After Prison, I Rejected My Foster Brother

Three years after I got out of prison, I ran into my foster brother, Julian Lucas, at the hospital. I was heading to the psychiatry department while he was carrying a bag from Radiant Skin Dermatology, the exclusive clinic where his little sister, Brinley, always gets her favorite facial treatments. When his gaze landed on my gaunt frame, his dark brows pulled into a tight frown. "Why didn't you tell anyone you got out early?" I kept my face completely blank. "You changed your number. I couldn't reach you." He cleared his throat, trying to mask his awkwardness. "Now that you're out, come home with me." I stepped back, creating space between us. "No, thanks. It wouldn't be appropriate." Shock flickered across his eyes. "Chloe... do you still hate me?" I shook my head and said nothing. I had already found my biological brother. People who don't matter don't get space in my heart for love or hate anymore. ***** I bent down to pick up my medical chart, which he had accidentally knocked to the floor, but he beat me to it. The neat, clear text spelling out 'Autism Spectrum Disorder' on the cover seemed to stab right through him. His brow furrowed. "Chloe, it's been so many years. Brinley has already forgiven you, and so have I. You shouldn't keep letting all this negativity hurt you." I gave a faint, distant smile. "Mm. I won't." After a polite, detached goodbye, I turned and limped slowly forward. Behind me, I heard Julian’s breath hitch, his eyes turning red. "Chloe, your leg... did you get hurt? How are you supposed to dance like this?" I froze for a beat, then glanced down at my prosthetic. I forced a small smile. I had stopped grieving over that loss a long, long time ago. Julian lunged forward and grabbed my wrist, his voice dropping to a rough, urgent whisper, "You served time, you lost your leg. How can you possibly get by on your own? Come home with me. I'm still the older brother to you and Brinley. Even if you make a mistake, I'll take care of you both the same as I always have." I hadn't even gotten the words of refusal out of my mouth when Brinley stepped out of the dermatology clinic, a bright smile on her face. When she spotted me, her smile froze solid, but she smoothed it back into place in the blink of an eye. "Chloe? You're out of prison?" She raised her voice on purpose, and every eye in the clinic hallway turned straight to me. Julian’s brows knitted tightly as he stared at her. "Brinley, keep your voice down. Chloe is still my..." When I caught sight of that familiar, manipulative, hurt-puppy expression Brinley always trotted out, I cut Julian off mid-sentence. "It's fine. No need to hide it. What she said is true, after all." Brinley reached out to grab my hand, but I shifted my body out of the way. The plastic smile never slipped from her face. "It's my birthday today! Julian brought me here for a premium hydra facial and laser treatment. It costs six whole thousand dollars! He even baked me a cake with his own hands, and since he knows I love a big party, he booked a whole city firework display just for me!" She paused, looking me up and down. "Chloe, do they even have cake and fireworks in prison?" She suddenly clapped a hand over her mouth, her eyebrows drawn together as if she had just realized she'd said something terrible. "I'm so sorry, Chloe. I didn't mean that. What I really mean is, I want to invite you to my birthday dinner. It's just one more person at the table, and Julian and I don't mind at all." Julian shot her a sharp, warning glare, then turned to me with a flustered, awkward explanation. "Chloe, I'll get all of that for your birthday too, I promise. Just come today, show your face, and say hi to everyone." I stared at them, my face cool and calm. "No, thanks. I already have plans with someone. I won't intrude on your day." A thick, heavy silence hung between us for a beat. Then Julian spoke, his voice thick with bitterness, "All your old friends cut you off after that incident. You just got out. Who could you possibly have plans with? Chloe, I know you blame me. But no matter what happens, we're still the closest family you have in this whole world." I just smiled, remaining noncommittal. Once upon a time, that would have been true. Back then, we really were the closest people in the world to each other. I was born with autism. Growing up, everyone called me a monster. My mom couldn't stand the whispering and the pointing behind our backs, so she ran away, and she took my biological brother with her. When Dad went to work, he would leave me with the elderly neighbor who lived downstairs. The neighborhood kids used to gang up to throw rocks at me, betting on whether they could make the 'weird girl' angry enough to talk. Every single time, Julian would chase them off for me, then hand me a lollipop. Then, not long after, Julian walked in on his mother having an affair with his father's older brother. He was still at that age where he couldn't keep a secret, so he blurted the whole truth to his dad. That same night, consumed by rage, his father killed his mother and his uncle, then jumped from the top of their apartment building. The day the social workers came to take Julian away, I clamped both of my hands tight around his wrist and refused to let go, no matter how hard they pulled. And that was how he ended up staying with us. That day, my dad got a new son, and I got a big brother. To protect Julian from the crushing guilt and the gossip of being the boy whose family destroyed itself, Dad packed up our lives and moved us all to a secluded coastal island. But tragedy followed us. When a brutal hurricane swept through the coast on a fateful night, Dad dove into the churning ocean to pull a drowning Julian out, and the raging undertow swallowed Dad whole before he could make it back to shore. As I huddled, shaking in the corner of our flooded home, Julian held me tight and swore a solemn vow. "I'll take care of you, Chloe. I'll give you every bit of love you've ever missed out on." From then on, he worked himself to the bone. He took on three jobs just to keep up with my rising medical bills: delivering newspapers before dawn, hauling materials at construction sites by day, and running food deliveries late into the night, all with his bare hands. Watching his shoulders streaked with raw friction burns and his fingers cracked from constant hard labor, I slowly grew up and learned to mask my symptoms. I also found my passion: dance. When the specialist told him that movement and dancing could help me open up to the world, Julian scrimped, saved, and skipped meals just to enroll me in the best dance academy in the state. Then came that ordinary, devastating afternoon. The dance studio burst into flames. By the time Julian arrived, the roaring fire turned half the sky blood-red. Someone in the crowd screamed that a quiet, non-verbal girl was still trapped inside the burning building. He shoved past the firefighters trying to hold him back and bolted straight into the inferno, yelling at the top of his lungs, "My sister is in there! I have to get her out!" The flames singed his hair, and the smoke choked his throat, but he never slowed down, charging deeper into the fire. I had actually escaped earlier through a back exit. Pushing through the crowd of onlookers, I spotted him coughing violently on the pavement, his lungs filled with smoke. That day, looking at him, I spoke my first words ever, "Julian... Chloe is fine." At that moment, Julian, the boy who had never shed a single tear no matter how much he bled, clutched me to his chest and sobbed tears of pure joy. "Chloe, you spoke! You actually spoke!"