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"Why are they so short?" Changbin asks as they make their way through the lot.
"Why are you so short," Chaeryeong says, but he's not wrong. When they were kids it was like wandering a forest, walking between the giant trees and calling out when they found a good one. Back then they must have risen ten feet into the sky. All of these she could trim without standing on her toes.
It can't just be them. They've barely grown since the year their mother decided she'd had enough of the needles and the sap and the fighting with the lights and got a fake one. Not that it matters really. She doesn't want a ten foot tree. She just wants something small and pretty that will make it smell like Christmas.
"I like this one," she decides, pointing to a tree that's narrow but dense. It'll look cute in the corner of her living room, her collection of presents beneath it. Maybe she won't even hang her handful of ornaments. Maybe just some lights and a few sprigs of baby's breath tucked in between the branches.
"That's a good one," a voice says, and she looks over her shoulder to a salesman coming up behind them. "Little young to have been cut, but it'll last you." He gives a nod, hands tucked in his pockets, and looks between them. "First Christmas?"
Chaeryeong looks at Changbin. The smile's already settling on his face, the secret one they share for a second whenever this happens. It looks good on him. He looks good, in his winter jacket with the fleece peeking out underneath. He looks like the kind of guy who'd let his wife pick the tree and grouse good-naturedly as he got it set up, just the way their dad always would.
"Yes," she says, cutting in before he can answer, and everything inside her floats like they've just hit a dip in the road.
His forehead creases as she says it. He's quiet, but she can hear the no he's holding in his mouth. The she's my sister. Then the laugh, the apology, the brushing it off. The script they always follow.
Don't, she thinks at him. Just this once. Let it go.
When they were young, so close in size, people would think they were twins. They're not, almost two years apart. But sometimes he reads her mind like one. "That's right," Changbin says, and if the salesman hears the doubt in it he doesn't bring it up.
"Well congratulations." He claps Changbin's shoulder and shakes his hand. "Let's net that up and see if we can't find you a discount."
"Sorry," she says, as soon as they're back in the car. Changbin's car, with the tree tied down to the roof. Hers wouldn't have held it. Even on his, the tip hangs out over the windshield, casts a shadow on the dashboard. "I don't know why I said that."
"It's fine," he says, the easy way he says everything. "Got you ten bucks off didn't it?"
It's not though. Fine. At least it never has been. Not since the days he started working out, bulking up, and people stopped looking at them and started looking at him. At Changbin, broad and strong and handsome. Only then turning to the girl next to him and assuming she must be his girlfriend.
He's always so quick to correct them. To stop the thought from growing in their heads. Of course she's not. She couldn't be. He doesn't have to tell her that.
"He thinks we're married," she says, as though he could have missed it.
"I know," he says, fiddling with the heat. The sun's just gone down and it's suddenly freezing. On the way out she'd have wormed her hands under his jacket, complained as he batted her away. Tonight she tucks them under her thighs. The man thinks they're married. He thinks she's his wife.
"You don't mind?"
"It's a joke, right?"
She curls her fingers so her nails dig into her jeans. They're too short too. None of the cut can get to her skin. "Right."
"Then it's fine. He's not gonna remember us."
She nods. "Probably not," she agrees. Or maybe he will. Maybe he'll think of that nice young couple and hope they come back again. Maybe there'll be one person in the world who knows them as something other than Changbin and his little sister.
She likes it when Changbin drives. He's calm behind the wheel, comfortable, and even when he's frustrated he doesn't yell about it. Mostly he puts on music that's too girly pop for her and they fight over who gets to pick the next playlist. She always wins, and he always knows the lyrics better than she does.
He's messing with his phone, nothing playing yet, as they sludge their way through rush hour traffic. She's trying to rub the sap off her hands but only managing to spread the stickiness. "What if it wasn't?" she says as he inches forward, steps on the brake again.
"What if what?" he says, like he's forgotten as quickly as he thought the salesman would. Like the whole thing has no weight in his head. She probably shouldn't have asked.
"If it wasn't a joke."
He's looking at her now, she can feel it. The phone is limp in his hand. "Why not?"
She stares out at the stagnant river of cars. How does she answer that. How could she make him understand. She probably can't. People don't look at their siblings, think about them. Not like she does. He shouldn't get it. He doesn't think of her like that. "Because," she says, as simply as she can. She looks down at her lap. "I want that."
The cars around them are creeping forward. Someone's honking. They're not moving. "You do?"
She takes a breath. The sticky sap has spread to her chest. "When they think I'm yours," she says. "I like that."
He moves forward then, when some car honks again, and she chances a look at him. Same Changbin. Different expression on his face. He doesn't look at her when he says, "Just think?"
The tingling in her hands isn't from rubbing at them. No. Not just. She wants him, looking at her. Him, touching. The way he used to before she became the only girl he wouldn't. The way he touches the others. "I want them to be right."
She thinks she can see a twitch of his jaw as he swallows, but that's his only reaction. She's ready to look away, apologize again, promise to never mention it, when he flicks on his blinker and noses into the next lane. "Where are you going?"
"Nowhere," he says. "I'm thinking."
There's a road sign just ahead of them, and she has to smile when she reads it: Only a quarter mile left before they hit the loop. One highway that connects to another that connects to a third that will drop you off right back where you started. Where they both learned not to be afraid of merging on and getting off, where they've long gone when they have some wheel spinning to do.
"You can put something on if you want."
"No." There's nothing she wants to hear right now. No song she wants to remember as the one that played while her brother turned her down.
The highway hums beneath them instead, accompanied by the worry bubbling in her belly. She doesn't know what there is for him to think about. If he doesn't feel the way she does, there's nothing to say but no. Does that mean maybe? Or that he never even wants to see her again?
The loop takes twenty minutes on a good day, thirty when it's bad. Today they go a whole thirty-four before they're turning onto the backed up exit ramp. It's impossible to read what he's thinking. It always is. This is why he wins at card games. Stupid poker face.
"Okay," he says, as they wait at the flashing red light. "Where are we headed?"
It's another half hour to the florist, one that's well outside of town. Changbin parks on the side of the building, no windows, no eyes on them. No one they should know. Her heart's beating hard in her chest, her seatbelt still stretched across it. Changbin drove twenty miles out of the way so she could hold his hand in public. She's never even done that at home. She almost wishes he'd said no. At least that she could understand. She doesn't know what this means and she doesn't know how to ask.
"We don't have to go in," he says. "Or anything. We can just go home."
She stares at the brick wall as she nods. Of course they can. Forgive and forget, all of it. He might be weird for a while but they'd be okay by Christmas. And she'd never get a chance again.
She hits the release on her belt. He's only a moment behind her.
He really does take her hand in his. It's warm, and solid, and maybe the only thing keeping her standing. She'd think she was dreaming if it weren't for the cold air in her lungs. She holds tight and he lets her, doesn't even pretend she's breaking his fingers. Leads her toward the door. "Come on."
"Hi," the woman behind the counter greets them. She's the same age as their mom, smiling at them the way she would at anyone. "Can I help you?"
Chaeryeong's eyes are probably too wide. Her hand in Changbin's is sweating and sticky. He squeezes it anyway. "Hi," she says softly. "I wanted to get some flowers." She looks at Changbin and he's looking back, holding on. She'd live right here if she could. "For our tree."
There's a syrupy pitch to the woman's voice as she replies, and the sound of someone else coming in, and Chaeryeong rests her forehead on Changbin's shoulder. What is she doing, claiming him like this. What is he doing letting her. Wrapping his arm around her back, kissing the top of her head. All the easy affection she's watched and wanted and never had. That just for a minute she gets.
The bouquet they walk out with is huge in his hands, the blossoms tiny and white. When is the wedding? she would have asked, just this morning, and laughed as he pretended to throw it to her. Tonight she can feel all the places he touched, and she wants to take it from him so he can do it again.
"Wait," he says, one hand on her arm as they round the corner, before she can go to the car. She turns to look at him. It feels like a date that's coming to an end, the moment before they say goodbye when he might close in for a kiss. Or maybe the one when he lets her down easy. He'd be so nice about it. Changbin can't stand to hurt anybody. Especially not his sister.
She wishes she were the one holding the flowers, had something to grip and twist as she waits to see what she's waiting for.
Her breath catches as he leans toward her. The tingling in her hands is back. She keeps her eyes open as he moves in, closes them only when his mouth finds hers. There's a sour churn low in her stomach and even his breath smells good. She breathes it in, and she wants to crawl under his clothes and against his skin and she wants to fold her arms around him. His tongue brushes against her lips and just like that she's floating again, chasing after him, weightless as he pulls away.
She keeps her eyes closed. As soon as they're open it's going to be over.
"They're right," he says, and there's a sting behind her eyelids. She nods. She knows they are.
She looks at him then. His smile isn't big, but it's real. Affectionate. He hands her the bouquet. "Let's get this thing home," he says, nodding at the tree still weighing his car down. "You need to tell me where it goes."