“And you,” Derrick shoves me. Of course, Ziah only gets a look, and I get shoved. “Stop being an ass. What else would you be doing? Going out with one of the girls you never want to see again? You can do that shit later. I’m your brother. Stop acting like a douche-bag.”

Me? I’m the douchebag? He’s the one who doesn’t want anything to do with me unless it’s to put me to work on the wedding I’m trying to save him from.

I look over at Ziah for support, but her eyes look watery. She turns away from all of us, and I’m not sure anyone notices but me.

“You’re right. I’m sorry. Can I use the bathroom before we go?” she asks before she sniffs. Something’s definitely up.

“I’ll show you where it is,” I say.

She doesn’t say a word to me as I show her where the bathroom is. I don’t really feel like talking either, but part of me is curious what’s going on. She may be pissy, but she’s the only ally I have in this.

A few minutes later, we’re all piled in Derrick’s car, Ziah and I in the backseat. She’s looking out the window again, and I find myself wondering what’s wrong. Is it just the wedding? I mean, that’s enough because it’s a hell of a big thing, but I’m guessing there’s more.

I watch as her eyes drift forward to look at Lora. A couple times she shakes her head, and others she just looks sad. Looks like I’m not the only one getting ditched by the lovebirds up front.

I’m surprised when he doesn’t slow down as we approach our pizza place. “Um… did you forget where we eat?” I thump Derrick in the back of the head.

“I’m not really in the mood for pizza.”

Lora jumps in. “We can go eat pizza if you guys want. I’m cool with anything.”

Her words are nice and all, but they kind of feel like she’s throwing me a consolation prize. And even though I really want some damn pizza, I’m not taking it. “Nah, it’s cool. We can eat wherever.”

A few minutes later we pull up at a little Mexican restaurant. Derrick and Lora sit on one side of the booth, and Ziah and I on the other. While we’re waiting for our food to arrive, Lora pulls out her trusty pen and paper.

“Okay, so we’re thinking one of the first things we need to do is visit a few venues to decide where the wedding should take place.”

The word venue makes me want to laugh for some reason. “Since you’re the ones taking the plunge, don’t you think you should pick the place?”

“D!” Derrick gives me his pissed-off look.

“I agree with him,” Ziah jumps in.

Ha! “Seriously, though, I’m not trying to be a jerk, but I don’t see how we’re supposed to help with this one.” Or anything, but I don’t say that.

“We have a big list of places we want to visit. It’ll take too much time, so we figure we could split the list, you two go and we can go. You guys can take pictures, write down all the price information and stuff, and it will help give us something to go on.”

Lora looks like she practiced that speech in front of the mirror like a million times.

“Why can’t I go with you?” Ziah asks.

Lora looks stumped by that question. I have the urge to give Ziah a high five.

Lora looks over at Derrick, and I lean closer to Ziah. “The surgery to separate them would take too long. We wouldn’t want the wedding postponed, would we?”

She chuckles.

I lean back in the seat. “I’m cool with going with Ziah.”

Lora smiles. Derrick nods at me, but Ziah’s head whips around. “What?”

“Excuse us for a second.” I start to nudge Ziah out of the booth, and she’s looking at me like she’s wondering what the hell I’m doing. But she goes. When we get to the hallway by the restrooms, I stop her. “You like talking about my brother?”

She crosses her arms. “No.”

“Good. I don’t like talking about your sister either. We separate them, and I’m pretty sure we’re going to want to chop our own ears off before long. At least if we do this together, we don’t have to watch Derrick pant around after her with his tail between his legs while Lora plays the sugar plum fairy filled with sugar and spice and everything nice.”

And as the words come out, I’m wondering why I’m bothering with this. It would be a lot easier to talk my brother out of getting married if he’s detached from his girl. Instead I find myself, once again, determined to make Ziah smile.

She’s close, but doesn’t do it. Damn, she’s a tough sale.

“Fine, but this doesn’t mean I like you.”

“News flash, but you’re not exactly my favorite person either.” Even though I do want to touch that one stupid strand of hair, just so I know what it feels like. And even though I just put us in a position to be spending a lot of time together.

I need to pull back away from this girl. “Look. I think you and I could work about a million times faster than those two. We can take pictures and pretend to play nice.” Not a bad plan if I do say so myself.

“Okay. I can do that.” She nods.

“Good.” We head back toward the table. As we walk around the corner, I see Derrick nuzzling Lora’s neck. I sort of want to puke again, but it’s Ziah who freezes, her whole body going still as though she is unable to move. She gasps a little like it actually hurts her to see them or something. I mean, I definitely don’t like seeing them together, but it seems different with her.

“Hey… you okay? You don’t seem like yourself.” Not that I know what herself actually is, but it works.

She bites her lip and turns to look at me. “How did you—” And then like she changes her mind she says, “Nothing. I’m fine,” before stomping back to the table.

I pray to God she didn’t bring her voodoo dolls with her.

Eight

~ Ziah ~

Christmas passes in a blur of me trying not to think about James and Alyssa or Derrick and Lora, or what it’s going to be like to go back to school with them and plan a wedding that I’m not sure should even happen.

I’m still pissed at Lora because freaking Dylan noticed something’s wrong with me while she’s still running around clueless. At this point, I’m not telling her out of principle.

***

Two days after Christmas, I’m almost home from my run when I see James on my porch. I want to turn around and run away, but two things stop me. First off, I’m stronger than that. And second… he saw me.

I slow to a walk, wondering what on Earth I’m going to say to him when we get close. I don’t know what happened, and I don’t want to know. The whole thing makes me sick, and it’s all bottled up inside me because I can’t talk to Alyssa, and my sister’s too busy with Derrick.

James’ voice pulls me into the present. “Ziah, I…”

“You do not want to hear what I have to say right now.”

I point at him and push past where he’s standing on the sidewalk. How long has he been standing this close? And wow, I just sounded way tough.

“No, no. I do. Let me have it. Say anything you want.” He keeps pace with me. “Anything so we can be back to the way we were.” He’s been crying, no doubt.

“Tell me everything.” I stop to stare.

He needs to say what actually happened, all of it.

“I told you already,” he pleads. “I texted you everything.”

Right. The texts I didn’t read. “Well. What would you say if I said I’d talked to Alyssa?”

I haven’t talked to Alyssa, of course. I haven’t read texts or email, but I figure right now my best option is to pretend I have.

His jaw drops. My heart rips a little further. It’s bad. More than once? Many times? I’m confused as to why he still wants me.

“Yeah. That’s what I thought.” I run up my porch steps and push open the front door.

“Ziah, please…”

“What? What else do you want from me, James?” You’ve already crushed me. There’s nothing left.

“She was drunk, Ziah. And you don’t pull on me like that anymore. Like you really want me. I knew it was stupid. And it was just one time. I swear. When I was dropping her off.”