After breakfast, Mr. Atkins drove me and Noah to Dr. Moore's office. This time the receptionist let us go in right away. Noah pulled me to the couch and we sat together as Mr. Atkins sat on the other side of Noah.
Dr. Moore smiled and greeted us warmly, "Welcome back." He looked at Noah. "You must be Noah? I've heard a lot about you."
Noah nudged me. "You talking crap on me already?"
I shook my head vigorously. Technically I didn't say anything. I pointed at Mr. Atkins to push the blame somewhere else.
Noah swung his head to face his dad. "Wow. Betrayal by my own dad. So what did you say? That I'm perfect? The best son? The worst? Youngest is a given. Hmmm."
Mr. Atkins rolled his eyes. "The most dramatic." He gave an apologetic smile to Dr. Moore. "Excuse Noah and his antics. He's....a bit....unique. One-of-a-kind."
"No, it's fine. It's alright. I did want a glimpse of their dynamic together so this is actually really great." Dr. Moore smiled and pushed his glasses up on his nose. "Noah, what do you think of Jake's inability to talk."
Noah sat up straight. "Inability? He can talk just fine."
"I know. I'm talking about his selective mutism. His inability to speak in social interactions?"
Noah squinted. "I don't have a problem with it. Jake and I talk often. He only struggles to talk to strangers now. Which is normal. Zeke doesn't like speaking to others and I don't see him sitting here in this office."
Dr. Moore looked to Mr. Atkins. "Zeke?"
Mr. Atkins gave a tight smile. "My oldest son. He's the strong but quiet type."
"How does he do in social environments?" Dr. Moore asked.
"He likes to stare at people and scare them away from talking to him." Noah muttered. I let out a little laugh. That was partly accurate. "Zeke doesn't speak much, but when he does, people listen. If I had to describe him in one word, it would be, overbearing."
Dr. Moore grabbed his notepad and wrote some things down. "And you, Jake? If you had one word to describe Zeke, what would you use?"
"Intimidating." I said clearly.
"Oh? In what way?" He continued.
I froze. Why was there suddenly a follow up question..? Noah didn't have to answer a follow up question. I tilted my head at Noah.
Noah sighed. "I'll go first. I find my older brother very overbearing. He's a tyrant on the baseball field. Number one in the county if you didn't know. He wants everyone on his level and just dominates the sport. It's hard to compete with that pressure even though we're on the same team. For example, this past weekend, we had a tournament and he won Most Valuable Player. You know what I got? An honorable mention. Even though I had so many great plays, it doesn't amount to Zeke's achievements."
Dr. Moore took notes. "Jake, do you think along the same lines?"
"Of course he doesn't." Noah laughed. "Jake is very similar to Zeke. He's really good at baseball too. He won the award for best underclassmen performance." Noah nudged me. "Go on. Tell him why you find Zeke intimidating."
I cleared my throat. "He's tall."
Noah laughed at Dr. Moore's stunned expression. "Keep going."
"He's older. Good at baseball." I mumbled.
Noah continued to laugh. "Come on. What's the main reason?"
I took a deep breath, and let out, "He makes me run laps."
Noah leaned back into the couch, laughing his head off. Mr. Atkins sheepishly ran his fingers through his hair. And Dr. Moore paused from his note-taking. I sat there awkwardly.
"The laps are apart of the baseball team." Mr. Atkins jumped in to explain. "I promise we're not abusing Jake. The baseball team has a system where they have to run laps for mistakes or for misbehaving. Jake and Noah run together."
Dr. Moore slowly nodded and started to write once more. "This is good. This is exactly what I wanted to see. When Jake came here last week with just you, he was stuttering. Noah really does give him a sense of comfort. But what I want to know...is why that didn't help yesterday?"
Noah looked unsure. "That's never happened before. Jake was fine. And then suddenly, he wasn't. He just clammed up and then decided it was nap time."
Dr. Moore nodded. Then focused on me. "Jake, how about you tell us in your own words what happened and what you felt? Just give us a rundown of the late stages of the game."
I nervously looked around the room to see them all staring at me, waiting. I couldn't remember much though. Just the feeling of being tired and weighed down like I might drown.
"Wasn't it something that was done or said?" Dr. Moore prodded.
I thought about it, trying to retrace my steps. I got a hit. Then Zeke got a hit. I was standing on third base, looking at him with amazement. He had gotten the cycle: a single, double, triple, and homerun in one game. It was impressive. Impressive enough for his mom to cheer super loud and say with pride, 'that's my son.'
A phrase no one would say about me.
"Did you figure it out?" Noah asked. He was studying my face closely as if it was a textbook.
I gave a small nod, but didn't say anything. How could I put my feelings into words when I was feeling a multitude of things?