Sticks and Stones

Six: Brothers and Bygones

Tatum couldn't get her mind off the session with Brady.

Her curiosity had only piqued as she thought things over more and more. It was honestly absurd that the police hadn't closed their investigation. But a lot of things conflicted each other, and Brady's statement didn't help matters. He had claimed that it was just an accident on his end and that no one else was there. But then others claim they saw someone run in right before it happened. Brady said that wasn't the case. He was adamant about it, in fact. She suspected the police knew something wasn't right, but they couldn't figure out how to prove it or why Brady was covering for them.

Figuring out how to go about picking apart the events of the night somewhat alluded her. She didn't exactly have experience with this sort of thing. She had to be subtle about how she went about things. Besides, Tatum couldn't afford to get too distracted with all of this. Yes, she wanted to know. But she couldn't let it take away from focusing on securing the recommendation with Doctor Ashford.

She also couldn't let it go so far that it would effect her friendship with Kinsley. It was obvious that even the small mention of Brady had been enough to make her friend shrink up. Kinsley had barely been around since Tatum's birthday a few days ago, in fact. Tatum didn't see her when she had gone back to the dorm throughout the weekend. Tatum was worried that she shouldn't have mentioned Brady at all, but she thought it would be worse to keep Kinsley in the dark. But maybe that was where Kinsley wanted to be.

Tatum just wanted things between them to be okay again. She hated when they fought. But this wasn't even a fight, really. It was just a sense of unease. Words unspoken that congested the air and suffocated them into spitting out what they wanted to say. Anything between them would always pass over fairly quickly. But this felt different. Even if it ended, it felt unfinished. Like there was something more to say, but Tatum even didn't know what was left. It just felt like it was only starting.

Pulling her phone out of her pocket, she tried to push aside the feelings of unease. They would be fine. Like always. They had to be. Tatum tapped her phone quickly against the screen, pressing send before giving it another thought. 

Tatum
Dinner tonight?

The few minutes in between sending the text and receiving a response had her heart pounding and hands sweating. But then her phone buzzed.

Kinsley
Sure, heard they have sushi tn

Her entire body sagged with relief. She could always tell Kinsley's tone from her texts. It wasn't hard to figure out when something was wrong. This... this was fine. She was fine. They were fine.

Tatum forced herself to stop over thinking things and switch gears to focus back on the current task at hand. The hospital. Her shift had started around an hour ago. Things had been going smoothly so far. She hadn't had any patients give her a hard time. Everyone seemed to be in decent spirits today. A doctor even bought a lot of the coffee. Which was very much needed.

Her Mom wasn't in today. She had been able to go home for a bit, but Tatum knew she'd be back in a few days for a check-up. Tatum tried to not think about how they were getting more and more frequent. The irrational part of herself had decided it was because things were getting better and they had to monitor her progress to make sure that trend continued. But she couldn't ignore the way the doctors looked at her with an increasing sense of pity.

Tatum needed a pick-me-up. And when she walked by a certain patient's room, she knew exactly how she could get that.

"Hey, Jamie," Tatum sang happily as she pranced into his room.

She froze in her step, blinking as if the sight in front of her would change.

What the hell was Brady doing here?