Fall Away

I groaned when my alarm went off the next morning. I reached over and slammed buttons until the annoying beeping turned into music. I relaxed slightly as I recognized the song playing and I let my eyes close for an extra minute of rest.

What felt like a moment later, I heard another noise. This one took me a moment to recognize – some kind of annoying sound…. Almost music…

I jerked up in bed as I recognized my ringtone. “I’m going to set this as my tone,” he had said, “so you’ll always know when I’m calling.”

“Daniel!” I cried. “Hey!”

“Hey Ellie.” My brother’s warm voice made it sound like he was next to me, instead of hundreds of miles away. “How are you?”

“Fine,” I replied.

“Just fine? Nothing new or exciting in your life?” he teased.

I shrugged, then realized he couldn’t see me. “Not really.”

“Aw, don’t tell me that,” Danny protested. “There’s got to be something.” There was a moment of silence before he began to talk again. “You still working?”

“Yeah.” I glanced at the clock. “In about an hour, actually.”

“Do you ever give yourself a break?” my brother asked, a serious note in his voice.

“Yes,” I replied in a slightly exasperated tone. “I’m actually off at six, believe it or not.”

“El, that’s still, like eight hours.”

“Seven,” I snapped. “And I have a half-hour lunch break, and I don’t have to work the transition shift. That’s pretty good.”

“You lost me.”

I sighed. “The transition shift is the period where we’re switching between Amor and Bella.”

Silence.

“You know, the two different halves of the store?”

“Not really,” he shrugged. “But if you say it’s hard, I’ll believe you.”

“It is. And I’m not working it,” I replied, emphasizing my original point. “I’ll have plenty of time tonight.”

“Okay, okay.” I could hear the laugher in Dan’s voice. “I believe you. Just make sure you have fun every now and then, okay?”

“I will,” I sighed. “I do.”

There was another silence, and I knew he was mulling something over. “Don’t worry about me,” I protested. “I’m doing fine.”

“That’s part of what worries me,” he admitted wryly. “You never call. It’s as if you don’t need me any more.”

“You know I love you,” I sighed. “I’m just… used to being on my own.”

Danny sighed. “Yeah, I know. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault. Besides, you’re almost as bad as me,” I teased, desperate to lighting the mood. We were getting dangerously close to it, the one thing we tried not to talk about - for both our sakes.

“I am not!” my brother protested.

I laughed to myself.

“I’ll have you know that I have a very busy social life on top of my job. Unlike some people I could name…”

“You’re out of college.”

“What’s your point?”

“You have a lot more free time than I do.”

I smiled as he came back with some useless argument. I had missed our friendly banters. I don’t think Daniel knew quite how much I depended on him, but you can hide a lot when you live a thousand miles away.