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Becca liked Dr. Langdon. Mel had said lots of nice things about him after her first day at the PTMC, so Becca had already had a good impression of him. Then he treated her for her UTI, and he was so nice and had great hair and did his best to make her comfortable, and Becca liked him even more.
A few months later, he began eating dinner with them every other Tuesday, and Becca started to actually get to know him. She showed him Elf, and her favorite board games, and her favorite reality shows, and Elf again.
He sometimes made jokes that Becca didn’t understand, then looked embarrassed that Becca didn’t understand them, which Becca thought was fun. People often got annoyed at her when she didn’t understand what they said. It was new for someone to be embarrassed, like he had done something wrong, not her.
A little while later, he started driving Mel to and from work, which meant that he also drove Becca to and from Middle Hill. It was a bit of an adjustment, especially since his car smelled a little weird, but being in a car was much less overwhelming than the bus, so it worked out in the end.
Becca wasn’t entirely sure when, but at some point, Frank — not Dr. Langdon, because she wasn’t his patient anymore — became a part of her life. He was Mel’s friend first and foremost, but he was also Becca’s friend now. He hung out with her when Mel needed to relax or run errands or things like that, and he didn’t seem like he did it out of obligation. He seemed to actually like Becca’s company. And Becca liked his.
Which was why it was so devastating when Mel and Frank told her that they’d started dating.
Becca stared at the two of them across the dinner table. They were holding hands, Mel squeezing Frank’s hand hard. Frank smiled excitedly. Mel smiled nervously, because she knew Becca better.
Becca didn’t like to yell. She didn’t like to cry. She didn’t like to have meltdowns. She just… She couldn’t control it sometimes.
And the panic and fear and anger and grief that bubbled up inside her in that moment was too much for her to control, to push down, to ignore. Her whole body felt like it was buzzing, her senses blurring and screaming.
“No,” Becca heard herself say. “No, no, no.”
“...No?” Frank repeated.
“Becca…” Mel said in her please-don’t-do-this-voice. But Becca couldn’t help it.
Becca stood up, pushing her chair so far away that it toppled over and crashed to the floor. “It’s not fair! It’s not fair for you to do that when I’m already friends with him! That’s not fair!”
Mel stood up too, still holding Frank’s hand, and the sight of it made Becca so mad. “Becca. Come on, please. I– I thought you wanted me to get a partner?”
“Not one I’m friends with!”
“Wha– Why is that a bad thing?” Frank asked quietly, looking very confused. Becca would’ve made fun of him if she wasn’t so angry.
Mel opened her mouth to say something, but Becca turned on her heels and ran to her bedroom. The sound of her door slamming shut was satisfying but also loud enough to make her cringe. She reached desperately for her headphones, planting them firmly on her head before she dove under her weighted blanket.
Then she started crying. Her ugly cry-screaming that she felt so ashamed of. The one that always made Mel panic a little. The one Adam got too, and had said he didn’t mind when he’d seen her cry like that.
Mel was right; Becca did want Mel to get a partner. Mel was always so lonely, and Becca wanted her sister to be less lonely. And sex was great, and Becca wanted Mel to be able to have it too. Becca just didn’t want to be friends with Mel’s partner.
She’d made that mistake once before.
Mel had had exactly one romantic partner before. Her name had been Nicky, she’d had dark curls and brown skin and a smile that had made Becca feel very safe. Mel had been friends with her for a while, and started dating her in their senior year of high school.
Becca had gone to a different school than Mel, so she hadn’t met Nicky before Mel had come home and introduced her to Becca and Mom as her girlfriend. Becca still remembered that moment: Mel and Nicky standing hand in hand in the living room, Mel clearly nervous but also so happy.
Nicky had been amazing. She’d read and loved all the Twilight books, which had been Becca’s special interest at the time. Mel had read the books too, but she hadn’t really liked them, so it hadn’t been that fun to talk to her about them. But Nicky had loved them almost as much as Becca. They’d spent hours and hours discussing the books and characters and ships and movies.
At the time, Becca hadn’t had a lot of friends. She’d had a few people in online forums that she’d talked to pretty often, but she’d never actually met any of them. Outside of her family, Becca hadn’t had any friends in real life. She’d been really, really lonely.
Then Nicky had come into her life, full of joy and warmth and kindness. She had quickly become one of Becca’s best friends.
And then, suddenly, without any warning, she’d disappeared from Becca’s life forever.
Nicky hadn’t visited in over a week when Mel had finally told them over dinner. Her eyes had been red and she’d been shaking a little. She’d told them that they’d broken up. Hadn’t wanted to tell them why.
Mom had recently been diagnosed, just a few weeks before. Becca remembered thinking that it wasn’t fair that those two things happened so close together. That she’d have to lose two people at the same time.
Of course, Mel later told her that it hadn’t been a coincidence. Mel hadn’t wanted Nicky to have to deal with her sad life — Dad was already dead at that point, and Mel had had a much clearer view than Becca of what their life would look like after Mom died. In order to not burden Nicky, Mel had broken up with her.
Becca still thought this was stupid. Nicky had been a very kind and loving person, and she would’ve helped Mel through it. It would’ve been much better for both Mel and Becca if Nicky had been there as Mom slowly, and then quickly, died.
But, at the time, Becca hadn’t known this. She hadn’t known why Nicky and Mel had broken up, so she hadn’t been able to be mad at Mel for it. If anything, she’d been sad on her sister’s behalf. Still, the feeling that had overwhelmed her much more than sadness on Mel’s behalf — the feeling she still thought about from time to time — had been an all-encompassing grief for the loss of Nicky.
She’d cried for a week. She’d barely been able to talk to Mel. She’d stared at her Twilight books for hours until she finally decided to give them away. (She still couldn’t think about Twilight without thinking about the best friend she’d lost through no fault of her own.)
Becca had wondered for hours and hours about whether or not she could text Nicky. She’d had her number, after all, and they’d used to text all the time. But Becca hadn’t known whose fault the breakup was, and she hadn’t wanted to betray Mel in case Nicky turned out to have been very mean to her.
She’d waited for weeks, hoping Nicky would text her. Something. Anything. Even just a goodbye text.
Nothing.
Becca never heard from her again.
She’d promised herself that if Mel ever got a partner again, she wasn’t going to become friends with them. She would be very happy for Mel, and very supportive, but she wouldn’t get to know them. (Not until they got married, at least.) They would be Mel’s partner, not Becca’s friend. If they ever broke up, Mel would be sad and Becca would only be sad for Mel.
Of course, everything had been ruined now.
Because Mel had managed to sneak Frank into Becca’s life when they were friends, not dating. Friends were different, Becca had reasoned, because friends didn’t break up. Mel and Frank seemed like they would be friends forever, so Becca could become friends with Frank too.
And she had. It had been easy. He was kind and funny and she liked being around him.
She couldn’t stand the thought of him suddenly disappearing too.
Becca avoided Frank for a week. Every time he visited, she went to her room until he left, or she asked to go to Adam’s. This obviously made Frank sad, but he had made her sad first, so it was only fair.
Becca tried to be civil with Mel, but it was hard. Anger and betrayal bubbled under her skin every time she looked at her twin. How could Mel do this to her? Hadn’t she seen how devastated she’d been after Nicky? How could she want to subject Becca to this again?
Mel was angry too. Becca could see it, even though Mel tried to hide it. She didn’t smile as much, didn’t talk as much, snapped more easily. Several times, she tried to bring up Frank, tried to beg Becca to be happy for her, but Becca just left or put on her headphones. She didn’t want to hear it.
She wasn’t being fair. She knew that. But every time she closed her eyes, she imagined Mel telling her that she’d broken up with Frank, that Becca would never get to see him again, that she had lost another one of her best friends.
It wasn’t fair.
“Becca, please stop doing this,” Mel said with desperation in her voice.
Frank had come over and Becca had immediately gone to her room. Mel stood in the doorway to Becca’s bedroom, hands clasped in front of her chest. Becca felt bad, but she was also really angry. So.
“Nothing has really changed that much,” Mel said. “Frank will be over almost the same amount, maybe just a little more, and sleep here sometimes — but only if that’s okay with you. He will still hang out with you just like before.”
Mel didn’t get it. She was close, but she didn’t get it.
“I didn’t want to be friends with him,” Becca muttered.
“Becca, please…”
“I want to be alone.”
Mel sighed and closed the door.
“Mel and Frank have started dating,” Becca told Adam almost a week after the announcement. She wasn’t sure why she’d waited this long. She’d needed to gather her thoughts.
The two of them were sitting on Adam’s bed, a very big and comfortable one with blue sheets and a very nice weighted blanket. His room was pretty big, full of figurines mostly from Pokémon, but also a few other games. He had a huge gaming PC and a very comfortable gaming chair that Becca liked to spin around in.
She really liked his room.
“That’s … cool?” Adam said hesitantly.
“No, it’s not.” Becca fiddled with her fidget cube, pressing a few of the buttons, enjoying the clicking sound they made. “Because I’m friends with Frank, and when they break up, I won’t get to be friends with him anymore.”
Adam put a hand on Becca’s ankle, pressing slightly into it. Grounding. “Why wouldn’t you be friends with him if they break up?”
Adam was an only child. He didn’t know how sibling stuff worked. Becca had needed to explain a lot to him. It was a little frustrating that she had to explain stuff now when she was upset, but she was going to do it anyway. He was always so nice when he explained things to her.
“Because you just don’t do that,” Becca said. “It’s your sibling's partner. Even if they're friends with you, it’s more important that they’re your sibling’s partner. If they’re not that anymore, then they’re not your friend anymore either. It’s just how it works.”
“That sucks.”
“Yeah.” Becca’s eyes stung. She blinked away the tears. “I wasn’t going to become friends with Mel’s next partner, but I’m already friends with Frank, and I can’t undo that friendship. I… I don’t want to.”
“No, I don’t think you should do that.” Adam rubbed circles into Becca’s ankle with his thumb. “It’s… annoying that they’ve started dating, but you can’t really do anything about it.”
“... I know.” And she didn’t want to either. It was obvious that Frank made Mel happy. It would’ve been really mean of Becca to try to sabotage their relationship.
She just wished Mel had started dating literally anyone else.
“You should still be friends with Frank,” Adam said after a moment. “He’s really cool.”
Yes. That was part of the problem, wasn’t it?
A knock on her bedroom door. “Hey, Becs.”
It was Frank. Becca recognized his voice, obviously, but he was also the only person who called her Becs. She’d liked the nickname; it had made her feel like they were close. Now it just hurt.
“Can I come in?” he asked carefully.
Becca sat up in her bed so there would be room for him at the end of it. “Okay.”
Slowly, the door opened, letting in sharp light from the hallway. Becca’s room was currently dimly lit by two lava lamps, bathing the room in pink and orange and purple. Frank quickly closed the door behind him.
“Can I…?” he gestured to the foot of the bed and Becca nodded. She’d made room for him.
When Frank sat down, his knee immediately started bouncing. He had ADHD. Adam did too, along with autism. Adam also got migraines, which seemed to really suck.
“I don’t like that you’re dating Mel,” Becca said, because it was clearly what Frank wanted to talk about and it was best to just get straight to the point.
Frank looked sad. “Yeah, I’ve gathered. Can you tell me why, though? I thought… I thought you liked me?”
“I do like you,” Becca said. “I like you a lot. That’s the problem.”
Frank looked confused now. “Becs… I think I’m gonna need you to explain this to me.”
Becca liked that. Liked that he wanted to understand. It was one of the things she liked most about him.
“I didn’t want to be friends with Mel’s next partner,” she said. “Because then I wouldn’t be so sad when they broke up.”
Frank let out a long breath. “Oh.”
“Mel had a girlfriend named Nicky in high school,” Becca said, hoping Mel had already come out to him. He didn’t look surprised, so that was good. She hadn’t wanted to out her sister. “I became really good friends with her, and when they broke up, I never saw her again. She didn’t even say goodbye.”
Frank’s face did something weird at that, but he eventually landed at a sad expression. “So… You’re upset that Mel and I have started dating because you’re afraid of losing me? Like you lost Nicky?”
“Yes.”
Frank looked down at his hands for a second, clearly thinking. Eventually, he said, “First off, I wanna say that that’s really sweet, Becs. I … I didn’t realize how important I was to you.”
“You’re one of my best friends,” Becca said.
She had a lot of friends at Middle Hill now — a couple of best friends there too — so she wasn’t lonely anymore like she’d been in high school. But Frank was her only friend outside of Middle Hill who wasn’t Mel, and that felt important. He was important.
Frank smiled softly. “You’re one of my best friends too, Becs.”
“That’s why I don’t like that you’re dating.”
Frank sighed, dragging a hand through his hair. He looked over at Becca briefly, his blue eyes shining, before he looked back at his hands. He was even worse with eye contact than she was, but she was pretty sure he did it just around her so she would be comfortable. Another thing she really liked about him.
“Look, I don’t want me and Mel to break up either,” Frank said, his voice quiet. “The thought of losing her, of losing both of you…”
Tears stung at Becca’s eyes. She wiped them away furiously.
“But… I can’t guarantee anything. Hell, even if we get married, that’s still not a guarantee that we’ll stay together forever.” Frank rubbed at his bare ring finger. He was divorced. Becca had asked him a lot about it one day when Mel hadn’t been around. (She thought it was rude for Becca to interrogate him about his divorce, but Becca was just interested. That wasn’t rude!)
“I hate that,” Becca murmured.
“Yeah, me too,” Frank said with a short laugh. He looked over at her again, briefly. “But… I can tell you that I’m in this for the long run. I wanna be with your sister forever, or as close to forever as possible.”
“But you can’t promise that.”
“No. I can’t.”
A pause.
“But, you know, no one can really promise all that much,” Frank said gently. “Even if Mel and I had stayed friends, we might have drifted away, and you might’ve lost me anyway. Not to say that you will, I just mean… Life is weird and fucked up. People lose each other in different ways all the time. It’s just how it is. And it sucks, but… At least we get to know a lot of really great people throughout our life, even if we can’t keep them forever.”
Tears sprung out from Becca’s eyes, and she wasn’t fast enough to wipe them away this time. They dripped down her face, warm and salty and embarrassing. This was a quiet cry, at least, not one of her loud and ugly ones.
Frank looked sad, but also like he was thinking hard.
“Hey, you know what I can promise?” he said after a moment. “I can promise that I won’t just disappear. If we ever break up, I’ll still keep in touch with you. We can text, send each other memes, keep each other updated on our lives. Maybe not as often as now, but … You’ll still hear from me.”
Becca wiped away some tears, hope sparking in her chest. “Are you sure it won’t upset Mel?”
“I’ll ask,” Frank said, “but I’m pretty sure it would upset her more to see you be sad because I didn’t keep in touch.”
Becca leaned forward, closer to him, and he turned to her. She held out her pinky. “Promise?”
Frank grinned, his eyes glittering. He wrapped his pinky around hers. “Promise.”
Frank left the room so Becca could cry herself out. Around an hour later, Mel knocked on the door. She started walking towards the foot of the bed, but Becca shifted so Mel could sit beside her. Mel smiled and climbed into the bed, resting her head on Becca’s shoulder.
“Frank told me you’ve worked something out,” Mel said softly.
“He’s gonna keep in touch with me if you break up,” Becca said.
“Yeah, he said.” Mel was quiet for a second, before she continued, “So that’s why you’ve been upset? You were scared of losing Frank?”
“Yes.”
“I… I’m scared of losing him too, you know,” Mel said quietly.
Becca closed her eyes, guilt washing through her. She knew that, of course. She knew the breakup with Nicky had affected Mel even more than herself. She knew that a breakup with Frank would affect Mel more than her.
Becca just hadn’t wanted any pain at all. She had wanted to shield herself from it, and Mel hadn’t let her.
But…
If Mel had waited to introduce Becca to Frank until they started dating, Becca would’ve never become friends with him. She would have missed out on one of the funniest and coolest people she knew, just because she would be scared of losing him.
And no matter how much it hurt to think about her, Becca was glad she’d been friends with Nicky. She’d been so kind and full of joy. She’d made high school a lot less lonely. Like Frank had said: even though it was sad that Becca hadn’t gotten to keep Nicky forever, it was nice that she’d at least had her for a while.
“You have him now,” Becca whispered. “We have him now.”
Mel let out a noise. It was kind of sad but also kind of happy. “Yeah. We have him now.”