Oh Brother

Nova just stared wide-eyed at her brother as her face turned red. Everything seemed to freeze as her brain tried to come up with a response. As she struggled Carter's smirk grew before he exclaimed, "What? Is little Nova nervous and shy about getting caught returning from her first date?" Her mouth opened instantly but he quickly stopped her by saying, "Nope. Don't try to deny it. That was your first date and, I believe," His smirk morphed into a suspicious look as he continued, "that this is the first time you have ever shown interest in a guy."

That statement took Nova back and her mouth dropped open. What he said was true, but how would he know that? She couldn't help but ask, possibly slightly defensively, "How would you know that?"

Carter chuckled, "Please, I may seem to not care little sis, but I do and I have been watching out for you. I couldn't ever figure it out though."

"Figure what out?" Nova questioned him as soon as she realized he wasn't going to continue.

"You." At her confused look, he continued explaining, "I could never quite figure out why you were trying to trick everyone into believing a big lie. Even mom and dad believe it. Man, even I believed it for a bit."

Nova looked uncertainly at him with a strange mixture of dread and hope. She moved over to a coach in the living room and he followed and sat on the other couch before she finally asked, "What lie specifically?"

His eyebrow instantly arched upward, "There is more than one?" Nova paled slightly before nodding, even though technically it was a compound of lies that have combined to form the lie of her identity but who wants to be technical? Her response caused him to sigh with a slight frown before telling her, "The one about the parties and the guys."

Nova's head tilted slightly to the side and she was about to open her mouth when she heard the sound of a car pulling in the drive. Maybe her brother had figured it out, but she wasn't ready to face her parents yet so she stood up and ran toward her room while waving her brother to follow.

Once the door shut behind them, Nova let out a small breath while Carter looked around her room. He had a slight frown before he moved over and sat in her desk chair. Nova quickly jumped onto her bed and sat crisscrossed before returning to the subject at hand, "Honestly, it just fit with the expectations. I didn't purposefully mean for those lies to start, they just did as everyone expected me to follow after Kelly."

Carter gave a short snort and declared, "You're nothing like Kelly. Even a blind person should be able to see that." Nova's head tilted as her brows furrowed before he explained, "She had drama coming out of her ears. She got in catfights over guys pretty much every week. Kelly also seemed to have her face constantly glued to her screen reading about the latest gossip which she would then spew out to all those around her. You, do none of that."

His observation caused her jaw to drop slightly as she tried to wrap her mind around the fact that someone had noticed. With a nod, she admitted, "Yeah, you're right I am nothing like her but, apparently, our whole school is both blind and deaf."

That caused him to laugh, an actual laugh, Nova wasn't even sure the last time she had heard him give that kind of laugh. It caused her to frown as she realized just how distant she had grown from her brother.

After a few moments of silence, Carter finally spoke up, "You know, when I heard of you going to your first-party I decided I wasn't gonna let my baby sis get into any trouble so I asked a guy who was going to the same party to watch you. He messaged me about 20 or 30 minutes in that he saw you leave the party. I did the same for the next few parties and they all either told me that they never saw you or that you disappeared pretty early in the night."

Nova's eyes widened and she asked, "Did any of them put together the dots?"

Carter smirked and told her, "No, I asked a different guy each time so none of them realized it was a reoccurring thing."

Nova nodded and they fell into a spell of silence again before Carter popped out the question, "So, what did you do when you left the parties?"

Before she could stop herself, her eyes glanced toward her computer which sat open a foot away from him. The currently open tab had her online biology class and he would see it if he woke it up. If Carter found that, she would never hear the end of it. So, her eyes snapped back to him and commented, "Ahh ya know, movies and sleep."

She had only glanced for a second, but the smirk on his face caused a knot to form in her belly. Then his eyes glanced over his shoulder sealed her fate. "Ahhhuh, sure," was all he commented before he turned around and clicked a random button bringing her computer to life.

Nova let out a groan and covered her face as she fell back onto the bed. She could just picture the smirk on Carter's face as he let out a triumphant laugh. The next thing she knew, a large weight had landed next to her before her brother's voice boomed too close to her ear, "So. Little Nova's a nerd?!"

She shot a warning glance at her brother as she said, "Don't you..."

But he cut her off immediately by saying, "I can't believe you're a nerd! My little baby sister is a nerd! Huh, go figure." She knew he wasn't going to stop so she just pushed him right off her bed, making him land with an "oof" before he popped right back up with a mischievous grin, "awww, is the little nerd embarrassed?"

Nova rolled her eyes, but when he moved around the bed with twitching fingers they quickly widened. Before she could get up to run, he had lunged forward and started to tickle her bringing a squealing laugh out of Nova. She quickly reached back and grabbed a pillow and hit him in the head. He stood up straight in shock before recovering and grabbed a pillow of his own. That was when a full-scale pillow fight broke out.