SEVENS

FRIES ONLY FIX SO MUCH

The examination room was cozy though that didn't mean jackshit to my nerves. I bounced my healthy leg, tried to mimic the beat with my injured one, flinched, stopped and started over.

"Were you this nervous when Rafael took you to the emergency room the first time?" Pierre asked, his hand shoved deep into a fast food bag. I watched the grease stain on the paper as it seemed to grow, I couldn't look Pierre in the eye.

"He's different." I muttered. Fuck I was still hungry, my puke fest earlier couldn't negate my hunger—maybe it made it worse. I'd already eaten my burger and serving of fries but I could feel my stomach clenching around air and Pierre was eating so fucking slow—

"You two are dating then?"

Then I looked at him. "What? No. Fuck you—"

"I just thought that's why he took you to L.A."

"I don't want to talk about it."

"I'll give you the rest of my fries if you do." He said around a mouthful of starch, he held out the bag.

"Why the fuck do you care?"

"Alexei you're my son—"

"We don't know that yet." I didn't know why I was disagreeing with him. Oh wait yes I did. Because if it weren't true— I was back where I had started the semester.

Pierre sighed and stood from his seat on the examination bench, I had forced him to sit there while I took the one blue leather chair behind the door. He set the bag with the fries on my lap and grabbed his wallet from his back pocket before he sat back down. His wallet was made of brown cracked leather, soft at the edges and folds, cash visible in the big pocket. I snatched a few fries out of the bag as quickly as I could before he could take it away again. He took two little slips of paper out of one of the credit card slots. He looked at them fondly, side by side, before flipping them over so I could see them. I leaned forward, tucking the paper bag to my side, away from Pierre.

I knew Jean well enough from sharing a dorm with him that it wasn't hard to pinpoint him in the photo on the right. He was smiling with Sophia and Elias on his lap, posed but happy. They all had the same nose and the same brilliant blue eyes. My eyes. Pierre's— Elias took his mothers hair though, so brown it was almost black, and Sophia though she had her mother's lips and dark colored lashes, also had the trademarked blond curls of the Bissette family. My curls. His—
The photo on the left had two smiling boys on it though I didn't recognize either of them. They looked familiar though, like Jean, maybe cousins? I recognized their noses though, hard bridged. The eyes, blue. My eyes. The curls, they looked like they were standing by a lake, the gold of their hair glittering just as much as the water in the midday sun.

"Who—"

"Me and my brother when we were your age."

I recoiled. I didn't need to see his family. Not when everything was so uncertain and not when if they knew they would hate me. I pressed my tongue hard against the roof of my mouth, swallowing back a wave of tears.

"You look like them— like me, my brother—"

"Lots of people have blue eyes. My hair is brown anyway."

"Is it naturally that color? Your mom has your description as blonde."

I flinched again. "Fuck her. And so what if it's not naturally brown?"

"Alexei—" A knock at the door interrupted Pierre. "Come in."

The door opened and a man walked through.

"Alexei?" The doctor looked like Selena, but male. Just as friendly. He smiled a fake cordiality smile but frowned when he found Pierre on the examination bench instead. He hadn't seen me yet. "Pierre what are you doing here? Is it Jean? Sophia? Elias? Whose Alexei?" He looked down at his clipboard.