Brian looks up at me like I just started speaking Japanese. “Wait, what?”

“You told Maggie I eat everything, so you were hiding the bulk of something. That something was?”

I meet Brian’s eyes, but he looks pretty frozen, like he can’t hear anything I’m saying.

“Hello, Brain,” I say.

“Noah, I’m so sorry,” he says.

I raise an eyebrow. “So you didn’t make me any food?”

He rolls his eyes. “You know what I mean.”

And yeah, I do, but I’m kind of dancing around the edges of it because it’s easier to hint at something totally off topic than it is to address the fact that Brian’s dating a transphobe. I mean, it was bad enough when Becca was talking to a known TERF, but that was just talking, and I’ve seen the way Brian looks at Maggie. I hate feeling like I’m offering Brian the opportunity to choose Maggie over me.

But I also can’t just pretend it didn’t happen.

Brian puts down the big wooden spoon he was using to scoop meat into the egg roll wrappers and says, “Did you hear the whole conversation?”

I shrug. “I got the gist of it.”

“I—I’m sorry. I really am. I never thought Maggie would—”

“It’s okay,” I say, because I don’t really want him to reiterate everything Maggie said. One time was enough. “Thanks for standing up for me.”

He smiles. “You’re my brother. How could I not?”

And I smile back. Okay, so maybe Brian isn’t choosing Maggie over me. Maybe he can find a way to balance her shitty transphobia and me without ever forcing us to mix. It’s not the worst option considering I’m pretty good at lying to myself.

Brian picks up the spoon again, working on crafting his own long, lean egg roll while I make mine short and chubby. Honestly, the more meat you stuff into the first ones, the fewer you have to make. It’s a foolproof plan.

Then he pauses again and says, “I broke up with Maggie.”

My head cocks up at that and I fight back the urge to pump my fist into the air like that iconic Breakfast Club scene and settle on an “Oh? How come?”

Brian rolls his eyes again. “Because I can’t be with someone who talks shit about my little brother, okay?”

I wipe a fake tear from my eye, my voice high as I say, “You didn’t have to do that for little ol’ me.”

Brian shakes his head, using the spoon to fling beef chunks at me. “Fuck off, Noah, we both know you wanted this.”

“Am I that obvious?”

“Yes,” he says. Then he looks down and says, “But who knows, maybe I should just trust your judgment from now on.”

“Because I’m a genius?”

“I’m pleading the fifth on this one.”