AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“That’s different, Cas. She’s not my sister.”
I blow out a long breath. “I know. But I…there are boundaries. There are plenty of things I keep between us that I don’t tell Sydney.”
“If she’s upset about something, she should trust me enough to tell me herself.” He sighs. “I’m a shitty brother.”
“No, you’re not.”
“You’re not exactly unbiased.”
“I’m not a liar either,” I reply.
One corner of Holden’s mouth curves up. “Not a good one, at least.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You have tells.”
“Tells? What do you mean?”
“Whenever you lie, your eye twitches.”
“Bullshit.”
He grins. “I’m right. If you’d played the game that night, I would have known the lie.”
“If you knew the lie, it would have been because you know me.”
“Mmhmm,” he hums.
“Or because I lied about something stupid, like my favorite ice cream flavor.”
Holden rolls his eyes. “I wasn’t in the mood for games.”
Slowly, the light moment fades.
His hold on me tightens. I make no attempt to pull away.
“They’re not us, Cas.”
I pull in a deep breath.
“I know more than your tells, flower. But your parents aren’t us. They made it really far. Just not all the way to the finish line. We will.”
“We don’t even know where we’ll each be living next year. After graduation, we could—”
“We’ve done long-distance before. If we have to, we’ll do it again.”
“By long-distance, you mean us not talking for the past eight weeks?”
He half-smiles. “Okay, it was a rough trial run.”
I snort. “As long as you realize there’s room for improvement.”
“There’s definitely room for improvement. But that doesn’t mean we’re doomed. It means we’re worth working on.”
I nod. “I know we are.”
“Thanks for texting me back.”
