I was shaking by the time I reached the hallway.<\/p>\n
I nearly dropped my keys.<\/p>\n
I looked at my phone again.<\/p>\n
Tuesday.<\/p>\n
2:14 in the afternoon.<\/p>\n
I could see Noah's calls in the recent-call list.<\/p>\n
The last conversation had lasted only thirty-one seconds.<\/p>\n
Thirty-one seconds.<\/p>\n
That was all it took to turn an ordinary afternoon into something I could barely understand.<\/p>\n
I headed for the elevator.<\/p>\n
My office was twenty minutes from home.<\/p>\n
Twenty minutes on a good day.<\/p>\n
There were traffic lights between us.<\/p>\n
Cars.<\/p>\n
Intersections.<\/p>\n
A whole downtown area I suddenly wished I could drive straight through.<\/p>\n
I pressed the elevator button.<\/p>\n
Then I pressed it again.<\/p>\n
I knew that would not make it arrive faster.<\/p>\n
I did it anyway.<\/p>\n
All I could hear was Noah telling me about his arm.<\/p>\n
And the other man's voice.<\/p>\n
That threat.<\/p>\n
I knew I needed the police.<\/p>\n
I also knew the police might not get there before somebody who was already nearby.<\/p>\n
My brother.<\/p>\n
Derek.<\/p>\n
He was older than me.<\/p>\n
He had always been the one who showed up when something needed fixing.<\/p>\n
Not with a speech.<\/p>\n
Not with a promise.<\/p>\n
He just came.<\/p>\n
I remembered the day Noah was born.<\/p>\n
Derek stood beside me while my son lay wrapped in a blue hospital blanket.<\/p>\n
He had looked at that tiny baby and smiled.<\/p>\n
Later, he taught Noah how to bump fists.<\/p>\n
Noah loved doing that with him.<\/p>\n
Sometimes he did it so hard that Derek pretended his hand hurt.<\/p>\n
My son would laugh.<\/p>\n
That was the sound I wanted to hear again.<\/p>\n
I remembered Noah's yellow bicycle.<\/p>\n
Derek had given it to him for his birthday in May.<\/p>\n
One of the training wheels had gotten bent.<\/p>\n
I could still picture Derek crouched beside that little bicycle with a wrench.<\/p>\n
Grease worked into the lines of his hands.<\/p>\n
He had spent years repairing cars.<\/p>\n
To Derek, a damaged wheel was something to inspect, understand, and put right.<\/p>\n
He had pointed out a scrape on the bicycle frame once.<\/p>\n
There was white paint over the damaged yellow metal.<\/p>\n
He had asked whether Noah had run into my garage again.<\/p>\n
Just another ordinary question.<\/p>\n
Just another ordinary afternoon.<\/p>\n
I had never thought I would miss something so simple.<\/p>\n
I also remembered the night Noah had a fever.<\/p>\n
Derek stayed beside him until morning.<\/p>\n
He did not complain about losing sleep.<\/p>\n
He did not make a big deal out of it.<\/p>\n
He stayed because Noah needed someone.<\/p>\n
That was my brother.<\/p>\n
He had also spent years training and fighting in regional mixed martial arts.<\/p>\n
A shoulder injury had ended that part of his life.<\/p>\n
But I did not call him because he knew how to fight.<\/p>\n
I called because he knew how to stay calm.<\/p>\n
Because he cared about Noah.<\/p>\n
Because he would understand that this was not a situation for shouting or wasting time.<\/p>\n
The elevator doors opened.<\/p>\n
I stepped inside and called him.<\/p>\n
He answered.<\/p>\n
"Michael?"<\/p>\n
"Derek, where are you?"<\/p>\n
"What's happened?"<\/p>\n
"Noah called me."<\/p>\n
I swallowed.<\/p>\n
"Lena's boyfriend hit him with a baseball bat."<\/p>\n
Silence.<\/p>\n
Only for a moment.<\/p>\n
Then Derek asked, "Where's Noah now?"<\/p>\n
"At the house."<\/p>\n
"Are you there?"<\/p>\n
"No. I'm still at work."<\/p>\n
I looked at the elevator numbers.<\/p>\n
"I'm twenty minutes away."<\/p>\n
Derek's voice changed.<\/p>\n
Not louder.<\/p>\n
Quieter.<\/p>\n
"Where are you?" I asked.<\/p>\n
"About fifteen minutes from your place."<\/p>\n
My heart dropped.<\/p>\n
He was closer.<\/p>\n
Not close enough to make me comfortable.<\/p>\n
But closer.<\/p>\n
"Please go there."<\/p>\n
"I'm heading over."<\/p>\n
"I'm calling the police."<\/p>\n
"Do that."<\/p>\n
I closed my eyes.<\/p>\n
"Derek, Noah said Travis threatened to hit him again."<\/p>\n
My brother did not swear.<\/p>\n
He did not shout.<\/p>\n
He answered with a few words.<\/p>\n
"I'm going."<\/p>\n
Then he moved.<\/p>\n
I was shaking by the time I reached the hallway. I nearly dropped my keys. I looked at my phone again. Tuesday. 2:14 in the afternoon. I could see Noah's … <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41412,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41414","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-insightdrama"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41414","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=41414"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41414\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":41424,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41414\/revisions\/41424"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/41412"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=41414"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=41414"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/insightdrama.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=41414"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}