It occurred to me, as I shifted my bags at the door of Brody’s apartment situated above a small bakery, that I should’ve at least checked to see if he was even going to be home. For all I knew, I could be spending the next five hours waiting for him to get back from class.
Thankfully someone opened the door when I knocked. Instead of my shit-for-brains brother greeting me, it was a handsome stranger.
Guess my brother had already made some friends. Hot ones.
“Hi, I’m looking for Brody. Is he here?”
The guy opened his arms wide and plastered on a smile. “You found him.”
What?
“I’m sorry, is Brody here?”
“I’m Brody. Can I help you with something?”
“You’re not Brody.”
He jerked his head back like the accusation was absurd, and for a brief second, I wondered if I’d somehow entered the Upside Down and was in some sort of parallel universe where nothing made sense and my brother was a gorgeous stranger who looked happy to see me.
I pushed past him without waiting for an invitation. “Brody! Brody!” I called as I moved through the apartment.
“I’m right here. I’m sorry, who are you?”
“The better question is who the hell are you? Because I’m Brody’s sister, and you’re sure as shit not Brody.”
Chapter Two
S O P H I A
“Have you lost your goddamn mind?” I asked Brody as soon as he picked up his phone.
“I feel like I get asked that a lot.”
“That should probably tell you something, then. Where are you right now?”
“At home, why?”
“Home as in Mom and Dad’s?”
“No. My apartment. Why? What do you need, Soph? I’m trying to study.”
I was still looking through the apartment like I was going to find Brody bound and gagged in a closet somewhere, which made absolutely no sense since I was currently talking to him. Meanwhile, the man claiming to be Brody was following me around, trying to talk to me. I continued to ignore him.
“You know how I know you’re not at your apartment right now?”
“How?” He sounded skeptical.
“Because I’m at your apartment right now, and there’s some guy here pretending to be you. You wanna tell me what the fuck is going on?”
“Why are you at my apartment?”
“I feel like you’re missing the point!”
“What is the point?” He seemed calmer than the situation called for. I sounded like a victim from Saw 2, and he sounded like fucking Gandhi.
“The point is that I got kicked out of my sorority house, and I came here so I could stay with you for a little while, but you aren’t here.” I looked at the Brody imposter. “Some weirdo is, and… You know what, I’m calling the cops.”
“No! Wait! Don’t hang up. Don’t call the cops.”
I was happy he sounded frantic now too. “What am I supposed to do? You’re missing, and there’s some person claiming he’s you.”
“I’m not missing.”
“Then where are you?”
There was a pause so long, I took the phone away from my ear to see if I’d lost the call. I hadn’t.
Finally, after a deep sigh, he said, “Italy.”
Now it was my turn to pause. “Italy? I really hope you just forgot to put the word Little in front of it and you don’t mean you’re actually in Italy, as in another country on another continent.”
Brody’s silence confirmed it was the latter.
“Oh my God! What are you doing in Italy?”
He let out one of those long, pained sighs, like all the air inside him had been released, leaving him completely deflated. It made me feel like it would be a good idea to sit down for the rest of the conversation, so I walked to the couch, lowering myself carefully onto it like the movement might disturb some imaginary sleeping person.
“You can’t tell Mom and Dad,” he said. “Promise me.”
“Jesus, Brody. I’m not gonna rat you out.” I was more hurt by his insinuation than I cared to let on.
“Right. I guess not. Because then I’d tell them you got kicked out of your sorority house.”
I rubbed the bridge of my nose in frustration. “Do we always have to talk in threats? We’re not kids anymore. Can’t we just help each other because we’re family? Just tell me what’s going on.”
“It’s not really that complicated. I just couldn’t do the whole school thing. I thought I could, but I went for like three days before I needed to get away.”
“You’re such a douche.” The comment slipped before I could think about its effect.
“See? Why would I tell you anything?”
It was a valid question. “I’m sorry. Really. I just… I thought you were finally committed to going down the right path.”
“Well, the right path for you may be the wrong path for me. The idea of staying there, trying to become what Dad wants me to be was… It was suffocating, Soph. I needed to get away.”
Oh, the drama. He should’ve been a theater major.
“What are you gonna do about your classes? Dad’ll find out you’ve been dropped from every course because you haven’t shown up.”
“That won’t happen.”
I laughed out loud. He’d really lost it. “How could it not?”
“Because my teachers think I’m showing up to my classes.”
My eyes locked with the person who’d claimed to be Brody, and suddenly it all clicked. I pulled the phone away from my ear.
“What’s your real name?” I asked the stranger. “When you’re not pretending to be my brother?”
He hesitated like the admission might cause him serious harm.
“Drew Nolan.”
Now my attention went back to Brody. “And how much are you paying Mr. Nolan to live your life for you while you’re across an ocean drinking wine and eating pizza?”
“If that’s all you think Italians do, you’re the one who should be traveling.” When I didn’t reply, he spoke again. “I’m not paying him. Just giving him a place to stay and a chance to learn something about business. It was kind of a mutual exchange.”
“Right. So you get to travel around Europe, and Drew gets to learn macroeconomics. Seems like a fair trade.”
Drew was pacing now.
“I don’t need to justify my choices to my little sister.”
“No. I guess you don’t. But you’ll need to justify them to Mom and Dad when they find out what you’re doing. And they will find out eventually. I get that you’re new to this campus, but you actually think that your teachers won’t notice another person pretending to be you?”
“They haven’t yet. He looks enough like me to fool people who’ve only known me a couple of days.”
“And what about your social media accounts? You think when Drew meets friends here they aren’t gonna check out his Instagram and see that there’s another person on there?”
“Have you been on lately?”