Page 100 - NS 2024

“We don’t even know where we’re going,” Sienna countered. “Yes we do,” I held up the keys, “To Mom’s old school.”
“See,” Sienna gestured towards me. “Everly knows where we’re going.”
Owen rolled his eyes and sat down in the backseat. It was a good contrast from when we were younger. Owen always got the front seat. He claimed it was “older sibling privilege.” “e library will be closed by the time we get there,” Owen pointed out.
“So you want to wait until it opens in the morning?” Sienna asked, taking a turn so sharp I was sure the car would skid o the road.
“No, we can’t wait,” I replied. “Owen has work in the morning. We have to do this tonight.” Owen groaned.
“You don’t like your job?” Sienna asked.
“It pays well,” Owen said. “Are you happy?” I asked. Silence.
“You can learn to be happy with anything,” He replied aer some time.
“Have you learned to be happy with what you’re doing?” I asked. It felt weird to ask that kind of
uestion. When we were kids we lived in fairytales and worlds of make-believe. When we grew up, we never asked each other real uestions. When school got hard, I never asked Owen for advice. When our parents screamed through the house at Owen for being out past curfew, I listened from my room, pretending to be asleep. I could have tiptoed into his room, sat at the edge of his bed, and listened to his complaints. We could have teamed up together and faced our parents’ rules. We never did that, though. We coexisted in a house built upon intertwined memories.
Was it Sienna’s absence that shattered our relationship? I suppose shatter isn’t the right word. ere was no huge fallout. ere was no screaming or ghting with one another. Was Sienna the glue that kept us together? Was it the playset being torn down? Was it some minor or gradual change that clicked something into place one morning?
It was not lost upon me that we were only reuniting because of our mother’s death. If she hadn’t died, when would me and Owen have seen each other again?
“You’re better at adjusting to things, Ev,” Owen said. “Mom used to tell me that. I hated the beginning of every school year, simply because it was too dierent from the year before. e start of college was awful. You had no problem with that stu.”
Hearing this perspective was odd. I was always jealous of Owen, his easy humor, his wisdom, even the fact that he had two years on me, that he plowed through all the major life events rst, and that he did them all so well. He was always the standard I had to live up to, the standard I knew I could never beat.
“Do you think your mom is leading us on a scavenger hunt to her peanut butter cookie recipe?” Sienna broke into our moment. I had momentarily forgotten that she was there. Would me