6. Archie
Archie
I don’t bother with the pull-up handle on Piper’s big bag. I’ve already embarrassed myself once in front of her today, and I was witness to the karmic powers of that handle. Piper got her reward for laughing at me, but who knows what I have in store for the many wrongs I’ve done to her?
And now I’ve got the scene of Piper tripping over her skirt replaying in my head, along with the part where I got a brief glimpse of her leopard-print undies.
I try to push it away, but nope, that image is burned into my brain.
Not because I got a thrill from it or anything.
She’s my annoying stepsister— ex-stepsister, anyway.
Well, almost. We’ve never really been family to each other, but I still couldn’t look at her that way.
I just like animal prints. That’s it.
“I’ll show you where you can stay.” My eyes volley around the room out of fear that my face will give away what I’m thinking. My focus lands on the big suitcase I’m helping with, but when I lift it, an “oof” escapes. How can someone so little own anything this heavy?
My eyes dart to Piper’s. Her quick grin tells me she heard it.
“Did you pack bricks to remind you of New York?” I hold the bag closer, pretending it doesn’t weigh half a ton as I carry it up the steep wood staircase.
“Those are my shoes,” she says behind me. “I have a lot of them.”
Good to know, since I’ll probably be carrying them back downstairs tomorrow.
I don’t want Piper to stay. I’m only relieving my guilty conscience by allowing this at all. It’s raining, and she has nowhere to go because of me—just like Dex and Britta soon won’t. If the list of people I’ve evicted gets any longer, I can add shady landlord to my resume.
And I can’t quit thinking about what she said. Forsythes’ whims screwing up other people’s lives…stay in your privileged bubble…actions have consequences.
She didn’t say Malcolm’s whims. She meant mine, too. From her perspective, I’m as much to blame for this mess as Dad is. More so, maybe.
No one talks to me that way, and it makes me cross. But, as much as I hate to admit it, she’s not wrong. I had no idea Piper would be showing up today, of course, but I haven’t once cared how my decision to put off deeding the house back to Dad would affect Cynthia.
When I reach the top of the stairs, Piper is still near the bottom, hugging her bag to her chest as she attempts to navigate the steps in her skirt and pull up the smaller suitcase.
Since I’m already aware of the problems that skirt can cause, I leave the big suitcase and hurry down the stairs and take the smaller one from her.
I wave her ahead of me, which is a huge mistake.
My eyes keep drifting to where the leopard print is hiding under her skirt.
“Nice picture.” She points to a framed “Surf City High” promotional poster hanging in the stairwell. There’s a tease in her voice.
The picture is embarrassing. “Dad—or Sybil, more likely—had it hung during the first season when we all lived here together. Dunno why I haven’t taken it down.”
At the top of the stairs, she turns to me, her face open and curious. “Why would you take it down? Doesn’t it bring back good memories?”
I consider her question and whether to answer it honestly.
It sort of feels like telling the truth might set me up somehow, but lying about it feels petty, seeing as how we’ve called a truce for the night.
“Yeah, it does. Those were good days, living with my mates, still able to surf big waves…” I nod at the poster. “Being famous for a living.”
I don’t often get nostalgic about “Surf City High , ” but with Dex married and in Fiji, Rhys on tour, and Frankie basically in hiding, I reckon I miss being a part of something. We moved in here right after Mum and Dad got divorced, and Rhys and Dex became family to Frankie and me.
“Famous for a living? That’s how you think of your time on the show? Not as a surfer or an actor?”
Piper has always had a way of asking direct questions, but it seems less annoying now. Or maybe I’m just more mature.
Or maybe I’m that lonely.
“Let’s be honest,” I say, giving her a small smile and cocking my head to the side.
“I wasn’t much of an actor. And once my collective injuries knocked me out of competition level sport, I wasn’t much of a surfer either.
The only reason I was on the show in the first place—or that there was a show at all—is because Dad bankrolled it to make his kids famous. Everyone knows that.”
I scoot past Piper and roll her bags toward Frankie’s old room, which seems the best option.
Dex and Britta have been staying in the primary suite, and I’m in the same room I stayed in during the show.
She follows close behind, a tentative peace settling between us.
It’s preferable to fighting, but I’m not quite sure what to do with it.
For as many times as Dad talked about Piper being “my sister,” I never called her that. I didn’t even call her my stepsister. If I called her anything, it was my fake sister. I barely know her.
I know about her—at least up until she moved to New York four years ago, on Dad’s dime, of course, to fulfill the “ambitions” he was so impressed with. But I’ve never taken much interest in getting to know her .
So, the fact she’s asking questions that go deeper than just small talk is disconcerting.
Do I answer like an older brother? I’ve never been that.
Do I answer like we’re old friends catching up? Because we’re definitely not that either.
Do I answer like we’re friends now? At best, we’re acquaintances. For the moment, anyway.
Once Piper finds somewhere else to live, we probably won’t see each other again. Which, I think, is what we both want. We don’t mean anything to each other. I’m sure she feels the same way.
I wheel her bags inside Frankie’s room, where we’re both met with another giant promotional picture of me, Frankie, Dex, and Rhys.
“How many more Surf City posters should I expect?” Piper points at the photo, all of us holding surfboards, laughing like we’re having the time of our lives.
I look so young and it’s a little embarrassing to think how impressed I was by my success at the time.
Success that had little to do with me and was pretty short-lived.
The reality is, that shot took about a million takes and wasn’t the best time.
Dex was irritated he was missing the best waves of the week for a photo shoot; Rhys and Frankie had just broken up in real life but had to pretend they were still a couple for the show, which was a hundred shades of awkward.
I was starving because I was on a protein diet to build muscle, and the only food the crew had brought that day was donuts.
“That’s the last one. I promise.”
“You sure? I want to be prepared so I don’t fangirl too hard over Rhys every time I’m met with a life-size poster of him.” Her sarcasm is back. “Seeing as how I’m madly in love with him.”
Honestly, I deserve her sarcasm for all the times I teased about having a massive crush on Rhys James. Even in front of him one time. That was a jerk move I’d take back if I could.
The fact is, I was never very nice to Piper, and she obviously hasn’t forgotten. I don’t blame her. I’ve got no excuse for making her life miserable when our parents married. But I don’t have to make it miserable now. I’m a grown man. I can be better.
I let go of her suitcase. My hand hurts from squeezing the handle. “Why don’t you plan to stay the weekend? I’ll keep out of your way, and you can take the time to make other arrangements. I know this isn’t your fault.”
Piper studies me like she’s digging for an ulterior motive to my offer, or maybe a reason to refuse. When she doesn’t find one, she nods with a quiet, “thank you.”
I scoot past her with an apologetic grin.
It doesn’t make up for the past decade, but what would?
I can’t go back in time, and once I sign the deed to this house back to Dad, Piper and I aren’t forced family anymore.
There’s no sense in cultivating a relationship at this point.
I just want to feel like I’ve done right by her for once.