The Sullivan Sisters

More Than Just Sisters Now

"You British now, or something?"

Paloma blinked slowly, demonstrating her unimpressed demeanor. It wasn't the first time that day that Ava insinuated such a thing. The second Paloma drowned a small tea bag in a sea of boiling-hot water and partook in place of coffee, its most potent rival, Ava didn't hesitate to express her disdain.

Paloma perched her right leg over the other to best accommodate her skirt then clasped her liquid treat even tighter. "Believe it or not, Brits don't own the rights to tea."

"They should." Ava grinned into her own mug. "After all, it is an inferior beverage."

Paloma fought a smile but it came to fruition anyhow. Witnessing the warmth that finally returned to the woman, Ava scooted further in at their table and matched her expression.

Every weekday, like clockwork, they monopolized one of the two breakrooms the office offered. Then again, it wasn't a very hard thing to do considering it was a humble area, to say the least.

Paloma and Ava sat at a modest table adorned by a couple of overly firm chairs. Aside from that, the room could manage no more than a fridge, a low-budget microwave, and a few cabinets that served as a barrier between the appliances. So, really, it wasn't their fault that they just so happened to always find the seats empty and waiting as if reserved specifically for the two of them.

One would expect a dash of creativity at a minimum throughout an office who prided itself on such a thing in a literary sense, but aside from the décor workers imposed on their 'designated slave quarters', as Paloma liked to call them, there wasn't much charm, charisma, or even color in the whole building. The breakrooms were no exception.

"Seriously, what's going on with you? We both know that, like myself, coffee is your drug of choice. Addicts don't just give up their fix for no reason," Ava said, elevating an eyebrow.   

"If you must know, I wanted to change things up a bit. As idiotic as it sounds, I can't even look at a cup of coffee without thinking about my sister." Paloma ran her hands over her face as much as she could without smudging her makeup. "The guilt..." She tsked. "That shit's eating me up."

Ava's humor subsided in one, abrupt sweep. "Paloma, we already talked about this. What happened with your sister is terrible. The kid didn't deserve any of that. No one agrees with you more about that than I do. But you didn't know and, for that reason, you don't get to feel guilty. You can't change or fix something that you know nothing about."

"Yeah, but I would've known if I'd done something—anything."

"Okay," said Ava. "Sure. Maybe that's true." She raised her shoulders one good time. "Now what?"

Paloma had been asking herself that for weeks but a response never emerged. She ran a hand over her tired face and grimaced. "The kid wanted to have sex with him." When Ava's eyebrows spiked, Paloma nodded. "Her words. God, I didn't even know she thought about sex."

Ava couldn't help but chuckle. "She's fifteen. What else would she be thinking about?" When Paloma didn't bite, Ava's expression sobered. "Beating yourself up about it doesn't help you or her. And, not that you asked, but it doesn't do anything for me, either, alright? So, stop. We are not spending our entire break trying to scrounge up ways to change the past. Instead, let's figure out how to make things better in the now." She took a long gulp of her coffee then set it firmly on the table. "What do we know?"

"We know that she was pinning after Michael because he was, according to her, everything I wasn't," grumbled Paloma. "I essentially drove her right into his freakin' arms."