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Short filmTranscript
00:0898 degrees.
00:10The AC in my room died this morning.
00:13Just gave out.
00:15I hate this house.
00:16The way it is now anyway.
00:18I hate the day mom married Kevin and packed him and his quiet thirty-nother son into my life.
00:27Two years now, every wrong thing under this roof started that day.
00:32Too hot to think.
00:35I've kicked off my shorts,
00:38a tank strap slipping off my shoulder,
00:41and flopped back on the bed to call her.
00:53Mom, my AC's broken. I'm melting up here.
00:56Her end is all rattling carts and store announcements.
01:00I know, I know. I'm at the store. Back soon. Have your brother look at it.
01:04He's coming home for lunch anyway.
01:10Your brother. Those two words set me off.
01:13But my brain won't listen.
01:15It pulls him up before I can stop it.
01:18He does HVAC.
01:19Fixes AC lines and pipes all day.
01:22Always slick with sweat.
01:24Last week in the kitchen.
01:26Head tipped back.
01:28Chugging ice water.
01:29His throat working with every swallow.
01:32A drop running down his jaw to his collar pine.
01:35The muscle in his forearm bunching tight as he cranked a valve.
01:39I press my thighs together.
01:41And hate myself the second I do.
01:44I hate him.
01:45I really do.
01:47So what the hell is this?
01:50Downstairs, the front door clicks open.
01:52The stairs groan step by step under someone much heavier than me.
01:58That's when I remember what I'm wearing.
02:01I lunge for the shorts on my chair.
02:03Too late.
02:05The door swings open.
02:06Samir.
02:07Work pants.
02:08Gray tank soaked through and clean.
02:10Every line of his chest and stomach right there.
02:14Toolbox in hand.
02:15The hair at his forehead damp in strands.
02:18I should look away.
02:20I don't.
02:21My eyes dragged down on their own.
02:23His slick chest.
02:25His tensed forearms.
02:26And finally...
02:28See something you like?
02:30His voice comes out rough.
02:31The corner of his mouth tipping up.
02:33Caught.
02:34Heat shoots all the way to my ears.
02:37I rip the blanket up over myself.
02:40Who's looking at you?
02:41Don't flatter yourself!
02:43He doesn't look away.
02:45The smirk only deepens.
02:46His throat moves once.
02:48The AC.
02:50He steps in.
02:51Drops the toolbox.
02:52And looks down at me curled up small.
02:55Where is it?
02:59Over there.
03:00I jerk my chin at the unit in the corner and pull the blanket tighter.
03:03He doesn't move right away.
03:05First those heavy eyes drag over me.
03:07Then he comes.
03:11The unit sits high on the wall above my headboard.
03:14My bed right under it.
03:15The room's small.
03:17And a man his size only makes it smaller.
03:21He takes one look and frowns.
03:24Get down.
03:26Why should I?
03:27I dig my heels in.
03:28Though it sounds hollow the moment it's out.
03:30Two years.
03:32And this is all I know how to do with him.
03:34Bristle.
03:35Jab.
03:35Push back.
03:37Mom remarried.
03:38He and Kevin moved in.
03:39And the house stopped being just hers and mine.
03:44I came home for the summer wanting some quiet and now I share even my breathing room with this stranger.
03:51I can dodge him for an afternoon.
03:53Not for the long line of summers after.
03:56He doesn't argue.
03:58One knee on the edge of the bed.
04:00And he stretches up toward the unit.
04:03I shrink into the corner, but the bed's only so big.
04:06As he leans, the soaped gray tank brushes my shin.
04:09Heat.
04:10Sweat.
04:11That sun-warmed smell of him.
04:12All of it crashing over me at once.
04:14His arm works a screw overhead.
04:16The muscle bunching and releasing inches from my face.
04:19I hold my breath.
04:20I don't dare move.
04:21No one's downstairs.
04:23Mom's still at the store.
04:24The whole house is quiet.
04:26Just my sun-baked bedroom.
04:27Door shut.
04:28Sealed off from the rest of the world.
04:30The thought sends a hotter prickle up my back.
04:32Up here.
04:33Door closed.
04:34Whatever happens, no one below would know.
04:38Move over.
04:39He says low.
04:40His elbow pressing toward me.
04:41There's nowhere to go.
04:43His hip is against my drawn up knees.
04:44I'm wedged between him and the wall.
04:47Half of me pressed to his side.
04:50I told you I can't get away from you.
04:52He says, glancing down.
04:54His throat moving.
04:55Goes both ways.
04:59He turns it a few times.
05:00Swears.
05:01Says the wiring's fried.
05:03The whole thing has to come apart.
05:04The minutes crawl.
05:06The room's hot enough to swim in.
05:07The two of us crammed into this scrap of space.
05:09Neither one talking.
05:10My back's to the wall.
05:12Half of me against his sweat-damp side.
05:14The sweat glues us together.
05:16Skin to skin.
05:17Impossible to peel apart.
05:18I should be disgusted.
05:20I'm not.
05:20I can feel the muscle in his side tighten with every turn of the screw.
05:24That strength soaking through a thin film of sweat into my skin, sinking low in my belly.
05:29A picture rises before I can stop it.
05:31If that hand weren't reaching for a screw overhead but sliding down my waist instead.
05:36I kill the thought.
05:37My face burns.
05:38I hate him.
05:39I think of the wedding day.
05:41Him standing there, cold.
05:42Not even a hello.
05:43Two years ago I swore I'd never go soft for this man.
05:46Not once.
05:47And right now my thighs are clamping together on their own.
05:50The wet heat there is impossible to hide.
05:54Slick.
05:55Sticky.
05:55Mortifying.
05:57It's the weather.
05:58I lie to myself.
05:59That's all.
05:59Just the heat.
06:01Irritated, I try to shift.
06:02To find room to breathe.
06:04My knee moves and, by accident, grazes the inside of his thigh.
06:09His hands stop.
06:10The whole room goes still.
06:12Becca.
06:13His voice drops to gravel.
06:14It travels straight down my ear into my spine.
06:17You'd better not move.
06:19I don't listen.
06:20My heart's slamming.
06:21And something hotter than hate eggs me on.
06:23I push out again, elbow digging into his side.
06:25On purpose.
06:26The next second his free hand clamps down on my waist.
06:29A hand big enough to span half of it.
06:31Too strong to fight.
06:32And it hauls me back against him.
06:33My gasp jams in my throat.
06:35My back hits his scalding, sweat-damped chest.
06:37His heartbeat, through two thin layers of cotton, slams into my spine.
06:42Once.
06:43Again.
06:47What are you doing?
06:48I keep my voice down and claw at the arm locked across my waist.
06:52It's cast iron.
06:53It doesn't give.
06:54I should break free.
06:56Drive an elbow into him, call him a creep, bolt downstairs.
06:59But my body betrays me.
07:01It sinks into him, fitting against every scalding inch of him.
07:04I can feel his breathing turn rough.
07:06His chest rising and falling at my back.
07:11He grunts.
07:12My elbow jabbing his stomach and in the scramble.
07:14Quit it.
07:16I won't give in.
07:17And I'm even more scared he sees through me.
07:19So I open my mouth for another jab.
07:22Nothing comes out.
07:23His free hand lifts and closes around the front of my throat.
07:26Not hard.
07:27But sure.
07:28Steady.
07:29Tipping the back of my head into the hollow of his shoulder.
07:32Every drop of blood in me runs cold.
07:35Then floods back scalding.
07:38Two years of fighting.
07:40Of cutting each other to the bone and he never once touched me.
07:44But now his palm cradles my throat.
07:46His thumb on the pulse going wild there.
07:49And I'm not afraid.
07:51Being held completely in his hand.
07:54Helpless in his grip.
07:55It turns me to water.
07:58I'm in the same hell you are.
08:00His mouth is at my ear.
08:01His breath hot and horsey.
08:03Each word brended in.
08:04But you are going to hold still.
08:08His breath fans against the side of my face.
08:11No more squirming.
08:12No more little whimpers making it worse.
08:14The hand on my throat tightens a fraction.
08:16You hear me?
08:17I try to nod.
08:18Only then does he ease off.
08:20I guilt for air.
08:21My heart wild enough to leap out of my chest.
08:26For a long stretch I stay curled against him.
08:28Not daring to move.
08:29His arm stays locked around my waist.
08:31Never once loosening.
08:32And his thumb against the damp curve of my side moves slow.
08:35Up.
08:36Then down.
08:36Up.
08:37Then down.
08:37Every drag of it sends a current sliding down to the small of my back.
08:41I clamp my thighs tighter.
08:43And it only makes the want sharper.
08:45I want more.
08:46The thought scares me.
08:48That's when, downstairs, the front door clicks open.
08:51I'm home!
08:52Becca!
08:54Did your brother go up to fix your AC?
08:56No!
08:57No, he didn't!
08:58I call down, forcing my voice into its usual annoyance.
09:01He's probably off slacking somewhere again!
09:03A beat of quiet below.
09:05Let me come up and look at it.
09:06You can't sit in this heat.
09:08The staircase creaks, taking Mom's weight.
09:10One step.
09:11My blood goes to ice.
09:13I claw at his arm.
09:17Let go.
09:17She's coming up.
09:18Let go of me.
09:19He doesn't.
09:21Worse.
09:21The hand that's been resting at my waist slides painfully slow down the line of my hip.
09:26Over my stomach.
09:28Over the dip of my hip bone.
09:29Lower still until it settles squarely over me.
09:31Through the thin fabric already soaked with sweat and something else.
09:34My whole body bows tight.
09:36A sharp, high sound rushes up my throat.
09:37I bite down on my lip and swallow it.
09:39Second stare.
09:40Creak.
09:41He bends his head, nose against my scalding ear.
09:43And through the soaked fabric his palm grinds down on me.
09:46Not soft, not hard.
09:48Once.
09:50Soaked like this.
09:52And still lying that no one came up.
09:54He breathes.
09:55Low and filthy.
09:58Samir.
09:58It comes out a plea.
10:00My voice in pieces.
10:01Please, my mom.
10:03His thumb presses again, dragging a winner out of me before I can swallow it.
10:06The hand doesn't move from where it is.
10:08Scared now?
10:08Third step.
10:09Mom's voice is closer.
10:11Becca?
10:11Why is the door locked from the inside?
10:13He looks down at me.
10:15Held completely in his hand.
10:17Every breath a luxury now.
10:18His eyes lit with something that makes me dizzy.
10:21He leans to my ear.
10:22Word by word.
10:24So how about you let your mom see exactly what you look like right now?
10:38Becca?
10:39Why is this locked from the inside?
10:45His palm is still on me.
10:46Grinding in that slow, punishing way that has me shaking all over.
10:50His breath brushes my ear.
10:51Answer her.
10:54I-I'm changing!
10:55I call out.
10:56My voice in pieces.
10:58It's too hot!
10:59I'm not dressed!
11:00Don't come in, Mom!
11:01God, this heat.
11:03Hurry up then.
11:04Come down and eat.
11:04I got sandwiches and cold pasta salad.
11:07Step by step, the stairs let her go.
11:10Soon there's the rustle of plastic bags.
11:12The fridge opening and closing.
11:14The threat ebbs.
11:16I slump back against him, ringed out, gulping air, furious and humiliated.
11:20My eyes burning.
11:21You're insane.
11:21You actually would've-
11:23He doesn't answer.
11:24And he doesn't do what I expect.
11:25Doesn't let go and retreat behind the wall we've spent two years building.
11:29He just holds me, chin on my shoulder, silent for a long time.
11:33Long enough that I can hear the fridge humming downstairs.
11:36Then he says it, low, without a trace of his usual sneer.
11:40I don't wanna let go.
11:42I go rigid.
11:44I twist around to look at him.
11:46Two years.
11:48And I know every cruel thing he's ever said to me.
11:51This wasn't a joke.
11:52Not even close.
11:56We stay frozen like that.
11:59Downstairs, mom's putting groceries away, humming something tuneless.
12:03The AC's still dead, the heat lying thick on my skin.
12:07But the heat running through me stopped being the weather a while ago.
12:11I've been locked against him too long, wound too tight.
12:14Now my lower back and the tops of my thighs start to cramp.
12:18A deep, dragging ache, like the heaviness before my period.
12:21I shift in small movements, trying to work it loose.
12:24Don't move.
12:25He says, low.
12:26But it's not his usual impatience.
12:29It's horsey.
12:31Careful.
12:32Something I've never heard from him.
12:34I shift again.
12:36Can't help it.
12:37A small noun escapes.
12:40Both his thumbs have come to rest on the outsides of my thighs.
12:44Kneading slow, back and forth.
12:45The touch lifts every hair on me, but the ache is worse.
12:48I bite my lip and admit it.
12:51My lower back, and where my legs meet, tense too long.
12:55It aches.
12:57I want to stretch, but you're pinning me.
12:59I can't move.
13:02His hands pause on my legs.
13:05Bring your knees.
13:07His voice drops lower.
13:10Up onto the bed.
13:14I twist around to glare at him, red-faced and lost.
13:18Neil?
13:19Neil, how?
13:20He pats the narrow space along his thighs.
13:23Feet here.
13:24Then taps the mattress in front of me.
13:27Knees here.
13:28When it hits me what he's asking, my face goes up in flames.
13:31But the ache is unbearable, and somehow I do it.
13:34His hands settle on my hips and guide me forward.
13:36Easing my feet up one at a time, knees spreading.
13:38By the time I catch up, I'm straddling his lap with my back to him.
13:41A position so shameful my toes curl.
13:44Lean back.
13:45He draws me against his chest.
13:48Head.
13:49Back on my shoulder.
13:50My throat's dry, and I obey without knowing why.
13:53The back of my head finds the hollow of his shoulder.
13:55My whole spine rising and falling against his scalding, sweat-damp chest.
14:00His hands lock on my hips, and slowly he bears down, lifting my lower body, arching it back into a
14:04deep bow.
14:05Inch by inch, my whole torso pulls open.
14:07The ache I've held for so long lets go all at once.
14:10So good my eyes well up.
14:12A long moan slips out before I can stop it.
14:14One time.
14:17Come on.
14:18Come on.
14:18Come on.
14:19Come on, back up.
14:19He curses low behind my ear, his nose bearing into the side of my neck, dragging once, hard.
14:25His breathing goes racked.
14:26His hands press in harder, deepening the arch.
14:29Once, twice, open, release.
14:31Each one melts the ache into something else, burning up from the base of my spine.
14:36We hold it for almost a minute before the arms carrying me start to shake.
14:42I'm smaller than him, but I'm no slip of a girl.
14:46Holding me up in mid-air like this would wear anyone down.
14:50I'm better now.
14:51A lie.
14:52My face burns.
14:53He grunts and lowers me back onto his lap, but his hands don't leave my hips.
14:57I know exactly what it means.
14:59Still straddling him, back turned.
15:01And for some reason neither of us moves to fix it.
15:04Two years of fighting.
15:05And this is the longest we've ever sat together without tearing each other apart.
15:09That alone unsettles me.
15:11Thanks.
15:11I say it at last, barely a whisper.
15:14He hums.
15:16The stubble on his jaw drags across my cheek with it, and a fine melting tingle races up my spine.
15:21I know I have to push it down.
15:23Pretend I didn't feel it.
15:26Downstairs, Mom's still busy in the kitchen, humming off key.
15:29His long fingers, in time with every breath I take, slowly tighten on my hips.
15:35The heavy ache starts pulsing back.
15:37I can't help squirming.
15:39Still hurts?
15:42Sorry.
15:44He hesitates.
15:45Then his hands come slowly around from my sides to the front of me.
15:48Drop your back down.
15:51The rasp in his voice impossible to hide now.
15:54Lift your hips a little.
15:57He pushes my tank up and slides both hands into my shorts.
16:01His squirting thumbs find the two aching knots at the base of my spine and press in.
16:05Steady, grinding down in slow circles.
16:08My lips tremble.
16:09I suck in a breath and a moan I can't hold pills out.
16:12His thumbs circle.
16:13Leaning in harder.
16:14Grinding the stiff ache loose, inch by inch.
16:16I clamp down on my tongue.
16:18Downstairs, the tap is running.
16:19Mom washing the produce.
16:20Please God, she heard nothing.
16:22He stills for a few seconds.
16:24Then he knees deeper, faster, his hands spreading wider.
16:27Outward, downward.
16:28My hips move with his rhythm on their own.
16:30His thumbs are too close enough to turn me to water in that place,
16:34with every circle of his hands betrays me getting hotter and hotter.
16:37Samir.
16:39His name comes out wrecked, soft and clinging.
16:42Pleasure spreads in waves from where his fingers press,
16:45melting every ache out of me.
16:47I bite my lips between my teeth and strangle the next moan in my throat,
16:50terrified they'll hear downstairs.
16:52Below, the water surges louder and Mom calls up.
16:56Just a few more minutes!
16:58Drowning out every sound I don't dare make.
17:01And under that cover, his hands the slides one inch lower.
17:06His breathing changes too.
17:07Especially the moment he buries his face in the curve of my neck, lips against my skin.
17:11Every hair on my nace stands up.
17:13My whole spine shivers with that melting tingle.
17:15Then, suddenly, he pulls his hands out of my shorts.
17:17A small lost whimper leaks out of me before I can stop it.
17:19The next second I want to disappear into the floor.
17:21Oh God.
17:22He was just being decent for once, working out a cramp.
17:25And there I was, panting and windering under his hands making those sounds.
17:31I must have scared him off.
17:33The silence stretches, my heart still pounding.
17:36Over his hands, over the mouth he'd press to my neck.
17:40I get ready to pull away, ready to say something ugly.
17:43And that's when Samir's fingers hook the edge of my shorts and tug.
17:47One inch down, his warm mouth grazes my ear.
17:51Good girl.
17:52He breathes, low and rough.
17:54Lift your hips for me again.
17:57Good girl. Lift your hips for me again.
18:00The words land somewhere deep inside me.
18:03I squeeze my eyes shut, trying to quiet my racing heart.
18:07And instead, I just obey, lifting my hips, shaking.
18:13Downstairs, Mom's voice suddenly rises.
18:15It's all set out. Come eat before you go back up.
18:20It hits like a bucket of ice water over my head.
18:23Samir goes rigid.
18:24And I snap awake.
18:26What am I doing?
18:27My mom just got home.
18:29She's right downstairs.
18:30And here I am in my own room straddling my stepbrother.
18:33Lifting my hips because he told me to.
18:35Shame torches through me.
18:36I shove his hands off.
18:37Scramble off his lap.
18:39Yank my shorts up.
18:40Not daring to look back.
18:41I'm going down.
18:42Becca.
18:43He says behind me.
18:44I don't stop.
18:45But just before I pull the door open, I look back at him after all.
18:48He's on the wrecked bed.
18:50Chest heaving.
18:50Hair soaked.
18:51Eyes burning into me.
18:52Not a trace of the usual sneer.
18:54Just something scorching.
18:55Cut off mid breath.
18:57I flee.
18:58Straight down the stairs.
19:02I don't taste a single bite of that lunch.
19:05Across from me, mom rattles on.
19:08The store had a sale.
19:09The neighbors news.
19:11Why is your brother so quiet today?
19:13I murmur back.
19:14My whole heart's still stuck in that burning room upstairs.
19:18Samir sits at the other end, eating with his head down, silent.
19:21But I can feel it.
19:23Every time mom looks away, his eyes land on me.
19:26Heavy.
19:27Heavy.
19:28Hot enough that I can barely hold my fork.
19:30Oh.
19:31I have to go help your aunt move some things this afternoon.
19:33She's swamped.
19:34Becca, you rest at home, okay?
19:36Samir.
19:37You're home this afternoon.
19:39If the AC's still not fixed, call someone.
19:41Don't let your sister roast.
19:43My grip on the fork jumps.
19:45Afternoon.
19:46House.
19:46Just the two of us.
19:48My head snaps up.
19:49Right into his eyes, looking at me past my mother.
19:51He says nothing.
19:52Just the faintest tip of his mouth aimed at me.
19:55And the string in me that just snapped pulls tight again.
19:57Humming.
20:01The second mom's out the door.
20:03The house goes so quiet, there's nothing left but my own heartbeat.
20:08I shut myself in my room, back to the door.
20:12Telling myself I'm going nowhere and opening for no one.
20:15This morning's madness never happened.
20:18I hate him.
20:19I have to remember I hate him.
20:21But my body won't obey.
20:23Just remembering the heat of his palm, that good girl and my legs start to give again.
20:29The stairs crack, step by step, taking the weight I can't escape.
20:33The footsteps stop outside my door.
20:37Open up.
20:38His voice comes through the wood.
20:40Low.
20:41Rough.
20:42Leaving no room to refuse.
20:44No.
20:45I brace against the door, but my voice is laughably thin.
20:48Go away!
20:49I hate you!
20:52A beat of silence outside.
20:55Becca.
20:56His voice drops to almost nothing, each word like it's spoken against my ear.
21:01The way you looked this morning didn't look like hate.
21:05My face goes up in flames, my heart slamming till it aches.
21:09I stare at my own hand on the lock.
21:12Watch it.
21:14Beyond my control.
21:16Slowly turn it open.
21:21The instant the door gives, he's through it.
21:25I step back, he steps in, and in three strides he's backs me into the corner.
21:31One hand braced on the wall by my head, caging me between him and the plaster.
21:36Heat.
21:37Sweat.
21:38That scent that's only his.
21:40Everywhere.
21:44What you didn't finish saying this morning.
21:46He bends down, nose nearly to mine, his breath scalding.
21:49Say it now.
21:51Say, say what?
21:52Whether you hate me.
21:54He cuts me off.
21:56A certainty in his voice that lifts every hair on me.
21:59Look at me and say it.
22:04I lift my eyes to his.
22:06Two years of resentment.
22:07Every I'm fine I ever fed my mother.
22:09And this morning's surrender I'd die before admitting.
22:12All of it jams in my throat.
22:14The word comes out shaking apart.
22:16I-
22:16He waits, eyes locked on me without a blink, the hand on the wall corded with tension.
22:21I close my eyes and let it go.
22:22The truth I've held for two years and the last of my dignity with it.
22:26I don't know.
22:27I hear my own voice tremble.
22:28I just know.
22:29Don't let go again.
22:31His breath catches.
22:33The next second he's kissing me, pressing me into the wall.
22:39Becca, I forgot my keys. Are they on the entry table?
22:43We both freeze.
22:44His mouth still on mine.
22:46My fists still in his tank.
22:48Both of us breathing hard, chest against rising chest.
22:51One wall and one staircase away.
22:54My mother's ordinary afternoon voice knowing nothing.
22:57It cracks through me like thunder, jolting me out of the heat that was about to swallow me whole.
23:03I shove him off, frantically fixing my clothes and my breath.
23:07My voice shaking as I call down.
23:09They're- they're on the entry table! Just grab them, Mom!
23:13Got him!
23:14Okay, I'm off!
23:17The whole house sinks back into scalding silence.
23:21I lean against the wall, legs too weak to hold me and look up at him.
23:25He's looking back, and what's churning in his eyes burns hotter than the 98 degree day.
23:30Neither of us says a word, but we both know that near miss, one wall away, didn't put us out.
23:37It lit something for good.
23:39The summer's only just begun.
23:42And this door of mine will never quite shut again.
23:48That night at dinner, I can barely sit still.
23:50The AC finally got fixed that afternoon.
23:53The four of us around the table.
23:54Mom on my left, busy topping off everyone's plate.
23:57Kevin across from me, head down over his food.
24:00And Samir right at my side.
24:01On the surface, everything's normal.
24:03Mom rattles on about the neighbors.
24:05Kevin grunts now and then, some dull Rivroy playing in the background.
24:08I stare at my plate, trying to look like I have at every meal for two years.
24:11At war with the stepbrother beside me, too disdainful to spare him a glance.
24:15But under the tablecloth, it's another world.
24:17His hand has settled on my knee.
24:18My fork stops in mid-air.
24:20I try to brush him off without a flicker on my face.
24:22He doesn't budge.
24:23His palm is hot enough to feel through my dress.
24:27Slowly, he slides it an inch up my thigh.
24:30Mom speaks up and I nearly come out of my chair.
24:34Is the AC all sorted?
24:35Did your brother do okay up there?
24:37In that exact second, his hand climbs another half inch,
24:40stops high on my thigh and presses down with meaning.
24:42Like he knows precisely what he's doing to me.
24:45I grip my fork and force my voice flat as dead water.
24:48Hmm. It's fine.
24:50Passable.
24:52Samir's coughs beside me, cold as if we're actually fighting, not even turning his head.
24:57Still as ungrateful as ever.
24:58Above the table were still the step-seblings who can't share a room.
25:01Beneath it, his thumb grinds slow circles into the inside of my thigh through the dress.
25:07I stab at something and shove it in my mouth without tasting it.
25:10My face is burning.
25:12I gulp water to put it out, but my throat's bone dry.
25:15I set down my fork, my voice unsteady.
25:18Mom, I'll go get something to drink.
25:21I'm practically fleeing as I stand.
25:24And as I turn for the kitchen, I see it clearly.
25:28Samir, in no hurry at all.
25:30Setting down his fork too.
25:33A half-wall counter separates the kitchen from the dining room.
25:36Back to the doorway I grip the counter, shut my eyes and breathe deep,
25:41trying to push down the heat in my face and the chaos in my chest.
25:45Behind me, the floor gives the flattest creak.
25:47Before I can turn, two hands brace the counter's edge, caging me between him and the counter.
25:53His chest against my back, his chin on my shoulder, his voice barely there, breath brushing my ear.
25:59Running from what?
26:01You're insane.
26:02I grip the counter, hardly daring to make a sound.
26:05You're right there.
26:07One ball away.
26:08I know.
26:09He laughs low, the vibration traveling down my spine into me.
26:12He touches nothing else, just drags his nose painfully slow over the skin behind my ear.
26:17So you'll have to hold it in.
26:19Same as under the table just now.
26:20Every drop of blood in me rushes to my face.
26:23From the living room, the TV, the on and off murmur of Mom and Kevin drifts over clear as day.
26:29Close enough that one lifted head, one turns.
26:32My breath shakes.
26:34Samir.
26:35He leans closer, pressing me into the cold counter's edge, his voice full of knowing amusement.
26:42Shaking like this.
26:44Are you scared of getting caught?
26:46He pauses.
26:47We're scared I'll stop.
26:50I can't answer.
26:52Because I don't have an answer to either.
26:55From the dining room comes the scrape of a chair leg on the floor.
26:59Becca?
27:00Mom calls.
27:01The drinks are on the bottom shelf of the fridge. Can't you find them?
27:04We both go still.
27:08Found! Found them!
27:09I blurt it, squeezing out from between him and the counter,
27:12yanking open the bottom shelf, grabbing two sparkling waters at random.
27:16Only when the cold bottles hit my scalding palms do I get a sliver of my mind back.
27:23Samir steps back, unhurried, and pulls a beer from the fridge, as if he weren't the one who just had
27:30me prin to the counter.
27:32I carry the water back to the table, my legs still unsteady.
27:37But this time, Mom doesn't pick her chatter back up.
27:41She sets down her forks and looks between me and Samir.
27:45From my flushed face to the faint mark on the side of his neck I only now notice, left there
27:50at some point I can't place.
27:52You too.
27:53She says slowly, her tone impossible to read.
27:56Why aren't you fighting today?
27:58The air locks.
27:59Kevin looks up too.
28:01My heart pounds in my ears.
28:02Two years and we've never had a quiet meal at this table.
28:05Today's silence is the biggest tell of all.
28:07Fight about what?
28:08Samir says it first, flat as if he's remarking on the weather.
28:12Can't be bothered with her.
28:15Exactly.
28:16I jump in, chin up, packing every ounce of panic into the familiar jab.
28:21Like I'd want to talk to him.
28:23Mom watches us.
28:25For a long time.
28:28Then she smiles and picks her fork back up.
28:31Good.
28:32We're family.
28:34No need to be at each other's throats all the time.
28:37But the moment she looks down, I catch Kevin's eyes.
28:40He says nothing, just lingers a thoughtful second on that faint mark on his son's neck.
28:45Under the table, Samir's knee bumps mine, very lightly, as if to say, careful.
28:50And also, this isn't over.
28:54That night I can't sleep.
28:56Turning over and over.
28:57Not just from the unspent restlessness humming under my skin all night.
29:01From Mom's look at the table, and Kevin's one second pause.
29:05Two fine needles in the softest part of my chest.
29:10I start thinking things I've never let myself think.
29:14What if we get caught?
29:19To marry Kevin, Mom rebuilt her whole life from when I was 16.
29:24Sold the old house.
29:25Moved to this strange city.
29:27Learned at 40 to be a newlywed again.
29:30So carefully, she tried to weld two families into one home.
29:34And here I am, planting a bomb under it in the most unforgivable way there is.
29:40I hate Samir.
29:41That's what I've told myself, and told my mother, for two years.
29:46Now, I finally see it.
29:48That hate was laced with something else from the start.
29:54I hated him barging in because I couldn't stop looking at him.
29:59I went toe to toe with him because it was the only way I dared get close.
30:03I dressed up my wanting as loathing and kept it up for two whole years until I nearly believed it
30:08myself.
30:10In the hall, the floor creaks.
30:14My doorknob turns, very lightly, locked.
30:19Then a small folded note slides in under the door.
30:25Barefoot, I slip off the bed, pick it up, unfold it in the moonlight.
30:34Samir's handwriting.
30:35One line.
30:37They're both out tomorrow.
30:38All day.
30:39I hold the note, standing on the cold floor, my heart nearly bursting through my chest.
30:45Outside, not a breath of summer wind.
30:48And I know, perfectly clearly.
30:52Tomorrow, I won't lock the door.
30:54By early the next morning, the house is empty.
30:57Mom and Kevin head out with their bags to help my aunt move.
31:00On the way, Mom pokes her head up the stairs.
31:03Sort out your own lunch.
31:04There's food in the fridge.
31:05Then the garage door rumbles down, and the engine fades.
31:09Then the whole house is quiet enough that all that's left is my own breathing.
31:15I don't lock the door.
31:18I lie on the bed, staring at the ceiling, and hear his door open downstairs.
31:24Footsteps, step by step, climbing slow, stopping outside mine.
31:29The knob turns.
31:31It opens.
31:32Samir stands in the doorway, backlit by the window, and looks at me a long time.
31:37Neither of us speaks.
31:39Two years of friction.
31:41Last night's note.
31:42The empty house silence.
31:44All of it pressed into these few steps between us.
31:47Come here.
31:49I hear myself say it.
31:51Soft, but without a shred of hesitation.
31:57He crosses to me, sits on the end of the bed, and tucks a damp strand of hair behind my
32:01ear.
32:03A gesture too gentle to be his.
32:06I thought about it all night.
32:08I look at him and finish the sentence I've hidden for two years.
32:13I don't hate you.
32:15I never really did.
32:17His throat works.
32:19He leans down, forehead to mine.
32:22Our breaths tangling.
32:24Same.
32:26His voice is almost too Hosky to hear.
32:29From the day you stood at that wedding at 16 and glared at me, I was done for.
32:36He kisses me.
32:39This time there are no footsteps below, no voice about to call us, no threat waiting to puncture everything.
32:46Just a room full of summer light, and two people who don't have to pretend anymore.
32:51The camera holds outside the drawn curtains.
32:56For the next few days we live inside a stolen, scalding bubble.
33:00By day the parents are at work and the house is ours.
33:03But the sweeter it gets, the tighter the string in me pulls.
33:06Because I know, this bubble is borrowed, and sooner or later it comes due.
33:11The faint mark on Samir's neck fades, and a new one takes its place.
33:15He keeps saying it's fine, but I start checking his collar before every meal without thinking.
33:19And checking my own face.
33:22We relearn how to bicker at the table.
33:25Except now every jab is a code only the two of us can read.
33:31The change starts on a Saturday.
33:33Mom suddenly doesn't go in.
33:35She sits on the living room couch, watching Samir, and me, come down the stairs one after the other.
33:40Something in her eyes I can't read.
33:45Becca.
33:46She pats the seat beside her.
33:48Sit.
33:48Keep me company a minute.
33:50Samir's step hitches almost imperceptibly, before he keeps going toward the kitchen.
33:55I sit.
33:56My heart's going wild.
34:04Lately.
34:04Mom takes my hand, her voice light, but every word a hundred pounds.
34:09Is something weighing on you?
34:13Half the blood drains out of me.
34:15No.
34:16I manage a smile.
34:18What would I have on my mind?
34:19Mom looks at me a long time, then lets out a soft sigh.
34:22When you were sixteen, I moved us here, and you hated me for a long time.
34:26Her eyes drift to the window.
34:27I know.
34:28For my own happiness, I pulled you up by the roots from everything familiar.
34:33Dropped you into a strange house, gave you a strange brother.
34:39All these years I felt I owed you.
34:41My throat tightens.
34:43I can't speak.
34:44I just want you to be happy, Becca.
34:46She turns back, her eyes shining.
34:49Really happy.
34:51Not the put on, I'm fine you show me.
34:54In that instant I almost tell her everything.
34:56Almost lay it all out.
34:58Two years of pretending, these scalding few days, the knot of joy and fear tangled in my chest.
35:04But I look at that careful light in her eyes, the light of a woman who gave everything for this
35:09family, and I swallow the words.
35:17I'm happy, Mom.
35:19I hug her, bury my face in her shoulder, my voice shaking.
35:24Really?
35:26At the foot of the stairs, Samir's stair stands holding two glasses of water, motionless.
35:33He heard.
35:35He heard.
35:36He heard all of it.
35:42That night, another note slides under my door.
35:48This one is four words.
35:50We need to talk.
35:57We meet in the garage out back.
36:00The one place in this house the parents won't think of and can't hear.
36:04This can't keep going or it'll blow up.
36:06Samir leans against the workbench, his voice heavy.
36:09Your face today.
36:10Your mom will see through it sooner or later.
36:12So what do you want to do?
36:14I cross my arms, my voice sharp, even as my heart drops.
36:20I don't know.
36:21For once, he looks at a loss, dragging a hand down his face.
36:25I just know I don't want to keep you hidden, turn you into some secret that can't see daylight.
36:31You shouldn't have to be that.
36:32I freeze.
36:33But what can we do?
36:35My voice trembles.
36:36Tell them?
36:37Becca and Samir, the step-siblings, are together?
36:40Picture my mom's face.
36:41She welded two families into one home and it cost her everything.
36:45One sentence from us and it all shatters.
36:48The garage goes quiet.
36:50Only the light overhead, buzzing.
36:53What if?
36:54He says suddenly, looking at me, his eyes frighteningly serious.
36:58We weren't step-siblings.
36:59What do you mean?
37:03In September, I start the project out in Tucson.
37:06My own place, my own life.
37:08Word by word.
37:09I won't live in this house anymore.
37:13We won't be siblings under one roof.
37:15Once the dust settles, once you graduate too, we can start over.
37:20As something we don't have to hide.
37:22I look at him, my heart aching with each beat.
37:25It's the first time I realize he isn't after this stolen summer.
37:28He's after the after.
37:35But some things don't wait for you to be ready.
37:39It's a Tuesday evening.
37:41I think the house is empty and come out of the bathroom and nothing but a towel.
37:45And there's Samir, waiting in the hall.
37:48He backs me to the wall, forehead to mine, both of us grinning like kids who swiped candy.
37:55Neither of us hear Kevin's car, home early, below, or his footsteps on the stairs.
38:07Samir?
38:09The instant his father's voice sounds from the end of the hall, the whole world stops.
38:14We spring apart.
38:16Too late.
38:17Kevin stands at the top of the stairs, looking at his son half-wrapped around me in a towel,
38:22his son's hand still at my waist, and his face freezes, then breaks, inch by inch.
38:30What are you two doing?
38:33No music to cover it.
38:37No door to block it.
38:39No excuse that holds.
38:42This time, we're truly seen.
38:47That night is the longest of my life.
38:50Kevin calls Mom home.
38:52The four of us sit in the living room under a harsh white light.
38:57Mom's face goes from confusion, to disbelief, to something I'll never forget, heartbreak.
39:05How long?
39:07Mom, I asked.
39:09How long?
39:13This summer.
39:15Samir speaks first, stepping in front of me as if to shield me.
39:20I started it.
39:22Blame me.
39:24No.
39:26I grab his hand, my voice shaking but holding.
39:29Not just him.
39:31Us.
39:33Mom, I know this is hard to take.
39:35We're not blood, but we became siblings inside your marriage to Kevin.
39:41I know how absurd that is, how much it hurts.
39:45Mom covers her face, her shoulders shaking hard.
39:49Kevin can't get out a single word, just stares at the floor.
39:53I spent two years pretending to hate him because I knew from the start it was wrong.
39:58But Mom, I can't keep pretending.
40:00In the living room, all that's left is Mom stifled crying.
40:03In that moment, I finally understand what a price is.
40:06It isn't the thrill of getting caught, it's watching the person you love most break because of you.
40:14For the next two weeks, the house is frozen over.
40:18Mom barely speaks to me.
40:21Not anger.
40:22The harder kind of silence.
40:25Kevin moves into the study to sleep.
40:27Samir moves up his transfer to Tucson, and we agree.
40:31Until the dust settles, neither of us crosses a single line.
40:35It's the penance we set for ourselves.
40:39I think this is how the family splits apart.
40:43The bomb I planted with my own hands finally went off.
40:47But one night, going down for water, I find Mom alone in the kitchen, two untouched cups of tea in
40:52front of her.
40:54Sit.
40:58I sit and wait for the verdict.
41:01When I was 19, I fell for someone everyone said I shouldn't.
41:08My mother, your grandmother, wouldn't speak to me for three years.
41:12I thought I'd long forgotten that feeling.
41:15Knowing it in your heart and not being able to tell a soul.
41:17I'm not giving you my blessing.
41:19She looks at me.
41:21Exhaustion, struggle, and a small loosening.
41:25I need time.
41:27Kevin needs more.
41:28This may not be fixable, and you should be ready for that.
41:33But I won't force you to keep playing.
41:34I'm fine anymore.
41:36My tears come all at once.
41:38It isn't forgiveness.
41:41But it's a beginning.
41:44In September, Samir moves out.
41:46We don't say goodbye in secret.
41:49In front of Mom and Kevin, he loads the last box into the car.
41:52Then comes to me and, under both their eyes, says it plainly.
41:56I'll wait.
41:57For this family to take its time.
41:59For you to graduate.
42:00I won't rush it.
42:01But I won't pretend none of this happened either.
42:04Kevin turns his face away and says nothing.
42:06But he doesn't stop it.
42:07Mom stands on the porch, arms around himself, watching us.
42:10After a long moment, she gives the faint, barely perceptible nod.
42:13The car pulls away.
42:15That stolen, scalding summer is over.
42:18But strangely, I don't feel the emptiness I expected.
42:21Because this time, his leaving isn't running, isn't an ending.
42:25It's the two of us choosing, together, the harder road we can walk in the open.
42:29I turn to go in.
42:31Mom stops me at the door, hesitates, then reaches out to smooth the hair the wind has must.
42:37The same gesture, exactly, as that morning two months ago.
42:41Except this time.
42:43Neither of us have to pretend anymore.
42:47What follows is a long year.
42:49Samir in Tucson.
42:51Me at school.
42:54We keep it clean, almost like we're meeting each other for the first time.
42:58Calls, texts, the occasional weekend at a cafe where no one knows us.
43:03Like two ordinary adults finally doing this right.
43:08The ice at home melts slowly.
43:12Kevin gives first.
43:14One Thanksgiving, at the table, he asks for the first time, unprompted.
43:20How's Samir doing?
43:22And something starts to seep into Mom's silence, too.
43:25She begins asking if I'm okay.
43:28And when she asks, her eyes are really on me.
43:31Not every story gets a clean, tidy forgiveness.
43:34Our family welded its cracks back together inch by patient inch.
43:38Some places will always carry the scar.
43:43But a scar is proof of healing, too.
43:50The next summer, I graduate.
43:56On graduation day, Mom and Kevin are in the audience.
44:02And beside them, at a respectable distance, Samir.
44:09There is someone who doesn't have to hide anymore.
44:15That summer is brutally hot again.
44:17I move to Tucson, a small apartment a ten minute walk from Samir's place.
44:22We don't live together.
44:24Mom said to take it slow.
44:26And we both agreed.
44:28On moving day, the AC breaks.
44:33I collapse among the boxes.
44:35Dizzy with heat.
44:36And somehow think of that identical afternoon two years ago.
44:40Lying in a stifling room.
44:42Hating a man.
44:43Unable to stop pressing my thighs together.
44:46I laugh out loud.
44:47Then I pick up my phone and text him.
44:50My AC's broken over here.
44:54Minutes later, familiar footsteps come up the stairs.
44:57Step by step.
45:01The doors unlock.
45:03He stands in the doorway.
45:04Toolbox in hand.
45:06Gray tank.
45:07Hair soaked at the forehead.
45:09Identical to the first glimpse of him that summer.
45:12Except this time he isn't the stranger who barged into my life and took my mother.
45:16And he isn't the step brother I have to pretend to hate.
45:18Where is it broken?
45:21I look at him.
45:22The man I resisted with two years of pretending and then fought for with all the honesty I had after.
45:27And the thing that caught fire in me that scalding summer burns now.
45:30Steady and sure.
45:34Come here.
45:35I'll show you.
45:39Outside the window, summer is just beginning.
45:43And this time, we have all the time in the world.
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