The night before
Istared at the text on my phone and then shoved it under my pillow. Maybe if I couldn’t see the phone anymore, it would cease to exist.
The phone buzzed again and I rolled over onto my stomach before pulling it back out from under the pillow.
Mr.Big Important Man Charlie:I know you saw my message. You have read receipts on.
“Dammit,” I muttered.
His previous message, the one I wished I could unread, said:We need to talk about the family business. This can’t wait.
Rescuing Isaac from his date and then completely violating that innocent photo booth had distracted me enough until we walked into the mansion and my phone chimed.
The thought of talking to Charlie was bad enough, but the fact that he wanted to talk business had my stomach turning. He always found a way to make me feel stupid, like I couldn’t possibly understand the importance of the work Mom and Dad left behind.
It didn’t help that sometimes I wondered if he was right. That if I actually jumped in next to him and tried to figure out quarterly projections and supply chain issues, I’d fuck up the last piece of Mom and Dad that I had left.
Anyway, Charlie and I could barely talk without bickering and we definitely couldn’t discuss the business without fighting... and my brother never picked fights he couldn’t win.
It would probably surprise most people to know how much I hated conflict. In casual, everyday life, I slipped so easily into flirty, catty banter, but when the stakes were real, I clammed up and shut down. There was no losing if you didn’t fight back, right?
My phone rang and startled Mr.Tumnus. He hissed before jumping off the bed and nudging the door open to escape.
“Jealous,” I whispered as his tail swished through the crack in the door.
I let the phone ring for too long before I finally looked at the face on the screen. Charlie. The picture I’d assigned him was from his eighth grade orchestra concert. He was in a tux and a zebra-print bow tie to match theLion Kingtheme.
Finally, I hit the green accept button.
“I was starting to think you were ignoring me,” Charlie deadpanned before I could even say hello.
“I was contemplating it,” I admitted.
He paused for a moment. “We need to talk about the company.”
“You know I’m not interested in the family business.”
“Which should make this easy,” he said. “Theoretically.”
I groaned into the phone. “You know, we could just be normal siblings who call each other to check in or text belated happy birthday wishes or vent about the collective trauma we share.”
He sighed. “How are you doing? Happy belated birthday. Mommy and daddy issues live on long past their deaths.”
“That’s one thing I can agree with you on. And I’m great, thank you. I just sold my first script.”
“Is it aPirates of the Caribbeanorgy at sea?” he asked.
“No, that’s been done,” I said with a smirk. “Believe it or not, this is a Christmas movie for the Hope Channel.”
He coughed, and then sputtered with laughter. “Do they know that your boobs are Googleable?”
“Yeah, they were really impressed by my boobs’ SEO stats.”
He grunted on the other end of the line.
“What do you need, Charlie?”
He wasted no time answering. “I’m taking Bundles of Joy public.”
