Title: Socks

Author: FraidyCat

Disclaimer: Don't own 'em.

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Don balanced his laundry basket on one hip and let him in the front door of the Eppes house.

Stupid laundry room in the apartment building only had two washers, and two dryers — and today, one of each was broken. It was unfair enough that a Saturday boasting perfect fall weather be spent on domestic chores. It was an added insult that he couldn't even get those done.

He plopped the mail be had taken from the metal box beside the door on the table kept in the entry for that purpose, then called out. His Dad's car was gone, so chances were, his father was, too. Charlie's car was here, but since no one answered his shout, he figured his brother had either gone for a bike ride in this great weather, or was with his Dad.

Don walked through the living and dining rooms into the kitchen, and to the laundry room beyond. He separated lights and darks and tried to resign himself to wasting the day. At least his Dad had ESPN — maybe he could find a college game, somewhere.

He checked the pockets of a pair of jeans before he put them in the washing machine and corrected his thinking. Charlie had ESPN. Don could not get used to this house being his brother's now. It didn't look any different to the naked eye, but it…seemed wrong, somehow. He wondered if he had the whole house thing mixed up with the fact that his mother had been gone for two years now, and his Dad was taking steps to move on.

Or at least, he was trying to. Poor Alan. First, he decides to sell the house and downsize, and Charlie won't let him. Don still felt a little annoyance at how that had worked out. So Charlie wanted to buy the house — fine, it was a good investment. But he behaved as if their father automatically came with it, like the kitchen appliances, or something. From where he stood, Don had seen an assumption on Charlie's part that Alan would keep living there, keep taking care of him. And so far, during these first few months, he had.

But Don could see him taking other small steps, and he wondered how long that would last. He was working part-time again, running an engineering consulting business with his old friend, Stan.

Then, there was The Caterer. Before he sold the house to Charlie, Alan had let an old friend of the family use it for her wedding. At the event — almost five months ago, now — he had found some connection with the woman hired to cater the reception. He invited her to join his book club, flirted with her a few months, and now was seeing her. As in, "seeing" her. Don hadn't quite been prepared for that, but he knew that it would happen, eventually — his Dad was still a vital man, and he was the kind of man who wasn't happy alone. So Don had come when Alan asked him, to a dinner out with The Caterer.

Charlie had been there, too, and he had not been…anything. He couldn't really be accused of being rude, but he was definitely not friendly, either. He was out of the restaurant before they had all finished dessert. Later, and ever since, he had refused to talk to Don about the fact that their father was dating, again. Maybe Charlie was through with "P vs NP", but it seemed to Don that his brother still had an unsolvable problem. He was trying to preserve the things that made him feel safe — the house, his father — under a layer of evasive maneuvers.

He added detergent to the machine, closed the lid and wandered back into the kitchen. He grabbed a beer from the refrigerator and was going to go back into the living room, to search for that game on ESPN, when he stepped into an especially warm ray of sun, streaming through the kitchen window. Screw it, he thought, popping the beer and taking a swig. I'm not blowing a day like this in front of the television. I can at least go out by the koi pond for awhile.

Opening the kitchen door and stepping outside, Don was surprised to see Charlie already at the koi pond. He was sitting cross-legged on the ground facing the water, and seemed to be concentrating on something in his lap. Don crossed the lawn and stood over him, sipping the beer. He saw at least a dozen socks, strung along the grass and Charlie's lap. His brother was painstakingly threading a needle, deep in concentration.

"What are you doing?"

Charlie's head whipped up, his hand jerked, and he jabbed the needle into a finger. "Shit! Geez, Don!" He looked back at his finger, regarded the drop of blood there. "Don't sneak up on a guy like that!" He stuck the finger in his mouth.

"That's disgusting, Charlie," Don observed, lowering himself to the ground.

Charlie took out his finger, wiped it on his jeans and refocused on the needle and thread. "What are you doing here?"

"Laundry. Machine's still busted at the apartment building. What are you doing?"

Charlie smiled as he triumphantly threaded the needle at last. "Darning Dad's socks."

Don paused, bottle halfway to his mouth. "Really? I didn't know you did that sort of thing."

Charlie picked up another sock. "Yeah. Neither does Dad, so don't tell him."

Don thought about that, lowering the bottle. "What do you mean? How can Dad not know? How does he think those holes disappear?"

Charlie shrugged. "Maybe he thinks socks grow. Or it's lint from the dryer, or something."

"I don't get it. If Dad didn't ask you to darn his socks, why are you doing it?"

Charlie carefully tied a knot. "Mom asked me to."

Don set the bottle on the grass and moved his gaze from the sock to Charlie's face. "What?"

Charlie felt his eyes and looked at him. He looked solidly at Don for a second — just a second, and Don felt as if he had seen a secret.

When Charlie didn't answer and looked back at the sock, he took a guess. "Mom asked you to take care of him, didn't she?"

Charlie seemed to hesitate, but finally nodded his head. He spoke, sadly. "I don't think I'm doing a very good job. It's too much of a role reversal. He wants to take care of me, all the time."

Don watched Charlie, sitting in the late afternoon sun of a fall afternoon at the edge of the koi pond, darning Alan's socks. He felt the solid house behind them, and wondered what else Charlie had done, privately, and quietly, and sadly, for their father. Maybe the evasive manuevers had not all been about preserving his own equilibrium.

He draped an arm over Charlie's shoulders and squeezed. Charlie looked at him, surprised, and Don smiled. "I think you're doing a great job," he said.

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FINIS