Page 24 of First Impressions of You

“Did you go through my stuff?” She sits up straight, eyes accusing me.

“No,” I tell a half truth. “The day I left a desert from Porto’s on your nightstand, it was sitting there, and I saw it.”

She searches my face for any signs of a lie, but I don’t let her see that I’m just partially being honest. She doesn’t need to know that I moved some papers around to be able to see the logo. Her room is always such a mess that it’s plausible enough she would’ve forgotten the envelope in plain sight.

“Wait.” It’s my turn to sit up straight. “What are you hiding from me, and why does Julia already know?”

They share a room. Even if it was under some papers, it wasn’t exactly hidden. Why didn’t I realize this earlier? I’m the only who doesn’t know what this is about, and I feel more sad than angry about it.

“I…” She pulls her legs under her. I notice she’s hesitant to talk about this, and I hate myself for making her feel this way.

“Whatever it is, you can tell me.” I give her my most reassuring voice.

“Do you promise you won’t tell Mom and Dad?”

What is Olivia up to? I open my mouth to verbalize that question but close it as soon as I realize that this is not the way to go about this.

I nod, instead. “I won’t.”

“I’m majoring in screenwriting.”

“Okay?” I don’t know exactly what I’m not supposed to tell our parents.

“They think I’m studying business.”

“You lied to them about your major?”

“They wouldn’t let me come if they knew about it.”

“Olivia, they’re paying for your education. Don’t you think they should know what they’re paying you to study? You can’t lie about something like this!” I get up from the couch, too much energy running through my body to sit still. “What were you thinking? That they’d never find out? What are you going to do when you graduate? Photoshop your major out of your diploma and replace it with a business degree?”

“This is exactly why Julia knew and you didn’t,” she screams at me, frustration dripping off her words. “She didn’t judge me when she found out. She understood why I did it.” She storms off, slamming the door of her bedroom behind her and leaving me standing alone in the middle of the living room.

I can’t wait for Julia to be back home.

The good sister part of me is happy that she’s enjoying her time with Cam, but the selfish part of me wants her to come back already so I don’t have to go another minute pretending not to notice the hurt I caused Olivia.

I wish I could just go to her and apologize. I don’t know why I can’t. I know I’ve been too harsh on her. If there’s someone in this family who should understand her reason to lie to our parents, it’s me.

When I was in my second year studying to become a doctor back in Brazil and realized that I was never going to be happy if I continued on that path, it felt terrifying coming clean to my parents. I pushed the conversation back so many times, I ended up having to enroll in my fourth semester just because I didn’t have the guts to talk to them.

When I finally did tell them I was dropping out, the news was met with a lot of resistance, as I’d expected.

There were some threats before we finally reached a deal. But we did reach one.

Because we talked. Because I was honest. I faced the consequences of my choice. I didn’t just lie to them and chose to hide what I was truly studying like Olivia is doing.

She’s simply avoiding the backlash that she knows she’d face because it’s what I went through, and part of the reason why I can’t bring myself to apologize to her is because I wish I’d had the guts to do what she’s doing. To just say fuck it and live my life how I want it.

The sound of my phone vibrating on the arm of the couch pulls me out of my thoughts, and when I see an unsaved number on the screen, a chill runs down my spine. Even before picking it up, I know something happened to Julia.

I wish I could make this bus go faster. My legs won’t stop bouncing as I will the driver to speed up.

Convincing Olivia to stay home was like trying to tell a kid they can’t go on the playground, but eventually she acquiesced. I needed her to cover my early shift tomorrow if we didn’t make it back in time. And something told me it was very likely that we wouldn’t.

When I answered the phone and Winter’s voice filled my ear, the cold feeling of dread that took over my body had nothing to do with my distaste for him. I already knew he was going to say something had happened to my sister.

“She’s okay,” he said first. But I knew she wasn’t. “She just had an allergic reaction. We didn’t know she couldn’t have coconut.”

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