“I love Rage Against the Machine, but I don’t need their poster over my kid’s crib.”
I forced out a laugh and it didn’t sound entirely fake.
“I love you, Blake,” she said.
God, she was always a better person than me.
“I love you too, little sister.” I quickly changed subjects. “Everything going okay with Rix and the baby?”
“Outside the nursery issue, Rix and I are great. My morning sickness lasts until the afternoon, which is unfun. I’m keeping my fingers crossed I’ll be one of those pregnant women who move out of that when I move into my second trimester.”
“I’m keeping my fingers crossed for you. And we’ll need to start talking about your shower, which I, of course, will be hosting.”
I was pleased to hear the humor was back in her tone when she replied, “Of course.”
“If Gal and Katie want in on that action, we can co-host. I’ll text them.”
“Awesome.”
“All right, I’ll let you go,” I said.
“Okay, honey. I’m so sorry about you and Dair. Take care of yourself and call me if you need me.”
“Will do.”
“Later.”
“Alex?” I stopped her.
“Right here,” she said.
I closed my eyes.
I opened them again and said, “I don’t know if I ever apologized for being such a bitch to you pretty much our whole lives.”
There was a moment of silence before she said, “I thought we got over this that day in Mum’s bedroom.”
“We did, kind of,” I replied. “I just think the words need to be said.”
“What brings this up?” she asked suspiciously.
“I just…it’s important you know I understand how awful I was to you.”
There was another moment of silence before she said, “Fellow captives, remember?”
“I remember but…no excuse.”
“Blake, we’ve been over this, we were kids,” she said staunchly. “I removed myself from the dysfunction, mentally, and whenever I could, physically. Which meant the brunt of it was focused on you. It should be me who’s apologizing.”
God, my sister was so awesome.
“Hardly,” I replied.
“The point I’m making is, yeah, you were a mean girl. No, it didn’t feel good. But I understand why you were,” she stressed. “And the minute I reached out a hand with any real intent to fix what was broken with us, you took hold.” I could hear the humor in her tone when she finished, “And you did it with some serious panache.”
One could say I definitely did that.
“Does this have something to do with what happened with you and Dair?” she queried.
