Two
Mia
Present Day
My sister throws open the front door of her apartment and pulls me into a hug. “Thanks for showing up.”
The silky bonnet covering Kim’s curls brushes my cheek, and when she pulls away, I can’t help but notice her moving-day outfit
of cotton shorts and a T-shirt with the mascot of the high school where she was just hired as assistant principal is nearly
identical to the writer-on-deadline style she teases me about.
We share the same brown complexion that deepens in summertime, a blend of our parents’ heritage. Our mom is white, with thin,
straight hair, while my sister and I inherited Dad’s tight, springy curls—Kim’s hair is nearly black, and mine is a warm,
deep brown. Our aunt and cousins taught us how to do our hair when we were kids, and my sister has rocked a short natural
style for the past few years, but I like to change things up more often.
“Yeah, well, you can repay me by being my assistant at the book convention in August. You’re still free that weekend, right?” She often helps me at summer events, since until earlier this year, she was an English teacher and had summers off.
“The back-to-school picnic with parents is the following weekend, so I can definitely make it.” Turning, she weaves her way
through the stacks of boxes filling the hall, pausing by the arched entrance to the kitchen. “Where’s Gavin?”
“Circling the block, trying to find a spot big enough to fit his pickup.” I kick off my sandals. “Where are you planning to
park the moving van with all the festival traffic?” Prompted by Kim’s raised brows, I sigh and position my shoes neatly by
the door. “Because my offer to hire professional movers still stands.” Both of us are frugal, but with the huge success of
my latest series-turned-hit-show, I have more than enough for a comfortable living and would much rather spend money on loved
ones than myself.
It’s the first time neither of our parents is around to help, since Dad recently remarried and moved to Virginia, where the
woman he’d had an online-dating relationship with for several years lives. Not long after I graduated college, Mom left Chicago
for a dream job. They both made career and relationship sacrifices during our childhood to stay in the city and keep our homelife
stable because of shared custody, and I don’t begrudge them taking their happiness where they find it now, but I do miss seeing
them more often.
“Ted would hate that,” she says. He claims taking favors from family leads to tension, but my theory is his conscience won’t
let him be beholden to me after what went down all those years ago.
“I’m not worried about what Ted would hate.” I don’t feel any kind of way toward Ted, not anymore, but I don’t like having
to take him into consideration when helping out my sister.
The front door opens behind me, and I turn to find my former friend, current brother-in-law wheeling a dolly into the condo.
Sunglasses are shoved into his over-gelled crew cut, and his polo is tight enough to draw attention.
If I wrote him into one of my books, readers would guess from page one that he wasn’t the love interest. Too bad twenty-one-year-old me didn’t get the memo.
“Good to see you, Mia,” he says.
I give him our customary half hug of greeting, a gesture that used to feel second nature but has long since become cursory.
Patting his shoulder, I immediately regret it when my palm comes back damp.
He plucks at his shirt with an apologetic wince. “Scorcher out there today.” Another reason why Kim owes me one. Hauling around
boxes in summer heat is not my idea of a good time.
Pretty sure what they’re really interested in is Gavin’s pickup, not my help, since Ted’s friends are coming over to handle
the heavy lifting. “We’ve boxed up most things,” he says. “But Kim didn’t trust me with the fragile stuff.”
Lord knows it took a while for me to trust Ted with anything fragile, least of all my sister’s heart. But I’ve been trying
to see the best in him ever since their wedding six years ago when she walked down the aisle to a man who had the nerve to
suggest I wear a tux and stand on the groom’s side since I was always “like one of the guys” so his sister could be a bridesmaid
without throwing off the numbers.
I head to the kitchen, expecting to pack up their glassware, but the cupboards are open and empty, so I’m not sure what he
meant by “fragile.”
Continuing past an equally cleared-out bathroom, I find Kim in the second bedroom that doubles as an office. She’s sitting
on a rolled-up rug, surrounded by stacks of books, and I smile. The sight brings back memories of our childhood spent reading
whenever and wherever we could.
I take a paperback off the pile nearest the door. “Fragile stuff, huh?”
“Some of these have been with me since before I could read,” she says, boxing up a clothbound copy of Little Women .
The shelf behind her is filled with copies of all the books I’ve written, the spines uncracked.
She’s purchased each and every edition, from the paperbacks to hardcovers with sprayed edges.
To keep them pristine, she only reads her favorites in ebook format. I like to joke that the driving force behind her move
from the classroom to an admin role was the horror of years spent witnessing high schoolers dog-ear the classics.
“You really trust me to handle these?” While Kim’s collection could earn top dollar in a secondhand bookshop, my most prized
books are coffee-stained and annotated, the pages splattered with water from reading by the pool, covers bent from being shoved
into a carry-on after nearly missing the boarding call in airport terminals.
But I’m as careful as an archivist with other people’s books, and Kim knows it. “I’ll just make you give me some of your author
copies if you ruin these.” She pushes a full box toward me, and I grab the packing tape from her desk to seal the lid. “But
I mostly wanted the company,” she says. “Ted’s a sweetheart, but he’s almost too helpful sometimes.”
That’s the rub. Ted is a nice guy. It’s why we were friends. It’s why, when I told her of his betrayal and she sheepishly admitted she’d always
kind of had a thing for him, I swallowed my hurt and gave my conditional blessing. I wanted her to be happy but also careful.
Warned her to be braced for him to throw her aside for someone else like he did with me.
To this day, I’m grateful I didn’t speak up about how hurt I was at the time. We never lost our close bond. Didn’t let a guy
come between us. In fact, she texted me after their first kiss, giddy with excitement, and I replied with a string of hearts.
But my next text was to Gavin, asking him to meet me at the grungy college bar that offered two-dollar pitchers. Over cheap
beer and a bowl of stale popcorn, I made him promise to never, ever, allow me to date a friend again.
To be clear , he’d asked. Am I your friend?
I hesitated, just long enough to wish I could say no.
Long enough for me to imagine how easily we could slip into something more, something with the potential to wreck me.
To realize how much of my heart I’d already lost to this man who’d texted me a running commentary while reading my manuscript in a single weekend.
Who’d carried me on his back over a slushy puddle on a freezing-cold walk to study at the library.
Who’d kicked off the night with a toast to Ted’s protein bars turning rancid and a second one to Frank’s good health.
Looking at Gavin, golden hair mussed from the beanie he’d pulled off and shoved in his coat pocket, cheeks flushed red from
the heat of a crowded bar, or maybe something else that I didn’t dare dwell on, I hesitated long enough to know I had to say
yes. It took all my effort to not wonder how his lips would feel on mine and instead say, I sure hope so , even though in that moment, I did not.
He’d raised his glass, scooting away, just a little, and said, To friendship. I’d clinked mine against his and swallowed down my regret. I’d made a decision to protect my heart. To make sure things stayed
like this between us, more sweet than bitter. It felt like an oath, and before long, keeping it became second nature.
As for my sister, month after month, year after year, Ted showed himself to be deeply in love with her. No hint of a wandering
eye. He treats Kim like the best thing to ever happen to him.
Which is why I upgraded my conditional blessing to wholehearted when they announced their engagement three years after they
started dating. But my friendship with Ted never recovered. He’ll always be the guy who kissed me while pining after my sister.
The first guy, though not the last, who taught me romance ruins friendship.
“I’ll take too nice any day.” I pull another box toward me. “Do you remember the dude I went out with who insisted on not getting out of his car until I opened the door for him? Called it reverse feminism.”
She makes a retching sound. “I’m so glad I never had to deal with dating apps.” She darts a concerned look at me, like always
when the subject of how she and Ted met comes up, and like always, I brush it off.
“It’s exhausting, which is why I’m taking a break. I’m good on my own for now.” Especially with a looming deadline for the
biggest book of my career.
“Hardly on your own,” she says, with a childish singsong lilt. “Ever think that having a best friend with movie-star good
looks might be making some guys hesitate about going all in?”
We’ve had a version of this conversation for nearly a decade. “Any guy who’s jealous of Gavin isn’t worth my time.”
“Agreed. But you two are so...” She flaps her hands, searching for the right word. “In sync.”
“That’s what happens when you’re friends with someone so long, and exactly why no one I date should feel threatened by him.
If we’d ever had feelings for each other, it would’ve come between us by now and he’d be long gone.”