Page 10 of Some Things Never Change

I let out a loud yelp. “Andy, if you drop me, I will punch you in the face and break that perfect nose of yours!”

Behind us, Anthony was already far down the street. I could feel the strain of my weight on Andy’s body as his chest flexed against my stomach and one of his arms wrapped tightly around me. He breathed heavily with each long and quick stride.

It almost felt as if I was on some amusement ride as I hung onto him tightly for dear life. Once we finally reached our destination at the stoplight, Andy gently set me down on the ground. His chest was heaving as sweat lightly beaded on his forehead. He kneeled over, laughing wholeheartedly.

“What the hell, Andy?” I yelled.

“You said yes!” he said through heavy breaths and laughs. He quickly dodged the light punch I tried to throw at his chest.

“At least give me a warning!”

“I did! I asked you for your consent and you said yes! Not my fault you didn’t get the hint. Even Anthony knew!”

He grinned widely as he began jogging in place. His twin finally caught up to us, half jogging and half laughing his lungs out.

“You should’ve seen your face, Julie!” said Anthony.

He slowed down to take a seat on the ground, trying to catch his breath. I watched as the two brothers laughed together—Anthony with his infamous hyena snickers and Andy with a gentle, melodic chuckle. I quickly flipped them off and earned another annoying laugh from Anthony before I headed back home on my own.

“For the love of God, you’re both thirty already!” I yelled.

“Oh, come on! Tink, wait for us!” said Andy, taking off after me.

“What the hell? You two were supposed to wait for me, too!” said Anthony from the ground.

His voice was distant and far behind as I bolted down the street. Meanwhile, Andy was hot on my trail. I could feel him running up behind me as I pushed my burning legs further into sprints.

“Having fun?” asked Andy, easily coming up to my side. He barely broke a sweat since he wasn’t hauling me over his shoulders anymore. A cocky smile crossed his lips.

“Shut up,” I said, angrily huffing.

Andy threw his head back and laughed.

Anthony came running up to the other side of me without much effort as well. “Finally! We’re running!”

“I am running, you assholes,” I said, letting out an uncontrollable heave in the process.

“Doesn’t look like it,” commented Anthony.

Andy continued to howl in laughter as I groaned. We ran like this for some time until we came up to the block our parents lived on. The three of us slowed down to a walk as we all heaved from the exercise, taking in shallow breaths. Anthony burst into laughter while I shook my head.

“I miss doing stupid shit like this with you guys,” he said.

“Just move down to Santa Mariana with me and you won’t have to miss it anymore,” I said.

“As if I’ll live with this guy ever again,” Anthony scoffed, pointing accusingly at Andy. “I’ve already had to share a birthday and practically everything else with him growing up. I’m not going to share another house with him.”

Andy shook his head. “Says the one that never even liked to share.”

“Shut up. You’re the one that literally hogged all the good stuff,” retorted Anthony.

“No, I didn’t! You were the one that had the PS2 all to yourself!” countered Andy.

“You had the computer in your room!” reminded Anthony. “Who the hell knew what you were doing all night? At least I was in the living room!”

“Shut the fuck up. It was just a computer hooked up to dial-up internet,” said Andy, scoffing.

I rolled my eyes at their sibling banter, but smiled anyway as we walked closer to our parents’ homes. Like Anthony, I missed this, too. I missed living next door to the twins, and I even missed their dumb repartee with one another.

---