Free Straddling the Line by Sarah M. Anderson

for?”
    “What’s her name?” Billy shot back a few minutes later.
    “None of your damn business.”
    “Typical.”
    Ben ignored him as he took the carburetor apart. It was some time before he said, “What’s that supposed to mean?”
    Silence.
    This was the difference between talking to Billy and talking to Bobby. Bobby slung words around like bullets and he had stocked up on ammo. So what if a few ricocheted away from him and he drew blood? So what if he never listened? Words were disposable. Meaningless.
    Billy, on the other hand, hoarded words like they were gold coins. He could say three sentences in three hours and consider that a conversation. He thought about each and every thing he said, and he didn’t say something he didn’t mean.
    True to form, it was another twenty minutes before Billy answered him. “The only time you come down out of your little cave up there and actually get your hands dirty, you’ve got woman problems.”
    Ben bristled. Maybe today, he liked Bobby better, because even though the little jerk said crap like this all the time, Ben knew he didn’t mean it. “It’s called an office. You have one, too. You should check it out sometime.” Billy used his office for storage and sleeping. The shop was his office and everyone knew it. “You know you’re behind schedule. Why the hell are you wasting time on that?”
    Billy couldn’t be goaded into a fight as easily as Bobby, though. He merely snorted in amusement and kept working. Slow. Methodical.
    “You remember Cal Horton?”
    The silence had gone on so long that Ben had half forgotten Billy was still there. “Horton? The shop teacher in high school?”
    “Yeah.” Billy sighed as he wiped his hands on a rag. “He was like…the anti-Dad, remember?”
    Ben nodded. Billy had lived in the shop class. If it hadn’t been for shop, Ben didn’t doubt that his brother wouldn’t have graduated from high school. And Mr. Horton—Mr. Who, the kids had all called him behind his back—had been a scrawny guy with big ears, buck teeth and a voice that never shouted. Ben had taken shop for a while, but it was the one class in high school where he couldn’t show up his big brother. After Billy, all the other teachers were thankful to have a Bolton who could be taught. But Ben always had gotten the feeling that Mr. Who would take Billy every day of the week.
    “Anti-Dad. Very funny.”
    “I’m serious. He didn’t make you earn his respect, you know? He gave it to you. To me, anyway.”
    The weight of thirty-two years’ worth of effort to get Dad’s honest respect suddenly crushed Ben’s chest. “Yeah. I can see that.”
    “Cal helped me out a few times, when I got in real…trouble.” Suddenly, Billy looked way more than serious. He looked positively moody.
    Billy’d had no shortage of trouble back then. A smart remark about bail money and strippers danced around Ben’s mouth, but a strange sort of sadness made Billy look young. Small, even—which was no mean feat. Let Bobby be the jerk in this family. Ben knew how to keep his mouth shut.
    “Yeah?”
    “Yeah.”
    Billy stood there for a moment. Ben was about to give him some space and get back to work on his bike when Billy unexpectedly went on. “After September 11th, he re-upped with the army, did three tours in Afghanistan before an IED got him a few years ago. He finally got clearance to ride again—but his wife doesn’t want him on a chopper.”
    Hands down, this was the longest, heaviest conversation Ben could ever remember having with his brother. A lifetime of loyalty—what the hell kind of trouble had Billy gotten himself into back then?
    Ben didn’t even get his mouth open before Billy started talking again. “He expected better of me. Everyone else—even Dad—expected me to fail. But not Cal. He almost died for me, for my country. He never asked me for anything. The least I can do is build him a damn bike. On my own time. With my own money. And if you’ve