Speeding Through a Blind Curve

LAP THREE

Rae and her brothers have been dealt some pretty inconvenient cards. But they're making it work.

Her little brother Max has it the hardest. He's the one who's forced to live so far away. In the interest of saving funds, he has to live in Pampanga with their aunt who was kind enough to take them all in after their parents died. As if making it through high school isn't hard enough.

Tim, on the other hand, has been old enough to live on his own for a while. At least he's already in his first official year of residency. He's getting his first chance at earning a little more to help out. A friend of his was also kind enough to let him board rent free until he can manage to earn his keep.

Life has been good, considering.

Some months they only get to meet when the schedule permits, but they try their best to see each other at least once every few weeks.

Rae's surprised to arrive first at Shakey's. She finds a nice booth near a window and tells the waitress who approaches that she'll be waiting a little bit more for her company. Five minutes later, Max finally arrives. Poor thing looks a little haggard from the commute and he plops down beside Rae looking like a wet puppy.

"You're looking peachy." She earns a snarl for that. But Max contradicts himself with how he leans in to rest his head on her shoulder. He's still a little boy. He'll forever be her little brother no matter how much of a pain in the ass he could be sometimes.

"I probably smell like a rotten peach too. I hate Manila. It's even hotter here than in Pampanga."

"I know, buddy. I keep thinking it's going to rain but the sky just won't put out."

"The sky is a prude."

"Who doesn't want us to get wet—what am I even saying to you? This is not good sisterly conduct!"

Max laughs in a way that makes his pale eyes dance. His eyes aren't exactly brown, not exactly gray, but stuck in between where it almost sparkles under the light and is perfectly hazel when hidden from it.

The family resemblance becomes clear as soon as Tim joins them at the table. People say they all have their mother's eyes. From eldest to youngest, anyone who spares them a glance would know that these are three from the same apple tree.

With the mix of their mother's Irish blood, they don't look as Filipino as they're supposed to. Lina, as the waitress's tag says, is visibly taken aback when Tim starts to speak to her in Tagalog. Rae sees her talking to another employee once she's back at the counter, smiling while she most likely recounts seeing another perfect specimen of the marriage of foreign and Filipino blood.

"So you're late." Rae has her arm around Max's shoulders, while the younger De los Santos sibling mimics every other adolescent in the restaurant and tinkers with his phone. She looks at her older brother like he's done something heinous, and she keeps at it until Tim matches her gaze.

"Don't act like you've never been late. I have an excuse. You basically live here already yet you still come in late sometimes. Actually, no. Most times."

"Not today I didn't," she says, smug. "And just because you go around saving lives, doesn't mean you can undermine my trivial existence, brother."

"—you exist?"

"Ha. Ha." Rae pretends to stab him with her fork.

---

Halfway through a perfectly decent meal, the sound of laughing catches Rae's attention and leads her eyes toward the entrance. What she sees causes her to freeze midchew, a bite of pizza hanging from her mouth.