LITMIR.BIZ

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to reach. No doubt they would catch each other over the weekend.

      He and Melissa carried their drinks into the living room, a contemporary space with simple yet cozy furniture. Melissa had helped him decorate the room, suggesting rusty browns and muted greens—subtle, earthy colors—to go with the pale walls and carpet. A huge ficus tree, which survived only because she remembered to check it regularly, stood in a corner by one of the large windows.

      Kyle set her water on the coffee table and sprawled on the couch with his beer.

      She sat a couple feet away from him, opening the bag of gingersnaps as she kicked off her shoes. She gave his knee a nudge with her sock-clad foot. “Don’t take your mother for granted, Kyle. She’s the only one you’ve got.”

      “I know.”

      Melissa had lost hers years ago. When she’d been eight, her mother and five-year-old brother had died in the emergency room following a car accident. She’d been the only other person in the car with them when they’d collided with a truck. Kyle didn’t think she’d ever gotten over the fact that she’d lived and they hadn’t, though it wasn’t something she talked about.

      Her sister, who was one year older than she, had been at a baseball game with their father. They’d lived on, just as Melissa had, but not very well. Her father had become depressed and Anita hadn’t fared so well, either. Melissa had tried to take care of them, even though she was the youngest. She still did.

      Kyle doubted they still wanted or needed her to, however.

      Last July Anita had decided to get an apartment with her boyfriend. It was a big deal. The sisters had lived together for years, ever since Melissa had returned to Portland after med school. Melissa, he knew, had liked sharing a household. But Anita, at thirty-two, had wanted to live away from family members—something she’d never done before. She’d made her announcement right before that crazy, unexpected night in July…

      The X-Files came on. Kyle took a swig from his beer bottle and tried to concentrate on the show. In his peripheral vision he saw Melissa tuck her feet up under her on the couch and nibble on her gingersnaps.

      The episode was one of their favorites, but it didn’t hold his attention. Melissa did.

      Whitney at the clinic had once told him his relationship with Melissa was like the one between the X-Files’ main characters, FBI agents Mulder and Scully. He’d laughed. But the comparison had some validity, he acknowledged to himself. He and Melissa had the same kind of connection, a quiet respect and unwavering loyalty to each other. They trusted each other with their lives, though they rarely discussed their innermost feelings.

      And the sexual tension. It was always there in the background, simmering. Neither of them would admit it, but that was how it was.

      After the show ended, Melissa picked up the remote from the coffee table and switched off the television. “You okay, Kyle?”

      “Mmm, sure.”

      “You seem a little distracted.” Reaching back, she patted her hair and felt that it had gotten mussed. She released the tortoiseshell clasp and ran her fingers through the straight strands.

      The movements weren’t intended to be seductive. They were seductive, though, and it didn’t help his distractedness.

      I did that, he thought. I ran my fingers through that hair, felt its silken texture. I know it smells like gardenia.

      He’d caught himself leaning too close to her recently, trying to get a whiff.

      It made it worse, he thought, to know what she smelled like, felt like, tasted like. Now that he’d seen her naked body, caressed her curves, it had become almost torturous to be near her.

      Especially to be near her and not be able to do it all again.

      He swallowed. “Guess I’m a little preoccupied with the fall fund drive,” he said. A fib. He hated to lie to her and he didn’t have much practice. The need had never arisen in the past. But she wouldn’t want to hear about him lusting after her. “Sorry.”

      “Anything I can do to help?”

      “Nah. You’re already volunteering plenty.” Kyle finished off his beer, which was flat and warm. He decided he’d better attempt some kind of conversation. Assure them both everything was okay. “So…any luck finding a roommate this week?”

      Anita had moved out of their little house around the corner on September 1st. More than a month had passed and somehow none of Melissa’s roommate applicants had worked out yet.

      She shook her head. “Actually, I’ve been thinking of calling off the search. Living by myself for a while.”

      He gave her a look. “Because you think she’ll come running back,” he said, and they both knew he meant Anita.

      “Honestly? Yes.”

      “What if she doesn’t?”

      “Then I’ll live alone.” She gave a half smile, just a slight quirk of the lips. “Maybe it’ll be good for me.”

      “You know how I feel about that.” It would be great for her. He’d been telling her so for years. She needed to live for herself awhile, instead of for others.

      “Then why are you eyeing me as if I’ve done something wrong?” she said.

      Okay, they weren’t going to have a lighthearted conversation tonight. This would be one of their serious ones, instead. That was fine, he told himself. As long as it didn’t pertain to the two of them. “You’re not planning to live alone. You’re planning for your poor, weak, flighty sister to have a dramatic breakup with her boyfriend, just like she always does, and then come running back to you. You’re counting on it. She probably knows it.”

      “Am I supposed to expect their relationship to last? Expect her and Ty—”

      “Troy,” he corrected.

      “Troy.” She paused. “I’m supposed to expect them to live happily ever after? That’s never happened before.”

      “How many times has your sister moved in with a guy?” He knew the answer, but he wanted her to say it.

      “Never. But she’s talked this way about plenty of guys. I can always recognize it. She gets the same tone in her voice, the same look in her eyes. You want to know what it says? ‘It’s real this time. He’s my knight in shining armor. He’s the one who’s going to sweep me off my feet and make everything all right.’ But it never lasts.”

      “Maybe this time is different.”

      “It’s not.” She spoke with absolute certainty.

      Kyle considered her. “Okay. Say it isn’t. Say the relationship goes up in smoke. You really think it’s good for her to come running back to you?”

      “Who else can she turn to?”

      She didn’t say, Not my father. I’m the only strong one in the family. She didn’t have to. He’d heard her say it in so many ways a hundred times before.

      “Mel, what about her standing on her own two feet? Not needing to depend on anyone?”

      “You sound like such a guy, Kyle. All that independent, rugged-individualist stuff.” She stood up. Grabbed his beer bottle and her water glass and the gingersnaps. “In my family,” she said, “we support one another when times are tough.”

      Melissa carried her load to the kitchen. She returned with a cloth and wiped up the three microscopic cookie crumbs she’d gotten on the coffee table. Her hair clasp, which she’d set on the arm of the couch, went neatly into her pocket.

      He knew she didn’t realize how revealing her actions were. She’d spoken so calmly, but that obviously wasn’t how she felt.

      She always cleaned things when she was agitated. Tidied a pile of papers. Dusted a picture frame. Suddenly

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