31. June #2
I sit on the edge of his bed and tell him. I describe the fight, the things my brother said that I can’t stop replaying, the shove. Dorien sits next to me with his knee pressed against mine. He doesn’t interrupt, just listens.
“He’s never done that before,” I say. “The yelling is normal for us because we bicker, but he’s never pushed me. And his face… he looked like he scared himself as much as he scared me.”
Dorien takes my hand and his touch is comforting. I’ve noticed he hasn’t been wearing gloves lately. “He’s going through something,” he says carefully. “Don’t we all do that sometimes? Go through shit and shutdown.”
“I guess, but he won’t even talk to me a little. Every time I try he snaps and then I just…” I let the sentence trail off. The ending is too honest: and then I come running to you instead of staying and fighting for my brother’s attention.
Guilt is a familiar companion.
“Everything feels… off,” I say. “You and me, this is so good that it scares me. But is it weird that we finally start something and then Aeron retreats? Because every time something good happens between us, someone nearby pays for it. We had that perfect moment in the rain yesterday. Then today my brother puts his hands on me for the first time in our lives.”
Dorien is quiet. Then the words leave him slowly, like they’re draining his energy. “I’ve been worried too. That us being happy takes something from others.”
“What if it does?”
He turns my hand over in his, tracing the viridian paint smudge on my index finger from this morning’s work.
“It feels bad but also sounds like that can’t possibly be real.
Maybe that’s only what the trauma taught us,” he says.
“To believe that being together is dangerous. But thoughts are liars. The worst ones are the most convincing because they come from inside you, so they know exactly what hurts the most.”
I lean into him, my forehead pressing against his shoulder.
“I think Aeron is dealing with other things not related to us,” Dorien says. “Last month he asked me about dating.”
I lift my head. “What do you mean?”
“I think he had a crush on someone. He asked where he should take a girl. But when he asked her, she rejected him.”
“Who?”
“He didn’t say.”
I return my head to Dorien’s shoulder and think about what he’s just revealed. As far as I know, Aeron has only ever had a crush on Cinna. But if he had asked her out or something, she definitely would’ve told me.
Now I feel even more sick and guilty because my brother had a crush on someone else and I had no idea. Getting rejected, probably for the first time in his life since he’s never asked a girl out—that I know of—is really painful. That makes sense why he’s extra withdrawn lately.
“This is kinda off topic,” I start, wrapping my arms around his waist and squeezing, still struggling to believe this thing between us is real. “But I’m worried about telling Cinna. About us, I mean.”
He strokes my hair. “Why? She’s your best friend.”
“Eh, well…” Might as well say it. “She has a crush on you.”
He pulls back to stare down at me. “What? No she doesn’t.”
“I know you think she’s maybe flirty with everyone because she’s done it a few times with Carter. But no. She’s only flirted with Carter to make flirting with you less obvious.”
He’s shocked, I can tell, because he’s gaping at the towel covering the door mirror. “Merde,” he finally says.
“Whatever that means. You still need to teach me some French.” His mother is French, so he grew up speaking some of it alongside English. And since it’s a romance language, that’s all I want him to speak now. He sounds so sexy when he does it.
“Qu’est-ce que tu vas faire pour ton ami?”
I have no clue what he said but I melt against him.
He smiles and kisses my forehead. “What are you going to do about Cinna?”
The thought of her face when she finds out makes my stomach fold in on itself.
I pray she’ll be supportive the way she’s always been, that she’ll squeeze my hand and tell me she’s happy for us.
Cinna has always been the one who shows up for me, no questions asked.
But there’s a version of this where she smiles and says it’s fine, and then slowly pulls away until our friendship fades.
I don’t want to hurt her or lose her. This thing with Dorien wasn’t planned.
It happened, and maybe it was always going to happen, but that doesn’t erase what it might cost.
“I’ll talk to her before Thanksgiving.” Once Carter knows we’re official, the entire world will know within the hour. Cinna deserves to hear it from me first.
“Good,” he says before kissing me.
We shift on the narrow twin, lying back together. We manage to both fit because I curl against his side and his arm wraps around me. My head rests on his chest. I listen to his steady heartbeat while his fingers trace lazy circles on my shoulder.
“This is nice,” I say, watching a strip of tea-colored light from the window fall across his stomach.
“I love you,” he says.
The words penetrate the quiet, and me, and my eyes sting. I lift my head to look at him and his face is completely open and honest.
In my heart, all this time, I realized I’ve only ever wanted to tell him, “I love you too.”
So I say it and he pulls me closer with a handsome grin. I press my face into his neck and the tears come, just a few.
We stay like that on his tiny bed, my body tucked against him, his arm holding me close. And I let myself believe that love is stronger than anything.