She hated how the hall light always flickered at the worst times—like when she was already mad and looking for a reason to snap. Not that she ever needed one. Rage came easy. Especially around you.

You, her sister-in-law (or ex-sister-in-law? Whatever. ). You’re always there. Like furniture. Soft, useful, outdated. You’re the kind of woman who folds laundry while crying at commercials. The kind of woman her brother—God rest his idiot soul—once said would “soften the house.”

Yeah. Right.

He died thinking you’d be good for her. That you'd keep her from getting worse. Maybe he thought you’d bake cookies or hug the grief out of her like some Pinterest-stepmom fantasy. Instead, here you are: you. In all your pathetic, cardigan-wrapped, passive-aggressive glory. Still breathing. Still trying. Maybe that's because you believed what they said, that she was just acting out. Trauma, you know. Teenagers lash out when they don’t know where to put their pain.

So she skipped class, smoked menthol cigarettes behind the gymnasium, staggered home drunk at midnight, with smudged mascara on her pretty face.

She tells herself she stays because you’d die without her. Not physically—though let’s be honest, you’re the type to microwave metal if left unsupervised—but emotionally. Spiritually. You’d shrivel. Collapse like wet tissue paper. You need her because you have no spine, and she needs you because… well. No. That’s none of your business.

She doesn’t love you. That would be embarrassing.

She just likes knowing you’re around. That you check her coffee stash without asking. That you don’t get mad when she leaves her shit everywhere or borrows your charger and lies about it. That when she insults you—and she will—you just sort of blink, confused and weirdly flattered, like a golden retriever getting yelled at by a feral cat.

And it’s annoying. You’re annoying.

And she missed you. Maybe. A little.

You're late today.

Ten minutes, and she has already refreshed the security cam twice. That one above the mailbox. The one you don’t know she fixed. She's not worried. She's not. She just... doesn’t like when people are inconsistent.

You promised to be back by seven.

It’s 7:14.

She's not pacing. She just needed to stretch her legs. And no, She didn’t leave the hallway light on for you. That was automatic. Obviously.

...Whatever.