“MAN, I LOVE THAT GUY. He’s a Grade A fucking guy.”

Austin was over-the-top cheerful, even for him. It made me a little nervous. It wasn’t that I was worried about him getting into trouble. Not really. It was just hard to see him standing there swaying like that.

“My sister! My beautiful twin.” Austin wrapped his arm around me. His movements were fluid and his pale cheeks were red. He was clearly smashed.

“Isn’t she beautiful?” he asked Kael. I froze. I hated when Austin talked about my looks.

Kael nodded yes, clearly uncomfortable.

“You’ve really grown up. Buying your own house and shit,” he said, squeezing me. “I mean there you are, holding down a steady job and shit. Paying bills—”

“And shit?” I finished for him.

“Essactly,” he said.

Something on the bridge of his nose caught my eye. I moved toward him. “Did you actually break your nose?” I asked, lifting my hand to his face. He jerked away, laughing me off.

“It didn’t break. It just, um … it just moved over a little.” Then he turned to Kael with a goofy smile plastered on his face. “Be careful with her, bro. I’m not going to be that guy who’s like threatening dudes over his sister or anything like that. Nothing like that. I’m just saying, my sister, well … she flips on you and man …” He used his fingers like a knife under his throat.

Kael cast his eyes downward, giving no indication of what he thought about what he’d just heard.

“I’m kidding. She’s a peach.” He hugged me again. “A real peachy, peach of a sister. Aren’t you?”

Oh yeah, totally smashed.

The kitchen was getting busy now with people coming in to refill their drinks, as if shift change had been announced or something. It wasn’t until Kael looked at me that I felt like a kid. I probably seemed so immature, borderline wrestling with my brother who was completely out of it. And shit.

“Right. Thanks for the news bulletin,” I said, maneuvering out of his arm. “Your new little friend is waiting for you. She looked lonely.” I nodded my head toward the living room.

“Did she? She’s cute, huh? She’s going to school to be a nurse,” he told us with pride.

Kael made a face like he was impressed, but I wasn’t as drunk as Austin, and I could tell that Kael was humoring him. He mostly hid his mouth behind the dark beer bottle.

“You mean the little girl wants to be a nurse when she gets to be all grown up? After she’s out of high school and into the big world?” It was how I was with Austin—teasing him about stuff. It was just part of our twin dynamic. We didn’t have that mythical thing where we could read each other’s minds or feel each other’s pain. Nothing weird like that. Okay, I understood him on a level that I didn’t feel with most people. And I felt a closeness to him that I couldn’t explain. But a lot of siblings felt that, especially when they’d gone through their parents’ divorce and all the mess that came with it. But it had nothing to do with being twins.

So, really, my comment had nothing to do with the girl at all. It was just what we did. Like the comment he made to Kael. (The comment that I swore to myself I wouldn’t obsess over until later, when I was alone.)

“She’s nineteen, okay? And she’s going to actual nursing school.” Austin lifted his plastic cup to his mouth, pouring out the last drops of whatever concoction he had been downing the whole night.

“I’m sure she is.” I rolled my eyes at Austin. “And the next Barbie will be—”

It took me a moment to register that everyone was looking over my shoulder to something behind me. MPs, I thought for a split second. Damn. We’re busted. I turned around to face the officers, to give them some sort of excuse or attempt some type of negotiation. Only, when I turned around, I saw that it wasn’t the MPs at all. It was the girl in the ruffly shirt and she had heard every word I’d said.

Damn. I was the one who was busted.