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“I call bullshit. She saw how much easier it was to let you manage the house, raise me, finish raising yourself and just coasted.”
“Be careful how you speak about Mom.” Each time we have this conversation, Skye pushes harder toward my mom being in the wrong, but she was so young when it all started. She wasn’t old enough to comprehend how much it fucked with mom when Skye’s dad left or when Grandad died. I was. She was a wreck. Maybe it wasn’t right for me to be the one to help her, but there was no one else to do it.
“You know what’s not fair? Staying up late to help your little sister with her homework and then getting up at five the next morning to work a job before school while your mom gets to go to bed early and sleep in.”
Pulling up to a stoplight, I briefly look her in the eyes. “It wasn’t fair that both of our dads skipped. It wasn’t fair that Grandad died so young. But that doesn’t mean it wasn’t reality.”
“You’re enabling her.”
“Did you take a psych class this year or something?”
“Two, actually,” she says, flipping her dark, curly behind her shoulder with the back of her hand. “You know, you’re allowed to put yourself first. You’re not doing anything wrong, living out here, doing things you love.”
“Never said I was.”
“Grandad would have been proud of you.”
“He’s the one who told me to take care of her.” Grandad taught me almost everything I know about fixing and building while he was fixing and building things for Mom. He always said he wouldn’t be around forever, and I’d have to pick up where he left off, eventually. After he died, I did exactly that.
“I’m sure he didn’t mean for you to do it at the expense of living your own life.”
“Is there a point to this?”
Skye pokes me in the arm. “The point is you shouldn’t feel guilty.”
“I don’t.”
“You’re impossible,” she huffs, crossing her arms over her chest.
“Common opinion these days.”
“Who else says that?”
My silence answers her question.
“It’s Allie, isn’t it? I cannot wait to meet her. Do you think she’ll be there today? Do you think I’ll like her? Do you think she’ll like me?”
“She will. And you will. And she will.”
My prediction about the two of them is proven correct within seconds of enteringTurbine.
“Is this your sister?” Allie squeals, coming around the counter. “It has to be. You have the same eyes.”
“Yes! And you’re Allie, right?” Skye reaches out, pulling Allie into a hug. Her eyes flash with surprise, probably at my sister knowing who she is already, but she returns the hug with enthusiasm. They look like old friends, not two people meeting for the first time. Allie fawns over Skye’s curly hair, and Skye asks where Allie got her silver necklace with a lock and keypendant, because she has to have one too.
“I am dying for coffee. He’s deprived me all morning,” Skye says, glaring at me over her shoulder.
“He didn’t let you have coffee at home?” Allie asks, voice incredulous.
“She wasn’t awake to drink it.”
“You should have woken her up with it,” Allie scolds, leading us over to the register. “Coffee is the only acceptable reason to wake someone up.”
“Noted.”
The two of them have a lengthy conversation about flavored syrups and seasonal specials, with Allie helping Skye pick the ‘perfect Palm Springs vacation’ coffee before Allie trades off her duty at the register with Marisol and joins us with a drink of her own at a round table by the glass wall.
“So, how has my brother been as a work neighbor?” Skye asks, dimples showing in her mischievous smile.
