"We have pictures," I told her, frowning as I tried to remember where our secret folder was. "We had our own private reception in the honeymoon suite at that BnB you loved."
"Madison's by the Sea?"
"Mm," I murmured, my fingers beginning to trail softly over her arm. "We ate burgers while sipping champagne directly from the bottle. Then made love on the giant bed while the sun went down."
She sighed, closing her eyes. "I wish I could remember."
I do too.
She blinked her glorious amber eyes open. "We were happy?"
"Blissfully so."
"Then what changed?"
I sighed, my fingers continuing to trail up and down her arm as I tried to dissect the last five years. "To be honest, I don't really know. It was incremental at first. We'd planned to go backpacking in Peru for our honeymoon. I had to work, but we were going to go in September, after the busy period. You said you wanted to get fit, so you started working out."
"Obviously, I liked it," she said with a wry smile gesturing to her body.
"That's the thing. I don't think you did." I dropped my hand, letting it settle on the bones of her hip. "It was like you were… trapped in a cycle. You became obsessed with status. You took advice from mymother."
Her nose wrinkled.
"Exactly." My mother was the last woman on earth you'd take any advice from. "Then you started to wear designer clothes. You told me it was because you hated when mum made comments about you when she saw you on the Estate."
"Wait. We lived on the Estate?" She sat up. "We agreed never to—"
"I know." I sat beside her, dragging a hand through my hair. "They built a house on the parcel of land they purchased from the Morgans."
She groaned, placing a hand over her eyes. "Worst idea ever."
20-20 hindsight, babe.
"Yeah," I swallowed, knowing the worst was yet to come. "You quit your job after we moved in here. Said you didn't have time for it."
She blinked, her eyes widening. "Excuse me?"
I shrugged. "You started doing brunches and charity things in the city with mum."
"And you let me quit?"
"I figured if it made you happy…." I trailed off, knowing that was the chickenshit answer. "To be honest, by that stage, it was just easier to let you do you."
She frowned, "I don't understand."
"You weren't you anymore, Em." I struggled to put into words the changes that had occurred. "You'd told me to take the promotions dad kept offering at work even though I had in no way earned them. You told me to use the trust funds. Youwanted this house, and you wanted personal training with a guy who cost a fuck more than I'd ever earned in a year before opening the family coffers. You wanted to vacation in places recommended by people who aren't anything more than fair-weather snobs who gossiped behind our backs.”
I gestured at her body. "You started doing juice cleanses and something that involved wrapping yourself in plastic wrap. You'd buy expensive clothing and wear them once. You called Honey fat."
"Your sister? No!" Her hands covered her mouth, her expression horrified. "Oh my God, Cal. Oh my God. How… how did… who… who am I?"
A woman I loathed to love.
I pulled her in, her slight body wiggling into me as she struggled against more tears. "You're still you, Em. Under all the bullshit that happened, you're still a generous and loving person. We just have to… work to not let us go back to that."
She tilted her head up, her face beseeching. "Butwhydid I become that? And if I became this woman, who did you become?"
A fucking great question.
