Never Always Sometimes. Adi Alsaid

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СКАЧАТЬ wearing the same clothes she’d worn to school, shorts and a T-shirt with the logo of a bookstore in San Francisco. Her feet were bare, but she was holding a plastic bag through which Dave could see a pair of high heels and a few boxes.

      “You’re joking with the shoes, right?”

      “Hey, if I’m taking part in a cliché, I’m going all the way.” She entered the house, moving past him with a light touch to his ribs. “I can’t wait for that moment when all the other girls take their high heels off to go barefoot and they finally see what a genius I am for not wearing shoes in the first place.”

      “I don’t think that’s a high school thing,” Dave said, following her into the kitchen. “I think high heels are more of a grown-up cliché.”

      Julia plopped the bag down on the counter and scowled at him. “Don’t take this away from me, Dave. Tonight the universe vindicates my disdain for footwear.” She reached into the bag and took out cupcake mix, some eggs, and a container of rainbow sprinkles.

      “What’s all this?”

      “The dads said it’s rude to show up to a party empty-handed,” Julia said.

      “So we’re gonna bake the Kapoors cupcakes?”

      “If I’m being honest, I fully expect the two of us to eat most of these. But yes.”

      Dave picked up the cupcake mix and examined it, uncertain about how the gesture would be received by their classmates, but finally deciding that if he was going to get made fun of for being considerate, as confusing as that would be, it was something he could live with. “If we’re going to this party, I guess there may as well be sweets involved.”

      “Damn right,” Julia said, leaning over to preheat the oven.

      “You are the only two high school seniors in the world that would be baking on a Friday night.” Brett stood at the entrance to the kitchen for a second, shaking his head before going to the fridge and grabbing himself a beer. Dave wasn’t a small guy, six feet and an above-average build, but when Brett stood at his full height, Dave couldn’t help but feel small. Dave was almost a carbon copy of his dad, but in Brett, their mom’s features lived on: the sharp nose and lighter eyes.

      “For your information, Judgey McHigh Horse, we’re going to a Kapoor party tonight.” Julia opened a few cabinets until she found a mixing bowl.

      “You two?” He looked at Dave, who could only shrug. “I wish I could see that.”

      “I’m sure you would take any chance you got to hang out around high school girls again.”

      “With you over all the time, I don’t really have a choice, do I?” Brett took a swig from his beer. He’d just turned twenty-one, which was a huge relief for their dad, who’d been letting Brett drink for a while now. After their mom had died, Brett had helped take care of Dave, and in his dad’s eyes, that earned him the right to do anything he wanted. “So what’s with the baking?”

      “It’s rude to show up empty-handed,” Dave offered.

      Brett laughed.

      “Okay, then. Good luck with that.” He lingered by the fridge for a few minutes, finishing his beer. “How are there still Kapoor brothers going to that school? I thought the youngest one graduated the same year I did.”

      “The triplets are juniors,” Dave said, pouring sugar and cream into a mixing bowl for the frosting. “And I think there was an oops baby that’s in junior high now.”

      “I heard a rumor that the Kapoor parents only procreate because they’re building up an army,” Julia said. In the few minutes since they’d started working on the cupcakes, Julia had managed to get herself covered in cupcake mix. It coated her brown hair and the tip of her nose, and there was a smear of batter on her chin. Dave had to resist the urge to take a picture of her or call her adorable. “They’ve been planning to take over San Luis Obispo for generations.”

      “I could actually see that,” Brett said, tossing his beer into the recycling bin and grabbing another can, letting loose a burp that sounded less like a burp and more like a bass line. “Dad, you want a beer?” he called out into the living room, where their dad was likely watching college basketball. There was a grunt of a response, so Brett grabbed another one and set it on the counter next to him.

      “Don’t open that,” Dave said to Brett. “We need a ride to the party.”

      Brett popped open the new beer defiantly, sucking up the foam that hissed out. “You really need to get your license already. You’re eighteen.”

      “This is more of a situation where we intend to, as you and your brainless friends would call it, ‘get wasted,’ and less of a Dave-not-having-a-license thing,” Julia said. “I could have driven if I wanted to.”

      Brett shook his head. “You two are so codependent.”

      Dave blushed, but Julia kept on mixing cupcake batter without missing a beat. “It’s not codependence, it’s attachment,” she said.

      “Attached at the hip, maybe,” Brett said, drinking from his beer. “You should take it easy on the booze; you two probably share a liver. You won’t last an hour at that party.”

      Julia scowled at him, then clapped cupcake mix off her hands in front of his face. “Why the hell not?”

      Brett coughed, brushing the white cloud away from his face. “You’re too... I don’t know. Artsy.”

      Julia laughed. “I don’t paint, write, sculpt, or play any music. I don’t think you know what artsy means.”

      “I think he’s trying to call you intelligent, but in a derogatory way,” Dave said.

      “I mean that you go to parties ironically, barefoot, and you bring cupcakes.” He took another drink, mulling something over in his head. “You’re right, artsy was the wrong word. I should have said clueless. The Kapoor parties are legendary for being wild. I don’t think you know what you’re getting yourselves into.”

      “I’m sure the beer-pong tournament will be really intimidating,” Julia said, turning back to the cupcake batter. “You know, I had second thoughts of going before you came in. But now I’m sure it’ll be a blast. I can’t wait until I see that glimmer in someone’s eyes when they start thinking high school days are the glory days. Like the look in your eyes, Brett.”

      Brett looked around the kitchen, giving his derisive laugh that was more like a snort. Dave could tell he was trying to think of a comeback. After a while, Brett scowled, muttered something about cupcakes, and then went into the living room to rejoin their dad. Watching TV was their favorite thing to do. They did so silently, never acknowledging that it drew them together. Sometimes Dave felt like joining them, but it seemed to belong just to the two of them. Dave didn’t mind so much; he had his own silent way of feeling close to his dad: They cooked for each other, meals that Dave’s mom used to make for all of them.

      “You have to teach me how to do that. I never get the last word with him,” Dave said, dipping a finger into the frosting to taste it. There was something delightful about watching Julia move about the kitchen recklessly, a trail of batter and eggshells in her wake. The tiled floor was a mess when she was done with it, polka-dotted СКАЧАТЬ