2: 2

I was quiet for two seconds, then went downstairs.

Melody was standing next to the soft-serve place with her arm looped through some guy in a basketball tank top, the two of them passing one cup of lemonade back and forth, sip for sip.

When she saw me, she smiled and waved.

"Sister Simon! Over here!"

I walked over, and she started introducing me to Lester James.

"Babe, this is the best friend I told you about. Sister Simon."

"He gave up an Ivy spot for the two of us. Changed his application to a community college."

"A friend like this, once in a lifetime — for someone like me, Melody Dickerson, that's more than enough."

Lester looked me up and down.

Cropped hair, a loose black T-shirt, cargo shorts, sneakers.

His face went dark, and he glared at Melody.

"He's dressed like that and you call this a friend?"

"Melody, is there really nothing between you two? Are you lying to me?"

She grabbed his hand fast, explaining.

"Babe, I really do see him as just a friend. He likes me, there's nothing I can do about that."

"Stop!"

I rolled my eyes and cut them off, loud.

"I didn't come down here for a two-dollar cone. I came to make one thing clear. I am not Melody's friend! At most, she's my deskmate!"

"She's the one who secretly changed my application. There is no story where I picked a community college for your relationship. Got it?"

The two of them stared at me and said nothing.

I shrugged.

"I said what I came to say. I'm out."

The second I turned to go, Melody grabbed me and yanked me over to the wall.

Her elbow drove hard into my shoulder, slamming me into the wall, my arm going numb with the pain.

Her face was ugly, her voice low.

"You had to expose me right in front of Lester? Make your friend lose face, is that it?"

I rubbed my arm and looked at her, cold.

"You'll do it, but you won't own it?"

She froze, then sighed.

"Forget it. There's no explaining this to someone who's never dated."

Then she started looking me over with distaste.

"You dressed this good on purpose, just to get under Lester's skin?"

I pulled in a deep breath.

"Are you out of your mind? This is how I always dress!"

"Always is always. Today is today!"

Melody raked her fingers through her hair, irritated. "Could you not dress a little more masculine? Stay in your lane as my friend? You're putting me in a really awkward spot here, you know that?"

I honestly had no idea what to say to someone this shameless, someone who insisted on treating a guy as her girl best friend.

So I just looked at her, flat, and let her put on her show.

Which she misread all over again.

She tossed her hair and spoke like she was doing me a kindness.

"Sister Simon, let me be honest with you. I really don't have feelings for you."

"Even if you stood in front of me stark naked, all I'd do is pick your clothes back up for you."

"Don't waste your energy on this."

My hand curled into a fist.

I held it in, held it in, and then I couldn't hold it in anymore, my hand already swinging for her face.

Lester suddenly stepped in and clapped my shoulder, grinning wide.

"Big bro Simon, come on, don't be mad, this is all my fault."

"Come on, let's go get some soft-serve, order whatever you want, my treat."

Before I could react, he'd dragged me over to the shop entrance.

A girl with cropped bleached-yellow hair, chewing gum, gave me a lazy once-over.

"So you're Sister Simon? You don't really look like a butch."

I turned my head toward Melody.

Her smile was radiant.

"This is the girlfriend Lester found for you. Well? Happy with her?"

3: 3

I looked at the tough girl one more time.

My head was buzzing.

Across from me, Melody was still running her mouth.

"Three years of high school and you never dated once. I know why, sis. You just never met the right one."

"She's a friend of Lester's. Goes to a vocational school. Face, style, character, there's nothing to fault."

She narrowed her eyes and smiled.

"Sure, she's not on my level, but she's plenty good enough for you. So stop pining over me, okay?"

"So? This one, you like her or not?"

I let out a furious laugh.

"I don't like this one!"

"And I'll swear it on my life. If I ever liked you, Melody Dickerson, may I go blind on the spot!"

Melody froze.

Lester panicked all at once.

"No way! You are not allowed to like my Melly!"

The tough girl tilted her head, confused.

"That's not right. High school boys, there's not one who doesn't like me."

Then something dawned on her, and she stared at Melody, shocked.

"She doesn't like women?"

Melody went stiff all over, grabbed onto Lester, and glared at me on guard.

"Don't you touch Lester!"

It hit me like a bolt out of nowhere.

So in Melody's eyes, I not only lusted after her, I lusted after her boyfriend too?

I was neither man nor woman.

I was a pervert.

"The three of you couldn't scrape together one working brain between you!"

I couldn't be bothered with any of them. I turned to leave.

I hadn't taken two steps before the tough girl chased after me, shoved a two-dollar soft-serve cone into my hand, and lifted her chin.

"My spending power. Satisfied?"

"What you think doesn't matter. I've got my eye on you, so you're my man now."

"Stick with me, and there's all the ice cream you can eat from here on out!"

I was completely dumbstruck.

"Move!"

Lester looked baffled.

"Sis Simon, my friend here is a big deal at her school. You're being a little too picky, you know."

Melody shook her head in disdain.

"Sis, she buys a two-dollar cone without blinking. A woman like this? If I were you, I'd have thrown myself at her already."

I drew in a deep breath.

Then I mashed the cone straight into Melody's face and smeared it good.

"You're overheated. Cool off!"

Lester stared at the cream all over Melody's face, helpless.

"Melly, what do we do, what do we do…"

The tough girl sighed, pained.

"If you're not eating it, give it to me. What a waste!"

I put some clean distance between us.

"Melody, don't contact me again. We're not from the same world. There's no need to force it."

Melody licked the cream at the corner of her mouth, her voice going cold.

"I'm a top recruit for Capital University's nuclear physics program! The only student in the whole state they took!"

"Simon Flores, you're a community college kid. What gives you the right to look down on me?"

I gave a dry little laugh.

Then I turned and walked off.

"Take one more step and see what happens! We're done being sisters for good!"

I broke into a run.

Behind me, Melody was screaming her lungs out.

"Fine! Simon Flores, from now on you are not Melody Dickerson's sister!"

I stopped.

I turned, ran back, and drove my foot into the back of her knee.

Her leg buckled, and she went down.

"What are you doing!"

I smiled.

"Paying you back for that elbow earlier."

"Call me your sister again, and every time I catch you at it, I'll beat you."

Melody's face went livid, but she didn't dare move.

After all, I'm a black belt in taekwondo. She couldn't take me.

So under the three of them glaring, I strolled off without a care.

Back home, I blocked every one of Melody's contacts.

A boundaryless freak of a classmate like that, best I never see her again this lifetime.

I was about to set my phone down when the class group chat blew up.

Melody had posted a photo of her and Lester cheek to cheek, making a heart with their hands.

"My boyfriend."

The others sent congratulations while getting their digs in at me.

"Sis Simon must be heartbroken now, huh? No hope left at all."

"Three years and Sis Simon still couldn't land Melody. Really hopeless."

I replied with a pinched-nose emoji.

Melody fired off a voice message right away, smug as anything.

"Sis Simon changed her college applications from the Ivies to a community college just so Lester and I could be together. Thank you, Sis Simon!"

The whole class started up again.

"Sis Simon's such a diva! Sis Simon, so noble!"

"A genius on paper, a fool in love!"

"That hurts. That hurts so much."

Melody tagged me.

"About today, sis, I didn't think it through. I'll try to keep you from running into Lester from now on, so you feel a little better."

"Don't stay mad. Sisters don't hold overnight grudges. Don't act like some little girl."

The others chimed in.

"Right, Sis Simon, be gracious about it."

"We women shouldn't be so petty."

Melody added one more line.

"It's fine when I call her my sister, but the rest of you can't, got it!"

4: 4

I gripped my phone, my hand shaking.

Melody was always like this.

She'd rally the whole class to bully me in the name of sisterhood, then turn around and pretend to defend me.

I typed fast.

"The school I applied to isn't a community college. It's no worse than the Ivy-tier ones. Stop stirring things up."

Melody dropped a screenshot of my applications right away.

"Sis Simon, let's not lie now, hmm?"

I zoomed in on the image.

First choice: Southport Technical College.

The screenshot was time-stamped ten days ago.

For ten days she'd messaged me every single day and never once mentioned that she'd changed my applications.

A chill went down my back.

If I hadn't checked my applications one more time today, I really would have ended up at a community college.

I set my phone down.

I didn't look at the messages in the chat crowing about how I'd been put in my place.

The only thing I had to do now was wait for my Capital University acceptance letter.

Half a month later, the class dinner.

Everyone was buzzing about their acceptance letters.

"I got into NYU!"

"I'm going to Fordham."

"Wow, so jealous. I could only get into the state school."

Someone asked Melody.

"Mel, did you get your letter yet?"

Melody was in the middle of taking selfies with Lester, and she gave a careless shrug.

"Not yet. Capital University screens hard, so it takes a while. But going by past years, it'll be any day now."

Everyone piled on the flattery.

"Mel's got the best school in our whole class!"

"Don't forget the little people when you make it big!"

Melody looked over at me in my corner, pleased with herself.

"And you, Sis Simon?"

I put my phone down.

"It comes today."

The courier had just called to say the letter was on its way and I had to sign for it in person.

Melody snorted, then couldn't stop laughing.

Someone said, I didn't catch who.

"Don't community college letters come like two weeks after the four-year ones?"

The whole room roared.

People slapping the table, doubling over.

I just leaned back against my chair and watched them, quiet.

Melody shot me a glance and shot to her feet.

"Stop laughing! Sis Simon's upset!"

"I'm telling you all, nobody gets to look down on Sis Simon for going to community college. She's my sister!"

Everyone chimed in, choking back grins.

"Fine, fine, we'll give Mel her face."

"Right, Mel, Sis Simon turned down the Ivy schools for you. Aren't you going to do something for him?"

Melody pouted, exasperated.

Seeing Lester step out to the restroom, she picked up her cup and raised it toward me.

"Sis, while Lester's not here, let me be honest with you. I do feel a little guilty about you."

"How about this. Wait for me a few years. If things don't work out between me and Lester, I'll come find you. Good enough?"

The next second, the cheering nearly blew the roof off.

I gave a cold laugh.

"May the two of you live happily ever after, locked in forever."

Melody clicked her tongue.

"Liar. In the end you'll wait for me like a good boy anyway, won't you?"

"But remember, you'll have to transfer to a four-year program, then do grad school. Otherwise the gap in our education is too big and my parents won't approve."

I fired back at once.

"You don't even have a university to go to. What gives you the right to look down on me?"

But my words were drowned out by the cheering.

"Mel's falling for him!"

"Mel's so thoughtful!"

I couldn't stand another minute of it and got up to leave.

Melody frowned and shook her head.

"Come on, sis. Upset again?"

"I'll lend you my acceptance letter so you can take a photo of it, show it off on your feed. That works, right?"

The words had barely left her mouth when the private room door swung open.

A courier stood in the doorway holding a document envelope, several media people behind him with cameras and microphones raised.

The courier looked in.

"Capital University acceptance letter. Whose delivery is this?"