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“Hey, Lainey.” She walks in and gives me a hug, wrapping her arms around me and squeezing hard.
“What are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be... studying?”
My half-sister, unlike me, never flunked out of medicine. Her grades are always perfect. I doubt she’ll have any trouble with her internship and residency, either. She’ll go all the way and become Dr Campbell. She has a boyfriend who dotes on her and adores her—a man our father approves of. Everything has always come so easily for her, especially her relationship with our father.
Today, her light brown hair is piled high on her head, and she’s wearing a pair of Ugg boots, tracksuit pants, and a sweater. Very unlike Tara apparel. Still, she looks fantastic, the spitting image of her model mother, Elkie. Tara is this gorgeous, upbeat little power package that never gets anything wrong, and is smart to boot. It’s impossible for me to look at her and not think about how different we are—how Dad compares us.
“Eh,” she lifts a shoulder. “I didn’t have class and I thought I’d pop in to see my big sis.”
She’s smiling brightly, and she looks radiant. Unbidden, jealousy drags me into its clutches and squeezes my chest. Why does everything have to be so easy for her?
“Well, come on in,” I invite a little stiffly, closing the door behind her. “Do you want a cuppa or something?”
“Maybe a cup of tea and some crackers. If you have any...”
When we get to the kitchen, I put the kettle on and look through my cupboards to see whether I have crackers.
“So, how’s Dixon’s?” she asks.
“Boring. Why don’t you tell me how studying is going?”
Her smile is still pasted on her face, but she’s fidgeting with the handbag on her lap and she looks a little nervous. “It’s not going at the moment.”
“Why is that?” I ask, sitting on the stool next to hers after I place a mug of tea in front of her, along with some savoury biscuits.
“You see...” she swallows. “I haven’t been able to focus on much since I found out I’m pregnant.”
“You’re pregnant?” I ask, my voice sounding further away than it should. My sister is pregnant. Holy crap. I’m going to be an auntie. “Congratulations,” I say, reaching out to hug her.
“Thanks,” she says, smiling at me when I pull away.
It’s difficult trying to think through the shock and pull out the questions I know I’m supposed to ask now. “How many weeks along are you?”
“Twelve. We just had the first ultrasound.”
“Kevin’s excited?”
Her smile vanishes. “It’s not his.”
I nearly drop the biscuit I just picked up. “Oh.”
“It’s over between us.”
Tara and Kevin have been together for as long as I can remember. They were high school sweethearts and then they went to university together. This news is as unexpected as the pregnancy.
“I... have you ever met someone who just got you? Someone you didn’t have to pretend with? Someone who liked you just the way you are?”
I take a sip of my tea and then put the mug down on the bench. “Yes.”
Ben is that person for me, and it’s all the more reason why I don’t want to lose him. That feeling of everything being right when I’m with him is something I don’t want to give up.
“For me, that person was one of my professors.”
If I hadn’t just swallowed my mouthful of tea, I would have spat it across the kitchen.
“He loves me, Lainey.” Her green eyes are on mine, warm and bright. “And I love him. We’re getting married. He’s had to quit his job... which sucks, but he says it’s worth it.”
She drops one bombshell after another on me.
