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Chapter Four
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Days passed. Theresa had convinced Justin to stay through the rest of his school vacation. "At least stay for Christmas," she'd insisted. "You have to stay for Christmas." So he'd promised to stay, even though every day was harder than the last to get through, to see that face and hear that voice that had haunted him for as long as he could remember—
"Justin."
Reflexively, he clicked out of what he'd been looking at: family photos, mostly of Alex, naturally. He looked up, tearing his eyes from his computer screen and locking them with those deep, chocolate orbs.
"Why are you in my room?" he questioned, hoping she hadn't seen anything. He hadn't heard her come in. He noticed that his door was closed.
She looked at him steadily, her eyes piercing into his, and asked, "What happened that night?"
He frowned and looked away, pretending to busy himself on his computer. "What night?"
Scowling, she pushed down the top of his laptop. "You know what night, Justin. Now tell me."
He glared at her, then sighed loudly. "Is that really any of your business?"
"Yes, goddamn it, it is." Their eyes met, glowering. "You were crying in my arms about something you said was all your fault. And then you went all Mr. Hyde on me and Max. So what happened?"
He couldn't take it anymore—the directness of their eye contact. Though neither his nor her eyes were filled with any sort of warmth, there was an intimacy behind it that made him uncomfortable. He had to look away.
Quietly, barely audible, he whispered, "I want to tell you… but I just can't."
There was a long, agonizing silence, before Alex sat on his desk and asked softly, "Why? Why can't you tell me?"
He paused, before answering, "It's… complicated."
He expected her to scoff, but she didn't. Instead she just said, "I really think I can handle it. Please tell me?"
At the word 'please,' he looked up at her, startled. It was so out of character for Alex to ask please for anything. She demanded, never requested.
With another small sigh, he decided that telling the edited version of the story would suffice. And hopefully satiate her curiosity enough to never ask me again, he hoped. And so he said, "Well… okay, but... you can't tell anyone."
"I won't," she promised, and somehow, by the way she said it and by the shocking sincerity in her eyes, he knew she was telling the truth.
He fiddled with his hands for a moment, and stared at them. It'd be easier to talk if he pretended she weren't actually there listening.
"To be honest? I was actually not out celebrating my victory at the competition."
Alex nodded, but he didn't see it. "Yeah. I kinda figured that."
"Well, anyway, I was really feeling rotten. I mean, it was not easy for me to watch you and Max lose your powers. You both looked like you'd lost a part of yourselves you'd never get back."
She sighed. "Justin, that's… true," she admitted, "but really, it's just magic. We don't need it to breathe. I mean, it's great, and all—really, really great—but over ninety percent of the world's population doesn't even know it exists. If they can do it, you know, live without magic, why can't Max and I can do it, too?"
He turned his head slightly in her direction, but didn't look at her. That was actually a really surprising thing for her to say. It made him feel even worse. Here before him stood Alex, ready and prepared to take on the world and the rest of her life without any sort of magical powers, and here he sat, knowing that he would be too cowardly to do the same. He returned his gaze to his hands.
"Anyway, I just felt terrible, so… Something came over me, and I decided to take a joyride to Scotland, I guess. And I went into this bar and sat down and thought, Hey, maybe a little alcohol can help lessen the crappiness—if only for the moment."
She looked at him mournfully, and her hand ached with the desire to hold and caress his face, and show him that she cared. That she worried about him. A lot.
"One drink turned into two which turned into something like five… I lost count."
Drinking is not the answer, she wanted to say. It's never the answer… But she held her tongue. She knew he already knew that.
"And there was this… woman," he added quietly, half-regretting even bringing this part up. Why would he ever be sharing this? Would a normal man share this with his little sister?
A woman? Alex's heart sank. What did he do… with this woman?
But of course she knew. He didn't have to tell her. She didn't want to hear it. And he told her anyway.
"She looked like… well, she looked so familiar. And I was drunk out of my mind, and completely depressed, and…"
"Depressed?" she asked, carefully. "You couldn't have been that depressed over the wizarding competition. It…" She paused, holding her breath. "It has to do with your girlfriend, doesn't it? Something's going on there."
Though it was completely inappropriate, he laughed. It was a mirthless laugh, layered with bitterness. "My girlfriend," he muttered, more to himself than to her. "Kenzie, huh?" He shook his head and glared at the wall in front of him. "I was so drunk, Alex. That woman I met looked so much like her… like the woman I'm in love with."
There, she thought, he's said it. He loves her—Kenzie, or whatever her name was. He's in love with her, and that's that.
"…the woman I can never have," he added, whispering it under his breath, lacing every word with anguish and contempt. He had to say it, though he didn't intend for Alex to hear.
But she heard it anyway.
The woman he can't have? She was puzzled. Doesn't he have her already? They're together…
She cleared her throat and regained enough composure to say, with her characteristically indifferent tone, "You slept with her, then. And you regret that. Cheating on Kenzie, you mean."
He blinked. Cheated on Kenzie…?
Oh. He had done just that, hadn't he?
Seizing this brilliant opportunity for a cover-up, he nodded and lied, "Yeah… Yeah, that's exactly right…"
There was another long, agonizing silence, and then Alex's hand dared to touch his shoulder, and they both flinched noticeably at the touch, an electrical surge jarring through their bodies. They froze, and then quickly, trying to regain normalcy, she put her hand back on his shoulder and rubbed his back sympathetically—that was a normal thing for a sister to do, right?
"It'll be okay, Justin," she told him quietly, her voice lifeless. "Kenzie will forgive you. And if she doesn't, then, well, clearly she's not worth your time, and is not the one for you."
"Damn it, Alex," he said suddenly, ripping away from her touch and walking to the other side of the room, "stop talking about Kenzie. I can't take it anymore." He put his fist on the wall and leaned his forehead against it, trying to regain his composure. He just wanted to forget about Kenzie, about everything, and sweep Alex into his arms and kiss her and show her what it was like to be truly loved by a man—taboos and sin be damned.
And all the while, Alex was warring internally with her own turmoil, wanting Justin to do just that, and crumbling with devastation that he never could or would. Her hand stayed up in the air where he had been, and then fell limply to her side. She wanted to be angry—scream, yell, anything to make him angry with her—but all she felt was emptiness.
"Kenzie's a lucky girl," she said boldly, hoping to elicit a violent response.
But all he did was stiffen, open his eyes wide, and slowly turn to her. "What did you say?" he asked.
She stared at him, trying to set it into a glare, and told him, "I said, 'Kenzie's a lucky girl.' Are you deaf?"
He wanted to melt into the wall behind him and evaporate into nothingness, into the cold outside and cease to exist. What was she saying? Swallowing hard, he demanded, "What the hell does that mean? Are you really that hateful that you would say she's lucky to have a boyfriend who gets drunk and sleeps with a complete stranger, because, what—she's essentially trash? That she deserves this kind of treatment? Is that what you're saying?"
A small smile tried to curl onto her face but died in the attempt. So he was angry with her now. Good. That was just what she wanted. It was easier to be angry with him if he was angry with her, and it was easier to be angry than to be mournful. But somehow, the anger within her would not grow. There was just sorrow.
She shook her head miserably. She was tired—tired of the secrets, of the lies. She just wanted him to know, and either accept or reject her and have it be done with, once and for all. The smile found its life again and she shook her head again, letting out half a laugh. "You just don't get it, do you?"
His face fell, and he felt as though his veins had frozen. Only his heartbeat, which was pounding murderously against his ribcage, let him know that he was still alive. His mouth remembered suddenly how to function, and he found the words, "What… don't I get?"
She smiled bitterly and then held her head high, and shook it again slowly. "You know what? Just forget about it." And before he could stop her, she turned and left, vanishing behind the closed door and leaving him to sink against the wall, alone with his thoughts, confused more now than ever.
—
She didn't come to dinner that night, but Justin could barely eat anyway. His parents exchanged concerned glances and his mother finally asked, "Justin, what's wrong? You've been worrying us a lot lately."
He looked up from his plate and sighed. "It's nothing, Mom," he lied; it most certainly was not nothing. "I just have a lot on my mind, is all." He looked around the table and asked quickly, to change the subject, "Where's Max?"
Jerry shrugged. "He's at Tyler's again," he answered.
"Been spending a lot of time there," Justin mused.
"Tyler's a good kid. You'd like him."
"Yeah. Thanks for the meal, Mom. It was delicious." And he picked up his plate, the food barely touched, put it on the counter by the sink and fled upstairs to his room. He locked the door and changed into his pajamas, then crawled into bed hoping he could possibly fall asleep and be freed from this torment in his mind for just a few hours.
Naturally, sleep did not come, and he laid there for hours, tossing and turning, until it was nearing one and he could simply not take it anymore. Possessed by a sudden impulse, he threw back the covers and slunk out into the dark hallway, closing the door silently behind him.
—
There hadn't been much for Alex to do after she left Justin's room but retreat to her own and stay there for the rest of the night. Sleep sounded like a good idea, but it was only five thirty, so she undressed, turned off the lights, slid into her bed with her laptop, and instant messaged Christian for several hours. When nine o'clock hit, she told him goodnight and put the laptop on her nightstand, then tried to fall asleep. Luckily for her, she was out within two minutes. It was an unusually light and restless sleep, though, and when her door opened at something like one in the morning, her eyes opened.
He watched her sit up and turn to face him, sleep and confusion in her eyes.
"Justin…?"
He ran his fingers through his hair nervously. It was hard to see him in the dim lighting of the moon and street lights outside her bedroom. "Alex, I want to tell you something. It's really important."
"Look," she murmured sadly, rubbing sleep from her eyes, "I'm sorry about what I said. If I offended you."
He paced a little, then stopped. "No, it's okay. But that's not what I wanted to tell you."
She frowned and looked at him seriously. "What is it?" she asked.
"Well…" He was trembling like a leaf, he knew. How was he going to tell her this? Why did he need to tell her this at all? She was his little sister, for God's sake. Chances were very high that if he told her he loved her, she would think he meant as a brother. But if he explained that, no, he loved her, not as a brother loves his sister, but as a man loves a woman—she would no doubt be disgusted.
He looked at her now, loving the way her bed hair framed her perfect face, how it flowed in gentle, frizzy waves down her back and over her shoulders. Her sleepy brown eyes looked so innocent, so pure in comparison to the filth he was about to reveal to her. He couldn't disturb that purity. It wouldn't be fair.
So why did he feel it was necessary to tell Alex he was in love with her? It would cause needless heartache and potentially tear apart the family.
"Justin. Are you okay?"
"N-no," he stammered.
She's my sister, he reminded himself for the umpteenth time. This would be so wrong.
But for one instant, one second, he didn't care, and he used that moment, that opportunity, to say something.
"Alex—I love you."
She stiffened for the shortest of moments, and he didn't notice; she tried to seem unsurprised. "I love you too, Justin, but what does that have to do with anything we're talking about?"
"No, you don't understand." He ran his fingers through his hair again, heart hammering against his ribcage, in his ears… he felt sick, he was shaking so violently. "What I mean is… I…"
Her own heart was drumming, just as hard, though not so wildly. Butterflies fluttered in her stomach. Was he going to confess love to her? Alex hoped so, but she would never admit it. After all, the chances he would love her back, the same way she loved him, were so small. She kept her cool up. He was definitely going to say something else.
He's my brother, she reminded herself for the umpteenth time.
But Alex, as usual, had more confidence than her gawky older brother. Though he was not so awkward as he was in his teens, there was still a shyness and utter lack of grace and poise that he would probably never lose. Alex loved that about him. She found it extremely adorable.
"Umm, what I'm trying to say, Alex, is, um, I don't love you… well I mean not like you think I do—unless you think I love you the way I do because, umm, erm—I know I'm your brother so I'm supposed to love you, but…" He was rambling, he knew, but he just couldn't stop. "What I'm trying to say, uh, well, I'm, kinda, sorta, in lo—"
Always the confident one…
In an astonishingly bold move, Alex got out of her bed and pressed her lips to Justin's. She pulled back after the quick peck, and he was quiet, and a little dazed. Okay, a peck. What difference did that make?
Well, to Justin, who was blushing, it seemed to make quite a difference.
Alex took a sharp breath and kissed him again, putting her arms around his neck and pressing her mouth tighter against his. Sudden tears she didn't expect came streaming down her eyes and she started to tremble like her brother, her lips shaky against his and losing confidence.
She waited for him to push her away…
Instead, Justin's body relaxed. He carefully put his arms around her waist and slowly pulled her closer to him. He had to be careful… one wrong move and it'd all be over. He was far past the point of no return now.
Alex pulled away just the slightest bit, causing Justin to momentarily panic. However, when Alex murmured, "Don't worry, I'm in love with you, too," and kissed him again, he felt so much at ease. Never before in his life, before Alex said those words, had he been happier. He felt like he could fly.
His hands roamed her back as the kiss grew more heated. He ran them through her own hair this time, and she lowered her arms around him. Her tongue pressed against his lips, and he gladly opened them for her. Nothing could spoil this moment.
Spells, potions, magical creatures, wizards… none of that mattered. That was fairytale stuff. If anything, this was the true magic; the feeling of Alex in his arms, of her lips on his, the miracle that was their shared love for each other, beyond anything siblings could feel. At once, he felt confident that he would give up everything, even his powers, even his name, to be with her. This was real, honest magic. Everything else paled in comparison.
