“My dad’s fiancée’s son,” which I know isn’t enough explanation. But I also don’t want to get intowe slept together and then he disappeared from the face of the earthfor three days, so I need some lie that?—
Oh, fuck me running. Emily was there the first time I met Javier.
“We were talking about candles earlier this week, so he called to say that, uh, he found some good beeswax alternatives.”
Emily blinks at me, looking mildly suspicious. I do my best to forget that I once literally sat on Javier’s dick while on the phone with her, even if she laughed about it when I finally confessed.
“So, your stepbrother?” someone else asks.
“Not yet.”
“Yourfuturestepbrother.”
“I guess, technically,” I say, trying to get as interested as possible in this flower crown. There was a vision I was trying to execute, but I don’t remember it now.
“Ooooooh,” she says and wiggles her eyebrows salaciously.
“I think I read that romance novel,” says the same person who supplied the wordstepbrother. I’m ninety percent sure she’s Jess.
“Isn’t that the plot ofEmma?” Katie says. “Or whichever oneCluelesswas based on.”
I try, and fail, to remember the plot ofEmma.
“Did she get with Paul Rudd in the book?” Emily asks.
“I don’t think so.”
Jess looks up and narrows her eyes. “Did you just ask if the heroine of a Jane Austen novel got with?—”
“She knew what I meant!”
“I did,” Katie confirms.
“Could you marry stepsiblings back then?” Emily asks, still cross-legged on her giant floor cushion. “I know they were into marrying their cousins, and stepsiblings are less weird.”
“Well, that depends on the stepsibling,” Jess points out, then looks at me. “Is yours hot?”
Jesus Christ, yes. “He’s okay, I guess,” I shrug.
“What’s his naaaaaaame?” Emily prods. “Hey, he could be your date to the wedding!”
I freeze because Emilyhas met Javier. Maybe. Sort of. They were in the same place at the same time at the very least. Though Emily was drunk and I’d had the one and a half drinks required to make me bold enough to talk to an extremely hot stranger.
I have no idea if they ever spoke. Did I introduce them or just stick my tongue down his throat? Did they chat when I went to the bathroom? Afterward, did I ever tell her his name?
She definitely saw him, at the very least, but that’s not the problem right now. The problem is that I am in a room with the only people who might be able to figure out thatmy one-night standandmy stepbrotherare the same person. And one of them just asked me a question. And now I have to lie.
“I don’t know.” It is the worst possible response.
“You don’t know your stepbrother’s name?”
I’m the dumbest person alive. “Uh,” I start, hoping genius will strike. “Well, his family all calls him…Bob…because it’s some inside joke? So that’s kind of his name, but it’s a nickname, but it might be a family only nickname? Which is why I know it.”
“Oh. Weird,” Emily says, then apparently decides that this discussion is over and holds up her current flower crown. “Does this need more ribbons?”
Later,when I’m trying to fall asleep, I think about texting him. It’s kind of funny, what happened today, and I could send a friendly littlehaha my friends who were there when we firsthooked up asked about you but I told them your name was Bobtext.
I get as far as typing half of it into my phone, then delete it because it’s late and a text that essentially saysHey, don’t forget we had sex!has definiteovertones, especially at this time of night. And one, we are in agreement about the nature of our relationship, and two, it’s pretty clear that Javier is only here for a good time, not a serious time.
