He watched the same animated movies with her so many times that he could recite every line.
By the time we were seventeen, I had started imagining a future with Ben.
I never told him.
The thoughts lived only in private moments while I brushed my hair or lay awake at night.
I pictured Ben and me getting married.
Rosie living nearby.
The three of us remaining connected forever.
I believed he imagined something similar.
He lingered on our porch after saying goodbye.
He remembered every detail I told him.
Sometimes, when our eyes met, I felt certain there was something neither of us had said aloud.
Ben kept his childhood promise.
He took Rosie to prom.
He wore a dark suit and brought her a wrist corsage made of pink roses.
When she came down the stairs in a sparkling blue dress, he looked at her as if nobody else existed.
I told myself that expression was kindness.
Years later, I would feel ashamed of how determined I had been to reduce his love to charity.
When I was twenty-two, Ben knocked on our front door one Sunday afternoon.
A small velvet box rested in his palm.
My heart rose so quickly that I nearly became dizzy.
For one reckless second, I believed he had come for me.
“Can I speak to Rosie?” he asked.
I stared at him.
“Rosie?”
“Yes.”
He looked nervous.
More nervous than I had ever seen him.
I stepped aside without answering.
Rosie was in the backyard helping Mom with the tomato plants.
From the kitchen window, I watched Ben approach her.
He spoke for several minutes.
Then he lowered himself onto one knee.
Rosie’s hands flew to her mouth.
Ben opened the velvet box.
She nodded so hard that her curls bounced around her face.
When she threw her arms around him, he laughed and held her tightly.
I walked upstairs before anyone could see me cry.
That night, I pressed my face into my pillow and allowed terrible thoughts to fill my mind.
Ben could not possibly be attracted to Rosie.
He could not truly want a marriage with her.
Perhaps he pitied her.
Perhaps my parents had pressured him.
Perhaps he had chosen the sister who adored him because the one he truly wanted had never spoken.
Every thought made me hate myself a little more.
The next morning, I smiled and helped Rosie create a wedding inspiration board.
