Fades In The Summer

The Sister

See, Dylan and I – we were best friends. Or at least we had been, until that one night, almost one year ago. He had been dating my fraternal twin sister at that time – sassy, cheerful, light-up-the-room-when-she-walks-in Talia. We both had the same green eyes, but that was all we shared. While my hair was dark and slightly wavy, hers was dark blonde with curls that sprang up no matter how much she tried to comb them down. In short, she looked just like our mother, which had made her Mum's favourite. She was also about two inches shorter, one size thinner, and always got the boy she wanted. And that boy, at that time, had been Dylan. It didn't matter that he had been my best friend, my first love.

But no, I wasn't being fair to her.

Talia was far from a bitch. That was what pained me the most. I was the bitchier one, out of the two of us. She was so nice – everyone had loved her, including me. She had been the best sister anyone could've asked for. To this day, I believe that if I had told her about my feelings for Dylan, she would've stepped back. She was sacrificial like that. But I hadn't told her. She'd even asked me – she'd flounced into my room one day and asked, a little nervously, about my relationship with Dylan. I'd pretended to be impassive and emphasised that we were just friends. Then she'd divulged, almost shyly, that she had the greatest crush on him. She'd asked if I was okay with her confessing her feelings to him. And I'd said the three words I'd eventually come to regret: "Go for it."

She'd gone for it. As Dylan's best friend, I'd known even before I'd walked in on them kissing in the kitchen what the outcome would have been. It had been around the seventh grade when Dylan had started to look like a deer in headlights whenever Talia's name came up in conversation, or when she'd walked past the open door to my room when he'd been over. I'd known that he had been crazy about her, even though we'd never talked about it. And when I'd walked in on them kissing in the kitchen, Dylan pressing her up against the refrigerator like he could no longer hold himself back, my heart had already been shattered by that prior knowledge.

After they'd started dating, I'd tried to distance myself from both of them. That had turned out to be near impossible. For one thing, living in the same house as Talia had meant that I'd always – always – seen them together. Talia was my sister. It had been impossible to avoid her. Avoiding Dylan had been marginally easier, but he, like Talia, had worried about leaving me out. They never had caught on that I would have preferred to have been left out. I'd tried to slip away whenever I could've, but had had to suffer through several outings with them. Several more than I'd ever wanted in this lifetime. It'd felt like been stabbed in the chest by a million shards – the shattered pieces of my own heart, probably – every time I'd had to see them holding hands or sneaking in kisses when they'd thought I wasn't watching. I had been, and it had been hell.

And then there was that night, near the end of the summer before senior year of high school.

They had been dating for fourteen months by then, and still going strong. There had been a party. We'd all gone together, but I'd broken away from them the first chance I had. Then I'd proceeded to go nuts, mixing brandy with tequila, whisky with vodka. I'd been so out of it, I probably would've danced naked atop a table if Dylan hadn't found me and dragged me out of the crowd. It was all a blur. I had no idea what had happened, exactly. The next I knew, I'd been waking up in a hospital bed with my parents, red-eyed and pale, by my side. Dylan had also been there, sitting in a corner away from my parents. I hadn't known what had happened, and why Dylan had been sitting almost lifelessly by the window, dull blue eyes shuttered, until I'd croaked, "Where's Talia?" and my mother had broken down crying.

Later, much later, Dylan had stiltedly told me the whole story. He and Talia had argued. Dylan had been sick of my attitude, as he had put it, but Talia had stuck up for me. Eventually, Talia had stormed off, dragging me along, even though she'd been frustrated with me herself. Dylan had watched her pile me into the car and then drive off, all the while knowing he should've offered to drive us both, because Talia was reckless when she was angry. And she had been furious that night. Instead, he had watched her screech off into the night before returning to the party and proceeding to get angrily drunk. He'd only found out the next day that Talia – and I – had gotten into a car accident. The car had veered off the road and straight into a wall by the roadside. Miraculously, I'd gotten off with only a few broken ribs, a broken nose and a concussion, but Talia's heart had stopped by the time the paramedics had arrived. She hadn't been wearing her seatbelt and the impact of the crash had jolted her forward and upward, slamming her head against the windshield. Then her airbag had deployed with a rush of air that had acted like a hard punch that had barrelled through her abdomen and snapped her spine. I'd been saved because she'd had to strap me in to stop me from rolling off the car seat while she drove.