Just a Bit from a Larger Project

Author’s Note: I am a bit leery of posting too much of a novel in progress, and I’m not sure I’d want to risk giving much of anything away in it (I do write a lot of mysteries, after all.) I just thought it might be of interest for people to see something out of one of my current larger projects. That was my original intent for the Kabobble’s Choice section, though I think the snippets work better for it.

This one has a lot of back story that’s being told back-and-forth with the current events part of it, and I stole a bit of the past to share. This is just a small disagreement between siblings when one of them is being a bit stubborn in an attempt to be noble.


He swallowed, choking down things he might have said. “It doesn’t matter what I want. It never has. Not with Dad. Not now. It’s not about bad memories. If it was just memories, this would be easy. She’d have won me over months ago.”

His sister reached up, placing her hands on his face. “You were won over months ago. You’re just too stubborn to admit it. I know you. I knew the first time I saw you on television with her that you’d already fallen. There’s this interview where they were ignoring you the entire time, and she’s talking all animated and happy about some project, and then the camera caught you, and you were watching her with this smile that betrayed everything you felt for her. It wasn’t polite, it wasn’t faked for the camera. You were caught up in her, and you have been for a long time. I don’t know why you keep fighting it.”

“I can’t do this to her. I can’t burden her with what I am.”

“You’re not. She wants to be with you. She doesn’t see it as a burden, and if she chooses it, who the hell are you to say she’s wrong to want it? You can’t tell someone else how to feel. That’s not the way it works. You can’t snap your fingers and make them feel one way or another. That’s not possible. You can’t stop her from loving you, and you can’t stop yourself from loving her. If you can’t change that, and you’re free to be together, why are you holding back? Because you’re a stubborn idiot?”

“Maybe.”

His sister rolled her eyes. “Can we skip to the part where you’re not already? I think we should.”

He almost laughed at that. He didn’t know how to skip over any of it. He couldn’t gloss over it like it was nothing. “You don’t even like her stuff. Why are you on her side?”

“Oh, she’s not that bad. It’s the crap she’s given to act that’s bad. I bet she’d be good at deeper stuff, but they give her nothing to work with.”

“She says she’s a spy.”

“I think I could believe that.”

“You’re as crazy as she is.”

“And you won’t win against the both of us. You know this. Accept it. The women always win in situations like this. You can either accept it with some dignity or be forced to make some embarrassing apology and grand romantic gesture to win her back. Do you really want to be humiliated?”

He glared at her. “I already have been, thank you.”

“So why make it worse?”

He let out a breath. “So I either agree to this insanity, or you find some way of humiliating me?”

“Pretty much.”

“I hate you so much, little sister.”

“That’s okay. I love you, big brother.”