Thanks to everyone who read and to Ghostwriter and Callisto's Moon for reviewing.

"So just don't go if you don't want to," Kenny said, slouching against the bleacher post. "I mean, what's he going to do? Dump you? That should have happened months ago anyway."

"What is wrong with you?" Caitie demanded, swiveling to glare at him. "If he likes it there, why are you being such a jerk about it?"

Kenny sneered at her, and Jamie tensed. Kenny's mood had once again been on the bad side of questionable lately, and he hadn't forgotten the black eye he'd picked up at the end of last year. Or the fact that it had started with Kenny shoving one of the girls which was about as uncool as it got considering that even if he wasn't any bigger than Jamie was, they were still both bigger than Caitie and Brianne.

Caitie only scoffed in return, though, before turning back away from Kenny. "Seriously, Jamie. If you have to go, you have to go, but it's not like anyone can actually make you talk. I don't even think they'd be allowed to do that."

"They wouldn't," Brianne agreed.

She sounded pretty certain, and Jamie looked at her. "What makes you so sure?"

She shifted a little and then sighed. "So after the whole huffing thing, my parents started dragging me to see this guy. To help with my 'self-destructive impulses' or whatever, I don't know. But every week I'm supposed to come in with stuff to talk about—it's basically like an extra set of homework which gets really annoying—and when I skip or lie and say I forgot my notebook he mostly just asks stupid questions instead. About school and friends and...I don't know. Whatever, like I said. I mean, he is kind of annoyingly good at talking around to things even when I don't want him to, but it's not like anyone's hauling out the thumbscrews or anything."

Jamie was less worried about thumbscrews and more worries about those stupid files that Alex had, but Brianne was the only person he'd talked to so far who'd actually seen a psychiatrist—well, except Alex, maybe, given what he'd said about his back, but Jamie wasn't sure if he was allowed to ask about that so he hadn't—and he was willing to give her words a little more weight than the others.

Kenny made a disgusted sound and shoved himself up off the post, kicking at a clump of dirt before stomping away, and Jamie rolled his eyes at his back and sighed. He wasn't giving Kenny's words any weight at all right now.

"Seriously, what is wrong with him?" Brianne asked. "He's been being a real jackass lately. And I mean more of one than usual, which is saying something."

Jamie glanced at Caitie, who only shrugged, so he echoed her movements and kept his mouth shut too. He'd told Caitie about the needles earlier this year, although he hadn't seen anything like that since, but if she hadn't seen fit to tell Brianne there was probably a reason for it.

"Anyway, do you guys want to go—"

Jamie's watch beeped, interrupting whatever Brianne's invitation was going to be, and he sighed. "I've got to get going or I'll miss the bus, and if Alex gets home before me today I really am dead. Later."

"See you tomorrow," Caitie said, waving. "And don't forget about the pre-work for the science lab tomorrow because you know if we haven't got it Mrs. Travers will make us do that in class and then stay after to finish the lab. And it's your turn."

"Yeah, yeah." Or maybe technically he might have forgotten, but his science book was already in his backpack since he had to finish the end-of-chapter questions anyway so he could just do the lab stuff at the same time. Maybe he could convince Alex that he had too much homework to go.

It was wishful thinking and he knew it, and despite what he might have hoped—after all, Alex couldn't be mad at him if the buses were late since he was the one who still had Jamie's keys—everything ran entirely on time, and Jamie even had time for a quick snack before he heard Alex's car in the driveway. Or he heard Alex beep from the driveway, anyway, and he put his plate in the dishwasher quickly and then headed outside. Life sucked sometimes.

"Hey, kiddo," Alex greeted. "Ready to get going?"

"No."

Alex gave him a look.

Jamie sighed and opened the passenger door, dropping in gracelessly. "I don't want to."

"That is entirely obvious, but I'm afraid that you don't get a choice about this. Not until you're a little older, anyway. Now, if Dr. Karabick isn't a good fit for an actual reason I can ask around and find someone else, but you are going to talk to someone."

Jamie crossed his arms over his chest. Alex would be smart not to take any bets on that one.

"Seat belt, please."

Jamie scowled.

"Jamie."

"Oh, fine." He yanked it across his chest and shoved it into the buckle.

"Thank you." Alex put the car in reverse and backed down the driveway. "And as annoyed as you are, we still need to talk for a few minutes longer," he said as he turned out onto the street. "You know I'll go in with you if you want, but there are probably going to be some times when she needs to talk to you privately. Are you going to be okay with that?"

"Why?" Jamie asked. It wasn't...he didn't want to talk to her at all, but at least if Alex was there he wasn't stuck alone in a room with some stranger.

"It's like with Dr. Reynolds. She needs to know that you're safe at home."

Dr. Reynolds being the one that had grabbed his shirt, and Jamie didn't plan on going near her again ever either. Besides, home meant with Alex, and Alex would never do anything bad to him so they were stupid questions anyway. He crossed his arms again.

"Can you at least try to talk to her?" Alex asked. "It might make you feel better."

"I'm fine. There's nothing to talk about."

Alex sighed. "Just think about it, okay?"

"So long story short, it comes down to William wanting all of us to go stay with his brothers and their families for two weeks right at the start of the summer," Tyler said.

If the twenty minutes Tyler had just spent reviewing the whole situation was the short version Jamie didn't want to hear the long one, but it wasn't like he was really in the mood to talk anyway so he just shrugged and waited for Tyler to step out of the way before turning the hose on the ambulance again. "Okay, but you still haven't said if you want to go. Do you?"

"I don't know." Tyler scooped up the rags they'd been using and tossed the whole lot in the trash. "I mean, it might be kind of fun. At least one of his brothers is into sailing too and I guess there's not just the big boat at their lake house but also a bunch of the little sunfish things that everyone is allowed to use. But it's not like I know any of them, and William and I are still sort of..."

They were getting along better than they had been last year, at least, Jamie knew that much, but it wasn't like he had any experience with step parents—or lake houses or sailboats, for that matter—so he only shrugged again.

"How are you and Alex getting along, anyway?" Tyler asked.

He shut the hose back off and straightened. "What?"

"You and Alex." Tyler grimaced and scrubbed his hands against his jeans. "Like I told you before, we were all kind of figuring that you were going to kill each other months ago, but since no one's found any bodies shoved into closets or any humanoid replacement robots wandering around in one of your clothes you must still be managing okay."

"Ha ha," Jamie said, gathering up the bottles of soap and returning them to the appropriate cabinet. Alex was over in his office right now, as it happened, and part of the reason that he and Tyler had been out here scrubbing down ambulances since the start of their shift was because if they went inside they'd almost certainly be waylaid and made to do paperwork. And granted that Brooke would be the one doing the waylaying, not Alex, but Alex would absolutely have her back so it worked out the same. Even cleaning was better than forms. "Alex and I are fine. Where did that come from?"

"Well, come on, William and I are only kind of different, and that's hard enough to deal with sometimes. You two are practically oil and water. Or, what's the other phrase? Peanut butter and orange juice?"

"Huh?" Jamie wrinkled his nose. "Who came up with that? That's disgusting."

"You know what I mean," Tyler said with a roll of his eyes. "You're a whole lot different. I mean, for goodness sake, your t-shirt right now says 'Disobey.' He's probably got a shirt with a notarized list of rules."

Alex mostly didn't wear shirts with printing at all unless they were from the hospital or the station or left over from med school, but if he did, Jamie could kind of see it. Then again, Alex wasn't exactly replacing or pseudo-replacing anyone, and Jamie kind of thought that that's where some of Tyler's problems with William came in. But there was no way in hell that he was going there, especially not out loud or to Tyler, so he only shrugged again. "Yeah, it's kind of weird," he admitted, "but we really are fine. I mean, he's strict about some stuff, and I spend way too much time grounded and watching stupid documentaries, but I knew that going in. Or I knew about the strict part, anyway." He still thought watching documentaries about the building of the five-billionth castle in England was weird, but if that was what Alex picked, Jamie could live with it. It wasn't like Alex turned off the heat or took away dinner or anything else. "It's not a big deal."

Tyler gave him a disbelieving look.

Jamie wasn't sure what else to say since he had no interest in talking about the foster parents he'd had before with Tyler any more than anyone else; in fact that was what he'd spent a good part of yesterday's session trying to avoid talking about despite Dr. Laura's questions and Alex's frowns. "I'm good with Alex," he finally said. "Honest. I don't really know why he's okay with me, but we do fine. He might even take me out to visit some of his family at the end of the summer."

"For real?" He paused. "You know, Alex with a family is almost weirder than anything else, now that I think about it."

"Yeah, it kind of felt like that to me too when his mom called the first time."

Tyler shook his head. "Huh. Well, I guess as long as it works for you, that's what matters. Still doesn't help me figure out what to do about William's family thing, though."

"Yeah, well, that's on you," Jamie said with a snort.

"Tyler, Jamie, are you guys—there you are," Hank said. "Where are the coffee filters?"

"Ask Brooke," they said in unison.

"And she said she's not our coffee robot and go figure it out myself. Oh, and Jamie, she really wants the paperwork from last Saturday's callouts."

Jamie groaned.