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from Daisy: I’m doing okay. While Ryke says, she’s doing the same.
    Those updates are irritating for people who like details.
    Ryke keeps shaking his head, frustrated.
    I pass him a coffee, knowing he’ll drink it black. He takes it, and I find another mug to fill for Rose.
    “It’s not that fucking easy,” he says. “She needs stability. Not to go through a bunch of random therapists to find one that works.” He lets out an angry breath. “And what if she gets a shit therapist like Lily?”
    “I never recommended that therapist to Lily. Her parents did.” I pause as I realize how I can have more details and help Rose’s sister at the same time. “Daisy can see my therapist. I’ve known Frederick for years, and he’s almost as smart as me.”
    Ryke glances at Daisy who rolls onto her stomach, still sleeping. “What kind of therapist is he?”
    “Frederick is a jack of all trades,” I evade the question. “He’ll be equipped to handle her problems.” He’d take her on as a patient without hesitation. Firstly because she can afford him. Secondly because her case is complex.
    Ryke’s jaw hardens, his hand tightening on the mug.
    “Do you trust me?” I ask him. I want what’s best for Daisy. Besides Jonathan Hale, Ryke always questions my motives the most.
    “I feel like you’re manipulating the fuck out of me, Cobalt.”
    I am. Partly. I want more information about Daisy that Frederick may be able to give me. “I want what’s best for Rose’s sister,” I say, only a portion of the truth.
    Ryke nods, as though he’s trying to believe me. “You’ll have to talk to Daisy about it. It’s not my decision.”
    I nod too. Ryke and I always cross paths in the morning, but usually it’s when I go to work and he goes rock climbing. We never utter a word to each other. Daisy lying on the floor between our feet has forced us to communicate at 6 a.m.
    A string of tense silence lingers in the air.
    He sips his coffee.
    I sip mine. “I’ve had better conversations with a stuttering parakeet Frederick used to own, though he wasn’t nearly as intelligent as you.”
    Ryke digests my statement quicker than most. “I’m sure you loved hearing your own fucking words repeated back to you.”
    My lips rise into my next sip of coffee, remembering the bird’s high-pitched squawk and how it took him five minutes to repeat one fucking sentence that I said. “I’m a narcissist, not a masochist.” I pause in thought. “Maybe if the parakeet didn’t have a stutter.”
    Ryke laughs under his breath and shakes his head.
    So I ask, “Are you nervous about the surgery?” It’s not a topic he likes to discuss, especially with me, but I’m curious. In January, he’s undergoing a liver transplant to help his father survive. Jonathan Hale destroyed his own liver after decades of alcohol abuse. His son is his best match.
    The surgery is a selfless act since:
    a) Ryke doesn’t like Jonathan
    b) Ryke will have a six-week-long recovery process and…
    c) That’s only if there aren’t complications. I’ve personally never seen Ryke bed-ridden or told to lie down.
    It seems out of his character.
    Ryke shrugs. “I just want to get it fucking over with.”
    “Ohmygod! Ohmygod!” Lily races into the kitchen from the living room, a black Halway Comics sweatshirt stopping at her thighs. Daisy somehow remains asleep, but Ryke watches her closely, ignoring his brother’s wife who bounds towards us like she’s on an urgent mission.
    Lily has a tablet in hand, waving it around as if no one notices its presence.
    I immediately reach for my phone…that I left in my bedroom. I usually always have it on me, but I didn’t expect to be in the kitchen this long.
    Lily is mainly focused on me, mutually ignoring Ryke, and in seconds, she accidentally rams into his bare chest. When she raises her head, she absorbs his shirtless, toned body, realizing he’s only in his underwear. She glances at her own sparse attire.
    Really,