Page 10 of Always Been Yours

“I think I want to stay out of this.” She stuffs a spoonful of pudding in her mouth, rendering it otherwise useless.

I know my sister, and she won’t be quiet for long. Her silence is more daunting than Lexi’s pestering.

They may be friends because of me but they have that annoying oldest sibling connection, so I’m still the one who gets ganged up on.

“I’ve kissed Grady before. It was… fine.” After we almost broke each other’s noses, the kiss was quick and soft but was anything other thanfine. It was like what I imagine Aurora felt when she woke up from her sleeping curse.

“Mmm, no. Bumping noses doesn’t count as kissing anyone.” I roll my eyes at Lexi. “You guys need a re-do.”

“Over my dead body.”

“It’s been like, fifteen years, Viv.” As if that should change my mind.

I stare at her for a few seconds before saying slowly, “Exactly. It’s been fifteen years, let it go.”

Lexi is about to speak, probably to tell me tolet it gowhen Calypso says, “Maybe if you just tell us how it went today, this one will shut up for a second.”

Lexi grumbles in response but crosses her arms and waits expectantly.

I take a large gulp of my wine and tell them how Stella and Daisy snuck into my classroom, accused me of hating their father and then Grady came to pick them up.

“That was… anticlimactic,” Lexi says before sipping from her glass.

“I don’t know what you were expecting. It was… fine.”

“I doubt that it was fine, Viv.” Calypso, ever the attentive older sister.

“I don’t know what you guys want me to say.”

“You could tell us more about what happened. People in high school get boyfriends and girlfriends. It was kind of ridiculous to think that you would be each other’sonlyrelationships, or nothing at all.“ Lexi cringes away from the dirtiest look I’ve ever given her, including our mutual years of hatred toward each other. “I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have said that. I just mean… I don’t know.”

It isn’t that I expected Grady and I to be each other’sonlyanything. Except maybe I did. I was young. And when it wasn’t Grady, I believed it could’ve been Brody. It definitely wasn’t him.

“You don’t have to tell us anything that you don’t want but I think what Lexi is failing to say is just that…” Calypso picks at the cat hair on the throw blanket. She and my two cats have a mutual dislike for each other. Cinnamon and Vanilla are currently lockedin my bedroom. “Was whatever happened between you and Grady really so bad? He was your best friend for years. It was obvious that you both liked each other.” Calypso takes another bite of the dessert before saying, “It’s just hard to imagine what could have ended that.”

I sit back in my velvet armchair and look out the window.

I don’t know how to explain to them that,yes,Grady asking another girl to homecoming his freshman year really had been so bad. Or that I cried in my bedroom the entire night while all my siblings and Grady were dancing to T-Pain in some gymnasium because I felt like I was losing something important.

And I’ve always hated to lose.

Sure, maybe I would have gotten over the date. Asher and Hudson always took girls to homecoming. I asked Asher about it once; he said ‘it’s just what you do.‘

I know that he wouldn’t have been allowed to take me anyway, I was only in eighth grade at the time, but why did he have to take anyone at all? Why did he kiss me on my roof just to never even try again? Why did he kiss her? Why didn’t he take me the following year?

And that was only the start of it.

I spent my entire childhood chasing Grady and being chased by him. Sharing secrets with him. Planning ten lifetimes worth of adventures together.

I spent my entire childhood believing that he wasmine.

That had been the night I realized that Grady Miller wasn’t mine at all.

Chapter Four

Vivi

Selena and I are standing in the lobby of the auditorium where the committee meetings are held. A few of the other teachers, who helped us prepare for the presentation, are also here.

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