She couldn't see his eyes.

When she tried to look into them, all she saw was her reflection. He had on mirrored sunglasses. She gulped. So? So what? She wanted to scream, tear her hair and growl nonsense, shake his shoulders, pace and pace and pace... But she just sat, hands folded in her lap, ankles crossed. The cold metal of the park bench had started to warm beneath her; they had been sitting in the silence for some time now. She shivered, a breeze dancing on her exposed arms. What do you want to do? About what? About what? She blinked. For God's sake, Riley, haven't you heard anything I've said? I heard you. I just don't see how any of this is my fault. You don't... you... What? The words spluttered and died in her mouth. She stared at his unmoving form, at his crossed arms and covered eyes and lack of emotion. You don't see how this is your fault? What about that night? That wonderful, perfect, terrible night... When you said you loved me? That you had always loved me, for as long as you had known me? For as long as you had watched me watching you, glancing at me when Ben wasn't looking? That night when you- took me, loved me, held me, whispered promises that fell flat... When you... Why won't you look at me? She wanted to break

those damn sunglasses, shatter them in his face so that he could feel a sliver of the pain she was now feeling. I lied. Two words. Two little words. The anger that had filled her, carried her to this cold bench outside his apartment, it broke, shattered and dissolved into bitter tears that threatened to course down her face. What do you want from me, Elle? Acceptance. Acknowledgement. The world. I wanted help, Riley. Or, at least some sort of... idea. Of what I should do. It was one night. I never wanted anything after. She was only a one-night stand? Is that all she meant to him, all she would ever be? I'm not just some girl you picked up at a bar. I know. You're Ben's little sister. He hadn't moved; his arms were still folded and his face still shielded. And yet she felt a shift in the tension that occupied the space between them. You don't want to anger Ben by knocking up his little sister. There. She watched him flinch. She knew his every move, knew all his actions. She had watched him, crouched on the top of the stairs as he played video games with her brother, video games she had tried to learn to play late at night

so that one day she could impress him. The aloof folded man sitting across from her in his jacket and shades, she didn't know him. But the man inside him, the man who didn't want to upset her brother by admitting anything. Him she knew. What do you want me to say, Elle? She heard the plea in his voice, a note of helplessness she had only heard when he would hunch over in the basement and worry about bad grades and his arguing parents. She thought that time, time and tragedy, would erase that note. But here he became a teenager again, worried about what people might say yet desperate to do the right thing. And she loved him for that. Only now did she realize that she had always loved him. I want you to tell me you love me. I can't. And yet he did; in those two words he admitted her love. Ben's dead, Riley. You don't need to worry about what he'd say. Ben's dead because we tried to be together. Ben must have made him promise that night. The night he died. She could still picture the way she sat, huddled on the staircase with tears coursing down her face, Ben's anger hurled at Riley's startled face. All they had done was kiss, and he couldn't stand it. I told him I would keep you safe, that I would leave you alone. He made me promise, Elle. He had such loyalty to her brother still, to this deathbed

promise. But that had been three years ago. No wonder he looked so tormented, sitting there with so much space between them. He had broken his promise. She shifted, leaning over his lap, her face's reflection ballooned by the distance she had destroyed. She reached up, fingers trembling, and removed those plastic frames from his face, tucking them in her back pocket. After all these years of watching his face, studying his body from a distance, she knew the truth. They both had stayed away from the other, separated from feelings by a long-standing loyalty to a boy they both remembered with sorrow. Then take care of me now. She waited, studying his now-visible eyes, they way they sparkled with truth. He nodded.