The Price of Twinship

I shouldn’t have been so nervous about a date with someone I’d never see again. For the last half-hour I reminded myself over and over that this was a mission of justice. Vengeance. A chance I’d get only once in a lifetime.

Almost to the restaurant. My heart beat fast as the dashed white roadlines. Every breath was a chance to turn back.

Was this how Sly felt the night he stole the jet? He’d felt justified at the time, and I did too. I told myself the same thing I’d told him earlier that day when he asked who it was. It’s just one date. We’ll probably never see each other again.

I didn’t know much about Liam Hazely except he had blazing red hair, stunning white teeth, and the nerve to ask me out. That wasn’t surprising because he didn’t know who I was. The surprising part was that he was the very same bozo who, four years ago, had had the nerve to insult a recently-deceased family member and provoke my twin brother, then a fellow student at the Flight Academy, to challenge him to an illegal air race.

Last week he’d showed up in town during my shift at the Tavern. Sylvester had been there with me. “Get his order wrong,” he suggested, before he went and snuck out through the kitchen. Too subtle, and I wasn’t about to hurt my tip.

But tonight I was no longer in waitress mode. Tonight was the night to serve up a sizzling hot dish of revenge. My goal was to have a fantastic date and then rip off the band-aid right when it hurt most.

My name is Irene Cisco.

You almost killed my brother.

Prepare to die.

I didn’t really want to kill him, just sear him to the core of his being with shame and regret. Give him a taste of what my brother had felt for the last four years.

It wasn’t exactly Hazely’s fault the jet crashed.

Shut up. It was totally his fault.

The restaurant overlooked a river. The patio was crowned with lights, unsuspecting of my sinister plans. I touched up my lipstick. Deep red. I usually only wore trace amounts, but tonight called for war paint.

A red convertible with the top up growled into a nearby spot. Was that him? Well, I wouldn’t expect him to drive anything else.

I waited until Hazely was almost to the door of the restaurant and got out. Maybe I should have picked a different dress. Mom said this black one with white polka dots was pretty, but she said that about literally everything except my pixie haircut.

Hazely noticed me and turned at the door. He was tall, and wore a white polo with green stripes. His freckled face broke into a stunning white smile. “Hey! Irene!” He glanced at his expensive watch. “Well, this is unfashionable.”

“Uh, what?” I said.

“We’re both early.”

So he had a sense of humor. Interesting. I let him hold open the door. Was it too late to turn back? I shot one last wistful glance at the parking lot before the door swung shut behind us.

The patio was a fairyland of lights and overhanging tree branches. We were guided to a table right over the river, where Hazely pulled out a chair for me. We shuffled our way through some awkward small talk. My plan sort of depended on charming his socks off, and so far I was failing miserably.

Hazely leaned forward, and the breeze rustled his red hair. “Want to know a secret about me?”

You’re a class-A jerk? “Sure,” I said.

“I’m really bad at conversation.”

I laughed. “That makes two of us. What are you good at, then?” Besides bullying and mockery?

“I like tennis.”

“And racing jets?” I said.

He raised his eyebrows. “Oh, you know about that? Do you go to air shows?”

I glanced down at the river, looking for an excuse. “Not really. I saw you were a pilot, so I just assumed…”

“Good guess, though. So what do you do for fun?”

It didn’t seem likely that curling up by myself and reading mystery novels counted as fun. “I guess I’m not much of a fun person,” I admitted.

“Hey, neither am I,” said Hazely.

“But you play tennis and race jets,” I said.

Hazely shrugged. “Does doing fun things make me a fun person?” Our salads came. Hazely aimlessly mixed his around while I slowly decorated mine in dressing. The green leaves nicely offset the color of his hair. “Now tell me a secret about you,” he said.

There were too many. “Well, one time my twin brother and I promised we’d never keep secrets from each other.”

“Oh. Did you keep that promise?”

I hesitated. “I kept it a lot better than he did.” Why was I telling him this? I needed to change the subject. “I’ve never actually played tennis.”

“For real?” he said. “Do you want to learn?”

“Maybe.”

“I have my stuff in the car. We could play after this if you want.”

“Dressed like this?”

“Why not?”

I tugged at an earring. If I was going through all this trouble to get revenge, I may as well get a tennis lesson out of it. “Okay,” I said. “I know of a good park near here.”

He lit up. We made short work of dinner, excited, and I took a glance at the bill as we left the table.

Had I read that right? I’d thought he left a giant tip at the Tavern because he’d just asked me out, but it looked like he’d done the same thing here. He was probably just trying to impress me.

Liam Hazely led me to his car, once again holding the door open. He started it and cringed, then said over the engine, “Hand-me-down from my brother. It’s a little pretentious.”

I ran my hand over the black leather seat and shrugged. “It’s a nice car.”

The radio automatically turned on. Violins. I narrowed my eyes. “You like classical music?”

His face reddened under the freckles. He reached to turn it off. “I guess I was hoping it would make me smarter.”

I could use a few more brain cells, myself. I switched it back on and said, “How do you feel about Chopin?”

He gave an uncertain smile. “I don’t know about that one.”

“Neither do I, but I sounded smart saying it, right?”

Hazely chuckled and relaxed a little. “Top up or down?”

“Down.”

Hazely handed me his aviators and we were off. I’d never been in a convertible before, unless you count a wagon pulled by a tractor. The mid-spring sun still hovered high, breaking through the pink and white flowers rushing overhead.

Hazely grinned and yelled, “Good thing you have short hair!”

Wow, did he like it? Maybe I hadn't made a mistake in chopping it off. I couldn’t help but smile back as the wind whipped around us.

When we arrived at the park, I took off my shoes and crossed the tennis court with bare feet. Hazely rifled through his tennis bag and noticed the black heeled shoes sitting there. “Oh… I’m sorry, I didn’t think about…”

“What, are my toes that ugly?” I said.

“Not at all!” said Hazely. He gave me some pointers and in no time we were racing around the court.

“You’re quick on your feet,” said Hazely.

“I grew up with three brothers,” I said, laughing.

Why did he make me laugh so much? I was supposed to hate him, dang it. Maybe I could get revenge this way. Death by tennis balls.

“That’s the spirit!” cheered Hazely.

I never managed to hit him with a tennis ball. In the end, I helped him gather them all up and put the rackets away.

The fun was over. Time to let him down. Time to rip off the band-aid. I slipped my shoes back on. What was I waiting for? I had to tell him who I was, how much he’d hurt us.

“I didn’t bring anything to drink,” said Hazely. “What do you think… ice cream?”

I opened my mouth. I should say no. We’d already been out longer than I expected.

“Do you like ice cream?” he asked.

Silly question. “Well, yeah,” I said. “Do I like sunsets or bees?”

Screw the plan. If his parents were rich enough to pay off the Flight Academy, he had money to throw away on buying me ice cream.

A heartbeat—or many quick ones—later, there we were. He ordered mint in a waffle cone.

“It matches your shirt,” I said.

“Hey, it does,” he said. “That means you’re getting cookies and cream, right?”

“Nope.”

“Black cherry, then?”

I put my hand on my hip. “Please. The only flavor worth getting is coffee.”

“Coffee.” He pretended to look stunned. “At this hour?”

“It’s before five-o-clock somewhere,” I said.

The ice cream place was in town, and we found a bench along the sidewalk. I ate mine slowly. The weird thing was… I didn’t want this evening to end. I thought I’d be in a rush to get out of there. I thought I’d be faking my way into his heart, and instead he’d charmed his way into mine.

Liam. A nice name for… a jerk? A bully? Was this the real him? From the few things Sly told me I’d constructed this image of someone whose face begged desperately to be punched. Maybe four years ago, it had.

Maybe he’d changed.

Could he actually be a better person now? Shame on me for even wondering such a thing. This evening had been too romantic and I was losing my head. I was falling for him simply because he’d bothered to pay attention to me.

I had to stick this out. For my brother. For justice.

Liam’s orange brows knitted. “Are you okay?”

“I’m not used to having this much fun,” I said.

“Neither am I.”

“But you race jets.”

“That’s different.” He finished his ice cream. “What do you like to do? You didn’t answer my question. I have a feeling it’s not waiting tables.”

I licked the top of my cone. “Well, I like to read mysteries.”

It turned out he knew as much about those as he did Chopin. I quickly remedied that by telling him about my favorites.

Too soon we were headed back to the restaurant, back to my car.

Liam tried to open the door and failed. “I guess it would help if you unlocked it first,” he said.

Here I was at the last minute, still laughing. Still doubting what I’d set out to do. If he was a fake, I had to let him down as quickly as possible. If he was real, revenge seemed unbelievably cruel.

Alarms in my head warned impending destruction. Was this how Sly had felt when he fell from the sky?

Liam opened the car door and then stood there in front of it. He looked at me for a moment. I looked up at him, trying to solve the mystery of who he was.

“Do you mind…” he said. “Can we do this again sometime?”

I ran my fingers through my bangs. I didn’t have to tell him. There was a third option, saying no. Driving away unscathed. No revenge, no more secrets. Never seeing him again.

If I said yes, my one secret would turn into many, and they wouldn’t last. Liam would eventually find out my last name. Sylvester, Mom and Dad, and everyone else would discover who I’d been spending time with.

It’s just one more date.

What was I even getting into?

“Of course,” I said.

He flashed a wonderful smile.

I drove home, my heart fluttering with a strange mix of nerves and joy. I couldn’t wait to see Liam Hazely again. I’d failed.