Prologue

Alright, before the start of this story, let me start off by saying this: I'm in love. This is about feelings, not some sort of mental disorder; I'm not a psychopath. I don't take secret pictures of him in the shower or steal his personal belongings to rub them between my thighs. I don't have an altar of him hidden in my wardrobe and I don't check my phone for a new message from him every two minutes. I haven't made plans for our wedding since I was five and I never thought of doing anything that would destroy his happiness only because it suited mine. I know that what I'm doing, what I'm feeling, is entirely wrong.

But how can someone just stop feeling?

I tried. Maybe I didn't try hard enough, but who can blame me when no other man has ever even wanted to be enough to replace him in my heart? Disappointment after disappointment, I came to the point that I just had to accept who I was.

I was the woman in love with her brother.

I was happy until I was five, living in the illusion of a bright, stable future. To me, it was like an unwritten truth; something no one could deny or keep me from. So, I didn't take it very well when my mother laughed loudly at me after I dared say that, someday, I was going to marry my older brother. That day I understood that siblings shared too much blood to actually become husband and wife someday; no matter how much I enjoyed wearing the same name as Chris.

And so, I stopped thinking about my brother as my only chance to ever get married; stopped pitying all those girls in my class who didn't have a cute older brother to make theirs in the future. It went well for many years. I even remember falling a little in love with one of the boys. I let him peck my lips when we were both eight, not knowing that it would be my first and only kiss until many years later.

Because, just a little later, our parents died, and the pain over it numbed me so much that it isolated me from every feeling other than suffering. Chris was the only one who could understand what I was going through, because, well, he was going through the same. However, my brother, fourteen years old back then, was much stronger than me; he did everything in his power to help me out of that hole I was in. Our grandma took care of us; gave us a home, a bed and kept us fed every day, but she never knew how to comfort us. That's something only Chris and I knew how to give to each other. He was the one who held me when I couldn't sleep at night, haunted by nightmares, and the one who understood how scared I was of our grandpa and his dentures that always ended up lying on the table next to his plate during dinner. And I became the one who believed in him unconditionally, and even when he told me he wanted to be part of the Air Force, I encouraged him to follow his dreams, not knowing how much his absence would hurt me, but I remained strong. As I mentioned before, I would never do anything that would make my brother unhappy, even if I was the one who got hurt along the way.

Chris was sixteen when our grandma passed away, and barely eighteen when our grandpa followed her into the afterlife. He had just started his training, and he came back to stop Social Services from putting me into a foster home. Could I have loved him more for it?

We lived together like brother and sister, but it almost felt like living in marriage. I cooked and kept the house clean, while Chris brought home the money. He was working and training most of the time, but he came home as often as he could. We would watch movies together, go on long walks and chat about our daily struggles. I would tell him how my latest exams went, and he'd tell me about his ass of a supervisor. One Friday night I mentioned I had been followed by some guys after grocery shopping. The next morning, Chris showed me how to use a gun. When I told him I wanted to go to college, he started working extra hours and saved all his money to grant me the chance to have a proper future. He was my man; the only one who ever did something completely selfless for me only because he loved me. However, I wasn't aware of how much that meant to me until, one day, searching for the documentation I needed to send in with my college applications, I found our birth certificates.

Maybe I had seen too many movies and family dramas with mom, but I suddenly felt curious why all those important documents were stored among dust and spider webs instead of an organizer in Dad's old office. I remember clearly how much I shivered when I opened the box, fearing I would find out something I didn't want to know.

Was I afraid of finding out that Chris wasn't really my brother?

Or was I afraid of the confirmation that he was?

The disappointment within me grew as I searched for hours for any proof that would confirm my suspicions, but every single picture, certificate or document I found only made it clearer. Chris and I had the same parents, without a doubt. After my research, I found myself staring into the mirror for hours, hating the face that looked so much like him. The same blue eyes, the same nose, the same weird shape of our ears; we were like bad copies of our father. It looked good on Chris. Myself, I was lucky that Mom's white skin sweetened my dad's hard features on my face, making me look a little more feminine. I had once read an article about how we feel attracted by face shapes that are similar to ours. No wonder I was so impressed by Chris' beauty.

Some days later, Chris came home unexpectedly early. After his supervisor's latest outburst, he had quit his job in a fit of rage that didn't fit the image I had of my brother, but by the time he came home, he already started to regret how it all happened. I suggested he could ask to get his job back, but he said that were no chances they would ever readmit him after what he had said. He was so broken; my poor brother. I cooked his favorite dish for him and opened a bottle of wine. I was barely seventeen.

"Since when do you drink?" He asked.

"I don't," I replied and filled two cups. "But we have to celebrate that you don't have to stand that asshole any longer."

He just smirked and drank. And then he said the most beautiful words ever a man said to me.

"I'm afraid I can't give you what you deserve, Claire."

He wanted to send me to college; wanted me to have a future. Could I love him more?

We slept in the same bed that night, like we had done so many nights before. The bed was huge so there was plenty of space for each of us. It had never been awkward between us, since, officially, we never had the lightest intention of ever getting to see the other in less than our pajamas.

Until that night.

Because that night I understood how deep my love for my brother really went.

I watched him while he slept. Okay, that might be the only thing that makes me look like a psychopath in this story. I watched him, wondering how he would feel against my bare skin, on me and inside of me. He was so beautiful, so strong and so caring and I wanted to touch him; to be touched by him. I had kept my virginity intact, never really feeling the need to be with anyone, and I finally knew why. I had kept myself pure for him. I was tempted to slide my hand into his pajama pants and see what lay beneath, how much of it lay beneath.

Chris had never brought a girl home; had never introduced me to any girlfriend and I wondered if he had ever been with someone or if he had been waiting for someone like me, someone he truly cared about. I didn't want to wake him, but there was nothing bad about touching myself, right? I pressed the inners of my fingers against my spot through the soft green pajama pants, feeling the heat between my thighs, while my other hand reached for my breast. I pushed my fingers into my depth as I watched my brother sleep. I had been playing with myself for some years already, but that night, next to Chris, I reached my first orgasm, and it was the best feeling I'd ever had. Poor thing, I almost woke him with my gasps.

Once I relaxed, I felt ashamed of what I had done. No matter how much I loved him, no matter how much my body longed for his closeness, this wasn't meant to be, so I turned my back to him and prayed for forgiveness, for help. That night I spoke a promise and two wishes silently into the night. I promised I would never give in to my desire for Chris and, in exchange, I wished I would someday find a man as caring as my brother, and wished that Chris would find someone who loved him as much as I did.