“But do you have feelings for Marcella?” she pressed. “Not sexual ones, I mean, but real ones. You know, like heartfelt feelings.”

“Anna, I barely know the girl. She’s sexy and DTF. I love Lolly. But sometimes … well, you know how boring it can get when you’ve been in a relationship for a while.”

“Actually I don’t know,” she replied, looking out the window. “Don’t look for sympathy from me. I’ve been with Alexander double the time you’ve been with Lolly.”

“Exactly my point! You two must know what I mean, or at least he must.”

There were so many things that annoyed her about her brother’s statement, she barely knew where to begin. “Are you implying Alexander cheats on me?” Anna asked, going straight for it.

“No, in fact, I’m sure he doesn’t. Your bf is much too good of a person, whereas I’m a tremendous shitbag.”

Anna was aware their mother often tortured her brother with comparisons to her seemingly perfect boyfriend. “I know this sucks. But stop deflecting. If you say you love Lolly, then why cheat?” she asked, knowing her brother didn’t have an answer. She was willing to wager her brother rarely knew why it was he did most of the things he did.

“I don’t know,” he replied as if on cue.

Anna knew this was the best she was going to get from him now and moved on. She asked Steven whether this was the first time he had cheated on Lolly, and after a long silence he said it wasn’t. She fired him a look of sisterly disapproval. “Are you sure you want to stay with Lolly? Because plenty of guys in this town stay single and hook up with a new girl every weekend. Maybe that would suit you more. Honestly, you don’t seem ready to be a boyfriend. Like, at all.”

“I know that’s what it seems like. But that’s how I know I love Lolly, because I want to be her boyfriend. She’s good like you. And no one’s sweeter. She also keeps me reined in, which you know I need. She makes me want to try harder to be better myself. Marcella means nothing to me. Though she had this dope tongue ring…”

“Ew. Enough about her. Steven, you’ve got to end it.” Anna loved her brother, but she didn’t like him as a person in this moment. She knew that boys were very different from girls, but hearing her brother talk made her feel the gap between the sexes was much wider than she’d ever imagined.

“I know. I will. And the tongue ring wasn’t a reference to anything lewd, it was something I saw because she laughed a lot. You know, because she thought—”