“Landscapes? Fruit bowls?” the man laughs, his straight, white teeth on full display, and I’m sure he thinks they’re dazzling. “People?” he smirks, and I slip my phone back in my bag, letting my mouth slide into a dimply smile and running my hand through my hair before glancing away. I track them back when I notice eyes so familiar, they could be my own. I squint, surprise zipping through me, my throat lodged with a nervous wedge making it hard to breathe. Because standing there clear across the bar, his own face a mixture of surprise and concern is my twin brother, Grant.
“Did you see a ghost?” the man chuckles, gently gliding his palm over my denim clad thigh as I slowly slide it away.
“A ghost would actually be better,” I mumble.Fuck. “Thanks for the drink.” I hope he sees the true apology in myeyes. He lifts a hand to halt me or use the force to pull me back, but I walk away, making my way to my twin brother, whose body has gone rigid with suspicion. I can already hear the barrage of questions.Why are you here? What are you thinking? Why do you always fuck everything up?
Running into him wasnothow I planned to let him know I entered his sacred little bubble. I need time to get my story straight, to figure out how I’m going to tell him that Connie, the birth mother he pretends doesn’t exist, is sick. I needed more time to figure out what I’m doing after I get her and her treatment settled, to craft the perfect way to tell him and eventually our parents why I left San Francisco at all.
“Hi,” I say to my brother, smaller than I intended. If he wasn’t so busy scowling at me, I’d try to give him a hug.
“What are you doin’ back here?” He’s still predictable as ever as he crosses his arms and I grit my teeth. With everyone but me he’s this easy going giant, understanding and patient. His capacity for grace is impressive; he’s practically a saint. I take after our birth mother, though—deeply sensitive to the point of destruction or abandon. My nature is a lot easier to hide with people who haven’t known me forever. But that’s the trouble with twins—we’ve known each other from the start. That’s why behind his judgmental gaze there’s already a glimmer of concern. It’s that sense we get about each other. He knows something is wrong.
“I—uh. I’m not technically back,” I stutter over the words, attempting to gain some ground with a measured breath in.
“What do you mean ‘technically’?” I didn’t even notice Ben Cabot was standing there. Last time I checked he had disappeared into thin air, leaving Grant high and dry. When I visited at the beginning of the summer it was mainly to help my brother organize and declutter all the crap he’d collected while still living in the three bedroom apartment he sharedwith Ben. Ben’s side of the apartment stayed vacant well into Grant’s junior year, so he finally decided it was time to downsize.
“If he’s coming back, I doubt it’s to here,” he’d told me, scoffing as he scribbled DONATE on the side of a box overflowing with old tupperware.
“I just think it’s bizarre he never explained,” I remember pondering, peering across the space into the empty bedroom Ben sent packers to clear out shortly after he left two years ago. “And his brother’s never mentioned what happened? You don’t find that odd?”
“They aren’t close,” my brother had said, suddenly defensive. “And I don’t talk to Will if I don’t have to,” he added, lifting a few boxes before dropping them at his door.
I remember thinking it strange that you could avoid talking to your team captain, or that my brother seemed to be put off by this guy to begin with. My brother doesn’tovertlydislike anyone.
Grant clears his throat and I’m back in the bar, my twin’s eyes and Ben’s staring daggers at me, like I’ve committed some secret crime.
“Meaning,” I huff, annoyed, “I am ‘technically’ not supposed to be here, nor does anyone know I am.” My eyes flare, a nonverbal attempt to get my brother to stop probing.
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean, Sloane?” he grills, and I step back. The small motion has his gaze softening, and I see a small opening.
“I had to get out of there, Grant,” I admit, and even though it’s all I say, he finally extends me some of that grace. Stepping forward, he wraps me in the kind of bear hug he’d give me after a bad night at our uncle’s, or after we’d get returned to the state after not being a good fit in afoster home, and I let myself relax for a few seconds. I think I haven’t really relaxed in weeks.
“Speaking of being back…I’m pretty sure the last time I was here, you were in some sort of witness protection program or somethin’?” I tilt my head toward Ben, hiding my real curiosity.
“Close—I was mostly just avoiding you,” he jokes, verbally ducking behind that carefully crafted captain persona I clocked the second I met him all those years ago.
Grant loves Boston, has always felt like it was this place full of promise, but I know it just felt far enough from home. I understand that—wanting to be free of our adoptive parents’ expectations—but Boston is so…cold. And Astor Hill College isfrigid, devoid of life. Everything has a subtext, no one says what they mean, and it’s just exhausting, being in this place. But it’s where Connie’s able to get treatment while trying to mend her relationship with Grant. And I can hide out until…I don’t know when. When I know what to do next.
For once, I envy how easily he keeps everything bottled up. He functions—no, hethriveswhen things are kept under the surface. He can’t stand a mess. Not in his house, and not in his life. I’ve always taken issue with this but, looking at him right now, I consider that his life is a lot more put together than mine.
Grant wouldn’t be caught dead making the choices I’ve made.
I roll my eyes at Ben, playing along as I flick him off. “Asshole.”
He shakes his head at me, knocking back his beer bottle to take a sip. A man I don’t recognize slings his arm around Ben and looks me up and down, openly, unabashedly, and his lips curve into a too perfect smirk. He’s cocky when he does it, like he’s viscerally awareof the effect itshouldhave on someone. I suck in my cheeks, tilting my head to the side as I study him, distantly aware of my brother and Ben bickering with him. They know each other—clearly.
My eyes catch on the subtle wave of his blonde hair, only long enough to barely fall in his face, and he pushes a few locks back because, I think, he sees me watching. His lips quirk, amused by my attention.
“That’s my sister, you sick fuck,” Grant tells him, shoving his lean frame that, upon closer inspection, totally gives away that he plays ball, and he pretends to stumble back, a hand flying to his heart. He’s unbothered by my brother’s aversion, but I am on high alert, desperate to avoid getting on Grant’s bad side already.
“Forgive me.” He takes my hand, slowly lifts it before stopping, and looks up at me, rolling his lips like he knows I’m waiting for them on the back of my hand. “You look nothing like your brother,” he finally says with a wink, and I drag my hand away, sensing my brother’s ire. Somehow, his friend hitting on me would bemyfault.
“I need a drink,” I scoff, turning away and rolling my eyes.
The bar’s packed now, and my shoulders brush with strangers, one after another, as we inch our way towards the bar. Ben lingers at the high top while Grant and his friend follow close behind me, but once we approach a slate of empty bar stools, I notice it’s only my brother.
“Where did…what’s–his–face go?”
“Andy? Probably off to find a new victim,” he laughs, and I don’t have to wonder what he means because I can see him, only fifteen or so feet away with a tiny brunette flanking him, her hair cropped close to her ears. I sigh, equal parts relieved that he found a warm body to fixate on and jealous of his freedom, of the weightlessness of it. I glance at my brother, feelingthe pressure he puts on everyone around him to be perfect all the time. “God, Sloane—please. Don’t even think about it.”
