He pulled out a roll of twenties out of his pocket. A thick roll at that. The medical salve Alex needed was around ten bucks for two weeks…

But my alpha didn’t like this guy at all. Even now, it stayed deep in the darkness, watching him carefully and avoiding his alpha. And I didn’t like this guy any more than it did…

“Why would you want me in on it? It would mean less money to you,” I noted.

“Trust me, there’s more of this where it’s coming from. They have a lot of things going on in this city, and we can’t be everywhere at once. Some gigs require a bigger crowd, too. So? Interested?”

I peered at the money. It sounded so easy…

“Who are these friends of yours?” I asked.

He snorted, still smiling, and put the money away. “Look. If you’re not interested, you’re not interested. I get it. I’ll just go ask someone else.”

I gritted my teeth together when he turned his back on me and headed to his seat.

“Maybe I am,” I said before I could stop myself. “I don’t have to decide right now, right?”

He glanced at me over his shoulder, then smiled. “Of course not. We can talk another time. Go help your little brother.”

I nodded and hurried to find the water bottles in Helga’s hut. Once I had them, I headed back home.

Alex was still awake and still sniffing under his small blanket, trying to get warm when I returned. He didn’t move, and he didn’t look up at me when I sat next to him.

“I got us some water. You should drink a little,” I told him.

He slowly reached for the bottle I was holding, but didn’t drink. He just stared into nothingness in front of him. He looked like he was just about to lose his mind. The itching was driving him into lunacy, and I feared I was going to lose him. I feared he was going to kill himself just to get away from it…

I couldn’t lose him…

“Look… I know it’s scary, but maybe we should go see a doc–”

“No!” he shouted and sprung up, his eyes filled with fear and desperation. He grabbed me by my wrists with tears streaming down again. “No. Please. I’m fine. I can deal with it. The weather is already getting better! Please, I don’t want to–”

“Okay, okay, okay,” I said soothingly, freeing myself from his grip so I could take his hands in mine. “It’s okay. We’ll just figure things out on our own.”

His breathing was still rapid, but he was calming down now. His eyes were still tense, but the desperation and fear were fading.

“You know what they’ll do if we go there…” he whispered and sniffed hard.

“Maybe they won’t break us apart,” I tried, even though that was my biggest fear as well. It just hurt to see him in so much pain and agony… “We can ask them not to tell anyone, and–”

“No,” he said almost angrily now. “I’m not taking that risk.”

I breathed out and decided to let it go. “Okay. No doctors.”

“No doctors,” he said sternly.

I nodded and hugged him gently. “I won’t let them take away from me. I promise.”

“Same…” he whispered against my shoulder.

I held him for a moment longer, then gently pushed him back. I smiled at him reassuringly and gave the water bottle back to him. “Drink.”

“You drink first,” he said in his stubborn way.

I chuckled and obeyed his little highness. Once I’d had a couple of big gulps, I gave the bottle to him.

“Your turn.”

He didn’t drink much, which concerned me. We hadn’t had much to drink today, because the water in the two sources we had in a walking distance had been dirty after the storms, and the stores that usually let us use their toilets had been closed for the day. We had tried to beg for money, but there weren’t a lot of people we could’ve asked, so we only got maybe six bucks. We needed to save that for his salve, since it was running out. But he needed to drink… Especially with his condition, he needed a lot more fluids than just a couple of sips…

“Try to drink a little more. I’ll try to find us dry clothes in the meantime,” I told him and stood up to check our clothes. They were all damp… I did find a somewhat dry shirt and pants for him and told him to change his clothes. There wasn’t anything dry enough for me, but it was fine. He needed dry clothes more with his condition.

Once he wasn’t wearing the wet clothes anymore, I kneeled back down, grabbed the small, almost empty tube of salve, a somewhat clean towel, and the water bottle. I told him to lie still and brace himself. Then I tried to brace myself and started treating his wounds the best I could. It wasn’t anywhere near enough… I couldn’t get all the dirt out of the deep crevices in his dry skin. There wasn’t nearly enough salve to treat all of them, either, and the ones I had to use it on only got an extremely thin layer of it.

His skin had always been bad. He’d always been itchy and flaky and bleeding lightly here and there, but this past week with the constant storms had really fucked him up. I feared it would only keep getting worse… Maybe we needed to go see a doctor…

But I was afraid, too… He was my brother. Not my flesh and blood, obviously, but he was my little brother, and I loved him more than anything in this world. If we went to the doctor or any other government worker… They’d take Alex away from me. They’d take him away and put me back in the system…

We just had to deal with this… The weather was getting better…

And if that guy from earlier had been telling me the truth, and he could help me earn some easy money… That would help us so much…

“There we go,” I told Alex once I was done treating his wounds. “Try to get some sleep.”

He was in so much pain after I’d poked around his wounds that he could only nod with his eyes pressed shut. I carefully tucked him in after he curled up on his tiny mattress and wished him goodnight.

“Goodnight…” he whispered back, his voice weak.

I put the bottles and the cloth away, then sat down on my own bed. I didn’t lie down just yet… I just watched him as he tried to make himself comfortable. He wasn’t trying to scratch now, so I hoped the salve was helping. I just wished I could do more for him… I wanted to be a better big brother to him… Because it was entirely my fault that his life was like this… Yet…

Yet he wanted to stay with me…

Eventually, my own weak body couldn’t stay seated up anymore, so I lay down. I couldn’t stretch my feet because there was no room, so I lifted them up against the wall instead. After a while, I started feeling uncomfortable, so I curled up on my side. I still couldn’t close my eyes, though… Alex was in front of me, shivering under his thin blanket… I was cold, too, but it broke my heart seeing him so miserable as he was falling asleep, so I took my blanket, put it over him, and grabbed a drying hoodie for myself instead before curling back down.

Alex slowly stopped shivering, and he soon passed out from exhaustion. I promised him and myself to go find us food, water, salve, and bandages tomorrow. I’d steal them if I had to. We weren’t looters, and normally I despised them for stealing from people and shops that were struggling enough as it was, and now more than ever for all the chaos they had caused lately, but… If I didn’t do everything in my power to help my brother… I feared Alex would actually go insane and do something horrible to himself… I couldn’t lose him…

He was the only person I had left in this war-torn world…

I closed my eyes, trying to force myself to fall asleep. I was so tired I thought I could easily pass out, too, but no… My misery kept me awake… And I could still hear them… The three alphas at the center of our village… They were still drinking, laughing, and having fun…

I couldn’t stop thinking about that roll of money… 

And before I could stop myself, I got up, crawled out of our hut, and headed back to where they were sitting. They fell silent when they spotted me, and watched me closely when I sat down on a block of bricks, and laid my eyes on their leader. He raised his eyebrows at me in amusement.

I still didn’t like him at all… But I needed to take care of my brother… So I tried to silence my doubts and took a deep breath…

“What do you want me to do?”