We're in it together now

 CW felt nauseous lately. He must have lost a good twenty pounds since Miracle came home. It wasn't like he was sitting around all day thinking of tomorrow. It was right now. He was a bit lightheaded. It might have been his blood sugar or his blood pressure. Really, he was too young to think like that. However, Crystal did. She could see him stagger to get things done around the place. But he was on it, even if it felt like more things were added daily to Daddy duty.

Not that he hated it, but it was new to him. He'd never held a baby until Miracle, and it was unbelievable then, but now it was life. His life. Her life. Their life. It pained him that he hadn't accomplished more. To be ready for something so extraordinary. He wanted to think clearly instead of being muddled with the could-of and should-of memories that dragged him down.

It was hard not to be sad, knowing he wasn't good enough and in his head, he might never be.

"Well, stop thinking that way, will you?" Darry told him his family would help him out.

"What? He's done more..more for me..than he should." CW winced, remembering how his dad had come through for him with his wisdom teeth problem last year. "I can't ask-" CW shook his head no. 

"They already know about the baby," Darry told them. "Who do you think sent me?" Darry's brow furrowed with concern as he shook CW's shoulders.

CW sighed. "I don't get it, I'm just a stranger-"

"You remind us a lot of my older brother." Darry shrugged. CW went to tend to the baby while Darry filled him in on how his brother was bipolar. "He won't let any of us help him now."

CW still wasn't sure where he fit in. 

"Why do you think we always help out at the homeless shelter?" Darry asked as he took the baby from CW. "We miss him, even if he doesn't want us to."

"But he could get help." CW looked at Darry as if this was just nonsense.

"If he wanted to, but he doesn't." Darry smiled at the baby. Still, CW knew there was more about this no-name brother of his.

"Look, my dad knows people," Darry told him.

"So?" CW wasn't expecting the lottery. Just a full-time job would do. Well, one that paid more than minimum wage. "Maybe I could get on at the slaughterhouse, or-" He didn't know. It would have to be one of those jobs nobody would really want. 

"There are jobs at the veteran's hospital." Darry nodded.

"I wouldn't have to kill small animals, would I?" CW looked at him out of the corner of his eye.

Darry cracked a smile.