Chapter Eighteen
“You have such good natural light here,” Claire says, stepping deeper into my apartment. The afternoon sunlight streaks through the large window and stretches across my “herringbone” floor; the floor apparently has a name according to her.
I watch her catalog my home’s deficiencies with the same meticulous focus Petra uses when explaining why my arabesque looks like I’m trying to escape from a swarm of bees.
“I believe natural light is a good thing, right?”
She glances back with a smirk. “It’s a great thing. It makes up for the fact that your furniture is completely ignoring the architecture of this place.”
“Petra mentioned something similar.”
“I bet she did,” Claire nods. “She has good instincts—just different ones. But I can already see what this place could be.”
She steps back, her hand sweeping through the air like she’s conducting an orchestra only she can hear.
“We need to create balance. Right now, everything is pushed against the walls, which makes it feel…unfinished. Your coffee table is too small for the space. The couch placement is fine, but you need a statement chair, something to ground the seating area. And you need texture. Right now, everything is just…flat.”
“Flat, huh?”
“Yeah. We need a mix of materials—wood, metal, and different fabrics to give it life. And I know you’re a ‘function first’ guy, so nothing too decorative. But warmth. You need warmth.”
Her gaze lands on my nearly empty bookshelf.
“You own, like, four books.”
“Hey, those are hand-selected paperbacks…from my mom.”
Claire snorts. “Sure they are.” She turns back to the wall like it personally offends her. “You need some art. Something personal. What’s the best hockey game you’ve ever played?”
The question catches me off guard. “Game four of the conference finals, two years ago. Scored the game-winner in overtime.”
She snaps her fingers. “There. That’s what you need—a framed photo from that moment, the celebration. Something that actually matters to you. Not just a generic team poster or a jersey in a frame.”
Then she starts rattling off items: textured throws, statement lighting, layered rugs. It’s the same total immersion Petra has when discussing choreography, that complete understanding of how things are meant to exist together.
I blink. “You’re good at this.”
“It’s what I love.”
She turns back to me, head tilted in a way that means trouble. “So…I hear your pirouettes are something to behold.”
I groan, rubbing my face. “Petra already gave you the rundown?”
“She might have mentioned your ‘training.’”
I shake my head but can’t fight the pride creeping into my voice. “Under Petra’s guidance, yeah. I had to rebuild myself, get my strength and mobility back. Hockey workouts get you strong, but ballet makes you powerful in a different way.”
“And you actually like it?”
“Let’s just say I have a lot more respect for what Petra does now. And a lot more ballet slippers in my closet than I ever thought I’d have.”
Claire laughs. “I can’t wait to see you play while I’m here. Petra says you’re finally back at full speed.”
My expression does something I can’t control, probably revealing too much. “It’s getting there. But game speed is something else. It’s one thing to feel ready; it’s another to actually compete and be a difference-maker out there.”
She studies me with eyes that see too much for someone her age. “You will be.”
The certainty in her voice is both reassuring and slightly unnerving.
We keep talking about ballet, hockey, design, and her plans for New York domination. She lists restaurants she wants to try and furniture stores she’s already scouted for inspiration.
Then she goes silent, retracts, and the mood shifts.
She lingers near the couch, fingers tracing the armrest seams as if she’s reading braille for bad news. It’s the same absent tracing her sister performs when something is gnawing at her. Her gaze goes unfocused in that way that means an internal crisis is brewing.
“Something wrong?” I ask.
Silence ensues. The bad kind.
I tilt my head, watching her closely. “You have the same mannerisms as Petra when she’s trying to hide something but also kind of wants to tell me something.”
I step closer, concern overriding my usual policy of not invading private space. “Claire?”
Her voice drops to barely a whisper, like the words might break if she says them too loudly. “I have a confession.”
“Okay…” I say. “Should we wait till Petra gets back with our lunch? She shouldn’t be much longer.”
Claire exhales sharply, hands squeezing together like they’re trying to hold her together. “No,” she says. “It’s something I can’t tell her, just you.”
“Is everything okay, Claire?”
“I didn’t actually get accepted to Parsons.”
The words hang in the air.
I blink, once, twice. “Wait. What?”
“I made it up.” Her voice trembles like a building about to collapse. “The whole thing. The acceptance letter, the plans…all of it.”
“Why would you—?”
And then she breaks.
“Petra was really going to leave,” she says, her words tumbling out like they’d been held back by a dam that just cracked.
“And after we lost our dad, the idea of her being a plane ride away in New York was hard enough. But halfway across the world? Across an ocean? In a different country, time zones away, where I couldn’t even just call her whenever I needed her? ”
She shakes her head, and I see it now—not the confident teenager redesigning my life, but a kid who’s lost too much already and fears losing even more.
“I thought if I could just keep her here long enough, she’d realize she didn’t need to go. That she was meant to stay. I just…I just couldn’t lose her too.”
The weight of her words settles over me. Because haven’t I been there? Haven’t I just spent days terrified of losing Petra too, ready to do anything to make her stay?
Then something else occurs to me: “But your mom…what does she know? Wouldn’t she have to start dealing with the tuition bills?”
“I told her I got accepted too…that I got a scholarship and would work part-time so she wouldn’t have to worry about paying anything.”
Claire wipes the tears from her face with the frustrated gesture of someone who hates crying but can’t stop. “I know it was wrong. I know I should have just told them how I felt instead of lying. But I panicked. And now I don’t know how to fix it.”
My hands find her shoulders with the awkward gentleness of someone who doesn’t usually do comfort in these situations but is trying anyway.
She sniffles, meeting my gaze with those eyes that look so much like Petra’s when she’s hurting.
I squeeze lightly, channeling every motivational speech I’ve ever ignored. “You made a mistake. But you did it because you love your sister.”
She nods rapidly, lips pressed together like they’re holding back an avalanche of emotion.
I sigh, rubbing my face because this is way above my pay grade but somehow my problem now. “We’ll figure this out.”
“You say that like it’s fixable.”
“Everything’s fixable.”
It’s a lie, of course. Some things break and stay broken. Some mistakes reshape everything that comes after. But standing here in my aesthetically-challenged apartment with my girlfriend’s little sister who just confessed to an elaborate fraud, I realize sometimes the lie is kinder than the truth.
“We’ll figure this out. It’s gonna be okay, I promise. I’m gonna help you get this sorted out.”
“You will?”
“Of course. I’m here, and I’m gonna help you.” I embrace her as she stifles a sob.
“And please don’t say anything to Petra,” she says.
“I won’t.”
“Thank you,” she breathes out, unsteady.
Don’t thank me yet, I think. We’ve got work to do.
Because now I’m not just the guy dating her sister. I’m the guy who knows the secret that could detonate everything. The guy who has to help an eighteen-year-old navigate the minefield she created out of love and fear and the very human inability to let go of the people who matter.
My apartment might be flat, my furniture might be ignoring architecture, and my bookshelves might be a monument to literary failure. But at least those are fixable with some throw pillows, recessed lighting, and a few trips to IKEA.
This? This is going to require a different kind of reconstruction entirely.
And I thought learning how to pirouette was complicated.