Page 9 of My Brother’s Best Friends Entanglement

I consider throwing my phone, but no matter how far it flies, it won't reach him.

I'll text it instead. I lie back on the car bonnet, staring up at the cloudless sky.

Six years ago, I sat in this exact spot, deciding between staying in Adelaide and leaving for Sydney. In front of the only house I'd ever known, where Dad taught me to parallel park years before I could legally drive, where Mum sat up countless nights watching 90s reruns while I studied, working myself to the bone so I'd never have to wonder what if I'd studied for one more hour...

I'd done all the hard things put in front of me.

Except one. Well, three.

And now Leon's asking me to meet them all head-on.

I sigh.

One week. I can do one measly week, right?

I groan, arms over my face, suddenly exhausted and missing my mother.

"Is this a party for one?"

I spin so fast I nearly slide off the bonnet.

Marcus is leaning against his car, parked on the other side of the road. I didn't even hear him pull up. Hands tucked in his pockets, one ankle crossed over the other. I see he's taken the time to change into a different shirt. Well, that makes one of us. Otherwise he's still dressed in some muddy jeans and work boots. Even though it's mid-August, his skin is tan enough to tell me that whatever sun Adelaide is getting, he's out working in it.

My heart does an involuntary flip.

He tilts his head, surveying me, as if he heard what's happening in my ribcage, the corner of his mouth twitching.

"Or can anyone come?"

THREE

Marcus

Alexia spins around so fast she nearly slides off the car bonnet, flipping onto her stomach, the short pink shorts she's wearing riding even higher up her thighs, her long wavy hair catching on the breeze.

And there it is. That face.

The face that had literally stopped me in my tracks when I'd stared up at it earlier today.

It's been almost six years since I last saw her. And somehow she's exactly the same, but completely different all at once.

But I don't have too long to contemplate how my body is immediately responding to being mere metres from her again after so long, because she lets out a loud and frustrated groan at the sight of me.

"Well," I say, peering through the windows of my car. "I'm going to assume that greeting is for one of you, because frankly, no one ever reacts that way upon seeing me." Especially women, I add to myself.

Zachary scoffs. Rhys says nothing. Typical of them both, really.

Taking the cue from my roommates, my best friend's sister ignores me and sits up, folding her body from her flattened position on the car and tucks her chin in between her bent knees, facing away from me.

I try to ignore how the shorts have found their way even higher up. Not now, I tell myself. Later. No! Not fucking later.

"You guys gonna help me out here or what?" I say, shaking the traitorous thoughts from my head, and push off my car, crossing the road towards the Riley house. Well. The former Riley house. A week from now, a new family is going to be living here, and I'll never get to walk through those doors again, never bask in fifteen years of memories with Leon's family. Not for the last time, I feel a twinge of regret that we hadn't decided to buy the house from Mrs Riley.

Behind me, two car doors close, so I guess we're all in this together after all. That's a good thing, because I cannot do this on my own. Nor should I. There will never be anything happening alone with Alexia Riley. Ever. Again. The end. Period.

She smells like my body wash.

That's all I can think of as I wait for a car to drive past before I cross the road to her car.