by Megyn Ward
“I can’t.”
I can’t.
I can’t let go.
Not without letting go of them too.
I don’t know how.
“You don’t have a choice.” He spreads his arms wide, showing me his palms. “Because I’ve let you do it for way too long and I can’t. I can’t let you do it anymore.”
“Take care of your brother.” When I say it, a ripple passes over my brother’s face. His eyes sharpen for just a moment before going flat. “That’s what Mom said to me, right before she died—take care of your brother.”
“Keats…” He rubs a hand over his mouth, looking at me like I punched him in it. “Is that was this is about? Why you’ve wasted your fucking life on me?”
“Nothing I’ve done for you has been a waste.” Even as I say it, I know it’s not entirely true and he seems to know it too because he sighs. Seems to be thinking about all the sacrifices I’ve made for him. Adding them up, he comes to the same conclusion I do.
It’s too much.
I’ve given him too much.
“She said the same thing to me, you know.” He lowers himself onto the arm of the chair behind him and looks at his hands. “You’d gone to get some ice or talk to the doctor…” He shakes his head and looks up at me. “I don’t know exactly, but it was just her and me and she opened her eyes and reached for my hand and said, take care of your brother.” His voice breaks a little and he clears it before continuing. “We were supposed to take care of each other. That’s what she wanted, Keats. She wanted me to take care of you because she loved you and didn’t blame you for what happened. No one did.” He looks away, shifting his gaze toward the bank of windows overlooking the city. “But I let you think different all these years because I’m a selfish prick.” He looks back at me and shrugs. “You’re better than me—always have been. I know that and so does she. She’s known it a hell of a lot longer than I have.”
She.
Briana.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying you don’t need my permission to be happy. I’m saying I’m sorry for letting you believe you did, all these years.”
I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. What I’m supposed to say. Since the day we put our parents in the ground my mission has been clear:
Take care of Kyle.
It’s been the tenet I’ve lived my entire adult life.
The only thing that mattered
And in the blink of an eye, it’s gone.
The guilt.
The certainty.
Not because Kyle said so, but because I finally let it all go.
And I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with all this newfound freedom.
Not a goddamned clue.
Kyle stands and reaches into his pocket and pulls out his key ring. “She’s at the apartment.” He snaps off a key and holds it out to me. “Try not to fuck it up this time.”
Twenty-eight
Briana
2015
It’s been a week since Keaton followed me to the pool party. Took me to his apartment and kept me there.
Every time I moved to get out of bed, he rolled me into some new position we hadn’t tried yet and made me come.
“Do you really want to leave?” he asked me, pressing his lips to my shoulder. We’re back where we started. Keaton on his back me sprawled out on top of him, his cock buried inside me.
“No.” I whisper it against his neck, the steady rhythm of his heart echoing in my ear. “But you’re tired.” I lift my head, digging my chin into the thick pad of muscle over his heart look up at him. He’s watching me, his fingertips playing along the length of my spine. “I can see it all over your face. You’ve worked all weekend and—“
“I’m a performer in a sex club, sugar—not a heart surgeon.” He’s grinning at me but I can tell I hit a sore spot. He doesn’t want to talk about work because he thinks it’ll lead to me asking questions. “I can sleep when I’m dead.” I don’t like the tone he’s using on me. It sounds exactly like the one he used on me the day we met by the pool.
Like he’s performing for me, right now.
I look at the clock on his nightstand it’s five o’clock Monday morning. Fall semester starts today and my first class is in three hours.
“I have class.”
Something shifts across his face.
Disappointment.
Maybe a little regret.
Whatever it is, seeing it on his face, aimed right at me while he’s still buried inside me, hurts enough to push me out of bed.
This time he doesn’t try to stop me. Just turns his head on the pillow so he can watch me put on my clothes. He must’ve gathered them for me sometime in the middle of the night because instead of scattered around the apartment, they’re all right here in a neat little pile on his nightstand next to the clock.
“I’m moving.”
“What?” I’m in the middle of tying my bottoms back on and I stop, my fingers going slack around the strings. “Why?”
“Kyle got kicked out of Notre Dame, so he’s coming home. Going to finish up his last year at the University of Illinois.” He’s not talking to me. Not really. He’s telling me a story. Feeding me a line. “That frees up a lot of money I was spending in tuition so I’m going to scale back at the club. Take more classes. I found an apartment closer to the college and Kyle is going to move in here.”
The way he says it, it makes perfect sense. Like there isn’t a reason in the world he should stay here.
Except me.
I’m here.
But maybe that’s the problem.
Maybe the real reason he’s leaving is because he doesn’t want to be around me.
I don’t have room in my life for more and that’s what I want—I want more with you but I can’t have it.
“You don’t have to move to get rid of me, you know.” I snatch my cover up off the nightstand and yank it on over my head. “If you don’t want to see me anymore all you need to do is say so.”
For a second, I think he’s going to deny it. Tell me that I’m not the reason he’s leaving. That I’m crazy for thinking so.
Instead, he just gives me a sad smile and shakes his head. “I already tried that. Didn’t work.”
I stand here for what feels like years, glued to this one spot on his floor, afraid to move. Afraid if I do, he’ll disappear on me.
“When?” I hate myself for asking. I want to be cool about this. I want to hi-five him and say Seeya around. thanks for the orgasms and strut out the door, without so much as a backward glance. I want to be as cold and decisive as Keaton is.
I want to be able to pretend not to love him the way he’s pretending not to love me.
“Soon.”
That’s all he says. All he tells me. Probably because he’s afraid I’ll go nuts on him and start stalking him if he tells me too much.
“Okay.” I push a smile onto my face and aim it in his direction. “Maybe I’ll see you around.”
“Maybe.”
He smiles again but it’s flat. Quiet. I can tell he doesn’t mean it.
I cried for three days straight.
Spent the next two in a fog. Shuffling to class. Shuffling home. My heart tugging in my chest every time the elevator doors slid open in front of me.
The next to I started to feel more like myself. I started to feel angry.
I deserve more than that.
I deserve more.
And so does he.
I don’t know why he doesn’t think he does but he’s wrong—and I intend to tell him so.
Standing in front of his door, I knock. Step away from it when I hear him start to turn the knob on the other side.
The door opens.
It isn’t Keaton.
It’s his brother.
It has to be.
Same dark hair but his is cut shorter. Neater. His eyes are blue and beautiful but not quite the same brilliant shade. Not too tall. Not too mu
scular. Not a tattoo in sight. Good-looking. Clean-cut. Proper.
Perfect.
“Hi,” I say, swallowing the lump in my throat and stick out my hand when I realize I’ve been standing here without saying anything for far too long to be considered sane. “I’m Briana St. James. I live in 6C. Welcome to the building.”
Twenty-nine
Keaton
She’s hot. She seeing anyone?
That’s what Kyle says to me over the phone when he calls to tell me that Briana came over to introduce herself.
Yeah. Me.
She’s seeing me.
I can feel my jaw clench tight, doing my best to keep the words from pushing their way out of my mouth. Instead of letting them loose, I swallow them whole because I know why he called. He didn’t call to tell me that she came looking for me. He didn’t call to deliver some sort of message from her. He called to see if I have feelings for her. If there’s something going on between us.
There isn’t.
Not anymore.
There can’t be.
“How would I know,” I grumble, leaning back against the headboard of my bed. These days I oscillate between sleeping on the couch because I can’t lay down in it without thinking about her and all the things I did to her in it and laying in it for hours for the very same reasons. “You met her. Ask her.”
It’s possible that she is. It’s been nearly a month since I moved out and let Kyle take over my lease. She could be dating someone else. A weird part of me hopes she is because then she’d be off the market and I’d have to stop thinking about jumping in my car, driving back the apartment and loitering in the lobby until she shows up or tracking her down at school
Showing up on a Tuesday night is my favorite fantasy. Walking into the laundry room with a basket full of clothes. She’d be there in her ratty laundry day outfit. Sunny blonde hair piled on top of her head. No make-up. Smoky blue eyes spitting fire at me because I keep jerking her around.
I’d apologize. Tell her I understand if she doesn’t trust me. That I’ll wait. As long as it takes.
Until she’s ready.
Until she believes me.
“If she’s not seeing someone, I’m going to ask her out.”
The declaration comes through the other end of the phone, loud and clear.
Kills my fantasy in an instant.
I imagine him in my nice apartment, living two floors up from the woman I’m in love with. Running into her by the pool. Asking her out for coffee. Maybe dinner.
Maybe more.
“Go for it, man.” I close my eyes and let it all slip away. “She’s a great girl.”
Anything for Kyle
Thirty
Briana
2018
8j
I stand at our front door and stare at it for a second, letting myself finally accept and understand just how messed up this whole thing is. After Keaton left, Kyle moved in. He transferred to The University of Illinois from Notre Dame for his senior year. He said it was because he lost his scholarship due to cutbacks but I knew it was a lie as soon as he said it.
There was no scholarship. Keaton paid his tuition. I know because he told me that once. That he went to community college because he couldn’t afford to put Kyle through college, support himself and attend a university.
He took care of his brother.
Gave him whatever he wanted.
Sacrificed everything.
Even me.
I want to hate him for that. For the fact that he gave up on us before we really even began. But it was more than that. He didn’t give up on us.
He gave us away.
Sacrificed what we might have been on the altar of his belief that he is responsible for his parent's death and that responsibility made him unworthy. Made himself a slave to his little brother’s wants and whims.
Pushing my key into the lock, I let myself in and shut the door behind me. Remember what it was like to have Keaton push me against it.
His hands on me.
His mouth.
Eyes squeezed shut, I take a deep breath and let it out slowly before forcing myself to open my eyes.
Kyle and I started dating six months after he moved in. After we graduated and my roommates and I prepared to go our separate ways, he asked me to move in and it made sense. At least I convinced myself that it did. That it wasn’t completely screwed up that the guy I fell in love with over the course of a summer left, so I got involved with his brother.
Moved in with him.
Said yes when he asked me to marry him.
It looks completely different than when Keaton lived here. It looks like a home, not a prison. Like the people who live here love each other, even if it is a lie.
Framed photos of Kyle and me on vacation. Skiing at Beaver Creek. Scuba diving in The Caymans. Partying in Vegas.
It wouldn’t surprise me to find out that Keaton funded every single one of those trips.
I realize I don’t want any of it.
Not one picture.
Not one piece of furniture.
Letting myself into the cabinet under the sink, I tear a garbage bag off the roll and head into the bedroom. There, I start opening drawers and stuffing all of my clothes into it. In the closet, I do the same thing. Clothes and shoes. Personal items. Things that belong to me and no one else.
Anything that Kyle and I bought together stays.
I just want to get out of here.
Go home.
I don’t realize I’m crying until I catch sight of myself of myself in the mirror over the bathroom sink.
I’m a mess.
Hair disheveled from shoving it out of my face for the past forty-five minutes. Mascara running down my face. Lipstick smeared from wiping tears off my face.
Ridiculous.
I’m ridiculous.
This whole situation is ridiculous.
The way I’ve spent the last two and a half years trying to convince myself I don’t love someone who will never let himself love me back.
The fact that I very nearly ruined my life by marrying his brother.
His brother.
Jesus.
Running a washcloth under the tap, I use it to wipe the majority of make-up off my face. Without it, I look more like Claire. People look us and think we’re as different as night and day but not really. We actually look a lot alike. Her cheeks are a little fuller. Her hair is a little darker. My eyes are a little bluer. Seeing myself in the mirror reminds me that I sent her to look for Jaxon hours ago. Makes me dig my phone out of my purse to check my messages.
There’s a new text waiting in my inbox.
Claire: I’m spending the
night at Jaxon’s… maybe
longer. ??
thank you, Bri. Thank you
for everything. I love you
and hope more than
anything that wherever
you are, you’re as happy
as I am right now.
Shit, I’m crying again.
Smiling, I wipe the tears away and grab the last of my trash bags off the bed to carry it down the short hallway that connects the bedrooms to the living room. Even if I carry two at a time, I’ll have to make two trips. Maybe even three.
I wonder if I can bribe the limo driver to help me drag it all down—
Keaton is here.
Leaned against the front door, hands dug into his pockets, gaze aimed at his shoes like he’s waiting for a bus.
I drop the bag in my hand and it hits the door with an audible thunk because it’s full of winter boots and tennis shoes.
He looks up at the sound, his bright blue gaze finding mine immediately.
“Hey, sugar—need some help?”
Thirty-one
Keaton
I haven’t been here since the day I left.
Could never bring myself to come back here. To stand in the place where I knelt at Briana’s feet and told her I wanted her but couldn’t have her.
Where I had her but wouldn’t let myself keep her.
But that was before.
Things are different now.
Now, I understand that it’s not up to me to decide what I deserve and what I don’t.
I want her.
I want Briana just as much as I did the first time I saw her, those smoky blue eyes of hers aimed right at me.
And if she’ll have me, I intend to spend the rest of my life showing her just how much.
She pushed her hair out of her face and sighs when she sees me. She’s been crying. Her face is pale. Eyes red-rimmed and puffy. It makes me think of that first night in the laundry room. She’d been crying then too. Because she and her sister had a fight. Because she felt guilty for leaving her behind.
It makes me feel as shitty now as it did back then. Maybe even more so because I know that this time she’s crying because of me.
“What are you doing here?”
“She would’ve liked you,” I say instead of answering her question. “My mom.” I nod, imagining it in my mind, introducing them. How well they would’ve gotten along. “You’re a lot like her.”
“Keaton—”
“You’re smart and strong and so much more than I ever thought I deserved.” I push myself off the door and make my way toward her. “I’m still pretty sure I don’t but that’s not my place to decide.” I pick up the trash bag full of shoes on the ground between us and sling it over my shoulder. “So, if you still want me, I’d like to take you home. To my home. For good.”
“What about Kyle?”
She has every right to ask.
Even before they became a couple, he was the thing between us. The wedge I used to keep us apart. I look around the apartment. It’s littered with evidence of the last three years. Pictures of them smiling. Things they bought together. The life they tried to build together on a lie.
A lie I helped create.
I expect to feel jealousy. Resentment. Maybe even a little anger but I don’t.
All I see are the two people in this world who mean the most to me.
All I feel is love.
“He’s not the guy for you, sugar.” I hold out my hand, silently praying that she’ll give me another chance and take it. “I am.”