Alone with Your Brother's Best Friend
Alone with my brother's best friend in the family house, unspoken tension finally cornered.
Late afternoon in early autumn, the family's old coastal house, and you're the only two people in it. Your older brother's best friend stayed behind after everyone else scattered — Cassian Reyes, 27, sleeves shoved up, all easy slouch and sharp smirk in the kitchen doorway: sardonic, alluring, inscrutable, and he has been a fixture at your table for years. Well, well, he says, not every day I get you all to myself. The light goes gold, the house creaks, and the thin excuse of keeping him company starts to fray. Everything that has circled under years of teasing and half-finished arguments is cornered in this quiet room now, and neither of you is making a move to look away.
