All Too Well ✸ Tim Shepard | ✓

CHAPTER NINETEEN

The month of October flies by like the leaves that float through the air, carried by the wind. The end of the month brings strong fall winds that has Becca leaving the house with a woolly scarf wrapped around her neck more often than not. When Becca is not at work, filling her own shifts and covering for Annie's on days she can't get out of bed, she is by Tim's side with a watchful eye trained on him as he recovers.

True to his word, Tim remains at home and rests. His uncle is happy for him to take time off to recover and only come back when he is ready. Tim isn't happy to be at home, acting as though he is a lion locked in a cage, forlornly looking on the sofa as his siblings enter and leave the house as they please.

"If only you were smart enough to avoid a knife to the guts like me!" Curly had said one day, slapping Tim over the back of the head as he exited the house.

Tim had wrapped his fingers around Curly's wrist and dragged him back, pulling him into a headlock. With knuckles pressing into Curly's hair, he retorted, "I only ended up in the hospital 'cause of you!"

Angela had been seated in the armchair, balancing a bowl of chips on her lap. Becca had been leaning on the arm of Tim's sofa and she had wordlessly leaned over, sharing her bowl with Becca. She had rolled her eyes at her brothers, calling them childish under her breath but Becca saw how her lips turned upwards before she hid it by shoving a handful of chips in her mouth.

Now, as the end of the month approaches and Tim is almost fully recovered, some of the Shepard gang boys have been coming around the house. Whenever they do, Tim asks for privacy and Becca gives him the space he's asked for. When Becca returns, there is a wild spark in Tim's eyes, a fire that brims below the surface that is begging to be unleashed.

Becca keeps her worries to herself, biting down on her bottom lip as she enters the Shepard house as the members of Shepard's gang leave. The worries bubble in her throat, especially as when she enters the house, Curly and Tim fall instantly silent, abruptly ending their conversation. The Shepard brothers have matching guilty expressions on their faces, like Becca has caught them with their hands in the cookie jar.

"What're you two talking 'bout?" Becca asks, suspicion creeping over her. It has something to do with how still the two brothers get, or the look Tim flicks over to Curly as to say 'keep your fuckin' trap shut'.

"Nothin'," both Tim and Curly answer quickly, doing nothing to assuage the suspicion rolling in Becca's stomach.

She lives with a constant knot in her stomach. It never loosens, only tightening every morning when she wakes up. She worries about Tim doing something reckless that he can't come back from, and she worries about Annie who has a secret that is eating her alive.

More often than not it is late into the night when she returns home, shrouded by the darkness that covers her apartment. Her body aches with fatigue and her eyes burn, wanting nothing more than to fall asleep but her mind stubbornly races. It leaves her with a weariness that claws its way into the deep recesses of her body, coated with every step she makes.

This weariness doesn't leave her even as she walks up the steps to Annie's house on Sunday. The Prices have gone to Mass and Annie is left by herself, feigning being under the weather. The front door flings open before Becca has a chance to knock her knuckles against wood and Annie is on the other side. Her bump has gotten bigger, still not noticeable to somebody who isn't in the know. Becca sees it in the way Annie's dress clings to her in a way it didn't before. She sees it in the dark circles under Annie's eye and in her bare face, devoid of makeup.

"Diana's already here," Annie says in lieu of a greeting, pulling the door wider for Becca to step through.

Annie walks with a nervous energy and her hand fiddles with the necklace wrapped around her neck. "There's somethin' I gotta tell you girls," she says just as Becca has sat down on the sofa next to Diana.