"You walk home?"
"Yeah," Mali-Koa said. "But it's okay. I like walking. Especially at night."
"I like walking, but not at night," I said with huff. "I'm afraid I'm going to get mugged."
She laughed. "What, are you from California or New York or something?"
"California," I told her. New York and California were basically the only states foreigners seem to know. Maybe some people know Florida, but that's basically it.
"Sorry for flirting with you, by the way," Mali-Koa said. "But I must admit, my little brother chose a looker."
"Um, thanks, I guess..."
"What's your name again?"
"Luke. Luke Hemmings."
"Hi, Luke Hemmings, I'm Mali-Koa Hood."
"Hi, Mali-Koa Hood. I'm Luke Hemmings."
"You already told me your name."
"I know."
We walked in silence. I felt extremely awkward. I started fiddling Calum's necklace and cracking my fingers. Mali-Koa seemed fine. She was walking casually down the sidewalk, her right on on the strap of her handbag, whereas I was completely stiff.
"Er, about how long does it take for you to walk home?" I asked, still fiddling with the necklace.
"A good thirty minutes," Mali-Koa replied. "Twenty, if I walk quickly."
"Okay."
Silence again. It was killing me. I wanted nothing more than to pull out my headphones and listen to music, but that would be rude. How did Mali-Koa not feel awkward?
"Does Calum ever talk about me?" Mali-Koa suddenly asked.
"We try to stay away from the topic of family," I told her.
Mali-Koa looked down.
"He has talked about you, though," I said, trying to make her feel better.
"What has he said about me?" Mali-Koa asked, a little bit happier.
I suddenly stopped. Calum has mentioned Mali-Koa only twice, and he didn't say very good things the two times he's mentioned her.
"He called me a bitch, didn't he?" she asked softly.
I hesitantly nodded.
Mali-Koa sighed. "I don't blame him, honestly. I admit, I can be a bitch sometimes, and it's not even PMS-ing. I just... I just am. Maybe it's an oldest child thing. Maybe it's because I expect so much from him. But it's okay, right?—to expect things from your younger brother? Maybe it's because he's the only real sibling I have. I mean, we have Daniela, but she's our step-sister, whereas Calum and I have the same parents. And with our parents separated, my dad coming occasionally to bring Daniela, and my mom basically gone because she hates knowing that my dad's here, I feel as if Calum can just slip away from me. He's the only real family I have left, and sometimes I abuse the fact."
"Okay."
Oh, my gosh, Luke you're so stupid. You don't just say 'okay'! Comfort her or something—she's your boyfriend's sister so you're automatically supposed to be best friends—
"He hates me, doesn't he?" Mali-Koa asked, her voice strained.
"No, no, no!" I said. "No, he doesn't hate you—"
"But that aside!" Mali-Koa said suddenly. She had a smile on her face, but it looked incredibly forced. "You haven't given me details on your little love story with my brother. I'll ask Calum about it later, but I want to hear your side of the story."
"Um, well... I met Calum online, we talked, we became best friends, and in the midst of this really huge jumble I don't want to get into, I fell in love with him."
Mali-Koa smacked me in the arm.
"What the hell was that for?!" I whined.
"I said details!" Mali-Koa said. "I'm a girl, for crying out loud! I need the deets!"
"Did you just say 'deets'—?"
"TELL ME EVERYTHING!" Mali-Koa said with a squeal.
I laughed, but it almost sounded like a scoff. "If you want me to tell you everything, then we have to sit down."
"There's a swing on our front porch," Mali-Koa said with a smile.
"Fine, then," I said. "Lead the way, Hood Number One."
Mali-Koa chuckled. "I thought you'd pick Calum to be Number One."
"Well, you're the firstborn."
"That I am."
Mali-Koa and I walked for another ten minutes or so. I was tired. I was still carrying my duffel bag around—my shoulder ached. Perhaps it would be smart if I moved the strap so that my duffel bag was resting on my other shoulder, but I was too lazy to move it. Plus, I was bound to take it off, anyway.
"We're almost here," Mali-Koa drawled out as we turned right into a neighborhood.
I looked down at the sidewalk, trying not to step on the lines or cracks. I think Mali-Koa saw what I was doing, because she let out a small chuckle, but I continued to do it anyway. I'm not ashamed.
We turned left onto a certain street. Mali-Koa said this was her street. She explained to me that her mother wasn't home, and Calum was most likely locked up in his room "doing whatever the fuck he does on his phone or laptop." I learned that she was twenty-three, but still lived with Calum and her mother (Joy, her name was) so that she could help support them. Mali-Koa had two jobs—one in the daytime, which is the job as a waitress at a diner, and another at night. She walks home from the diner at eight o'clock to see if everything is okay at the house. Then she leaves to work as a waitress at a bar.
"Waiting tables is just what I do," Mali-Koa said with a smile. "But, what I really want to be is a fashion designer."
"I'm sure you'll get there someday," I told her.
"How come your mother is never home?" I asked.
"I honestly don't know what she does," said Mali-Koa. "I hardly ever see her around. She's been very bitter since she and my dad signed the divorce papers. There was always the occasional night in which she came home drunk. I don't know what she does, but she gets by. It may not even be the best way to get by, but she's my mum, and I love her, so I stay. The most part is to take care of Calum, though."
"But your mother helps, too, doesn't she?"
Mali-Koa shook her head sadly. "I had just turned sixteen when I dropped out of school. Calum was eleven. That's when my parents got divorced. Calum was waiting right in front of the door to see our parents come home from work—that was their thing, coming home from work together, even when they had different jobs. Calum started crying when he didn't see our dad come home, and what made it worse was that our mum was pissed drunk. And when she remained in that state of intoxication for the next couple of weeks, I dropped out of school. I was working the entire day and coming home very late so that I could pay the house bills and put food on the table, because my mum wasn't doing anything. Maybe that's why Calum dislikes me so much—I made it my job to play the mother, when I'm supposed to be just the sister..."
"He doesn't dislike you," I said. We had just arrived at their house. That's when I saw the swing on their porch.
Mali-Koa and I walked up the steps to the porch. We sat down, and I dropped my duffel bag with a relieved sigh.
"Long story short, my mum's unstable, and I'm still here to make sure Calum is okay."
I smiled sadly. "You really do love Calum, don't you?"
"More than anything," Mali-Koa said.
It reminded me of Ben and Jack. Gosh, I miss them so much. I need to call them.
"You need to tell me your story," Mali-Koa said with somewhat of a smirk on her face.
"Okay," I mumbled, rubbing my hands together. They were starting to sweat. "Er, I met him online about two years ago. It was nothing really serious at the start. I suppose we were both just feeling lonely, and our company seemed to satisfy ourselves. He became my best friend. I knew his secrets, he knew mine. We know each other like the backs of our hands, even though we didn't know each other in person."
"Were you afraid," Mali-Koa asked, "that he wasn't as he made out to be online?"
"At first, I was. I was reluctant to give him my name. I didn't give him my full name because of that. I saw all of his selfies. I was still skeptical about it, sure, but when we started to post videos, I believed that he really was a teenager like me. Don't even get me started when we FaceTime'd for the first time. I was nervous as hell."
Mali-Koa hummed, a small smile playing on her lips.
"I had my problems, and he had his. I would always go to him for comfort, and he would do the same to me. When we were first friends, we promise each other that we would be there for each other no matter what. We promised that we would try to help each other with our own problems, and if we couldn't help each other, we would just listen, because we both knew that we couldn't keep things bottled up forever. He was like my life source. He was my support, and eventually, I knew that I couldn't live without him.
"I know it seems stupid. I was seventeen, and I couldn't depend on a boy eight thousand miles away from me to help me with my problems. But he was all I had. I couldn't tell my parents, I couldn't tell anyone at school, I was too afraid to seek counseling, so he was the only person I could go to. And he did help, in a way. Sure, my problems may not have gone away—I was too cowardly to face them. But he did make me very happy, and he made it seem as if those problems never existed.
"Then came something not so good. Are you aware of the term 'shipping'?"
Mali-Koa furrowed her eyebrows. "Is that the thing in which you create a stupid mashup of two people's names?"
"Er, basically, yeah," I said with a small nod. "Anyway, I was 'shipped' with some girl in high school. Her name was Rylee, but that's kind of irrelevant. Continuing, so many people were 'shipping' Rylee and I. They even called us 'Ryluke'. So many of my high school classmates were saying that she and I should get together. I guess I gave into the peer pressure, because I started to believe that I actually liked her, even though I didn't.
"So a couple of months passed by, and my so-called 'infatuation' for Rylee seemed to grow stronger. Again, I was blinded by the peer pressure of my classmates—I didn't actually like her. I then came up with the craziest idea of asking Rylee to be my girlfriend. I told Calum about it, of course, and eventually told my classmates. Calum said that I should go for it, and...some other stuff. Anyway! I eventually mustered up the courage to set up a date to ask Rylee to be my girlfriend. I remember it so clearly. I was sitting down, thinking of how it would be like to have her ask my girlfriend, and then it hit me."
"You were in love with my brother," Mali-Koa said.
"I was in love with your brother," I confirmed.
"What happened exactly? How did you know, just like that?"
"I remember telling a couple of my classmates that I was going to ask her out. Then we were sitting to eat lunch. I started to daydream on what it would be like to have Rylee as my girlfriend, except it wasn't Rylee. I was actually dreaming about making out with Calum..." I chuckled. "Now that I think of it, it's very weird telling your boyfriend's sister about your relationship goals with your boyfriend."
Mali-Koa laughed. "So what happened after your realization?" she asked after recovering.
"I stopped," I told her. "I forgot about Rylee completely. For the next month or two, I was completely set on your brother. I was having so many daydreams about Cal—hey, don't laugh at me!"
Mali-Koa continued to laugh, covering her hand with her mouth. "I'm sorry!" she said threw her fits of laughter. "It's just that you're so in love with my brother and it's so fucking cute."
I scrunched my nose in mock-disgust. "I'm not cute," I sneered.
"Calum would beg to differ, now, would he?"
I glared at her playfully. "I don't like you Hoods."
"Well, Hemmings, you're stuck with us."
I smiled. Calum's already perfect, not to mention he has a sister that matches his perfection. I bet their parents were perfect, too. I wonder what happened between them...
"Anyway! I was madly in love with Calum and trying to muster up the courage to tell him."
Mali-Koa squealed. She repositioned herself on the swing, crossing her left leg over her right. She rested her elbows on her knees and her chin on her palms. She looked like Calum, but she was a girl. Anyway, she was just as adorable as her brother.
"Okay," she said, the most adorable smile on her face. "I'm ready. Tell me everything."
I could feel myself blushing crimson. "Um, well, it was a daily conversation between us."
"Uh huh," Mali-Koa said, her position not changing.
"We were talking like we normally do."
"Uh huh."
"He was saying something about not liking to see me hurt."
"Uh huh."
"Then we started diverting the conversation."
"UH HUH."
"And I made a How I Met Your Mother reference."
"UH HUH."
"Then he said the dream was to make out with Leigh-Anne Pinnock and the fact that he can't is the biggest struggle."
"UH H—well, he really does love Leigh-Anne Pinnock."
"And then I said that liking a boy who doesn't like you back is the biggest struggle. That boy was him, by the way."
Mali-Koa squealed again, and he covered her face with her hands.
"Then he asked me who this boy was."
"UH HUH."
"And I told him the boy was him."
"UH HUH!"
"And I asked him to be my boyfriend."
Mali-Koa screamed. She got off the swing and started jumping around the porch. I was afraid she would break threw and fall, but she didn't seem scared. She was squealing and saying incoherent things that I couldn't understand, and then someone opened the door.
"Oh, my God, Mali, are you okay?"
Mali-Koa suddenly stopped. She looked at the figure standing under the threshold, and she gestured to me. "Yeah, I'm fine, I was just talking to Luke over here—"
It was him.
He was staring at me.
Oh, my gosh, he's staring at me.
Calum slammed the door, leaving me and Mali-Koa absolutely bewildered.