Berwald looked around at his half-empty drawers. His graduation hat was neatly put on a corner of his bedroom's desk. In his hands, he was holding the Copenhagen University acceptance letter. The paper promised nearly a decade of sleepless nights that would make a doctor out of him. The late teen considered himself at the start of his journey. He would be the first doctor of his lineage known to the family.

His reverie was interrupted by his mother's voice. It was time to leave for the capital and get used to living with his older brother again. Said brother would pick him up at the train station and take him to the apartment they were going to stay in. After a quiet commute by train, he would have to endure Mathias' nagging figure.

The mere thought of the shorter one refrained him from enjoying the trip. For well over one hour, he rehearsed the fittest words to greet his older brother. He didn't want to sound challenging. But he didn't want to sound submissive as well. He knew the older boy wouldn't dignify him with an acknowledging response, either verbally or physically. Still, he wanted to let him know things wouldn't be like home.

Communicating with his brother was trickier than it seemed. Unlike what most people thought, Mathias wasn't simple-minded. He was cunning and measured. His emotions were hard to read on his face or even body language. He didn't remember a single time the older one talked or acted out of line. Quite the contrary. He was quick to act right and say the right words. So quick that people mistook Matthias' calculated move for genuine actions.

Lucy fell hard for his older brother's trick. Gilbert, his brother's closest friend, sometimes joked about a stray puppy that yapped for Mathias' attention. His older brother half-heartedly admonished Gilbert until the joke died after a few months. Still, Gilbert would have a certain smug look when Lucy would react to Mathias' status.

Berwald didn't meet her until she started running with his brother on Saturday. From the start, he thought she was everything Mathias wasn't. First, she was a girl. Second, she was shy. And third, she was in love. At least, she had a crush on him. She revelled in their proximity whereas his brother used her to boost his ego.

The older one didn't love the girl he was dating. He loved being the centre of someone's undivided attention. Lucy didn't have any friends or romantic prospects. From what Berwald heard, Mathias was even her first love interest. At least, it was the first she remembered. Of course, her parents were happy with the way things turned out. Her teammates fawned over how her first crush seemingly reciprocated Lucy's feelings.

Everyone who knew the couple wished them the best for their joint life in the capital. Everyone besides Mathias' closest friend. Gilbert was mostly jealous of Mathias' luck in love and weirdly competitive against a girl he hardly met. His older brother eventually chose himself and had Lucy move with him, despite Gilbert's refusal to live with the couple.

Berwald didn't know if Mathias and Gilbert reconciled. For years, the two boys had been joined at the hips. Their parents assumed they would move together for university and experience the brotherhood they didn't share with their respective younger brothers. But when things changed last minute, they assumed Mathias was just in love and Gilbert was just bitter.

Berwald's thoughts were interrupted by the arrival's announcement. In the end, he didn't find the right words to address his brother and took refuge in silence. From greeting at the train station to driving towards the apartment, he hadn't said a word. Upon arriving, he greeted Lucy and beelined into his bedroom.

As the months went on, he realised how much his older brother was abusing her feelings. From helping with his homework to helping him in the bathroom, Lucy was babying Mathias. And the jerk made himself comfortable in her care. They tried to be discreet at first but it seemed they stopped hiding that she also helped him in the bedroom.

She deserved better than that. Lucy deserved better than a boyfriend who only dated her because he was too lazy to look for someone else. She deserved someone willing to go out of their way for her. Someone who didn't settle for the path of least resistance like taking over their father's position.

His brother had never entertained girls out of schoolgrounds. The girl's eagerness to cater to him had been the driving force of their relationship. Mathias was content to have someone put together and who made his life easier. With his girlfriend helping him, he could spend more time working on his dual degree.

And from the look of it, he intended to benefit from her unpaid work during his active life. Pretty much like their father, his older brother would trap his girlfriend into marriage. Then, she would take upon herself everything that wasn't directly related to his brother's work. But the latter would be the only one getting paid.

Some nights, Berwald wondered if he would ever get over his unrequited feelings. It was clear that Lucy didn't love him and refused to be reasonable. She was under his brother's influence. The fact that he was her first crush didn't help. She never experienced heartbreak and the subsequent healing. Her brain couldn't envision life after a separation.

He had to be the one to make her realise how unbalanced the relationship was. Or show her how underserving Mathias was. His busy schedule as a medical student didn't leave a lot of time to act. Yet, she had to notice his older brother would never look at her like he did, would never remember all the things about her that he did, and would never make her the centre of his life.

Berwald gave her his undivided attention whenever she talked to him. He started football in high school to get closer to her. He learnt to make crepes the way she liked them. He noticed the sparks in her eyes when she talked about her favourite fresh authors. He couldn't spend two nights without dreaming of her.

It was taunting to think that an errand his brother ran four years ago granted him the perfect girlfriend. It was also unnerving to think that had he been born first, their roles might have been reversed. Berwald knew he looked more like the older brother than Mathias. He was physically and mentally more capable. He always had better grades at the same age and got accepted into the most selective studies, instead of faking an advanced literacy with a double degree.

Yet, nothing helped Lucy's feelings. She couldn't love him and he couldn't understand why.