He placed a hand on her shoulder like he owned the moment and said, “Do not take it personally, big events create stress and you tend to read into things more than you should.”
I stood slowly and felt my heart pounding, but the feeling was not the same kind of hurt I used to feel because something sharper and colder had taken its place.
“I do not understand,” I said quietly, looking at Aubrey instead of him.
She let out a short laugh that carried irritation more than humor and said, “You always complicate everything, and you bring heaviness into moments that are supposed to be happy.”
She continued speaking as if she had rehearsed it, saying this was her time and her chance to build a life without the weight of old grief and responsibilities.
That word stayed with me longer than anything else she said because I remembered another time when she used that same tone.
I remembered the small condo in Kenosha, Wisconsin that had belonged to our mother, the one I spent two years renovating after college while pouring every dollar I earned from freelance work into it.
When I was twenty nine, I gave it to her as a gift because she said she wanted independence but still wanted to remain close to family, and she cried when I handed her the keys as if it meant everything to her.
Standing in front of her now, I held onto that memory like proof that something had once been real between us.
I asked her quietly, “Do you really want me gone, and do you truly believe I am standing in the way of your happiness?”
Before she could answer, Brandon stepped slightly forward and positioned himself within her reflection in the mirror as if inserting himself into every part of her life.
“She deserves peace,” he said smoothly, “and sometimes family creates problems without meaning to.”
He brought up something from years ago and twisted it into an example of how I made things harder for her, and Aubrey nodded as if everything he said was completely true.
That was the moment I understood something I had been avoiding for a long time.
Either my sister was no longer the person I loved, or she was still there somewhere beneath years of insecurity and the influence of someone who benefited from keeping her that way.
I looked directly at her and said, “If you want me gone, then say it yourself and do not let him speak for you.”