words : 5310
(A/N: Not really happy with this chapter but the story is moving so…. A comment would be appreciated as it would motivate me and let me know that I am not writing for a wall or something.)
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The grounding lasted three days.
Three days of house arrest. Three days of David giving them disappointed looks every time they came downstairs. Three days of meals eaten in semi-awkward silence while their father tried to figure out what combination of words would make his daughters act like normal human beings.
He never found the right combination. He never would. Mara could have told him that.
Jules, for her part, seemed to have achieved some kind of higher state of consciousness. She had fused with her phone. Become one with it. Transcended the mortal realm and entered a dimension where nothing existed except her screen and whoever was on the other side of it.
She was on that thing constantly. Lying on her bed, thumbs moving in a blur. Sprawled on the couch, giggling at something Mara couldn't see. Sitting at the kitchen table during breakfast, barely looking up long enough to shovel cereal into her mouth before her eyes drifted back down. Every single hour of every single fucking day, Jules was texting someone. Most likely TC but Mara couldn't tell, but Mara suspect otherwise.
-x-
Jules-watching had been Mara's favorite hobby since she was old enough to have hobbies.
She didn't think of it as creepy. It wasn't stalking — Jules was her sister. Sisters watched each other. Sisters paid attention. Sisters noticed things. That was just how it worked.
Besides, Jules was fascinating. Jules was the most interesting person Mara had ever met, and Mara had met a lot of people. None of them came close.
The habit had started when they were kids, back when lived in the old house, before the divorce, before everything got complicated. Mara would lie in her bed at night and watch Jules sleep — the way her chest rose and fell, the way her face relaxed into something soft and unguarded, the way she sometimes mumbled things in her dreams that Mara could never quite make out.
It evolved from there.
When Jules started dating, Mara followed her. Not every time — she wasn't obsessive — but enough to know who Jules was seeing, where they went, what they did. She'd trail at a distance, keeping to shadows and side streets, watching Jules laugh at someone's jokes or lean in for a kiss or walk hand-in-hand through a park like something out of a movie.
She wasn't jealous. That wasn't it. She just... needed to know. Needed to see Jules being happy, being herself, being Jules. It was like checking that the sun was still in the sky. Reassurance that the world was working the way it was supposed to.
When Jules started using the dating apps, Mara figured it out within a week. Followed her to a motel once, watched from across the street as Jules disappeared inside with some guy whose face Mara memorized just in case. Waited in the parking lot for two hours until Jules came out again, looking satisfied and slightly disheveled, and then biked home fast enough to beat her there.
Jules never knew. Jules never suspected.
At school, Mara had Jules's schedule memorized. Knew which hallways she walked, which bathrooms she used, which corner of the cafeteria she claimed with her friends. She'd position herself in spots where she could see Jules without being seen — leaning against a locker, sitting on a bench with a book she wasn't reading, blending into the crowd of bodies moving between classes.
She watched Jules do art. That was maybe her favorite. The way Jules's whole body changed when she was creating something — shoulders dropping, breathing slowing, everything else fading away until it was just Jules and the canvas and whatever was pouring out of her brain through her hands. Mara could watch that for hours. Had watched it for hours, sometimes, lurking in doorways or peering through windows.
She watched Jules do makeup. The careful precision of it, the way Jules's tongue would poke out slightly when she was concentrating on a difficult line, the transformation from bare-faced to art piece happening in real time. Jules in front of a mirror was Jules at her most focused, most intentional, most herself.
She watched Jules with friends. The way Jules laughed differently around different people — louder with some, softer with others, that particular giggle she only did when she was genuinely surprised by something funny. The way Jules touched people when she talked to them, casual and warm, like physical affection was just another language she was fluent in.
Mara watched it all. Catalogued it. Filed it away in the part of her brain labeled JULES in all caps, the section that took up more space than everything else combined.
It wasn't creepy. It was just love.
Obsessive, all-consuming, slightly-unhinged love, maybe. But still love.
-x-
So when Jules spent three days glued to her phone, texting TC with a frequency that bordered on manic, Mara noticed.
She noticed from her side of the room, where she sat at her computer pretending to focus on her game while her eyes kept drifting to Jules's bed.
She noticed from her chair in the living room, where she'd positioned herself with a book she wasn't reading, watching Jules sprawl across the couch and giggle at her screen.
She noticed from the kitchen table, from the hallway, from every angle she could manage without being obvious about it.
What the hell were they talking about?
Jules's thumbs moved constantly. Her face cycled through emotions — amusement, concentration, something soft and private that Mara couldn't quite name. She'd smile at her phone in a way she didn't smile at anything else. She'd hug her phone to her chest sometimes, like whatever was on the screen was something precious.
It was driving Mara insane.
TC was funny, sure. TC was Jules's best friend. But this was different. This wasn't just casual texting between friends. Jules was glowing. Giggling at nothing. Biting her lip at her screen like whatever she was reading was too good to handle.
Was TC confessing something? Were they finally admitting feelings that had been simmering under the surface for years? Mara had always suspected there was something there — the way TC looked at Jules sometimes, the way Jules leaned into TC's space like gravity pulled her there.
Or maybe it wasn't romantic at all. Maybe TC was just being extra supportive about the move. Sending memes. Being a good friend. Maybe Mara was reading too much into it.
But that smile. That was on Jules' face — soft and secret and lit up from the inside.
She didn't ask. Asking would mean admitting she'd been watching, and more importantly, it would mean giving Jules the opportunity to lie or deflect or shut her out. Better to observe. Better to wait. Better to figure it out on her own, the way she always did.
Eventually, she got bored. Which was unprecedented — she'd never gotten bored of Jules-watching in her entire life. But there was only so many times you could watch your sister beam at her phone without knowing why before it stopped being interesting and started being maddening.
She turned back to her computer. Cracked her knuckles. Logged into League.
If Jules wanted to have secret conversations that made her glow like a fucking Christmas tree, fine. Mara had ranked games to win.
-x-
Day 1 of Grounding
Mara was Gold III when the grounding started. Respectable. Not embarrassing. The kind of rank that said I know what I'm doing without screaming I have no life.
She queued up for ranked, locked in her main, and proceeded to carry her team so hard they probably thought she was smurfing. 15/2/8. Enemy team surrendered at 22 minutes.
Day 2 of Grounding
Gold II. Then Gold I. Then promos.
She won the first promo game by split-pushing while her team took Baron, backdooring the enemy Nexus while they were distracted. The all-chat went insane. Someone called her a god. Someone else called her a hacker. She typed "gg ez" and moved on to the next game.
Lost the second promo to a feeding bot lane. Unfortunate but predictable. You couldn't carry every game, no matter how good you were.
Won the third. Plat IV.
Day 3 of Grounding
Plat IV to Plat II in a single day. A seven-game win streak that felt less like luck and more like inevitability. Her mechanics were clean, her macro was cleaner, and every game felt like she was operating on a different level than everyone else in the lobby.
Her teammates kept asking if she was a smurf. She just typed "no" and kept playing.
By the time the grounding was officially over, she'd climbed from Gold III to Plat II. Three days. That was either impressive or deeply concerning, depending on how you looked at it.
Mara chose to see it as impressive.
-x-
5:00 PM — Freedom
Jules had been doing a countdown for the last hour. Literally counting down, out loud, like a NASA launch sequence.
"Thirty minutes."
"Twenty minutes."
"Ten minutes."
"Five minutes."
"One minute."
"Thirty seconds."
Mara kept her eyes on her screen, but she wasn't really paying attention to the game anymore. She was watching Jules in her peripheral vision, tracking the way her sister's energy shifted as the clock ticked closer to freedom.
"Ten seconds. Nine. Eight. Seven—"
"You know you don't have to do this out loud, right?"
"Six. Five. Four. Three. Two. ONE."
Jules was out of her chair before the word finished leaving her mouth. She grabbed her bag, shoved her phone in her pocket, and practically sprinted for the door.
Mara didn't hesitate. She alt-F4'd out of the game — sorry to her teammates, they'd probably lose, didn't care — and followed.
"HEY." David's voice echoed from the kitchen. "BE BACK BY TEN."
Mara paused at the front door, turned to look at him, and laughed directly in his face.
"That's adorable," she said. "You're adorable. You actually think we're going to be back by ten."
"Mara—"
"We'll be back when we're back, David. Don't wait up."
She was out the door before he could respond, jogging to catch up with Jules.
"Hey!" She fell into step beside her sister. "Can I come?"
Jules didn't answer immediately. Just kept walking, her face unreadable.
The silence stretched. One second. Two seconds. Three.
Mara felt something uncomfortable twist in her chest. It wasn't anxiety, exactly — she didn't really do anxiety — but it was close. The possibility that Jules might say no. That Jules might not want her there. That Jules had somewhere to be and someone to see and Mara wasn't part of it.
Four seconds. Five.
"Jules—"
"Yeah, fine."
The tension released so fast Mara almost stumbled. "Cool. Great. Where are we going?"
"TC's picking us up."
They walked to the intersection near their house — the one with the busted traffic light that had been blinking yellow for six months because the city couldn't be bothered to fix it. Mara checked her phone. 5:02.
At 5:04, exactly two minutes later, a car pulled up to the curb. Clockwork.
TC climbed out of the driver's side, all long limbs and easy confidence. They were dressed in their usual style — something Mara could never quite categorize, part skater, part art student, part something else entirely. Their hair was different than the last time Mara had seen them, shorter on one side, and they had a new piercing in their eyebrow.
"Jules!" TC crossed the distance in three long strides and pulled Jules into a hug — the kind of hug that lifted her off her feet, spun her around once, set her back down. Jules was laughing, her whole face lit up in a way Mara hadn't seen in days.
Then TC turned to Mara.
"Baby Vaughn!"
"Don't call me that—"
TC's hand came down on top of her head, ruffling her hair like she was a golden retriever. Mara swatted at them, but TC just laughed and did it again.
"You're like, one year older than Jules," Mara grumbled, trying to fix her hair. "You don't get to treat me like a child."
"And yet." TC ruffled her hair a third time, dodging her swat with practiced ease. "Here we are."
"I hate you."
"No you don't."
She didn't. That was the annoying part.
Jules was already climbing into the passenger seat. "Mara's coming with us," she called out.
TC raised an eyebrow at Mara. "Yeah? Decided to grace us with your presence?"
"Someone has to make sure you two don't do anything stupid."
"That's literally the opposite of what's going to happen."
"I know." Mara grinned. "That's why I'm coming."
She climbed into the back seat, settling in as TC got behind the wheel. The car smelled like air freshener and weed and something sweet she couldn't identify — probably whatever snacks TC kept stashed in the center console.
"Where are we going?" she asked.
TC and Jules exchanged a look in the rearview mirror. The kind of look that said should we tell her?
"It's a surprise," Jules said finally.
"I hate surprises."
"You'll like this one."
TC pulled away from the curb, and Mara watched the intersection shrink in the side mirror. The busted traffic light blinked yellow, yellow, yellow, growing smaller and smaller until it disappeared entirely.
She didn't know where they were going.
But Jules was here. Jules was happy. And for now, that was enough.
Mara settled back into her seat and watched the city slide past the window.
-x-
The car pulled up in front of a building Mara didn't recognize — low-slung, industrial, with blacked-out windows and a neon sign that read INK & IRON in aggressive red letters.
"A tattoo shop?" Mara leaned forward between the front seats. "We're getting tattoos?"
"Goodbye tattoos." TC killed the engine. "It's a thing."
"Is it though?"
"It is now." Jules was already climbing out of the car, her energy practically vibrating. "I told TC we were leaving, and they said we needed to commemorate it. So. Tattoos."
Mara looked at the building. Looked at Jules. Looked back at the building.
"I don't have a design picked out."
"Neither do I." Jules grinned at her. "That's part of the fun."
"That sounds like the opposite of fun. That sounds like a recipe for regret."
"Mara." Jules grabbed her hand, pulled her out of the car. "Live a little. Be spontaneous. Get a tattoo you'll either love forever or laugh about when you're forty."
"Hey I am the literal embodiment of spontaneousness, But what if I hate it?"
"Then you'll have a great story."
Mara let herself be dragged toward the entrance. She didn't have a real argument against this — she'd been wanting a tattoo for a while, actually, she just hadn't figured out what or where. But Jules was looking at her with that expression, the one that said come on, do this with me, be my sister, and Mara had never been able to say no to that face.
She'd never been able to say no to Jules about anything, really. She always folds like wet tissue
The inside of the shop was cleaner than she'd expected — exposed brick walls covered in flash art, leather chairs that looked recently sanitized, the buzz of machines coming from the back rooms. A guy with full sleeve tattoos and a septum piercing looked up from the front counter.
"TC! You brought friends."
"Farewell tattoos," TC said, slapping the counter. "These two bitches are leaving town. We need something to ensure they remember their roots."
"My specialty." The guy grinned. "I'm Marcus. What are we thinking?"
Jules already had ideas — of course she did, Jules always had ideas, her brain was a constant hurricane of creativity. She wanted something on her inner forearm, something small and delicate, something that would catch the light when she moved her hands.
Mara had nothing.
"What about you, little one?" Marcus turned to her.
"Don't call me little one."
"What about you, regular-sized one?"
"Better." She chewed her lip, thinking. "I don't know. Something... I don't know."
"Helpful."
"Shut up."
Jules nudged her shoulder. "Come on. There must be something. A symbol, a word, an image — something that means something to you."
Mara thought about it. Really thought about it.
What meant something to her? What was the thing she'd want on her body forever, the thing she'd look at every day and feel something about?
The answer was obvious. The answer had always been obvious.
"Can you do script?" she asked Marcus.
"I can do anything."
"I want a word. Small. Simple." She pointed to her ribcage, just below her left breast. "Here."
"What word?"
Mara glanced at Jules. Jules was watching her with curiosity, head tilted, waiting.
"Étoile," Mara said. "It's French. It means—"
"Star." Jules's voice was soft. "It means star."
"Yeah." Mara shrugged, trying to play it off as casual. "I just like the way it sounds."
She didn't mention that it was what she'd called Jules when they were little — her star, her bright thing, the point of light she oriented her whole world around. She didn't mention that she'd been saying it in her head for years, a private word for a private feeling.
Some things didn't need to be said out loud.
The tattoo hurt. Not as much as she'd expected — she'd braced for agony and got something closer to a persistent, irritating burn — but it still hurt. She lay on the chair with her shirt pulled up, breathing through her teeth while Marcus worked, and watched Jules in the chair beside her getting her own piece done.
An hour later, they both had fresh ink wrapped in plastic, instructions for aftercare, and matching grins.
"Okay," Mara admitted. "That was kind of fun."
"Told you."
"Don't be smug."
"I'm always smug. It's part of my charm."
-x-
TC drove them to Melrose — because of course they did, Melrose was the only acceptable place to shop if you wanted clothes that actually looked good and didn't cost a fortune. They parked in a lot that charged way too much and walked down the avenue, ducking in and out of stores that ranged from vintage to designer to that weird middle ground that Mara privately called "expensive but pretending not to be."
She knew what she was looking for. She'd known since they left the house.
Two weeks. It had been two goddamn weeks since she'd gotten laid — the longest dry spell she'd had since she started doing this. The grounding had been torture in more ways than one. Her body was practically vibrating with pent-up energy. She was fucking horny and mama needed the cure today.
She needed to get dicked down. Tonight. Preferably by someone hot, ideally by someone who knew what they were doing, and absolutely by someone who wasn't a fucking serial killer this time.
The dress she found was perfect.
It was black — because black was always the right choice — and it was short. Really short. The kind of short that made you reconsider your life choices every time you bent over. The fabric was some kind of stretchy material that hugged every curve, with a cutout that left her entire midriff bare and a neckline that dipped low enough to show off what little cleavage she had. The back was mostly straps, crisscrossing over her shoulder blades, leaving maximum skin exposed.
She tried it on in the fitting room and looked at herself in the mirror.
Her thighs looked incredible. Like, objectively. The dress hit right at the point where thigh met ass, showing off the muscle she'd built from all those gym sessions. Her stomach was flat and toned, the fresh tattoo peeking out from under the fabric. Her shoulders were bare, her collarbones sharp, her whole body on display like a fucking invitation.
She looked like sex. She looked like trouble. She looked like exactly what she was.
"I'm getting this," she announced, stepping out of the fitting room.
Jules looked up from the rack she was browsing. Her eyes went wide.
"Jesus, Mara."
"Good Jesus or bad Jesus?"
"That dress is... a lot."
"That's the point." Mara did a little spin. "I haven't been fucked in two weeks, Jules. Two weeks. Do you know what that does to a person? I'm losing my mind. I'm going feral. If I don't get some dick tonight I'm going to start biting people."
"Please don't bite people."
"Then let me buy this dress."
Jules sighed the sigh of a sister who had long ago accepted that she could not control Mara's choices. "Fine. But if you get arrested for public indecency, I'm not bailing you out."
"You absolutely would."
"...I absolutely would. But I'd complain about it."
"That's fair."
-x-
Eclipse Nightclub — 09:47 PM
The club was exactly what Mara needed — a neon-soaked den of debauchery, all flashing lights and thumping bass and bodies pressed together in the darkness. The kind of place where you could be anyone, do anything, disappear into the crowd and emerge three hours later sweaty and satisfied.
Eclipse was one of her favorites. She'd been to a lot of clubs — fake ID, good acting, general shamelessness — but this one had a specific energy she liked. Not too trashy, not too pretentious, just the right amount of chaos.
The bouncer at the door looked at her for a beat too long. His eyes traveled from her face down to the dress, lingered on the bare skin, came back up. Mara gave him her best coy smile — the one that said yes I'm young, no you can't prove it, yes I know exactly what I'm doing.
He let them in with the characteristic blank expression of bouncers everywhere. Professional. Unbothered. Probably underpaid.
Inside, the music hit her like a physical force. Bass she could feel in her chest, lights strobing across the dance floor, the smell of sweat and alcohol and perfume mixing into something almost intoxicating.
"Call me if you're leaving," Jules said, leaning close to be heard over the music. "I mean it. Don't just disappear."
Mara nodded. "Same to you."
"I'm serious, Mara."
"I know. I'll text you."
Jules squeezed her arm once and then disappeared into the crowd with TC, the two of them heading toward the bar like magnets finding their poles.
Mara turned toward the bar herself — a drink would be nice, something to loosen her up, take the edge off — and then stopped.
Fuck.
She didn't have her fake ID. She'd left it at home, in her other bag, because she'd been in such a rush to follow Jules that she hadn't thought to grab it.
She tried anyway, because you never knew, but the bartender took one look at her and shook his head.
"ID?"
"I, um. Left it at home."
"Then no drink."
"But—"
"No ID, no drink. Sorry, kid."
Mara slunk away from the bar, defeated. Jules appeared beside her a moment later, two drinks in hand, and took one look at Mara's face before bursting into laughter.
"Oh my god. You forgot your ID didn't you?."
"Shut up."
"You forgot your fake ID." Jules took a long, exaggerated sip of her drink. "Mmm. This is so good. So refreshing. Really hits the spot."
"I hate you."
"No you don't." Jules took another sip, making a show of enjoying it. "Mmmmm."
"You're the worst sister."
"And yet you love me."
Mara pouted. Actually pouted, lower lip jutting out, the whole thing. Jules just laughed harder and wandered back toward the dance floor, leaving Mara standing there like an idiot.
Fine. She didn't need alcohol. She had other ways to have fun.
-x-
The dance floor was a sea of bodies, packed tight enough that you couldn't move without touching someone. Mara waded in, letting the crowd absorb her, the bass pounding through her bones like a second heartbeat.
She found a group of girls near the center — her age, maybe a little older, all dressed to kill and grinding against each other with the intimacy of people who'd been doing this for hours. They welcomed her into their orbit without question, one of them grabbing her hips and pulling her close, and suddenly Mara was moving.
She knew how to dance. Of course she did — she was good at everything, and dancing was no exception. Her body found the rhythm automatically, hips rolling, arms raised, every movement fluid and controlled. She let the music take over, let herself become part of the mass of bodies, anonymous and free.
A guy appeared at her periphery. Cute — dark hair, nice jawline, tall enough that she had to look up to meet his eyes. He was watching her with obvious interest.
Mara smiled at him. An invitation.
He took it.
They danced together for a while, his hands on her hips, her back against his chest, bodies moving in sync. He was a good dancer — not great, but good enough that she didn't have to do all the work. His breath was warm on her neck, his grip firm but not aggressive.
"I'm Daniel," he said, lips brushing her ear.
"Mara."
"You're really fucking hot, Mara."
"I know."
He laughed. Good — he could handle honesty. She hated guys who got weird when you agreed with their compliments.
She turned in his arms, faced him, let her hands rest on his shoulders. Leaned up on her toes to bring her lips close to his ear.
"Want to get out of here?"
"Fuck yes."
She grabbed his hand and pulled him through the crowd, weaving between bodies until they reached the bathrooms. The women's room had a line; the men's room didn't. She dragged him into the men's, ignoring the startled looks from the two guys at the urinals, and pulled him into the last stall.
The lock clicked. The music thumped through the walls, muffled but still present.
Mara pulled him down into a kiss — deep, aggressive, tongues and teeth and two weeks of pent-up frustration pouring out of her. He responded in kind, hands finding her waist, her hips, her ass.
They made out for a solid minute, the kind of kissing that was basically foreplay, before Mara pulled back.
"Pants off."
Daniel blinked at her. "What?"
"Your pants. Take them off."
He stared at her for a second, clearly startled by her directness. Most guys expected more buildup, more negotiation, more pretense. Mara didn't have time for that shit.
"I— okay." He fumbled with his belt, hands shaking slightly, and pushed his jeans down.
Mara looked.
Thank fuck. Not short-dicked. Not huge either, but definitely workable. Above average, if she had to guess. She'd been with worse.
"Condom?" she asked.
He fumbled and produced one from his wallet — prepared, good — and she took it from him, tore the wrapper with her teeth, and rolled it on with practiced efficiency.
"Okay." She turned, braced her hands against the stall wall, and looked at him over her shoulder. "Let's go."
What followed was exactly what she needed — fast, hard, the kind of desperate fucking that came from two people who didn't care about anything except getting off. Daniel had decent rhythm and enough stamina to actually make it worthwhile, which put him ahead of like eighty percent of the guys she'd been with.
She came once, then again when he reached around and actually knew where to find her clit — miracle of miracles, a guy who understood basic anatomy — and then he finished with a grunt and a shudder and they both stood there for a moment, panting.
"That was—" Daniel started.
"Fun," Mara finished. She was already pulling her dress back down, smoothing her hair, checking her reflection in her phone camera. "Thanks."
"Can I get your number?"
"No."
"Oh." He looked disappointed but not surprised. "Okay. Fair enough."
"Nothing personal. I just don't do that."
"Yeah, no, I get it."
She unlocked the stall, stepped out, washed her hands at the sink while ignoring the scandalized look from a guy who'd just walked in, and left the bathroom without looking back.
The restlessness was gone. The edge was off. She felt loose and satisfied and ready to actually enjoy the rest of the night.
-x-
12:00 AM — Leaving
She found Jules and TC near the bar, both of them looking pleasantly buzzed. Jules's eyes were slightly glassy, her movements a little slower than usual, her laugh a little louder.
"There you are!" Jules grabbed her arm. "Where did you go? You were gone for like an hour."
"Got laid."
"Oh my god."
"His name was Daniel. Nice dick. Knew where the clit was. Seven out of ten, would fuck again."
"I don't need the details—"
"He had this thing where he—"
"MARA."
"What? You asked where I was."
TC was laughing, shaking their head. "You two are insane."
"She's the insane one," Jules protested. "I'm normal."
"You're drunk."
"I'm mildly drunk. There's a difference."
They piled into TC's car — TC was relatively sober— and pulled out of the parking lot. The city slid past the windows, all neon and shadows, the late-night streets mostly empty.
Jules leaned against Mara in the back seat, her head on Mara's shoulder. "Tell me about Daniel."
"I already told you. Nice dick. Knew where the clit was."
"More details."
"He was like, six inches? Maybe six and a half? Decent girth. Good rhythm. Didn't finish in thirty seconds, which automatically puts him in the top tier."
"That's a low bar."
"You'd be surprised how many guys can't clear it."
Jules giggled, the alcohol making her looser than usual. "I can't believe you fucked a stranger in a club bathroom."
"I can't believe you're surprised. This is extremely on-brand for me." Mara paused. "And you too."
"Shut up. I don't fuck people without getting to know them."
Mara gave her a flat look. "The motels," she intoned.
Jules opened her mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
"...True."
"How was your night? Did you and TC do anything fun?"
"Danced. Drank. TC made out with like three different people."
"At the same time?"
"Sequentially."
"Impressive."
"They have range."
TC glanced at them in the rearview mirror. "I can hear you, you know."
"Good," Jules said. "We're complimenting you."
"Carry on then."
-x-
12:30 AM — Home
David had left the porch light on. He'd also left a note on the kitchen counter: We're talking about this tomorrow. Go to bed.
"He's so dramatic," Mara said, crumpling the note and tossing it in the trash.
"You told him we wouldn't be back by ten. To his face."
"And I was right. We came back at 12:30. I'm a woman of my word."
They trudged upstairs, exhaustion finally catching up. The night had been long — tattoos, shopping, club, bathroom sex with a stranger named Daniel — and Mara's body was ready to collapse.
They changed into pajamas in comfortable silence, moving around their shared room with the ease of two people who had done this a thousand times. Jules's makeup came off with wipes that smelled like cucumber. Mara's dress got tossed into the laundry pile. They both flopped onto their respective beds at almost the same moment.
"Hey," Jules said, voice muffled by her pillow.
"Yeah?"
"I'm glad you came tonight."
Something warm spread through Mara's chest. "Yeah. Me too."
"Even if you did traumatize me with dick details."
"That's what sisters are for."
Jules laughed, soft and tired. "Night, Mara."
"Night, Jules."
The lights went off. The darkness settled. And somewhere in the space between waking and sleep, Mara thought about the word inked into her skin — étoile, star, Jules — and smiled.