Thomas Sarah Brooks

Thomas Whitaker almost missed the turn off Franklin Road.

He corrected too late and felt the tires catch gravel before easing onto the narrow rise through South Roanoke. Brick houses set hard against the slope. Lawns trimmed short for winter. Driveways cut steep into concrete. Mill Mountain rose behind them, trees bare at the crest. The star sat white against a clear sky.

He found a space along Stanley Avenue, angled uphill. Cut the engine. Kept both hands on the wheel.

The car ticked as it cooled.

He could still put it in reverse.

On the passenger seat lay a small paper bag from the bakery on Brambleton. Lemon bars. He had stood too long at the counter choosing. Almost left without buying anything.

A train horn drifted from the valley. Farther off, a dog barked once and stopped.

Daniel’s message waited in his pocket.

If you want to come by Sunday, we’ll be home.

Seven years.

And this was how it began again.

Not from his child.

From Daniel.

He stepped out before he could reconsider and locked the car. The hill rose immediately from the curb; a steep run of fieldstone and slate set into concrete poured in different decades, each repair a shade off from the last. The steps climbed straight toward a narrow porch at the top. No railing until halfway up. No landing wide enough to rest without committing to the climb.

A stroller stood folded near the porch door.

He stood at the base longer than he meant to.

He thought of Brandon Avenue. The house with curtains half-drawn. The second bedroom still painted the pale blue Sarah chose. He had never repainted it. Never moved the bed. The closet still held a few hangers turned sideways where a teenager once shoved them without looking.

“Evelyn.”

The word thinned in the open air.

He set his foot on the first stone.

The steps were uneven. Slate worn smooth in the center. Fieldstone pressing outward at the edges. Concrete patched and repatched where winter had split it open. He climbed carefully.

“Evelyn.”

As if it were ordinary.

Halfway up, his breath shortened. He paused and looked back down the slope. The valley spread clear and sharp. Nothing to blur the distance.

He climbed again.

Near the top, the concrete shifted lighter, newer. The porch came into view. White risers chipped at the corners. A clay pot by the door. Wind chime still.

Fluorescent light cut across his mind without warning. Antiseptic. The slow crawl of a green line on a monitor. Sarah’s hand in his, light as paper.

“Tommy,” she had said. “Take care of Evelyn.”

The name lay between them.

He nodded. Did not say it back.

Evan’s name pressed against his teeth, solid and familiar. Before the hospital. Before the thinness in Sarah’s voice. Before the long evenings at the kitchen table with words he did not know how to hold.

He kept it there.

Later, in the hallway, Evelyn stood near the vending machines. Shoulders drawn tight. Eyes rimmed red.

“She used my name.”

He watched the tile between his shoes.

“Your mother’s tired.”

The name Evan still sat heavy in his mouth.

She waited.

A nurse pushed past with a rattling cart.

He swallowed.

“I know,” she said.

She reached once toward the wall as if steadying herself, then let her hand fall. She walked toward the elevators without looking back.

He did not follow.

A breeze crossed the hill.

Thomas climbed the final steps and knocked.

Movement inside. Something set down quickly. Then quiet.

He waited.

He knocked again. Not louder. Just enough to confirm he was still there.

Footsteps approached. Slowed. Stopped just beyond the door.

The latch did not turn.

For a second he imagined Daniel opening it instead. Or no one at all.

The lock clicked.

The door opened halfway.

Evelyn stood there, one hand still on the knob.

Seven years had shifted her face but not erased it. Sarah’s eyes. His jaw. A faint line at the corner of her mouth he did not remember.

They looked at each other.

“Hi,” she said.

“Evelyn.”

He did not rush it. Did not soften it.

Her eyes flickered. Measuring.

“You found it,” she said.

“Yes.”

He held up the bakery bag without thinking. “Lemon bars.”

She looked at the bag. Then at him.

“Mom liked those.”

“I know.”

The word stayed between them.

She stepped back slowly.

“Come in.”

The house smelled faintly of detergent and warmed milk. A bassinet stood near the couch. Sunlight cut across the floor.

Daniel rose from a chair near the window. Taller than Thomas expected. Thinner. A man who had not slept long at a stretch.

“Mr. Whitaker.”

“Thomas,” he said. “Tom.”

Daniel’s handshake was steady.

“Thanks for coming,” Daniel said.

Thomas nodded.

“He just woke up.”

Evelyn moved down the hallway. Soft fabric sounds. A low murmur.

Daniel motioned toward the couch. “You can sit.”

Thomas lowered himself. Set the bakery bag on the table. Folded his hands between his knees.

A small cry came from the hallway. Questioning.

His shoulders tightened.

Footsteps returned.

Evelyn came back with a small bundle tucked against her shoulder. Pale yellow blanket. A narrow brow. A fist pressed near a mouth.

“You can hold him.”

Thomas stood too quickly and steadied himself.

He held out his arms. For a moment he placed them wrong, too wide. Evelyn adjusted his elbow without comment and lowered the baby into place.

The weight surprised him. Light but certain. Warm through cotton.

The baby blinked once, unfocused, then closed his hand around the front of Thomas’s shirt.

His palm curved beneath the small skull.

He could hear the baby breathing. And his own.

Thomas studied the fine line of the ear, the thin blue vein beneath the skin.

The baby shifted once and Thomas’s grip faltered. Evelyn’s hand hovered near, then withdrew when he steadied.

He cleared his throat.

“What did you name him?”

He nodded once. His jaw set. His grip shifted on the baby.

“Thomas,” Evelyn said.

The name went straight through him.

For a fraction of a second he thought she meant him.

Evan rose before he could stop it.

He swallowed.

He blinked. “What?”

“Thomas Sarah Brooks.”

The refrigerator hummed behind him. His own name carried forward with Sarah’s.

“For you,” Daniel said. “It was her idea.”

Thomas’s arms remembered the weight. The small, certain heft of a child who trusted the hands holding him.

He had held that shape once before. Before the hospital light. Before he let a name stay behind his teeth.

The baby’s fingers tightened in his shirt.

“Dad?”

No hesitation in it.

His vision blurred. He blinked hard.

“You’re crying,” Evelyn said.

He cleared his throat.

“Eye dew.”