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Shaun and I shared a bedroom as kids, for whatever reason--we never asked why, even though the house was obviously big enough for us to have our own rooms. Maybe the Masons reasoned that it'd let them get away with giving us that much less human contact themselves. If that was the idea, I think we can say it was an unqualified success: Shaun and I latched onto each other and never let go.
He was abruptly moved to his own room when we were twelve. We got no warning and no explanation. I can only figure that they'd noticed we were turning into teenagers; what might be a charming quirk in opposite-gender siblings as children was about to Not Look Good, and nothing ever made our parents move faster than keeping up appearances. I don't think we'd done anything that gave us away; realistically, at that point, neither of us fully realized there was anything to give away. And if the Masons did notice something that triggered the sudden switch, that was pretty much the last time they were perceptive about us--and the only time they knew something about us before we did. Their track record before and since suggests that it wasn't the case. So we'll say it Looked Bad.
Funny how often things backfire so badly that you get the exact opposite of what you wanted--their refusal to let us keep sharing a room, where we each had our own side to retreat to, is how we wound up sharing a bed instead.
We tried to put a game face on it at first. We didn't much care what people thought of us even then, but we knew what our parents wanted and we were still young enough that we tried to give it to them. If nothing else, we both liked having more room for our things. Maybe it would've taken if they hadn't been so fucking manipulative about it, first springing the change on us and then compounding it by not putting the UV lighting I'd started using into Shaun's new room along with the low-wattage bulbs that were used in the rest of the house, which meant it wasn't exactly painful for me to be in there with him, but it wasn't comfortable, either.
So we were trying, but we were angry and getting angrier with every night that passed without either of us getting anything like a decent night's sleep. We lasted a week before the first time Shaun crept into my room, which by all rights should still have been his too, and said, "George, are you awake?"
I still have no idea what would have happened if I hadn't responded. I think he would have come back another night, but I can't be sure. I can still hear the uncertainty in his voice, the crack that had nothing to do with adolescence.
"I can't sleep," I said, and he said, in near-perfect unison. I moved to the outside edge of the bed, and after only a moment's hesitation, Shaun clambered over me in the dark and flopped down between me and the wall. I think we were both out like lights the second his head hit the pillow--well, the mattress. It wasn't until the next night that he remembered to bring his own pillow when he came knocking.