His Smirk ||

25: Doing it Wrong

“You two went bowling?”

 

I laughed at how incredulous he sounded. “No, and I figured out why he was so insistent on refusing; he can’t bowl.”

 

He stared at me for a moment before shaking his head. “I don’t get why you dated him,” Matthew scoffed, “he’s such an asshole.”

 

“Only when he’s mad,” I found myself defending Kale on instinct. I would have taken it back then but it was true, and for some reason I couldn’t stop myself. “He has serious anger issues and is the most spiteful person I’ve ever met,” a little smile crept onto my lips, “but Kale has a good side too.”

 

“Sure he does,” he laughed as he got to his feet.

 

I refrained from saying any more. Matthew wasn’t exactly the person to talk to about this sort of thing. Not only that but I didn’t want to defend Kale. It would be so much easier if only I could hate him. As much as he’d hurt me and as dysfunctional as we were together; I still loved him. I simply didn’t want to be with him again.

 

After finishing up his nearly perfect game with a turkey, Matthew was back at my side and sinking into his seat. Instead of the smirk I’d expected to find he just stared at me with a piercing expression. “Is it true,” it looked like he was trying to solve a puzzle as he asked, “that your parents are getting married?”

 

“Uh,” I mumbled, caught off guard for a second, “yeah it is.”

 

“He always made it sound like they were just screwing.”

 

“They were already engaged when I moved in,” I grimaced.

 

Matthew’s gaze broke mine, flickering over my shoulder to the loud group of people entering the bowling alley. It only took a second before his attention was returned to me, eyes searching my face this time around. “Wait, so you knew he was going to be-“

 

“-my stepbrother?” I finished for him, groaning as I covered my eyes. That was a little detail I’d spent a good part of the year dancing around. Something about it just felt so incredibly wrong, and yet; it was the truth. “Our parents postponed the wedding so we could be together.”

 

“Everything always has to be crazy around here,” Matthew grumbled. Oddly enough he looked amused as he leaned back in the seat and looked over to me with a sparkle in his eyes. “You still have no idea what you moved into,” his smirk caught me by surprise.

 

The little twerp was making fun of me somehow. I just knew it. So I reached out and ruffled his hair and smiled at the fact he glared, but didn’t make any move to stop me. “I’ve been thinking about what you said,” I decided to change the subject, “about meeting your friends.”

 

Matthew’s cocky gaze remained, but the eagerness behind it peeked through as he leaned closer to me. “Yeah?”