Meant to be

The Best Brother's Best Friend - Evie

I watch the eighteen candles in front of me burn while those around me start to sing happy birthday and I feel a tad uncomfortable. Do I just sit here and smile, do I make eye contact or focus on the cake or do I sing along? Taking a deep breath I just put on a smile and look around the table at my four brothers, well three half and one step to be exact. The Bajan beauty also known as my best friend Jodie and lastly Mason Clarke, a man who plays recurring vital roles in all of my sex dreams as well as my brother's best friend.

"Are you going to make a wish or just stare into space like you don't have brain cells" my eldest brother Don raises his eyebrows at me expectantly. Rolling my eyes at him with a smile I blow out the candles without making a wish. I'm more of a believer of fate than I am wishes, if something is meant to happen then no matter how many wishes I make against it, it's going to happen. Or at least that's how I rationalise things in my life.

"Yum I'm so hungry" Jodie cuts herself a generous slice not waiting another second.

"It's so sweet of you to cut the cake and take the first slice before Evie does" Mason says with a look of amusement on his face.

"Thanks Mason" Jodie smiles oblivious to Mason's sarcasm. I take the knife from Jodie cutting equal slices for us all and distributing them. With a slice each I grab some chocolate milk out of the fridge ready to carry out my birthday ritual.

"I'll be back in a bit" I tell them as they're digging in with nobody questioning me. Walking out of the kitchen along the corridor to the open foyer before heading underneath the first set of stairs to the dormant part of the house where Dad's office resides before he moved out.

Sitting in the battered sofa I take out her photograph and try to recall as much about her as I can, Magdalena Novak, my birth mother. God she really was beautiful wasn't she, a Russian ballerina with a taste for trouble, well that's what her obit said. I can't remember a whole lot but I knew that every year on my birthday before she died we ate cake together, drank chocolate milk and talked about the best thing that had happened since my last birthday. So every year I continue to honour her by having my first slice of birthday cake with her and maybe to alleviate my guilt. Whilst trying to relive any fond memories I always wonder how she would feel about me living with Dad's family.

After all she was the other woman.

She didn't tell me much about Darius D'Silver only that he lived in another country and that she loved him but he loved another woman, his wife. When Mum died it made sense to everyone to have me live with Dad and his family. Being an only child it'd been weird suddenly being slotted into a big family, three older half brothers, Don, Michel and Leo D'Silver, baby half sister Ra-Ra as well as a stepmother Beverly. She's the farthest thing from the stereotype and to this day it still baffles me how she loves me like her own. Even when she and Dad divorced she insisted it would be in my best interest to stay with her and my siblings. She's kinda my role model actually. Sometimes I feel guilty that I even call Beverly Mum, it sort of slipped out one day and she never corrected me so I didn't stop. I'd like to think my bio mum wouldn't be mad about that, I'd hope that the most important thing to her would be my happiness and I'm happy.

Finishing off the cake and relishing in the few photos and memories I could muster I head out of the office almost instantly walking into someone. Warm hands grab both sides of my waist to stop me from falling back and my breath hitches only a little when I see the hands belong to Mason.

This is how some of my fantasies start...

"I regret not getting you glasses for your birthday you almost ran me over" he teases, a smile forming on his face and both his hands still on my waist.