Page 49 of Undeniably Perfect

“Brix? He’s great. He’s laid-back and super smart. He’s a doctor and treats children in third world countries. He’s almost always traveling. I miss him. We are pretty tight, but we still talk quite a bit.”

“Does he like baseball?”

I shrug. “I think so. We don’t really talk sports.”

Suddenly the crowd cheers and our attention turns back to the game, where Kent has just struck out a player.

“Well, just don’t discount him because he’s a jock,” Kylie adds quietly once the crowd stops cheering. I look over at her.

“Why would I do that?”

Kylie shrugs. “Just guessing that he’s not your typical type.”

I don’t know Kylie that well yet, but I think her observation abilities are way under-credited.

“He’s not, but…there’s something about him. Honestly, even if we never date, I’d still want to be friends with him. He’s good peeps.”

Kylie smiles. “He is. The best.”

I laugh. “Come on, he has to have at least one fault.”

She shrugs. “He stinks to high heaven after he works out. But otherwise…nope, I got nothing. The guy’s not human, what can I say?”

I laugh harder. “Come on, even my brother has his faults.”

She shakes her head. “Oh, there was this one time he locked me in the basement and told me there were ghosts down there. And he did cut my pigtails off once on a bet from Di. And once, he glued down all my CDs so I couldn’t pick them up. But other than being a jerk big brother when we were kids, he’s pretty perfect.”

“He what? Are you serious?”

She nods. “Yep. It’s not as bad as the stuff Di and Lanie did to him though. Like one time they shaved his head in a reverse mohawk while he was sleeping because he ate their Easter candy. And one time they dyed all his shirts pink and purple because he made fun of their birthday outfits. Oh, and one time when they were babysitting us, they locked us out of the house because they wanted to have their boyfriends over and didn’t want us in the way. Well, mostly Di didn’t want us in the way, Lanie just went along with it.”

“Wow! Brix and I never were that bad.”

Kylie giggles and shrugs. “We were a naughty little group of kids, what can I say?”

“The worst thing Brix ever did to me was make me do his chores for a month because he caught me sneaking candy after bedtime, and I didn’t want him to tell our grandparents.”

“Oh, we don’t really do the blackmail thing. We have a pact, but we do get each other back for things.”

“You have a pact?”

“Yep. The Moore clan pact. We always have each other’s backs, no matter what. We operate in a cone of silence outside the inner circle.”

“Wow. That’s, uh, intense.”

“I guess we all figure if you can’t trust your family, then who can you trust?”

Thoughts of my messed-up childhood swirl in my head. I can’t say that I’ve trusted anyone. Not like it’s a surprise or anything. When your parents don’t take care of you, you don’t exactly learn about trust in the way you should. I suppose I trust Brix, but from an early age, we were both sort of left to fend for ourselves. I mean, our grandparents did take us in and provided us with the basics and a safe home, but I just never connected with them. I shake myself out of my dark inner thoughts and insecurities.

I nod toward Kylie and go back to watching the game.

My phone buzzes with a text as I watch Kent pitch.

Lyla: Hey? You here?

Me: Here, as in the game?”

Lyla: (laughing emoji) yep

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