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“Cute,” the girl says, gesturing between Kristin and me. “If you two copulate, I’m calling Pampers to tell them I know where their next baby model is coming from.”
“Friend of yours?” I ask Kristin.
Kristin sighs. “Sister.”
Sister?
Disbelieving, I look more closely at the chocolate-munching creature.
Instead of Kristin’s smooth dark ponytail, this one’s hair is a mass of wild curls, sort of gold and brown, and maybe some red.
She’s got the same big eyes as her sister, except somehow they’re too large on her, and blue instead of brown. She also has her sister’s full mouth, but it’s too obvious, somehow. And whereas Kristin is slim bordering on skinny, this one is, well…lush.
“I know, I know,” the other girl says in a weary voice, tilting the M&M’s bag to her mouth and munching the last of the candies. “I’m the pretty one. Don’t tell Kristin; she’s sick of hearing it.”
I hear another tiny sigh from Kristin. “Michael St. Claire, this is Chloe Bellamy. My mom insisted she come along and watch, in hopes that this will be the summer that she’ll actually want to take part in some of the more active elements happening at the club.”
“Um, did you not see the way I kicked the ass of that vending machine?” Chloe asks, giving her sister an incredulous look. “And if Mom had ever seen me pursuing a midnight snack, she’d know just how active I can be.”
I stifle the unfamiliar urge to smile, even though I can see right through her.
Her curvy figure isn’t fashionable…not in places like this, where celery sticks qualify as dinner. But she’s smart about it; she’s joking about her weight before the rest of them can.
Annoyance flashes across Kristin’s face, but before she can open her mouth, I clear my throat, hoping to break up a sibling fight. “Ready?” I ask Kristin.
With a last warning glance at her sister, Kristin gives me a bright smile. “Totally. But go easy on me….I haven’t played since our lesson last week.”
“You’ve gone a whole week since trying to swat a fuzzy green ball?” Chloe makes a dramatic, despairing noise behind us. “Why, God, why? Why is life so hard?”
Kristin inhales long and slow. The sound is practiced, as though she’s done it before to cope with her annoying younger sister.
I don’t have siblings, but growing up with Ethan and Olivia in my back pocket, I know that sometimes pretending the other person’s not there is the best way to stave off a fight.
Kristin brushes at the hair near her temple, and I notice it’s curling a little in the afternoon heat. It’s cute. Unlike her sister’s curls, which are…crazy.
Kristin moves to one side of the net and I move to the other, ignoring the wolf whistle from Chloe as I walk by her.
I pull a ball from my pocket, lobbing it easily over the net. Kristin moves into place, sending it back in my direction with near-perfect form.
This goes on for several minutes until I hear a noisy fake snoring sound from the spectator on the sidelines.
Kristin pauses long enough to glare at her sister again. The ball goes sailing past her, and I see her frown.
Not exactly the flirtatious foreplay I’d been hoping for today.
But since I can’t make the annoying sister go away, I figure the least I can do is to engage her in conversation so she quits bugging Kristin.
“You play tennis, Chloe?” I call out as I pull out another ball and serve it to Kristin, harder this time.
“Do I look like I’m all about cardio?” she calls back in a cheerful voice.
“What about when you were younger? You didn’t take lessons?”
“Um, that’s a negative,” Chloe says around a mouthful of chocolate. She has a candy bar now. “Some of us were reading Harry Potter like normal kids.”
“Ignore her,” Kristin says sharply, delivering a strong forehand in the direction of her sister.
It misses by several feet, but the aim was not accidental, I’m guessing.
