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Jimmy doesn’t look like his big sister.
That’s normal, actually. Their parents are shapeshifters, so he and Lizzie are also shapeshifters, which means they get to change any bit of their body they don’t like, so people in families like theirs rarely look alike. Which is why Lizzie’s hair is always pink, not blonde like his. But it does feel weird sitting in class, listening to the teacher talk about genes and parents and kids who looked like their parents.
(Not that he remembers ever seeing his parents, but still. Lizzie’s the closest thing to a ‘normal’ parent he has — she’s older, plays with him, bandages his boo-boos. Takes care of him. That’s a good enough reason, for a kid.)
Jimmy doesn’t look like his sister one bit, and it’s unfair. Because Lizzie’s older, and really good at shapeshifting; and has different eyes from him, ocean-blue rather than a warm brown, and changes her hair so it doesn’t look like his. He can’t make himself match her; he is pants at shapeshifting — it’s not his fault he’s five years younger and also hates the feeling of shifting. Of twisting his features, shaping them like clay until he is no longer himself. It’s scary — because what is he, if he isn’t Jimmy, blond and brown-eyed and tall (for his age)?
(That being said, if he were any good at shapeshifting, he wouldn’t want to look like Lizzie anyway. Pink is girly. He’d rather turn his hair blue — he actually likes blue, and blue hair is very handsome, in his opinion. There’s a boy around his age he frequently sees at the playground, with powder-blue hair, and he’s so cool.)
***
When Jimmy is eight, he gets two more siblings who don’t look like him.
Obviously Pearl and Grian don’t have the same Mum and Dad as him and Lizzie. They came from the streets. Still, looking at the two of them, he can’t help but feel a bit envious. For it’s actually obvious the two of them are siblings — in their shared brown hair and blue eyes, or the almost catlike way they observe things; much less the way they care for each other, a reflection of him and Lizzie.
Still, his big sister’s insistence that they’re also their siblings now, regardless of blood, gives him some rest. If siblings don’t even have to be related, not looking alike shouldn’t make them any less of siblings.
It doesn’t stop that horrid pit in his chest from growing, though, seeing Lizzie fuss over Pearl, letting her try on all her old dresses, how even they look alike. Nor the laughter, so carefree, something he hasn’t been able to spark in his big sister in a while, that Grian seems to be able to so effortlessly bring out; even if it makes sense that they’re closer in age, and the elder half of their little quartet. Even if they welcome him to their circle with open arms, and it is never in doubt that all of them are his siblings.
***
It is more than a year into being Grian and Pearl’s brother when Jimmy realises there’s a slight inconsistency to the stories they’ve told him. Like in a mystery, where the detective finds a clue, except he’s been sitting on it for such a long time — and it was just basic math! Not that he’s usually any good at math, but still.
See, Grian says he started living on the streets when he was seven, after their parents left him there. Pearl, meanwhile, says she’s been living on the streets with him since she was four. But Grian and Pearl are four years apart, and Pearl’s the same age as him. Which means Grian would’ve been a year older than he’d said, right? Or Pearl was a year younger?
When he confronts Grian over it, the older boy seems just surprised, which is strange — not panicking over having one of his tall tales challenged, simply bemused.
“Timmy, Pearl only began staying with me later on. It’s as simple as that.”
“But it doesn’t make sense!” He insists. He knows his brother would never abandon Pearl, would never abandon either of them — so there’s no way they could’ve been separated to begin with. “Why would you two not stay together from the very beginning?”
“...Because I started first, and Pearl started later?”
“But why?”
“Because it just happened like that.”
His question is still unanswered, and now he’s confused. Which, judging by the look on his brother’s face, he shouldn’t be, this isn’t one of his weird riddles, it should be easy to figure out. He’s not that dumb, right?
“You look so baffled,” Grian chuckles, ruffling his hair. “What’s going on in that lil’ noggin of yours? No, really — what’s so hard to understand about our ex-parents leaving us there at different times?”
“I don’t know!” he huffs indignantly. “Why would they do that?”
“I don’t think all the people out there who leave kids on the streets would coordinate with each other to do it at the same time, Tim.”
“But they don’t need to coordinate!” And that’s the part that confounds him most. “You two have the same ex-parents! Couldn’t they have left you both there together?”
Grian stares at him for a few seconds — before howling with laughter, and Jimmy knows he’s definitely made a big mistake. Somehow. Embarassingly. Something that he’s missed, a joke he isn’t in on.
“Jimmy. All this time — did you spend all this time believing Pearl and I were siblings from birth?”
“You aren’t?!” He gapes. “You don’t have the same parents? How — how aren’t you two related?”
“No, no, first tell me how you assumed we actually were related.” His brother leans back smugly. “Go on, Tim. Let me clear up whatever misconceptions you may have had.”
“You two have the same hair and eyes, act the same —” He explains weakly. The revelation is stunning, flipping everything he’s known about his newer siblings so far on its head. As much as it has, very simply, answered his first question, he’s just more confused than before, so many other questions springing to mind.
Still, his brother listening to his list of logical reasons that no longer work now, nods thoughtfully. “Uh-huh. That’s fair. But we don’t need to be related to act the same, just close enough to learn from each other. And as for our other features...”
“You two aren’t also shapeshifters, are you?” Please no. He’s already had one huge bombshell dropped on him just now. If it turns out Grian isn’t actually avian, or Pearl isn’t actually human — actually, come to think of it, Pearl’s lack of wings — marking the two of them as completely different species — was something he’d never questioned, had he? Oh, he really is dumb.
“I wish. No, we just happen to look similar enough to pass pretty well.” His brother assures him, “I shouldn’t blame you for thinking we were blood-siblings just off appearance alone, to be honest. I mean, if it’s enough to fool a teacher, it should be enough to fool a Jimmy.” A mischievous grin creeps up on his face. “And even if it’s not enough to fool a teacher, it’s usually still enough to fool a Jimmy...”
“Oi!”
The conversation flows into happier matters from there, and overall he has a jolly good time talking to his big brother. Even then, that pit in his chest widens ever more, an ugly, sour surge brought on by this revelation. Grian and Pearl, who aren’t even related, still get to look alike anyway. Everyone with eyes knows they’re siblings. They even get to look more alike to Lizzie, with their shared blue eyes — than him.
He’s an odd duckling, the prospect of fitting in dangling just before him. If only he could be a bit better at what he was born to do, if only he didn’t feel so scared.
***
Eventually this misery of his leaks, drips of discomfort drenching him with every family photo he glances at. As much as Jimmy tries to tamp it down, assure himself that looking nothing like his siblings doesn’t make him any less of one, not if so many people in their little family aren’t even supposed to look alike — that fierce, ugly jealousy persists. It’s stupid. It’s his own problem, just a trifle. He’s not going to bring it up to Lizzie, or Grian, or Pearl, or anyone else for that matter.
Even then, apparently he’s just that bad at hiding his problems too, for it’s extremely obvious that his siblings have picked up on his gloom. Lizzie starts dragging him into doing things together, such as learning to bake his favourite cake, or watching guilty pleasure movies together. Grian tones down his teasing, and even offers to play video games with him, or teach him pottery. Pearl drops in on him often to hang out together, suggests teaming up to prank their siblings, or sneaking out to meet their friends at the playground. As fun as all these are, as much as they make him feel better, they do nothing to alleviate that feeling, and he isn’t about to crack and tell any of them.
Which leads, finally, to this predicament: getting ambushed in the front garden, while he was lying down for a rest on the grass.
“That looks comfortable,” he blinks, and Grian is leaning over him, blocking a vaguely creeper-shaped cloud. “Lovely weather today, innit? Don’t mind if I join you. No need to move, I’ll just sit right over here...” Scarlet feathers brush over his hair briefly, as his brother shifts his wings, making sure not to prod him — having seated himself perfectly close enough to talk without shouting.
For a few moments, they rest together, watching the sky in silence. Then, the older boy turns to him, shattering this tense peace.
“Say, Tim,” Grian begins, tone almost-casual, “you’ve been pretty sullen this past couple weeks. Is everything alright?”
“’M fine,” he replies. Short and sweet and not telling anything his brother can latch onto.
Though, of course, said brother is nothing if not persistent, and continues, “Are you sure? I hope I don’t need to take care of two mopey kids now. Pearl and this edgy phase she’s just starting are already looking to be a tad troubling. What’s happened to you, now?”
“It’s really nothing. Really.” Even as he speaks, he’s well aware of how unconvincing he sounds, and indeed his brother’s expression morphs into one of determination.
“Okay, Timmy. Let’s play detective, then, because this is getting worrying.”
“I’m a terrible detective.”
“Don’t worry, you aren’t the detective this time. You’re the suspect.” Grian adjusts his glasses, sun glinting off the lenses. “On charges of... being bothered by something and not letting your brother help you with it.”
“Isn’t that what you do all the time, too?” Jimmy asks, half-jokingly, and his brother’s face shifts just slightly.
“That’s neither here nor there. Anyway, Jimmy, you’ve been acting strangely for a while, can’t really pin down since when, but definitely after that conversation where you realised Pearl and I weren’t born siblings. If I were to guess that conversation was the reason...”
He isn’t going to answer. Why did his brother always have to be so perceptive — and so nosy?
“...Knew it.” Grian hums. “What could’ve gotten you so cheesed from that conversation, though... Can’t be just the part where you got something wrong, that happens all the time...”
“That wasn’t it,” he confirms. Was it, though? Always slower to get things than Lizzie, or Grian, or even and especially Pearl; always easy to fool; yet another way he didn’t belong, amongst all these witty people, who seemed to fit Lizzie better than he ever could — no, he isn’t exploring that right now.
“If, say, Pearl and I not being related was what bothered you, for some reason... but why?” he muses. “You were fine with us being your siblings, and Lizzie’s, so... what else, what else? Oh — our looks was the first thing you brought up then. Is this because we look like each other more than you and Lizzie do, even though you two are actually related and we’re not?”
“How?!” he blurts out, shocked, and a triumphant grin emerges on his brother’s face. “That was one guess! How did you...”
“Gut instinct. It’s a big brother thing.” Grian replies. “I could imagine, though, that is a bit strange, thinking about it. You and Lizzie really don’t look alike.”
Hearing it said so matter-of-factly, from someone besides his own thoughts, from his brother of all people, stings. Pierces the feeble shell he’s been constructing, to keep these troubles at bay — and it all shatters, instantly.
“Well, we wouldn’t have this problem if Lizzie just kept her hair blonde instead —” and all his grievances rush out, waters gushing from behind a broken dam; it’s almost catharthic. He rants, and he rambles, about his stupid problem, how he can’t even fix it even though it should be easy for him, as it is for Lizzie.
And, surprisingly, his brother listens. Doesn’t call him silly, or dumb, or laugh at him. Pulls him into a hug as he lays his heart bare, tearing away all these thoughts that had long festered, as the words become more painful and yet the weight on him melts away.
“You know,” Grian finally says, “I’ve never thought much about how it feels. To shapeshift. I always thought it’d be wicked to be able to turn myself into something else at will... but it’s scary, isn’t it? Like losing a part of yourself? I get it. Though I guess everyone’s idea of ‘yourself’ is different.”
“I guess,” he sniffles. “I just wish I was more like you guys. I wish I didn’t find it so hard.”
“Even if it never gets easier, you know we’ll always accept you, right? No matter how you look, or if you ever get the hang of things. Because deep down, you’re still you.”
“I know! But why did I have to be so different from everyone else?”
“That’s just how life works, Jimmy. I’m sorry.” His brother sighs. “You’re you, I’m me. We could change for other people, or we could stick to our guns, it’s your choice to make. To be frank, I’ve never really thought about all this, not the same way as you, at least. People change and grow all the time, but it doesn’t turn them into, well, not-them, just a different version of themselves. If I chose to change and didn’t regret it, that’s still me, innit?”
That makes sense. Even if his fear isn’t quite relieved yet, even if he still struggles to bring himself to shift, he already feels much better now.
***
A week later, Grian is late home from school.
Lizzie returns home without him, bursting into giggles when Jimmy and Pearl ask. The best response they manage to get out of her is, “It’s so stupid, but you’ll love it, Jim.” Which could mean anything at all, considering, well, it’s Grian.
Almost three hours after Lizzie returns, the doorbell rings again, and the two of them race down the stairs to open the front door. Pearl, always brave — or reckless, as their older siblings chastise her, skipping steps and jumping over railings to easily outrun him, reaching the door before he even reaches the bottom of the stairs.
He hears the hall door creak open from outside the room; then, his sister’s shriek. Immediately, his blood chills; he hurries his footsteps, to help her, if she’s being attacked. The drifting sound of their brother’s calm voice, however, stops him in his tracks again.
“— I thought it’d be fun to shake things up a tad. What do you reckon, Pearly?”
“It’s — it’s so bright!” Pearl exclaims. “It doesn’t — blimey, Griba, why would you choose this colour?!”
“Why not?” is the response. “Too bright for you? I thought you wanted to be a werewolf, not a vampire, baby bug.”
“No! It’s just — it just doesn’t look right —”
He steps into the hall, where Pearl is talking to an unfamiliar blond schoolboy, Grian nowhere to be seen.
“To you, maybe. Just give it some time, you’ll get used to it eventually.” And yet their brother’s voice sounds clear, as if in the same room as them. Befuddled, he looks around, eyes flicking to every corner of the spacious hall, where they’d played hide-and-seek so many times.
“It clashes so much, though!” Pearl protests, still deep in conversation with the stranger. “Time won’t make it less of a crime against colour coordination!”
“It’ll probably fix your attitude at least, so you can actually appreciate bright colours again, huh? You and that goth phase of yours. I need to have a talk with Lizzie on what she’s letting you watch —”
“It’s not a phase, Grian!”
Wait a second. No. The realisation hits Jimmy like a dodgeball to the head. That’s not...
“Grian?!” He shouts, stunned, and the other two occupants of the room abruptly turn to him. “Is — is that you?”
The grin on the blond stranger’s face grows, and, really, he isn’t a stranger at all, not with the same sharp blue eyes, the same spark, the same smile, all too familiar to him.
“Glad you could finally join us, Tim,” Grian remarks casually, as if he hadn’t just come home looking like a completely different person. “What, did you not recognise me?”
“He totally didn’t,” Pearl comments. “See, Griba, that’s what the effect is.”
“Ah, but this is Jimmy we’re talking about, remember.”
“What happened to your hair?!” he gasps, shock still settling in, still processing, with all the cogs in his head, the sight before him: his brother, with light blond hair instead of the wheat-brown that had become a familiar fixture to him. For how basic the change is — how small it should be to a true shapeshifter, even — it’s also so utterly surreal.
“Decided to dye it,” is the simple reply. “Do excuse the exact shade, though, it looked different at the hairdresser’s. Was hoping for something closer to yours. A proper shame, really, it’d be funny if people started mixing us up.” He chuckles, only the barest hint of nervousness audible. “What do you think? Do you like it?”
“I...”
And finally, it strikes Jimmy. How similar they look now. His brother looks like him. A warm feeling floods his chest. For he’d been too scared to change, but his brother wasn’t. A lump of sheer emotion, of gratitude, rises in his throat; the edges of his eyes suddenly seem just a tad more damp.
“I love it!” He bounds over, and wraps his arms around Grian tightly; he feels the elder boy tense slightly, before returning the hug. “Thank you, Grian. You... you really didn’t have to. Thank you.”
“Anything for my little brother,” he hears the murmur in response, and Pearl’s little “awww”.
“See, Pearl? At least one more person here appreciates my hair. You’re outvoted.”
“I mean, it’s not that bad...” she replies slowly, a devious lilt creeping into her voice. “Say, Griba, if you dyed your hair and it looks good, may I also —”
“Oh, only now that you actually want something from me, you’re gonna start praising my hair?” He laughs, reaching out to ruffle Pearl’s hair as well, which she bats away gently. “Firstly, you’re too young for that, baby bug. Secondly, what colour?”
“Well, if I said black...”
“No. Vetoed. That’s a downer colour, don’t you think?”
“Someone’s got to balance you out now, mister sunshine —”
And Jimmy laughs along with them, his siblings, whom he loves so much and love him back. A home he’ll always belong to, built by choice, no matter what happens — or doesn’t — to them. As much as they may change, they’ll always be a family, and he knows this in his heart.
(And if his first successful transformation, the first time he's felt comfortable in his skin, just so happens to be a pair of bird's wings upon his back; that's just who he is, what he's chosen to be.)
***
When Jimmy sees his brother again for the first time in years, on the eve of a Watchers’ Game, when he sees his face on the monster he has to stop, if he is to be a good Listener —
He almost doesn’t recognise that face. Not even for the years that have passed since Grian was taken from them, him and Pearl, the ones left behind in that fateful, blasted first of the Games. Not for the veneer of an uncaring smile, casually counting out lives as if they were little trinkets, a far cry from the brother so fiercely protective of them. Nor for the sickening purple wings, a twisted, warped mirror of his own, shadowy where once had been bright red.
Not even that his hair is back to its former brown, for he’d already grown out most of the dye back then in the world of Evolution; with all the twisted tests the Watchers set for them, re-dyeing his hair had been the least of his concerns.
(Much less when Jimmy had ditched him, latched on to Martyn instead as his main teammate. He’d spent the Game getting away from his brother, trying to prove that he could survive without him, and then he’d lost his brother forever in return. If he’d just spent those last few months, even just a few more days, with him — )
No, it is when the new Watcher, Gamemaster of this ‘experiment’ he has to stop, locks eyes with him, that he no longer recognises his brother. For Grian’s eyes had never been black, like the endless void. A window to the soul, something so utterly unlike the brother he’d lost.
It almost makes his job easier. Facing down a Watcher who doesn’t have his hair, or Lizzie’s or Pearl’s eyes. He might even be able to imagine, if he tries, he isn’t fighting his brother, but a stranger.
But that was never what defined family, was it?