Chapter 13

Choosing a Halloween costume for a party is way more complicated than working out a catering menu. For a girl, anyway. A guy can just stick a prop knife through his shirt and be done with it. But a girl has to take a lot into consideration. This Halloween I want to be sexy but classy, with just a dash of silly. I also recently bought the prettiest little green dress, and I want Liam to see me in it. So whatever costume I choose must somehow include that.

The idea comes to me three days before the party as I’m making breakfast. Twenty minutes later I’ve constructed a lightweight cardboard frying pan and pasted in two paper sunny-side-up eggs. I attach it to an elastic band and fit it around my head. Perfect. It’s a little silly, and I can debut the dress without looking like I’m trying too hard.

Ethan is upstairs working on a large cutout of a lightning bolt. He and Hope have decided to do a couples themed costume. He is strangely excited by the whole thing even though the costume wasn’t his idea and was responsible for their first fight—if you can call it a fight. My brother basically just rattled off pairs of organs for costume ideas: “We can be two kidneys! Two lungs! Two sides of a heart!”

But Hope said, “No. No. No. No body parts, Ethan,” and Ethan eventually got pissed off and walked away. They finally settled on “struck by lightning,” which featured Ethan as the lightning bolt and Hope in singed, hole-filled clothing.

I’m impressed by Hope’s idea because it satisfies both of them; the holes are in strategic, sexy spots (midriff, back) allowing Hope to look awesome, but the costume also appeals to Ethan’s obsession with human physiology. He spends a shocking amount of time lecturing all of us about the various consequences of electrocution. (Did you know that the capillaries in your skin explode and make a Christmas-tree-shaped burn all over your body?)

The final concern, after I’ve gotten the costume out of the way, is making up a white lie to tell my mom and getting her to extend my eleven o’clock curfew. I instruct Ethan to say nothing, and the day before the party I casually mention I’ve decided to take my brother to Kathy’s house and introduce him to a couple of my friends.

My mom actually glows at me. “That is a wonderful idea, Rain,” she says. “I’m so happy that you’re including Ethan.”

I sigh and shake my head. “Well, I don’t know if it’s going to work. Maybe we’ll only stay an hour. You know how he doesn’t like to have his schedule changed.”

“No, no,” she insists. “You should stay as long as he can handle it. The later the better. It’s going to be so healthy for him.”

“Do you really think so?” I say, wrinkling my nose. “Ethan’s never been out past ten.”

“Absolutely!” she says. “Stay out all night if he’ll let you. I give you my permission.”

“Well…okay.” I sigh again. “I’ll do my best.”

Oh, yeah, I will.

My mom gives me a tired smile and lies back on the couch. She’s gotten even thinner over the last couple of weeks, but when I ask her if she’d like some dinner she just waves her hand and tells me she’s not hungry. It worries me a little. I know she’s finished the case she was working on, but for some reason she hasn’t picked up anything new. In fact, over the last few days she’s been mostly at home, lounging on the sofa and listlessly surfing the internet. I would suggest she see a doctor, but I know she’ll just say she hasn’t seen a doctor for more than twenty years and she’s not about to start now. Maybe it’s a good thing she isn’t working on a lawsuit now. She looks like she needs some time off.

I’m dying to share my curfew triumph with someone so I knock on Ethan’s door and dance over to his desk. He’s pushed his books off onto the floor, and his table is littered with strips of aluminum foil and cardboard. The room smells faintly of beer, which I assume is coming from the cultures he grows on his windowsill. He glances briefly at me when I come in. “Hello, Rain.”

“Guess what?” I declare happily. “No curfew.”

“Okay.”

I was hoping for a more enthusiastic reaction. “After Kathy’s party,” I persist. “We can come home whenever we want. Mom said.”

“Oh. That’s good.” He goes back to cutting the cardboard.

“Just don’t say the word ‘party’ around Mom, okay? That’s really important.”

“I know,” he replies quietly. “You told me three times.”

“Yeah. Okay, sorry. I just wanted to make sure.”

“I know.”

I want him to look at me so badly, but he’s barely glanced up since I entered the room. He’s slicing tin foil with an intensity that’s severe, even for him.

“Ethan,” I venture timidly. “Secret Rule?”

He stops what he’s doing and stares stonily at the silver pile in front of him. “What can I do?” he mutters resentfully.

“Would you look at me please? I need to talk to you.”

He lays the scissors down and turns to me; his pale eyes fix on mine.

“You’re mad at me. For what I said before.”

He shakes his head. “I’m not mad about the curfew. But you need to tell me when we’re going home. So that I’ll know.”

I smile to myself. You’d think by now I’d know not to be vague with him. “I didn’t mean what I said right now. I was talking about that comment I made about Hope. About Hope and you.”

I know I need to be more specific than that, but I’m finding it hard to repeat the words. It was bad enough that I said it once.

But now he appears to be replaying everything I’ve ever said about them back over in his mind. I’m going to need to help him out.

“The eunuch thing,” I mumble finally.

“Oh. Okay.”

“I didn’t mean to hurt your feelings. When I said that.”

“But I’m not a eunuch.”

“I know you’re not, Ethan. That isn’t the point.” It’s weird trying to explain to my brother why he ought to be mad at me. I probably should just quit while I’m ahead.

“And Hope knows it too,” he continues seriously. “I asked her.”

“You did?”

“Yes. She didn’t know what the word meant. So I explained it to her. And then I told her that I’m sure that I wasn’t one.”

“You told her that—”

“That I masturbate normally. Once or twice a week.”

“Oh my God! Ethan!”

He flinches at my tone and shifts uncomfortably in his seat. “Please don’t yell, Rain.”

“You can’t say that to a girl!” I exclaim, throwing my hands up in the air. “You can’t say that to anyone!”

“I know,” he replies evenly. “She informed me.”

“She…she did?”

“She said I’m only allowed to speak about that topic if someone asks me about it first.”

“If somebody asks you? Who’s going to ask you about that?”

“People talk about it all the time on TV.”

“That’s different! It’s funny when comedians do it.” But even as I say it, I realize it’s impossible to explain to him why it’s comical when Seth Rogen jokes about the subject and completely horrifying when Ethan blurts out his personal habits. “Just don’t talk about it again.”

“I already promised Hope.”

I stare at him for a moment and then sniff the air. “Is that beer smell coming from your culture plates?”

He shakes his head and taps a half-empty bottle in his trash bin. “Experiment.”

“Oh. Did you drink the experiment?”

“Yes,” he replies shortly. “Am I done with the Secret Rule for today? Can I go back to my costume now?”

“Yeah—I guess.” I’m not sure I got what I’d come for, though. I got him to look me in the eye and talk to me. But I can’t invoke the Secret Rule to ask for something as vague as understanding or forgiveness. Even the Secret Rule has limitations.