“You can’t make me.”
“Nessa, I swear to god—"
“Alright, you folks are next,” the man at the door calls, waving us in. Nessa reluctantly stalks in, a fake smile plastered to her face. She won’t even glance my way as we get seated at a swanky table off to the side of the room. The place is low-lit, bougie, and playing soft jazz music in the background.
Fucking pretentious.
I sit down in the too-small chair across from my sister who already has her nose buried in the menu. She’s stubborn, probably needs to eat something in order to be reasonable, so I resign myself to flipping through the booklet set before me.
I’ll admit, the food here doesn’t look too bad. Nothing is foamed or moleculed or whatever the fuck it is they do with food these days. I’m relieved that I understand what’s on here.
When the waiter comes around, Nessa orders a bottle of wine for the table and lists off a few appetizers. One of the perks of going with a reviewer is that we get a wide selection without having to consider price since it’s almost always comped.
I would never say it, but it’s my favourite part of going out with her, second only to actually spending time with my sister.
The two are neck and neck if I’m being honest.
Nessa pulls out her notebook and starts jotting things down. I don’t care that it’s a part of what she’s here to do, right now she’s using it as an excuse to be an asshole.
“Nessa, we need to talk about what happened.” She slaps her pen onto the table.
“And what exactly would you like to talk about, brother dearest?” she asks in a snide tone. “You banging my bestie behind my back? Or our parents choosing you over me once again?”
“Nessa, you know that’s not how it went down.”
“I don’t know that that’s a thing that I know,” she says obstinately.
“Stop quoting chick flicks at me and listen,” I demand in my best big brother voice. Nessa rolls her eyes, crossing her arms as she leans back in her chair.
“The floor is yours, buttwipe.”
“Real mature,” I say, flipping her off as subtly as I can in the packed restaurant. The waiter chooses that moment to drop off our wine and appetizers. We put in our main course orders, and, sensing the tension, he promptly scurries off.
“Nessa, you need to know that Stella and I didn’t want to keep anything from you,” I start, only to be cut off.
“Bullshit!” she shouts, attracting the attention of the table next to us. They glare our way. A pointed look from me has them finding their menus suddenly very interesting. “You could have told me about the two of you at any time. Youchosenot to,” she accuses.
“You’re half right,” I admit. “Will you let me explain?” She thinks about it before huffing and sweeping her arm out in front of her.
“Whatever.”
“Great. First of all, we didn’t intend for this to happen.”
“When did it even start?”
“Can you not interrupt me?” She makes a zipping motion across her lips. “We met the night of her birthday. You brought her to the bar while I was playing, ditched her, and we bumped into each other. Neither of us knew who the other was. When we realized the connection, we stopped.
“When the snowstorm hit, she ended up staying with me,” I take a deep breath. “We clicked. We had a lot of fun.” Nessa snorts at that. “We played games, watched TV, and ate.Ihad fun,” I say, my voice getting quiet. “I hadn’t hung out with anyone like that in… well, ever. I never had that with Beth. Icertainly didn’t with any of my hookups. We knew it was a bad idea. We never wanted to hurt you. The pull between us was irresistible. We said it would be one time, and for a while it was. I can’t stay away from her,” I admit. I look up at her broken expression.
“You promised,” her voice cracks.
“I did, and I shouldn’t have.” She can’t mask her shock and hurt. “It wasn’t fair to either of us to promise that, Nessa. I want to look out for you, and I have always done my best, but I’m a person, too. I’m your big brother, and you will always be a priority, and I don’t think you believe that I would ever do anything to intentionally hurt you.”
“I know,” she grumbles, tears building in her eyes. “But you couldn’t even talk to me about it?”
“You’ve been… a little erratic lately,” I confess.
“I have not!”
