you to be good to mine.”

  “No,” Nick said. “I will. It was good to meet you, Ben.”

  “You too. Say goodbye to Paul and Dan for me, okay Mom?”

  “I will.”

  I let go of Sheri and moved to the door, looking back at them at the threshold and fighting to keep the waterworks at bay.

  I slipped away without another word, knowing I would probably never see them again.

  CHAPTER 14

  “That was a stupid thing to do,” Keep said as I joined him at the top of the stairs outside Mom's apartment.

  “What? Coming here to say goodbye?” I replied. “If you had a problem with it, you should have told me where we were going before you went into a coma.”

  “I didn’t think you’d go home.”

  “What’s the big deal? I got to say goodbye to my mother and sister and get some clothes that don’t make me look like a farmer. I call that a win.”

  “Your little family reunion put us behind schedule.”

  “I didn’t know we were on a schedule. You didn’t share that with me either.”

  “The hardware store closes at ten. It’s nine-fifteen and we still need to stop at my apartment. If we don’t make it tonight, we’ll have to wait until morning. Since you were so worried about getting Gloria’s car back, that should concern you.”

  “It does,” I replied. “But again, you should have told me the details of your plan and where I was going before you left me on my own. The worst part about buying Head Case was having to leave my family without a word, knowing they would worry about me. My mother printed missing person posters, Keep. They’re probably already plastered all over town. I’m not sorry.”

  “Well, lucky for you my place isn’t too far from here. We should still have time as long as we move fast.”

  “The way you walked out when we were embracing, do you have a phobia against families?” I watched his reaction. A slight narrowing of the eyes, a bit more tension in his jaw. “Or were you just jealous?”

  “Neither,” he replied. “I’m just trying to keep things moving in the right direction.”

  “Bullshit. Do you have a family?”

  “Everyone has a family,” he replied. “We don’t appear out of thin air.”

  I shrugged. “Maybe you have tech in the Spiral to make people appear out of thin air. Or a sigil that’ll do it.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Can we go back to the car now?”

  “Sure.” We reached the bottom of the steps and headed for the parking lot. When we got to the car, I tossed my duffel in the trunk and got in on the passenger side. “So, what was your family like?” I asked as Keep pulled away from the lot.

  He side-eyed me, face tight. “I don’t think that’s a valuable topic of conversation.”

  “Come on, Keep. You just met half my family. The least you could do is give me something about yours. Especially if you’re going to be my mentor.”

  “You don’t need to know about my roots for me to teach you to use sigiltech.”

  “I think it would help if I liked you, at least.”

  “You don’t like me?”

  “I don’t dislike you either. I haven’t really made up my mind about you. On one hand, you’re rude, gruff, condescending, patronizing, and kind of an asshole. On the other…” I trailed off. “You were super polite and kind to the Frasiers, but I got the feeling that it was all an act. You can’t be a curmudgeon all the time. There has to be more to you than that.”

  Keep didn’t answer. We pulled out of the apartment complex heading south, riding in silence for a few minutes.

  “Your mother reminded me of mine,” Keep offered. “Her kind face, anyway. The worry lines. I hadn’t thought about her in a long time.”

  “Were you close?”

  “Not especially. She had an important job and it kept her away a lot of the time. My father too. I was communally raised. Twenty kids to a pod, with four guardians keeping an eye on all of us.”

  “Like school?”

  “Schooling was a big part of it. We did a lot of extra-curricular activities too, but other than sports it was all learning focused. No television or video games like kids on Earth. We were pushed to use our minds creatively, to better our society.”

  “Which planet are you from, originally?”

  “Atlas.”

  “The Hegemony homeworld?”

  “Bingo. That’s the one. There are some places on Atlas that still use that system, but it’s mostly been abandoned for a less intense child rearing.”

  “Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”

  “To me? It’s a terrible thing. Kids on Atlas are more like you these days.”

  “See, there you go again, putting me down. You do that a lot, and it kind of sucks.”

  “It’s not my fault you can’t take criticism. And I know I’ve complimented you too. I give it straight as I see it, Bennie, good or bad. No punches pulled, no baloney. When I say like you, I mean like you when I first contacted you. I can see you growing and adapting. It’s a good sign.” He glanced over at me with a smirk. “That better?”

  “Do you mean it?”

  “I just told you, no baloney.”

  “So, seeing my mother care about me made you think about your mother and how she didn’t?” I ventured.

  “Sorry, Freud, that’s not it. My mother cared. I just came from a different culture. Affection wasn’t a big part of it, and seeing yours made me uncomfortable. That’s all.”

  “That’s too bad. I think it would have been good for you.”

  We turned into another apartment complex, which I realized was only a few blocks from VR Awesome!. He claimed living nearby was a coincidence, but I still didn’t believe it. For whatever reason, he seemed like he had been pretty sure he would find his buyer here. And he had. Curiosity begged the question of how he had guessed, but outside of curiosity, it didn’t really matter. I was the one who followed through, for better or worse.

  I grabbed my duffel when we got out of the car and followed Keep into a swanky six-story apartment building with a security guard at the front desk.

  “Hey, Joey,” Keep said as we walked past the desk, headed directly for the elevator. “How’s the wife and kids?”

  “Doing great, Mr. Keep,” the guard replied. “I haven’t seen you in a while. Did you go on vacation?”

  “Something like that,” Keep answered. “I’m in a bit of a hurry right now, but we’ll catch up later.”

  “Sure thing, Mr. Keep.”

  “See, I’m not always a rude asshole,” Keep said as we boarded the elevator, taking it to the top floor.