by Elodie Colt
“You’re right, sorry,” he mumbles at last.
“Smart choice.” My hand vanishes in my pocket, and I pull out his keys, jiggling them in front of his face. “Let’s go to your place, shall we?”
~~~
Jesse doesn’t complain when I rummage through his closet to get some fresh clothes. Most of my stuff is still in my suitcase at Ruby’s, and it will stay there until she decides to make a barbecue and burn it all in Sam’s garden.
“Damn, Ruby still has my passport,” Jesse mutters, patting down his jeans.
I scoff, fetching a bottle of Jim Beam from the kitchen along with two glasses. “That should be the least of your concerns.”
“I know.” Deflating on the couch, he buries his head in his hands, and for a fleeting moment, I actually feel pity for him. There was once a time when we were so close, we wouldn’t have survived without the other. When we parted ways after that shit went down with Lana, it left a wound that never fused again. I know Jesse feels the same way, but we both pretended to be better off on our own. “Shit, this is all so fucked up…”
“Yeah.” Filling the two glasses with whiskey, I hand one to Jesse and slouch down next to him. For a long moment, we stare straight ahead, numbing our mind with booze and brooding in silence.
“Why did you come here, Raphael?” Jesse asks at last, but his tone is rather sorrowful than accusing. “Did you want to score me off? Congratulations, man.” He lifts his glass in a toast. “High score.”
I rake a hand through my hair. “I didn’t hatch a plan to shit all over you, Jesse. I bumped into Ruby in Veracruz by accident.” His head whips in my direction, shock and disbelief edged onto his face. “I had no clue you lived in West Palm Beach, I swear.”
“And still, you ended up here. With her.” I remain quiet and slurp my whiskey. “Why didn’t you tell her right away she mistook you for me?”
This time, it’s my turn to shoot him a look in disbelief. “I had no clue if you told her you had a brother. As it turned out, you didn’t,” I add through clenched teeth, swallowing down the bitter taste of pain. “Besides, it took me some time to connect the dots. The thought that you were playing a part in this crossed my mind, but I thought it was too much of a coincidence to bump into my twin brother’s girlfriend somewhere in Mexico. Besides, Tara told me you were in North Dakota. When I realized Ruby was in a relationship with you, it was already too late.”
“Too late for what?” he presses with a sharp glance. I pinch my lips, averting my eyes. “You slept with her,” he finally concludes, although he surely knew already. Hard to keep up the act as a boyfriend if you refuse to screw your girl, right?
“I found out the day after,” I mumble after a pause. “It was the day I called you.” And after that, I slept with her so many times, I lost count. I keep this confession to myself, though.
Jesse mutters a curse, dragging a hand down his face. “So, you just thought you could play Ruby’s boyfriend for two weeks, fuck her behind my back, and break into my flat?”
“I didn’t break in,” is my lame deflection. “I used your keys.”
“That’s not the point, man!” He slaps a hand on the table, but I stay unfazed. “I know your angle, Raphael. You love a challenge. You never decline a dare. Ruby stumbled into you, and you took the bait, thrilled to play this dirty game. But this time, you crossed a line. You stole my girlfriend. You stole my identity.”
“Nothing we’ve never done before,” I remind him with a sour undertone. True, I’m not fair to him, but the game he’s playing was never a fair one to begin with.
Jesse huffs a dry laugh. “Are you kidding me? We were kids back then! We didn’t have brains, just dicks. None of the girls we shared mattered to us.” I shoot him an ominous look, one that makes him point a warning finger at me. “Don’t go there.”
Swinging an arm over the backrest of the couch, I turn to face him. “Oh, no, I think we should definitely go there,” I fire back. “After all, it wasn’t Ruby who warmed your bed the last two weeks, now was it?”
Jesse chews on the inside of his cheek, contemplating his words. “Lana knows that we’re not exclusive.”
I arc a brow at him. “So, you’re saying Lana knows that you’re taken? That you have been in a serious relationship for years?”
I know Lana. With her handicap, she might tolerate Jesse having his occasional flings, but she would never approve of him having a girlfriend and alas, shitting all over two women at once.
Jesse grinds his teeth. “I’m saying that I’ve never made any promises to her. And for the record, we didn’t have sex. I’d never do that to Ruby…” I gauge his response, looking for any signs that he’s lying, but I can tell he’s speaking the truth. “I love her,” he whispers after a pause, but it sounds as if he’s trying to convince himself.
“More than you love Lana? Why didn’t you pack your shit then and take the next flight to Florida after I told you I was here? Why did you not fight for her when you should have?” He cringes, and although I know my next words will be a low blow, I can’t help myself to add, “Tell me, brother dearest… who would you save first if they both fell down a cliff?”
Jesse’s whiskey glass smashes against the wall above me, and before I can duck away from the shards raining down, he hurls me up by my collar and flings me over the table. My body tumbles down over the edge along with the whiskey bottle, and I quickly scramble to my feet, bracing myself for another brawl. Instead, Jesse just stands there, looking lost and devastated. “I love Ruby. I really do, but…”
“But she isn’t Lana,” I conclude for him when he struggles with words. Slowly walking up to him, I place a hand on his shoulder. “You’ve never stopped loving Lana, and Ruby will never be able to replace her.”
Jesse presses his eyes shut, trying to hold back the tears. “No, but I can’t bring myself to leave her.”
I heave a deep sigh, debating if I should state the obvious or not. After how things escalated a few hours ago, chances are he already lost Ruby. Just as I lost her. You knew this was going to happen, the little devil in my mind scolds. You never stood a chance.
“Why are you still here?” Jesse asks after he’s composed himself. “The game is over. I doubt that Ruby will ever speak to me again. You won.”
“She still has my passport.” I try to make light of the situation, but it’s a poor attempt, and Jesse knows as much, telling me with one look that I better watch my tongue. “It’s not that easy this time,” I mumble at last.
“Why not?”
I turn my back on him, ambling over to the window, but he spins me around with a hand on my shoulder, willing me to look at him. A long moment of silence passes as he scours my face, and I know exactly what he will find. We are twins. We don’t need words to communicate with each other.
“You fell in love with her…” he utters at last, clearly appalled. “You fell in love with Ruby.”
Furious, I slap his hand away and shoulder past him. Bending down to pick up the whiskey bottle, I flip off the cap and take a huge gulp.
“And now what?” Jesse prompts, crossing his arms over his chest. “You’re going to convince her that it’s you she loves and try to win her heart?” I just shake my head, telling him that I’m clueless right now. “You forget that she’s still mine, Raphael. If you think I’m just going to stand by and watch you—”
“Are you fucking serious?” I cut him off, waving my hands in the air. Drops of booze spill over the bottle, staining the fluffy carpet. “Even if, and that’s a big if, Ruby forgives you and is willing to forget all that shit for you, you can’t be with Ruby and Lana. You have to make a decision. So, who’s it going to be, huh?”
“Willing to forget what?” he snaps instead, his eyes unrelenting. “That I didn’t tell her about me having a brother? That I kept the secret because he was the reason a girl nearly died and is trapped in a wheelchair for the rest of her life? That I didn’t even know he was in town, pretended to be me, an
d fucked her behind my back?”
Wow. Just… wow. After everything he did, he’s still playing the victim. “Willing to forget that you betrayed her with the love of your life for the past six months,” I correct him with a growl.
Jesse smacks his lips. “Ruby doesn’t know about Lana.”
My jaw nearly drops to the floor, and I need a moment to process what he just said. “Yet. She doesn’t know about Lana yet. But you’re going to tell her.” My words sound like a question and a statement at the same time.
Jesse opens his mouth to say something, but his phone ringing stops him, and he pulls it out to check the caller. “Business,” he quips. “I have to get this.”
Translation: Get out of here, I’ve got more important stuff to deal with.
Giving in with a nod, I stroll to the door, not looking back when I deadpan for good measure, “If you don’t tell her, I will.”
The orange flies high before it drops with a dull thud, bursting on impact and juice splattering everywhere.
“Shit, that was close,” I mutter to myself, grabbing another orange from the stack on the table and taking aim. This time, I manage to make it land without exploding and roll on the ground until it taps the big orange I set up in the middle. “Gotcha, ha!”
Lifting my fifth bottle of orange-flavored beer, I toast to myself then whip my head back and knock down the last drops. My belly gurgles in protest, and I nudge it a few times until a big belch bubbles out, making me giggle.
I’ve been at Matthew’s orange plantation only once before, but I love this place. Rows upon rows of orange trees run for acres in every direction, filling the air with a refreshing, fruity scent. No civilization. No traffic. The only sounds are the soft, eastern summer breeze and the creaking of the rusty porch swing as I sway back and forth. The patio turns out to be the perfect spot for playing Boccia with overripe oranges. I mean, it’s not as if I’ve got something better to do…
I only brought a duffel bag, and it’s barely half full. No books. No manuscripts. No text markers. No laptop. Not even my charging cable. My phone died down yesterday with dozens of calls and messages unanswered. I didn’t even bother to call in sick at work. Who the fuck cares? For the first time in my life, I get up when I wake and go to sleep when I’m tired. No alarm. No responsibilities. No strings attached.
The old Ruby would have thrown a tantrum leaving her gilded cage without her precious belongings. The old Ruby would have rather died of a heart attack than showing up late for work. But this Ruby here, the one who belches like a drunken pirate and hasn’t bothered brushing her hair for three days, coasts on cruise control.
I mean, it’s obvious I can dump my career as a couples therapist, right? I can hardly pretend to fix other people’s relationships if I can’t fix my own. For God’s sake, I didn’t even notice I fucked a stranger! My oh-so picture-perfect relationship was a ruse.
Thinking back to the last two weeks, I can’t believe I didn’t trust my gut. I knew something was off. It should have clicked the moment I stumbled into Jesse aka Raphael in that club after the wedding. I should have known he would have never returned sooner just to make me happy.
Later that night, when I said I loved him, his answer was ‘No one has ever said those words to me.’ He booked a hotel room instead of staying at Daniel’s because he didn’t know Daniel.
The day he screwed me senseless in the library and all the dirty talking? The Jesse I know would have never done that. He’s too much of a prude. Too good. Too boring. He laughed when I told him about my bad grade. He barely touched the blue cheese and hummus sandwiches when we made that picnic—two things he never could resist.
Jesse has wanted to visit Europe since I met him. The fact that we ended up cruising through the Middle East instead of staying at a fancy hotel facing Notre Dame should have rung all alarm bells.
I shake my head at my stupidity. God, how could I have been so blind? All the great adventures, all the heated looks, all the passionate moments… It was all fake and phony. Never real. Just a game.
And my heart was the grand prize.
The sound of keys jingling snaps me out of my self-pitying state, and a second later, Sam storms out onto the patio.
“There you are! Thank God,” she exclaims in relief, a hand over her heart.
I give her a perplexed look. “I told you I was here.”
“But you didn’t bother to tell the others. Kendra was super worried when she called me. Said you didn’t answer any of her calls.” She puts her hands on her hips, sending me a scolding look.
“My phone died, and I don’t have a charging cable,” I say with a shrug. Shaking her head, Sam fumbles through her bag and pulls out a mobile power bank before plugging my phone in. I don’t bother to glance at the screen, not even when it continues to ping with missed calls. “We don’t have Wi-Fi here yet, so in case you wanted to work—”
My laugh is vicious even to my own ears. “Nope. I’m perfectly fine without Wi-Fi.”
‘Your relationship lags,’ Skyla said. Well, no need to bother anymore. I’m now officially offline!
Already tipsy, I help myself to another ice-cold bottle of orange-flavored beer. “How was your honeymoon? And where’s Matthew?”
Sam lets her skeptical gaze swerve over my rugged face, my tangled hair, the empty bottles, and the pile of orange mush on the ground a few feet in the distance. “Matthew has to run some errands, and I’m going to tell you all about my honeymoon after you tell me what the fuck is going on. Kendra didn’t want to say anything over the phone. Just said it’s pretty bad.”
Taking a generous tip of my beer, I toss her the two passports. She throws me a puzzled look, but my gaze stays on the horizon.
“What’s this?” she asks in a cautious tone as she flips the pages. “Who’s Raphael Chandler?”
Huh, a good question. My flat tone matches the numbness inside me when I gruff out, “The twin brother Jesse forgot to mention.”
Sam shakes her head in confusion. “Why would he not tell you about a brother?”
Again, a question I’ve been asking myself a thousand times. “No idea.”
“Okay, so… why don’t you go back and ask him?” Her tone suggests that she’s still waiting for the punchline. Well, I can give her one that will knock her on her ass.
“I will after I’ve coped with the fact that I’ve fucked his brother for the last two weeks without my knowledge.” I can hear the wheels turning inside Sam’s head, and the breath hitching in her throat when it dawns on her what I’m saying. “They look identical, you know… so much so that I didn’t realize they switched places to fuck me over. Literally,” I add with a cackle.
“W-what?” Sam stutters. “But why would Jesse do that?”
Another question that’s been tumbling inside my head for three days now. “I’m not sure Jesse knew...” I pause for another sip of my beer. “Thinking back to how it all started out, I guess I stumbled into Raphael by accident, and he seized the opportunity.”
Sam tosses the passports onto the table and throws her hands in the air in agitation. “That makes zero sense!”
“No? Think about it. Jesse was about to stay in Venezuela for six weeks, and four weeks later, I run into him in a club in Veracruz.”
“Because he wanted to surprise you,” Sam points out, but she knows she’s grasping at straws. “He knew about the wedding—”
“Look again,” I interrupt her, nodding to the passports. She reaches for them reluctantly, and I can see the exact moment she makes the connection.
“Raphael was in Mexico, and Jesse was in… North Dakota?” Yep, another big question mark dangling above my head.
“He did the whole charade, you know?” I mumble, utterly depleted. “Served me breakfast in bed, took me out on dates, arranged the perfect vacation. He showered me with love and affection every single minute.”
Sam regards me for a long moment. “And you didn’t notice anything unusual? Not even when you
were in Jordan with him?”
“Oh, I noticed it all, but everything was so perfect, you know? I thought he changed. I thought he wanted to make things better. For us.”
I swallow around the lump in my throat when I recall my exact words to him that day in Mounts Botanical Garden. ‘For the first time in years, it feels like you love me with all your heart.’
But then the psychologist in me comes through, the one trying to reason with me that this is how new lovers feel.
From Raphael’s point of view, we came together two weeks ago, so technically, we started a new relationship. Many new lovers feel obsessed with each other, spending hours to build their feelings and satisfy their desires. They present themselves as the best package they believe the other might crave and typically withhold anything that could challenge the relationship. This is why I’ve felt so alive with Raphael—just like it felt with Jesse when we started dating five years ago. The euphoria tends to die down when everyday life sets in at some point, so I’ve never given it much thought.
And I can’t figure out what hurts more—the fact that I’ve been in love with the wrong brother or the fact that Jesse is still the old Jesse?
Sam grumbles when my phone continues to chirp with incoming messages and helps herself to a beer. We both glance at the screen when Jesse’s name pops up. No, not Jesse. Raphael. Get that into your fucking head!
Sam sends me a pointed look. “You’ve let them wait long enough, don’t you think?”
With a growl, I snatch my phone, first navigating to the settings and saving Raphael under Asshole Bro before the names can confuse me even more. There are a bunch of messages from Kendra calling me all kinds of names for not telling her I was staying at Matthew’s. Skyla sent several texts consisting of too many question marks, exclamation marks, and other freaky symbols I can’t identify.
And then there are a dozen messages Raphael sent.
Asshole Bro: I blocked Jesse’s number on your phone. This one’s mine…
Asshole Bro: Can you pls let me know you’re ok?
