Dotting I's and crossing T's

The next day, true to her word, Charley came into my room to lay down some ground rules. It felt odd given that she’d been the one to suggest this being a thing in the first place, but Charley liked rules. She always had. And besides, after last night I was pretty much good with anything.

“First things first,” she began, “caution is the number one priority. No one can ever find out, especially Mum and Dad. And that means that nothing is going to happen during the day while they’re at home. If we do anything, it’s going to be at night while they’re asleep, quiet as possible, but ideally while they’re out. Sound good?”

“Sounds good,” I replied.

“Okay. Secondly, when this thing ends, and it will end, we both agree there’ll be no hard feelings.”

“Our secret sibling affair isn’t until **** do us part?” I put my hand over my heart. “Ouch.”

She frowned, not amused. “I’m serious, Luke. I know I said that this wouldn’t affect my plan, but that’s only if it stays a short fling. This can’t stretch out to the extent that it’ll affect either of us meeting someone, getting married, having kids. Having a family. You get that, right?”

It was a bit of a bummer to put an expiry date on this so early on, but it made sense. “Yes ma’am.”

“Good. Finally, we should discuss the circumstances around which it might end. Honestly, we’ll hopefully just get it out of our system fairly quickly. I mean, this only started because of some chance encounters and how sex-starved we both were before that.”

“Uh-huh.” Sex-starved was one way of putting it.

“Failing that, you’re flying to Tokyo in September. A year apart would almost certainly mean this will fizzle out. And anyway, you’ll be in a foreign country, I’ll have started working, and we’ll be meeting a lot of new people.

“Which brings me to my next point,” she continued. “This doesn’t stop us from meeting people, going on dates. And of course, if there’s ever the possibility that a relationship with someone else could get serious, this ends.”

Yeah, I wasn’t sure how well that was going to go for me. I’d struggled to go after people not named Charley even before this had all gone down. But I nodded anyway.

“Alright, good.” She got up from my bed.

“Hang on,” I said. All the discussion about our relationship had got me a bit riled up. “Do you maybe wanna…”

“God, you’re insatiable,” she laughed. “No, not right now. I’m about to go out.”

“Fine,” I grumbled.

She shook her head, chuckling, and made her way to my door. But she stopped just before she left.

“Luke, there’s one more thing we should put out there, you know. Just to be thorough.”

“Well, I’m all about being thorough.”

“I’m not saying that this is likely, or even possible. But if at any point either one of us feels like this progressing past something that’s not just physical anymore … it ends, immediately. That’s non-negotiable, no matter which way it goes.”

“Yeah, of course. I get it.” That was one point I wasn’t going to try and contest. I knew all too well the risks of going in too deep – it was why I’d distanced myself from Charley in the first place, all those years ago. And I wasn’t worried, anyway. I had always known what my feelings were: a crush, pure physical attraction. I loved her, yeah – but as family, not romantically.

Still … now that it was actually out there, the idea of it made me feel a little strange. Charley and I in love? I shivered. Best not to dwell on that.

“Good. See you later,” she smiled, and shut the door on her way out.

I sighed as I flopped onto my back. My first ever exposure to a Charley planning session, and it was pretty mentally taxing, even though I hadn’t disagreed with anything she’d said. Was this just how her brain worked, every single day? Trying to fit everything in her life within the rules she’d set for herself? It all seemed a bit much.

I turned to the side and saw the monitor on my desk. Okay, Luke. You’ve occupied your mind with you and your stepsister’s relationship enough over the past 24 hours. Now, your PlayStation is calling your name.