Finally, finally, finally you had discovered a workable compromise.

Or at least, you hoped it was workable. You thought it would be, anyway. It had to be, right? This made sense, didn’t it? They were going to agree, weren’t they?

Sweat pooled in your palms and under your arms, making your sweater stick uncomfortably. You let go of the wrinkled sleeves and shook your hands out, then wiped them on your jeans.

This was going to work.

Knocking on his door sounded like the tolling of your own death bells. Or something. It was ominous, okay? Your tiny knuckles made a surprisingly deep sound on the flimsy wood.

There was the muffled sound of a grumbling voice, then a shuffle and a thud, like he was just now rolling out of bed. A spike of panic pierced through your heart. Had you woken him up? Was he going to yell at you? You shrank into your sweaty sweater and willed yourself not to run away and hide. Your feet stayed rooted only with the knowledge that waking him up for a ding dong ditch instead of a legitimate reason would probably make him angrier. So you huddled into yourself and felt each of his shuffling steps towards the door as a flip of your stomach.

Then the door was yanked open and there he was. Taller than you by nearly a foot, even if you were actually a year older. Dark, coiled hair and round features made his face almost cherubic, were it not for the thick eyebrows constantly down-turned in a scowl. Big brown eyes under those brows were a reflection of your own even when everything else, even skin tone, was completely different. Those eyes were the only indication that the two of you were siblings, even if only by half. Even if you hadn’t known he existed until a few months ago.

“What?” Ezekiel-call-me-Zeke-or-suffer-the-consequences growled at me through the crack of door he’d pulled open. I couldn’t see much of his room through that inch of clearance, but knew from prior glimpses that it would be a disaster zone. Clothes scattered, walls full of holes from stray punches or kicks, mattress punctured and the hole clumsily sewn back together to keep stuffing from spilling out. Ripped and tattered bits of things all over the place.

“You like to break things.” I burst out in a single exhale, and then squeaked when I realized I’d started talking. Zeke looked like he was weighing the pros and cons of punching me. “I know something you can break!” I forced the rest out before my throat could close up.

Zeke actually looked baffled.

“…what?” he asked, his scowl angling slightly into more of a confused then angry (but still scowl-y) expression. I took a deep breath, prepared to calmly and concisely explain the situation.

“I know you like to break things and I don’t know why but that’s okay because there’s stuff I don’t want to tell people either and I know that sometimes the stuff we don’t want to talk about is actually the most important so I thought that maybe you actually need stuff to break and there’s just not enough stuff and that’s why you break my things sometimes too and h-hit me that time; but I like to build things so I thought maybe I could build you some stuff to break and then you could just break that stuff and when it’s all broken I can just build or find you some more stuff to break and anyway there’s a thing I want to show you so come with me please?”

There. That was totally concise, right? …Concise did mean to explain everything as quickly as possible, right? I was pretty sure I hadn’t taken a single breath through all of that, and I’d talked as quickly as I could. So that was good, right? People talked about concise like it was a good thing.

Zeke looked at me like he wanted to punch me. I flinched back in preparation. He’d only hit me once before, and I was pretty sure it had been sort-of an accident. He’d been avoiding me since then, anyway, so I didn’t think he’d meant to, and I thought he probably didn’t want to again, but I’d come and bothered him on my own this time so maybe I’d triggered some kind of “free hit” rule or something… oh no…

“You made me something?” he asked, his growly voice almost softening. Hm. Maybe he didn’t want to punch me. Maybe that was just his face.

“Yeah! I can show you, if you want?” I pulled my head a little bit out of my shoulders, like a turtle (hah, I was totally a turtle-person; not a ninja though, unfortunately. And not a teen yet, think god. I was probably a mutant, though, and I was definitely a turtle.)

“… Sure.” Zeke said, and then slammed his door shut.

I was not sure what I was supposed to do with that. He’d said yes, so that meant he was going to let me show him, but then he shut the door? Did he expect me to bring it to him? That would be… hard. Really hard. Probably not possible, actually. I doubted it would fit in the house.

Then his door yanked open again and I realized he’d just been getting dressed. He glared at me, scowl-y expression still completely unreadable. But I tried anyway and decided he looked like he was waiting for me to get a move on. Impatiently. I squeaked and darted for the stairs. Zeke followed with stomping steps that seemed to shake the whole house and may have actually knocked some pictures off-balance. Geez. Big nine-year-old.

“It’s this way!” I called, hopping over half the steps to land on the carpet with my knees bent and my palms braced for impact. “The back door!” I shouted, skidding down the hall to wait by the door in question. Zeke followed slower than I would have liked, but maybe it was good he wasn’t going as fast as I was. That would have felt too much like getting charged by a bull. I would lose all my nerve for sure if I felt like that was happening.

When he was in sight I pushed through the door and jogged halfway across the yard, then hopped from foot to foot nervously as Zeke kept to his own pace.

“In the woods!” I yelled. “This way, this way!” He growled a little like a dog when I started to run off again, but I decided I’d rather be scared and out of reach than scared and otherwise, so I kept darting ahead and waiting, then doing the same thing over again whenever he managed to catch up. Eventually I’d frustrated him enough that he was half-jogging himself, and I was reminded of that bull scenario I’d feared earlier.

Oh well.

We made our way around the garden, climbed the fence behind the barn and trudged through a corner of the pasture. I said “hi” to my favorite cow, Auntie Cruella (she was half black and half white, just like the Dalmatian’s lady!) as we passed. She kind of grunted at me, and I took it as a good sign. Then, we entered the woods.

“How much farther?” Zeke growled, yanking away from a bramble vine that had caught him and ripping his shirt in the process.

“Real close, promise!” I chirped, afraid that he’d leave before I could even show it to him. And I’d worked so hard on it… if he didn’t even see it, after all that… I shook the thought off. It wasn’t helpful, and Zeke was still following me. He’d see it and he’d love it. I hoped.

We really were close. As I had the thought, I hopped over the trickle of a stream that was the last landmark before the clearing, and then we were there.

Nerves jumping under my skin, sweater still a little sticky, I didn’t dare look as I thrust out one arm and stepped to the side,

“Presenting, The Cardboard Castle!” I announced, capitalizing each word in my head. “Made from all those boxes dad left in the barn, and lots of duct tape! Probably too much duct tape!” I’d used like three rolls. Definitely too much duct tape. The Cardboard Castle itself was pretty darn cool, actually. All I’d really done was tape a bunch of boxes together into a castle, and cut the bottoms or sides out of some of them to make tunnels. There were even four towers! It was great, really. I’d spent an hour just crawling around in it and playing like I was a dragon the day before.

Zeke stood next to me, and I shuffled my feet, trying to edge away without being too obvious. I was sweaty and gross; he probably didn’t want to get too close to me anyway. But he wasn’t saying anything about the castle. He was just staring; and he was still scowl-y. Maybe a little less scowl-y? But still scowl-y. Maybe he didn’t love it. I wilted, and then stammered, desperate to explain and maybe salvage something of the situation.

“It-uh-um, it’s for you, to break.” I winced, wondering if I sounded as stupid to him as I did to me. Probably. ” I just thought- maybe you- I mean- oh…” I gave up and buried my face in my sweater sleeves, trying not to cry. I’d tried so hard, but maybe it wasn’t enough. Maybe Zeke really couldn’t be happy here. Probably he would actually be happier in the city, like he kept shouting. Maybe he’d never want me as his sister. It was hard not to flinch at the thought. I’d just been so happy when they told me I had a brother. I guess he really hadn’t felt the same.

“…for me?” Zeke’s voice was weird. I peeked out of my sleeves, and saw his face less scowl-y then I’d ever seen it, staring at the castle in… wonder? Then he glanced at me and back to the castle again, and I choked. He looked so confused and almost happy.

Maybe… there was hope after all.

“Yeah!” I chirped, wincing at my own volume. “To break! Go crazy!” I grinned, throwing my arm out at the castle again.

“You… want me to break it?” Zeke looked at me like I was crazy. Fair enough.

“Absolutely! OH, I even got you a bat!” I remembered, diving for the tree on the other side of the clearing and bringing back the dented metal thing that I’d filched from the barn along with the cardboard and duct tape. The black tape around the handle had peeled off, so I’d wrapped it in yet more duct tape. Honestly, by the end of that third roll, I’d been considering wrapping myself in duct tape. I may have gone a little duct tape crazy (as my ninja-wrapped pants can tell you).

Zeke’s hand closed hesitantly around the silver-wrapped handle, his scowl still more confused than angry, and I dared to hope. Then his scowl deepened, and he stared up at me, eyes more intense than I’d ever seen on anybody.

“You’re sure?” he asked, growly voice quiet and something close to soft.

I grinned, almost vibrating in excitement, and in lieu of an answer, simply stepped aside and gestured at the castle again. Zeke smiled. It was kind of a scary smile, and still scowl-y, somehow, but it was a smile all the same.

Then he went to town. He screamed and yelled and growled and even yelled curse words that I was sure mom would wash his mouth out for if she heard, but he was still smiling a little through it all as he bashed The Cardboard Castle to smithereens. I sat down, kept grinning, and made sure to memorize the curse words.

Near the end of it the castle was unrecognizable. Zeke had abandoned the bat in favor of sitting down and methodically ripping each piece into even smaller pieces. I had long since abandoned watching in favor of tree-climbing, and was nearing the top of the biggest tree around the clearing when one word from a growly voice caught my attention.

“Tami?”

That was my name. My heart just about stopped. He knew my name! I thought he hadn’t even bothered to learn it, cause he only ever called me “hey you” or “go away” or “loudmouth” or a word that mom actually had made him wash his mouth out for and that I wasn’t allowed to repeat and kind of didn’t want to anyway.

I scrambled down the tree so fast I could swear I turned into an actual squirrel for a second, like dad was always saying I’d do some day. Maybe that day was today. It seemed like a day for impossible things.

“Yeah?” I asked, breathless as I hopped down a few feet from him. He looked at me a little startled, like he hadn’t realized I’d been up there. Then he shook the actual expression off his face and went back to scowl-y-town. I decided I should surprise him more often if that was what it took to get expressions on his face.

He glared at the ground, then glared up at me, just as intense as he’d been when he asked if I was sure he could destroy the thing I’d built specifically for him to destroy. It was so intense it was almost uncomfortable, but I kept smiling, and only fidgeted a little bit.

“…thanks.” he said, and I grinned so wide my cheeks hurt. I held back from leaping at him in a hug, remembering how badly that had gone down the first time, and just vibrated a little instead.

“You’re welcome!” I screamed, putting all the energy I would have put into the hug into my voice instead. “I can make you another one anytime! Whenever you want to break stuff! Just ask me! I can do it! I can totally do it! Anytime, all the time, whenever!”

Zeke snorted a little as I shouted, and I gasped.

“Was that a laugh?” I squealed, too excited to keep the realization inside. Zeke stiffened up immediately, but I thought maybe it was an embarrassed kind of stiff instead of the I-will-punch-you kind. “It was a laugh, wasn’t it? That’s great!” I cheered, and suddenly realized I was hungry. “Do you want pop-tarts? I think dad bought pop-tarts when mom wasn’t looking. We have some in the pantry – two flavors, even! Come on!”

I started back to the house, and saw Zeke out of the corner of my eye as he slowly loosened up, glanced one more time back at the remains of The Cardboard Castle, and then followed me home.