I walk away as he returns to his codfish impression, clearly trying to come up with a witty retort. Add “witless” to the list.
I push out of the wine bar and into the pleasantly cool San Francisco evening. Having just slipped into October, we’re past the lingering late summer heat and back to the usual of sixties in the evening. I’m glad for the change, as I much prefer fall and winter to the heat of summer. I stroll the couple of blocks home through the busy Mission District, appreciating the bustle around me.
When I get home, I gladly dump my purse and keys at the door and kick off my shoes.
Matt looks up at me from the couch in our tiny living room. Then he looks pointedly at the clock on the wall.
“Guessing that didn’t go so well?” he asks with a teasing glimmer in his mocha-colored eyes.
I sink into the armchair next to him. “Meh.” I hold out my hand, palm up, and let him touch one of his long, slender fingers to it. He closes his eyes for a few moments as he pulls the highlights of the last hour from my mind. His retrocognitive abilities come in handy at times like this, when I have zero desire to bore myself further by rehashing everything.
He pulls away with a chuckle. “Seems like it wasn’t anything you couldn’t handle,” he replies, a smile tugging at his wide mouth.
I shrug. “Whatcha workin’ on?” I ask, deflecting.
He runs a hand through his short, dark brown hair, closing the lid of the laptop in front of him. “Just looking for a venue for our department head meeting.”
That pulls a frown from me. “I already gave you a list of potential options,” I point out, leaning forward to find it in the sheaf of documents sitting next to his laptop. He beats me to it, drawing it out of the pile.
“I saw it. But I’m just not sure if any of them are quite right. Since it’s going to be an after-work thing, I want it to be a little classier than our usual lunch out.”
I roll my eyes. “First, I wish you wouldn’t bring work home. It’s bad enough we’re siblings, and we work together, and live together. There have to be some boundaries.” He smirks at my usual lecture. “And second, you really need to embrace delegating these kinds of tasks. You’re a director now. All you had to do was tell me that. Trust me. I’ll take care of it.” He shoots me a skeptical look. I sigh impatiently in response. “If you can’t trust me, who can you trust?”
Matt scrubs both hands over his tired face. He’s been burning the candle at both ends these last few months since he was promoted, and clearly still feels like he needs to impress people. Which I get, because he’s only twenty-seven and has risen through the ranks of the social media corporation we both work for faster than he ever dreamed possible. It doesn’t hurt that he interned with them through college. Still, to hit director at twenty-seven is amazing. But then, my older-by-less-than-a-minute brother is that brilliant. I just wish he believed it. And then I know everyone else would follow.
He shoots a pleading look at me and offers his hand. His implication is immediately obvious, and I bark a derisive laugh.
“You want me to read you to tell you where the damn dinner will be?”
He smiles innocently. “This is me, trusting you.”
I roll my eyes and huff out an annoyed breath. Though he’s right, it’ll probably work. Normally, I’d consider this an exceedingly stupid use of my precognition, but there’s not much I’d deny Matt.
Begrudgingly, I grab his hand, perhaps a little more roughly than necessary, and close my eyes.
The vision rips through me, as always. But it’s just one flash this time. Brick walls. Tall windows. Tables, chairs. It’s clearly a small, cozy restaurant. I stay in the vision long enough to see the Bay Bridge looming just outside to the right before I rip myself back to reality.
Matt’s eyebrows are raised expectantly.
I gesture to his laptop, which he opens and hands to me. After a short search, I find it. I pull up the website, noting they have several private dining options that sound promising, and hand the laptop back to Matt.
It takes him all of five seconds scrolling through the gallery before a smile spreads across his face. “This is perfect,” he gushes. “Book it first thing tomorrow.”
I roll my eyes. “Sure thing, boss,” I reply with as much sarcasm as I can muster.
Matt narrows his eyes at me. “Yeah, get it out while you can, CJ,” he gripes. “Better now than in the staff meeting tomorrow. Which is at —”
“Ten, I know,” I gripe, rolling my eyes again. “I’m your executive assistant and you don’t just pay me to sit there and look pretty.”
Matt rises with a grin, stretching his tall, lean frame. “Technically, I don’t pay you,” he points out. “The company does.” He drops a kiss on top of my head as he shuffles out of the living room. “’Night, Sis.”
“’Night,” I murmur, sinking back into the couch.
I sit in the dark, silent living room for a few more minutes before trudging up to my room. I change carefully, slipping an oversized gray T-shirt on. Or regular sized, maybe — I’m just the size and build of pre-hormoned-up-food-era thirteen-year-old girl. I take my time brushing out my long, unruly brown hair before winding it into a braid. Rather than reflect on my wasted evening, I grab a book off my desk and slip between the sheets.
I soon realize reading is pointless; I have zero attention span. While I’m disappointed by my date, it’s more than that. I’m frustrated by my whole life right now. I know I shouldn’t complain. I’ve got a good job, a place to live, family who loves me. But right now it feels like the only thing in my future is booking a goddamn restaurant for our department heads to meet and doing the other thousand errands a day my brother requires. Not that I don’t love him, and it’s always been this way, just us two. How could anyone else understand us the way we understand each other? But it makes me wonder if it will always be this way. Deep down, I know I want more.
As soon as I arrive at work the next morning, I settle at my desk and place the call to the restaurant. I have to leave a voicemail as, unsurprisingly, the restaurant isn’t open at nine on a Wednesday morning.
The rest of the day is meetings, preparing reports, and pretty much organizing Matt’s entire professional life, as per usual. Even though my degree is in biology, I don’t mind so much. I really have no desire to be a lab technician or a doctor, and I’m not cut out for research. I think I just studied it hoping to find some physical reason for our psychic gifts. Unfortunately, I realized quickly that even if I dedicated my life to the cause, it would be nearly impossible to pinpoint.
But I am good at organizing, something my brother sucks at royally, so I was a natural fit to be his assistant. Besides, when you have our abilities, it’s not exactly safe to confide in anyone else, and I can provide him a measure of security on that front. But really, it’s more than that. Being orphaned at four, we’ve always relied on each other. Even before we discovered our gifts.
I’m torn out of my reverie by the ringing of the phone. It’s the restaurant coordinator, a Mr. Campbell, calling back. He makes the reservation for the following Thursday and invites me to come for a menu tasting. I figure hell, why not? It’s included in the booking fee, and I could use some time away from Matt, work, and, well, everything. So I book for a late lunch the next day, happy to have something to distract me.