“We—we didn’t exactly have sex then…” My skin burns all over, and I fight the urge to fidget. I have to remain calm and coherent. I can explain, if she’ll only listen. “I was… Look, it’s really complicated—”
“So you knew I liked him, you had already fooled around with him or ‘whatever’ in the basement, yet you didn’t tell me at all. Not when I confessed to you that I like him, nor any time since then.” Her gaze drops to the ground and she drags in a breath. “You made me look like a total idiot, Lauren. Here I was, nervous as hell that night at the bar, wondering if I could get him to notice me as more than his best friend’s kid sister. When the truth was he was never going to see me that way. You could have been honest and saved me the mortification—and the waste of time—but you didn’t. What, were you laughing at me, how stupid I am to want him?”
It dawns on me then that Cole is sitting upstairs, hearing this entire exchange. I’m tempted to ask her if we can move this somewhere else—both to spare her feelings and mine because of the intimate stuff he’s overhearing—but if I do, I know she’ll walk out that door, and that’ll be that. I can tell by her body language, by her tone, that she’s upset enough to burn that bridge with me and not look back. My stomach is so tight and hard that I want to throw up.
“No, of course I wasn’t laughing,” I say quietly. “I’d never laugh at you, and you know that. I love you.” My voice breaks on that last sentence, and I clear my throat. “I was feeling tortured over it all and had no idea how to tell you the truth, wrestling with what to do for days. But honest to God, I was going to talk to you about it today. Plus, at first I didn’t know how he might feel about you,” I add quickly. “Hell, I wasn’t even aware you guys had talked while he was overseas. And…that Wednesday night was a surprise, out of nowhere. Totally unplanned. I don’t think either of us believed things would evolve like this.”
“And yet here we are.” Christina looks up at me. Her face is a mask, but her body is tight and she wraps her arms around herself. “After what happened with Max, it took me years to forgive you and stop being afraid to let my wall down around you. But I put aside my hurt because you’re my sister, and deep down, I believed you were sorry for betraying me with my boyfriend.”
I close my eyes against the wave of shame that hits me. Dammit. It’s bad enough hearing her speak about our past after all this time. But Cole just heard it too. When I open my eyes, everything is blurry from the tears burning and spilling out. “I’m sorry,” I say in an agonized whisper, but she’s not done.
“Now I see that you really don’t care about anyone but yourself,” Christina says, her eyes narrowed, her voice heating as she continues. “I was an idiot to believe otherwise.”
I take a step toward her, desperate to get her to stop and listen to me for just a minute. “That’s not true. I care deeply about you and your feelings, which was part of my internal angst over this.” I drop my voice to little more than a breath. “I tried to be just friends with Cole, honestly I did. I wanted you to have that chance if that was what you two wanted.”
“There was never a ‘chance’ with him, and I was a moron to not see it in the first place.” She shakes her head. I can see her eyes are glistening, but she looks up at the ceiling and blinks the emotion back. Her voice trembles when she says, “It’s always so easy for you, you know. Far easier for you than for me. Men fall at your feet to be with you.”
“That is so not true,” I retort in a vehement tone. She’s joking, right?
“Really?” Christina looks at me and wipes her eyes. “Because that’s how it feels. That I’m the shoddy version of you, the poor man’s Lauren. And no one wants to be with someone like that, not when they can have the original, the best. Not Max, not Cole. Not any of my high school boyfriends who dated me so they could be closer to you.”
I’m so stunned I can’t speak at first. Her words are so raw, so…filled with her belief of that as gospel truth, that I don’t know what to say. It’s ridiculous in every possible way.
“You’re kidding, right? You’re such a better person than I am,” I finally manage to say. My heart aches so deeply that I don’t think it’ll ever feel good again. “You forgave me after I hurt you like that, which shows a kind and generous nature. You’re fun and beautiful and smart and witty. And I’m sorry, Christina. I’m so sorry this has all unfolded like this. It’s not what I wanted.” I clench my hands to keep from reaching out to her.
I want her to forgive me. Because I know this isn’t just about Cole. It’s about the old shit it has dredged up between us. The stuff we just shoved aside and let go, in order to reconnect. I admit, it’s hard for me to believe she could have strong feelings for Cole, but maybe I’m wrong.