Obviously not

What is ‘necessary’ when it comes to talking? I can go weeks or even months without talking to someone. So if she wants me to only talk to her when necessary… then we won’t ever talk. No. I did that before. I gave her all the space she could want and lived with her for three years with barely any words. If I want a sister-sister relationship then I have to make it happen. I can’t let this unexpected opportunity pass me by. She may not like having me as a sister, but that’s just because she never got to know me. And if I don’t talk to her she never will. This is college. I had the courage to come here, I have the courage to call her ‘sis’. And maybe if I do I can eventually even hug her!

I sit on my bed buried in my plushy friends with just my head sticking out of the pile. My mind is effortlessly letting what was supposed to be a psych up mental speech to get me ready to disobey Sarah’s instructions not to talk to her slowly devolve into day dreams about us chatting pleasantly about nothing while doing each other’s hair. I’m not really a hair girl but if it meant making friends with Sarah I could absolutely learn to be. But this isn’t the first time my brain has let me down by leaning into daydreaming. It’s been two weeks, and every day I get back before Sarah and try to build up courage, or come up with a plan to talk to her. And then she gets back and I sit and do nothing but imagine how cool it would be if I did say something and it went well.

But today is different. I have a plan! I realize that it was staring me in the face this whole time. While no one seems quite as dedicated to it as me, I have seen multiple people playing Pokémon Go and other games. Maybe I went overboard with an entire Pokéwardrobe, but there is something to the power of Pokémon in college. And who doesn’t like gifts? No one.

I pull up Gardevoir and tighten the little pink bow I’ve put around her. She has been carefully preened and cleaned to perfection. I’m pretty careful with my little buddies so they don’t get dirty, but this needs to go perfectly. I don’t think even Nintendo would recognize she wasn’t brand new. Now I just need to give her to Sarah. She doesn’t need to know how often I fantasize about my big Pokémon being cool older siblings to their younger versions, or that I’ve recently fantasized specifically about being the Kirlia to her Gardevoir. Now, do I give it directly to her or just put it on her bed? Handing it to her is more personal and special, and if she accepts it I get to immediately see her smile, and say ‘thank you’, and ask me to stay up late and gossip and become best friends forever… but if she rejects it I’d rather be buried in my plushies never to be seen or heard from again. Why does she dislike me so much anyways?

That line of thinking is abruptly cut off as Sarah opens the door to enter wearing a track suit in our college colors. Panic grips my heart and throat and I quickly throw Gardevoir across the room and onto Sarah’s bed, then dive under my pile of plushies in a hopeless bid to have her at least pretend she doesn’t see me. I scrunch my eyes closed, it’s not like I can see anything from under my fluffy pile anyways. Please let this work. I hear her sigh and walk to her bed. That’s good, she is at least humoring me enough not to call out my existence… in retrospect that may not be a good sign.

“Why are you throwing your toys on my bed?” She sounds exasperated and genuinely confused. But not angry! This is definitely good. Okay, now what. Oh, I haven’t fully thought this through. I mean, not all the possibilities at least. I did not think of this as a possible question so have no answer ready.

“It’s a gift,” says the pile of fluffy plush friends, with no human in sight.

I hear Sarah inhale deeply before letting out an even bigger sigh. “And why is it a gift?”

“… so we can be… friends?” She’s definitely not going to be happy if I said ‘sisters’, nice save brain.

“… look, I know you are not your parents. So maybe it is a little unfair for me to hold you accountable for them. But it’s pretty hard to separate you from them. And it’s not like we have to be friends. So, I’m sorry if I’ve made you uncomfortable or like I hate you or anything like that. But that doesn’t mean we need to do each other’s nails. Let’s just make it through this semester, and then we can probably change rooms.”

Nooooo. Filing away the nails idea for later fantasies, but come on! I feel a light thud above me and realize it must be Gardevoir being returned. I don’t know what comes over me. It’s not bravery or courage, it’s more like the lizard part of my brain has become so disgusted with the rest of me over complicating things that it decides to take matters into it’s own simplistic and scaly hands.

I stand up on my bed, open my eyes to spot Gardevoir, hop off my bed and grab her from it. I then hold her out to Sarah as she sits on her bed. “I don’t want to switch rooms. I’ve always wanted a sister. I think you’re really cool and want you to be my sister.” And, having completed its mission, my lizard brain slithers off. Leaving me dealing with eye to eye contact with Sarah while holding out an already rejected gift. Damn you lizard brain! I quickly feel my face heat up with my embarrassment and begin investigating the floor.

She chuckles. Ah yes, maybe we can bond over me humiliating myself. “You think I’m cool? Do you even know anything about me? What is it that’s so cool?” I can’t tell if she’s amused or annoyed with me.

And I don’t really have an answer either. After living with her for three years I was left with basically no knowledge of her or her interests beyond her sense of fashion, which involved a lot of jeans, and that she didn’t really like her new family. Really, I learned more about her in these past two weeks than I had in those years. Which gave me my answer.

“I think it’s cool that you joined track and field. I really admire how you make so many friends, you are always hanging out with someone. I admire that you came to college on your own… and, and I even admire that you can hold a grudge spanning several years against my parents even if I don’t understand why you don’t like them. I don’t think I could be mad at anyone for more than like… a week.”

I mentally pat myself on the back. That was pretty good. I glance up and… oh god what have I done. I fix my eyes downward. She looks ready to **** me. I should run. No, I should stand still and hope her vision is based on movement and she forgets I’m here. My eyes begin to tear up. My arm is getting tired holding Gardevoir up.

“So… I take it they never told you why I needed a foster home. I shouldn’t be surprised. What did they tell you? About why they were suddenly taking in some new kid.”

“… they just said you were coming… I didn’t really think to ask questions.” Damn you mom and dad, what did you do that led to me stepping on this land mine of a topic! I don’t even know what she’s mad about…”

“They killed my parents.” My mind goes blank. And then begins filling with questions. Too many to actually let one out of my mouth. Fortunately she takes my silence as a sign to continue, “our parents were coworkers, and at a company party yours ran over mine in the parking lot. So I became an orphan because your dad couldn’t be bothered to check his fucking rear view mirror. And since I don’t have any close family I ended up in the foster system. I could have said no when they offered to take me in, but I decided the least I could do was remind them what they had done for a while, rather than let them move on like nothing happened. So I agreed to let them foster me, so I could look them in the eye and tell them to fuck off every day.”

I feel her take Gardevoir from my now stiff arm and shove her into my chest. “So no, we are not and never will be sis…” the contact switches something on in my brain, and I step forward and hug her. I wish I could say I was being nice and trying to comfort her, but I immediately bury my face into her chest and begin to sob. I don’t know how to deal with this. I know intellectually that she has this much rougher than I do, but in this moment all I can feel is sadness. Sadness at not knowing this whole time, sadness at not being able to do anything about it, sadness for her, sadness for my parents trying to deal with a kid who hates them and a kid oblivious to everything, sadness at being completely utterly useless.

“…okay. I laid a lot on you there and you always were a sensitive little bitch. You’ve got thirty seconds, and then you’re gonna let go or I’m going to punch you.” I nod my head while still sobbing into her chest…

“Alright, times up. Let go… now.” I don’t move fast enough, still working up the courage to look at things, and possibly her, while in the comfortable position of seeing nothing. So, true to her word, she punches me in the shoulder. I let go and rub my now sore arm. I realize I’m still holding Gardevoir… and don’t know if I should try and give it to her again. I want to let her know I’m sorry for… everything. But she doesn’t like plushies, and I definitely don’t want to be anywhere within miles of insinuating that plushies are valid substitutes for parents.

She sees me contemplating my gift and sighs. “Fine, give me the damn toy.” She reaches out, and I hand her Gardevoir with a still teary smile. “I still hate your parents. Don’t expect that to change.”

Thinking that to be perfectly reasonable, I nod, turn around and climb into my bed to do nothing but snuggle my plushies for the rest of the day. I don’t think I can deal with any more… people things today.