Rose struggled with the heavy glass door of the campus library, her messenger bag sliding off her shoulder as she juggled an armload of books. The evening air was crisp, carrying the scent of fallen leaves and the distant aroma of pizza from the food trucks that lined College Avenue. Students streamed past her on the sidewalk, most heading toward the cluster of bars and coffee shops that stayed open late to cater to the weekend crowd.
She shifted the books to get a better grip; there were more of them than usual. Rose had arrived that morning and managed to claim a corner spot on the third floor of the library. But after three hours of trying to focus on her Psychology and International Relations coursework, she'd given up. Every time she tried to read about diplomatic theory or cognitive behavioral frameworks, her mind wandered back to the night before. To Noah's weight against her on the couch, the wine on his breath, the heat in his eyes when he'd woken up confused and... hard.
The house was dark when she arrived. No porch light. He wasn't home yet, even though it was already past nine.
I guess he's still meeting with students, she thought, though something about that explanation didn't feel right. He'd been vague about his evening plans, even more so than usual.
Inside, Rose dropped her books on the kitchen counter with a heavy thud that echoed through the empty colonial. The morning's breakfast dishes were still in the sink. She'd been too flustered to clean up properly after their awkward conversation. She ran water over the plates now, watching the soap bubbles swirl down the drain, trying to push down the flutter of anxiety in her chest.
The thing was, she couldn't stop thinking about it. Not just the physical memory of being pressed against him and the unfamiliar hardness against her thigh. But the way he'd looked at her when he woke. As if he were seeing her as a woman. Like maybe, for just a moment, he didn't care that they were supposed to be step-siblings.
She grabbed a Diet Coke from the stainless steel fridge and collapsed onto the sectional couch. The same damn spot where everything had changed last night. The throw pillows still had impressions from where they'd been lying together. She pulled her International Relations textbook onto her lap, determined to get some actual studying done.
"The Concert of Europe represented a fundamental shift in diplomatic practice, establishing mechanisms for collective security..."
She read the same paragraph three times before giving up. Her phone buzzed with a text from her study group asking about the following week's assignment, but she didn't feel like dealing with it.
Instead, she found herself scrolling through Noah's social media. Something she'd done quite a few times before, which felt weird to admit even to herself. This was who she was now, apparently. Someone who checked her stepbrother's Instagram feed like she was tracking a suspect… Or a cheating boyfriend.
Most of his posts were pretty standard professor stuff: pictures of books, shots of the Princeton campus, the occasional quote from a famous book. But there were older photos too, from before he'd started teaching. Noah, at some conference, looking sharp in a suit. Noah, at a coffee shop, laughing at something off-camera. Noah, in the desert during his time in the Army, with his arm around some pretty brunette, Rose didn't recognize.
She felt a stab of something that might have been jealousy, which was ridiculous. He was allowed to have a life. He was allowed to date. It was true that they weren't actually related, but that shouldn't matter to her. They've known each other since she was nine, so they might as well be. There were so many reasons for her not to care.
But I do care. That's the problem.
Rose closed the app and turned on the TV, flipping through channels until she found a mindless reality show. The contestants were screaming at each other about rose ceremonies and immunity challenges, their voices unnaturally loud in the quiet house. She pulled a throw blanket over her legs and tried to focus on the manufactured drama, but her attention kept drifting. This had been happening all day. Her ability to focus splintered like a windshield crack, small at first, then spreading everywhere.
Her phone buzzed again. This time, a text from Emma.
Emma: Hey girl!!!! How are you doing? More importantly, how's that sexy stepbrother of yours doing? Have you made a move yet? 😏
Rose stared at the message, her cheeks getting hot. She'd made the mistake of mentioning Noah to Emma during one of their video calls last month, describing him as "annoyingly hot for someone I have to live with." Emma had turned it into a running joke immediately.
Emma Santos and Rose had known each other since the first day of high school and had been inseparable for all four years. They were the kind of friends who texted constantly, attended parties together, and planned what colleges they would attend together, of course.
But then, a few months after her stepfather died, Emma had convinced Rose that they needed to do something spontaneous, something their futures wouldn't forgive them for not doing. A few months traveling through Europe. Emma had framed it as liberation, adventure, independence, and self-discovery. Rose had seen it as an escape from the crushing sadness that had consumed her and her mother inside her childhood home.
They'd started in London, then Paris. By the time they reached Barcelona, Rose was finally beginning to believe that maybe she could be someone other than the person she'd been in New Jersey. Someone braver.
That's where Jonah had found them. Or, more accurately, where Emma had insisted they find him. Jonah Reeves had graduated two years before them and had been in Barcelona for a year on his own study abroad program, living in a small apartment in the Gothic Quarter, and he'd seemed thrilled to see them. He'd shown them around, introduced them to his favorite bars, bookshops, and the small plaza where locals played cards in the afternoon.
Rose had liked him at first. He'd been charming, knowledgeable, and generous with his time. Emma also seemed happy to have him around and back in her orbit, even platonicly. Apparently, there had been some romantic connection between the two of them during her Sophomore year that had fizzled out shortly after he graduated. They'd spent two weeks with him, exploring the city.
Then one night, a night Rose still couldn't fully recall without her thoughts spiraling. She'd found herself alone with him in his apartment. Emma had gone to meet another friend from her study program. There had been wine. He'd told her that Emma had mentioned something about Rose being stressed, needing to relax, and he had some wine that would help. She remembered the taste of it, sweet and slightly bitter. She remembered the weight of him and the cold wall against her back and the peculiar detachment of her body from her mind, like she was watching something happen to someone else from a very great distance.
What she couldn't remember was what to call it. Was it her first time, or something else?
Rose: OMG, Em. There are no moves. We're just roommates who happen to share parents.
She typed quickly, eager to deflect.
Emma: Right. And I'm just casually learning Spanish, not stalking my hot professor.
Rose smiled despite herself.
Rose: Your professor is like fifty and married.
Emma: Age is just a number, and his wife is just a complication, babe. So is the step-sibling thing, technically.
Rose: Emma!
Rose put her phone down and looked back at the contestants on the dating show, now crying about vulnerable conversations and connections. She didn't need Emma's encouragement to think about things that couldn't happen. Shouldn't happen.
Her phone buzzed again, and Rose resisted for fifteen whole seconds before looking at the new message.
Emma: All I'm saying is, you're both adults. You're not actually related. If there's chemistry… everything else is justdetails and inconveniences, babe. Speaking of which, I'm honestly ready to wrap up this semester. I've been thinking about coming back to Jersey soon. BTW, you won't believe who I ran into last week.
Rose: Who?
Emma: Jonah! He's leaving Barcelona early. Some personal stuff back home, family stuff, I think. Anyway, he's flying back to Jersey next month. We should all hang out when I get back. It's been forever!
The TV had moved on to a new show. But Rose wasn't watching it. She stared at the words on her screen, reading them again and again, feeling them sink into her chest like a stone. Next month. Jonah was coming back.
Rose: Cool. That'll be fun.
Emma: That's the most half-assed response I've ever heard. What's up, girl? You've been weird since you left. Are you okay?
Rose's fingers hovered over the keyboard. This was the moment. This was where she could tell Emma everything. About Jonah, about that night in Barcelona, about the gap between the person she'd been before and the person she'd somehow become. This was where she could ask Emma if what had happened was what she thought it was, or if she'd misread the situation entirely.
Rose: I'm fine. Just tired. School's been a lot.
Emma: Rose...
Rose: Seriously, Em. I'm good. Just excited about seeing you next month.
Emma didn't respond immediately. When she did, it was only: OK. But we're talking when I get back. Followed by a string of concerned emojis that she couldn't bear to look at for too long.
Rose set her phone down and turned up the volume on the TV, pulled the throw blanket higher, and tried to think about nothing at all.
The reality show had moved on to someone crying about a challenge they'd lost. Rose grabbed the remote and flipped channels again, settling on a cooking show. The chef was making something complicated with lobster and talking about the importance of timing, or something or another about French cuisine.
After a few dishes, she'd almost convinced herself that everything was fine. That she was fine. That her avoidance of most college social events was simply a matter of preference, not fear. That her obsessive checking of Noah's schedule and social media was just sisterly concern, not surveillance. And that the flutter in her chest whenever he returned home was just anticipation for company, not something more complicated.
She found herself wondering what Noah was doing right now. Was he at his office, grading papers maybe? Or, Meeting with another student? The thought of him sitting across from someone else, giving them his full attention, made her stomach twist in ways she didn't want to think about.
This is stupid. You know this is stupid.
But she couldn't shake the feeling that something had changed between them, and she didn't know how to change it back.
The house felt too quiet without him in it. The silence felt loaded with possibilities.
Stop it. This is exactly how people ruin good things.
But what if it wasn't a good thing? What if this weird tension could turn into something different? Something… Dangerous… and amazing?
Rose pulled out her phone again, her thumb hovering over Noah's contact. She could text him, ask when he'd be home. It would be a normal sister thing to do. But something held her back. Maybe the fear that her motives weren't entirely innocent.
Instead, she forced herself to open her textbook again. "The Concert of Europe represented a fundamental shift..."
The words began to blur together: diplomatic theory, power structures, negotiation tactics. At some point in her Psychology classes, she'd learned about cognitive dissonance, about the mind's ability to hold two opposing beliefs simultaneously. About how people rationalized behaviors they knew, on some level, were wrong.
She was getting very good at that.
She kept checking her phone, hoping for a message from Noah while simultaneously terrified of what a message from him might say. Rose had spent the past year studying human behavior. The psychology of attachment, the neuroscience of trauma, the way people rationalized self-destructive choices.
She could write a paper on why she shouldn't be monitoring Noah's schedule, or scrolling through his social media, or measuring herself against the women in his life. She could cite research about obsessive attachment patterns and boundary violations.
She just couldn't seem to stop doing any of it.
The house kept waiting patiently for Noah to come home, while Rose struggled with thoughts she couldn't name and feelings she wasn't ready to face.