"This is the special du jour, pasta a la vegetables." Chloe slurred out, finessing a horrible fake accent as she waved around a bowl of pasta she had fashioned together for her and her brother.

"Um, okay, wow." Raleigh scoffed, arms crossing over his chest. "Chloe, that's a terrible Italian accent. And if it's French, 'monsieur' is not pronounced 'man sewer.'"

"Monsieur." She repeated.

"Monsieur." He corrected, rolling his eyes. "Come on, seriously, it's not gonna kill me to have some protein now and then." He took the bowl from her, plucking out noodles with his fingers before their conversation is interrupted by Chloe's phone ringing.

Chloe answered frantically, staggering out responses based on the voice at the other end of the line. "Hello? Uh, speaking. Uh-huh? Oh. Okay... Well, uh, wait, um, what about the hostess position that you, you... Oh. Okay, well, thank you. Thanks again." She heavily sighed, placing her phone facedown on the countertop before shuffling around some papers into a pile.

"You mad at me or something?" He asked Chloe as he looked up at her, a tang of worry troubling his eyes.

After a somber moment of silence she replied, "I thought I would be a match. I feel like I let you down." She referred to the difficult car ride home just a few days prior, when Chloe found out she was not eligible to be her brother's bone marrow donor. She remembered gripping the steering wheel almost in anger as her brother rested his head against his seat and stared out the window. She was perfectly healthy and they told her being related to the recipient increased her eligibility, so she didn't quite understand why she couldn't donate for him. Once the doctor said she wasn't eligible, she screened out his explanation about antigen typing and all the jargon that went with it. She didn't need the rest.

"You can't always be the hero." Raleigh interrupted her thoughts before stating matter-of-factly, "sometimes you have to let go."

"Like let go of you?" She sputtered, waiting for a reply. She knew better than to banter with Raleigh's life or death discourse. He pulled this behavior quite often, and the only one who seemed truly bothered by it was Chloe.

"I mean, aren't you sick of this? Taking me back and forth to the clinic. Bills, taking care of me, like, don't you want a life?"

"No. I mean, yeah, I... it's hard. But... Raleigh, you're my brother. This is my life. It's gonna be fine. We'll get through this." She reassured herself more than him. Raleigh didn't play along any further and picked up the portable gaming system resting on the countertop, resuming a violent shooting game. She sighed in defeat as she heard gunshots from the small speakers of his game. "Killing lots of aliens?"

"Nope, terrorists." He stuck his tongue out, thumbs slamming against the directional pad on his system.

"Killing lots of terrorists?"

"Straight up murderin' these terrorists, yo." Raleigh looked up, sensing that Chloe still had more to say than she was giving off. He paused the game with a sigh, knowing that he couldn't just be rude to his sister all the time when she genuinely was just concerned for him. He ended up prodding with, "what's up?"

Chloe needed some way to tell Raleigh that she was going to be out of the house for a while, since she now felt an obligation to go to the Lambrick dinner. Since the job at the restaurant was now a bust, her last resort was to try and win the mystery game. She didn't know exactly how long it would take so she pulled out an excuse: "Oh, um, I'm gonna go out tonight. I ran into a couple of friends from high school and I thought, you know what? I should go and unwind."

"Yeah, cool."

"So, you're gonna be okay here alone for the night?"

"Yeah. Got my meds, emergency contact. I'll just play video games or whatever. I could use the quiet."

"Great. Love you." Chloe almost whispered, leaving a tender touch to his arm before heading upstairs to get ready. She was already dialing Dr. Barden's phone number to RSVP for her upcoming night.