What hadn’t factored into either of our plans was Eliza.

Brush it off, bro. This isn’t about her. It’s about you.

I almost believed it.

The drive to upstate New York consisted of seeing how many gummy bears we could fit inside our mouths, listening to sports radio, heatedly debating which video game was the best, and of course, girls. Thirty of forty times, Carter had tried to text, inconspicuously, when he thought I wasn’t looking. Carter texting a lot was normal—but the messages always popped up in our group chat. So far, all I’d received were reminders from my mom about having fun and reminders from my dad about keeping my legs warm. Carter firing quick messages every time I changed lanes on the highway was both totally hilarious and completely sad.

“Who dat?” I tried to keep it casual.

He hesitated. “Hannah.”

“Booty call?”

“You’re jealous because you can’t get any.”

My jaw dropped to the absolute floor of the car, and then through the floor to the highway and earth’s outer core. He didn’t deny it, which meant one thing.

“It was?! Dude!” I held out my fist, but he declined to pound it. “Ouch. Why you gotta leave a bro hanging?”

“I don’t know yet,” he said.

“You’re not exactly, like, staving her off,” I said. “Isn’t that the stuff you always call Austin and me on?”

“I’m not leading her on,” Carter groaned.

“Why aren’t you going for it? Hannah’s great! Robert knows it’ll never happen anyway, and he’d understand if she got with you.”

Carter slid down in the seat. The car jolted as I pumped the brakes—not realizing we were going 92 mph due to my excitement. Luckily, the road was clear and speeding hadn’t been too dangerous. Of course, with a clear road it’s almost a given that cops will pull you over for doing 60 in a 55. I flicked on cruise control, just in case.

“Look, man,” he said. “You’re my best bro, so don’t take this the wrong way.”

I turned down his pop-hits playlist to give him my full, undivided attention—as much as I could while keeping us in a straight line.

“So, Hannah is my sister’s best friend. And my dating her would mean that I’m dating my sister’s best friend. Obviously, I told you that . . .” he mumbled, “I’m trying to say that me dating Hannah would be kind of hypocritical because I don’t know if I’d be okay if it worked the other way around, with my sister dating my best friend, which,” he said quietly, “would be you.”

It took me a minute to work out what he’d said, my sister’s best friend . . . what? When I got there, it hit me like a sock to the red zone of my manhood.

Not a great time for Aretha Franklin to be ripping us a legend in the background.

“Bro, I’m not saying I necessarily want to date your sister, but what’s the issue? I’m a great guy, we all know that. Purely hypothetical situation here . . .”