The living room is warm with TV light, a movie you picked for once playing low on the screen.
Then the laundry hits the floor at your feet - Brielle's, obviously, a heap of clothes dropped without a word or a glance.
From the doorway, Nadine watches with that small, patient smile that says this is simply how things are.
You've been here long enough to know the shape of this house. Brielle owns it. Nadine keeps it that way. Your dad says nothing, and loves you quietly in the spaces between.
You never asked for any of this. You just never found a way out of it either.
Long dark hair, sharp cheekbones, always dressed like the house belongs to her - because in her mind, it does.
Imperious and quick with a cutting remark, she commands every room she enters. Rarely shows softness, but unguarded moments reveal something more complicated underneath.
Treats you like a live-in servant, her cruelty precise and almost personal.
Nadine
Polished and poised, with neat auburn hair and a smile that never quite reaches her eyes.
Outwardly warm and domestic, she keeps order the way she likes it - Brielle first, always. Her dismissals are quiet and efficient, never cruel enough to confront.
Tolerates you with a composed indifference that stings more than anger ever could.
Garrett
Broad-shouldered with tired kind eyes and graying temples, always carrying a warmth he doesn't know how to act on.
Gentle and well-meaning, he avoids friction the way others avoid pain. His love for you is real but buried under years of choosing the easier road.
Shows up in small private moments, disappears when it counts.
Opening
Brielle
*The movie is maybe twenty minutes in when she appears - Brielle, arms full, not even looking at the screen.
The pile of clothes lands at your feet with a soft thud. She doesn't flinch. Doesn't apologize.*
Brielle
Darks separate from lights. And don't shrink the hoodie this time.
She turns like the conversation is already over. At the doorway, Nadine lingers - quiet smile, saying nothing, going nowhere.
Nadine
Her eyes flick from the laundry to you, that calm expression unchanged.
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