Brianna fixed me with the most withering glare a fifteen year-old girl can muster and crossed her arms beneath her breasts.

"You're a bully," she spat. "That was humiliating. What the hell is your problem?"

"You're grounded," I replied. "And I'm hungry. Are you going to come quietly or am I dragging you out of the mall? It's going to be one hell of a scene if I have to do that."

She came along willingly, but took my "quietly" more literally than I'd expected. A thick, charged silence hung in the air between us as we left the mall, climbed into my car, and began to head for home. The tightness in my chest had finally relaxed now that Brianna was safely back in my custody and her skeevy pal had been run off, but I was still hopping mad. I had a dozen questions to ask her and a dozen more lectures on the tip of my tongue, but I didn't trust myself to speak just yet. Bri didn't look any happier than I was, and I got even angrier that she seemed to be mad at me.

The only thing fighting with my anger at my bratty sister was my immediate need for food. It occurred to me that I might not be raging so much if I wasn't hungry, since I knew I wasn't the clearest thinker on low blood sugar. I knew I shouldn't spend the money on eating out when I had a can of cold soup waiting for me at home, but when we passed a Burger King, the idea of shoving a BK Broiler into my mouth immediately was too much for me. I pulled a U-turn at the next intersection and rolled slowly up to the drive-through menu. Setting aside my anger for a moment, I glanced at my sister.

"What do you want to eat, Bri?"

Silence. I sighed.

"Come on. You have to have some food."

More silence.

The speaker crackled. "Welcome to Burger King! What can I get for you?"

"Just a second!" I replied. "Bri... I'm not leaving here until you order something. Don't be rude. This is dinner."

We sat for a long moment until the speaker crackled again. "Sir? Are you still there?"

"Fries," Bri spat. "Small."

I rolled my eyes and ordered my BK Broiler meal, a small fry, and a ten-piece chicken finger basket with a medium Dr. Pepper, which was Bri's favorite BK order and exactly what she would have asked for if she wasn't being so petulant.

We rolled forward to the window, and I traded my credit card for a hot bag of food that smelled so delicious I wanted to rip into it then and there. I took my card back and fished a fry out, munching happily as I rolled the car toward an empty space, facing the road, and dropped it into park. The fry was almost too hot to eat, but I didn't care—I was dying!

Brianna remained silent, but she accepted the food I passed her and began to pick at the chicken fingers. I had to smile a little. The day Brianna passed up chicken fingers would be the day I knew something was seriously wrong with her.

I wolfed down my meal in less than two minutes and washed it back with a sip of Bri's Dr. Pepper.

"Hey!" she protested. "That's mine!"

I raised an eyebrow and smirked at her. "So you're talking to me now? I don't remember you ordering a Dr. Pepper."

She glared at me again. "Whatever. You ordered it for me. And we're still not talking. I'm mad at you for being such an asshole back at the arcade."

I felt a fresh spike of anger, but now that I'd been fed and I knew that Brianna was safe, it was tempered by a healthy dose of guilt. Maybe I had been a little over the top back there. I tossed my burger wrapped back into the bag, shoved it onto the floor, laced my fingers behind my head, and stretched my back out.

It was almost 8:00pm, and the headlights of cars on the dark road in front of us passed back and forth like pale ghosts streaking through the evening gloom. It reminded me of when Bri and I were younger, before the money got really tight, and I'd take her here all the time for midnight food runs. It had been almost a weekly ritual for us back then—sitting in the car, laughing and joking, shoveling fast food into our faces and talking about videogames while the radio blared in the background. It had been a necessary distraction at the time. Now I couldn't even remember the last time we'd done this. It seemed like we'd spent a lot more time fighting than laughing together lately.

While we sat in uncomfortable silence, Brianna finished her food, sipped her drink, and added her trash to the bag. Then she dropped her hands into her lap and stared out the passenger side window. I sighed and tapped lightly on the steering wheel as the guilt continued to build, trying to figure out what I could say to salvage the situation.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you back there," I finally mumbled. "I was just worried about you. You know how I get."

"You didn't really hurt me," she replied quietly, kicking at the bag on the floor. "And I know."

"Did you get my texts?"

She shrugged.

"If you got them, why didn't you respond? Why weren't you home when you were supposed to be?"

She shrugged again.

"I need to be able to trust you, Bri. I can't be around to watch you every minute of every day, and you still have to do what you're supposed to do."

Now she did glance at me, and there was a spark of fire in her eyes this time. "You don't need to watch me, Michael. I might not be an adult yet, but I'm not a child either. I'm fifteen. I shouldn't have to stick around the house like a latch-key kid just because you're working late."

"You're not stuck at home, but you're supposed to text me if you're leaving so I know who you're with and what you're doing."

"So if I told you I was going to the mall with Bradley you would have been okay with it?"

"That's not the point. You shouldn't be running around with some boy, anyway."

"He's not some boy. He's my boyfriend."

I shook my head in disbelief. "Bradley Harris? Bradley Harris is your boyfriend. Unbelievable."

Her lips thinned into a tightly compressed line and she folded her arms again.

"Do you know what my friends say about his brother? Do you know the shit Jason used to say about girls in the locker room?"

"Bradley isn't like his brother. He's sweet. And he likes me."

I snorted. "I'm sure he tells you that. You don't know the first thing about teenage boys, Bri."

"I might know more than you think," she replied, her eyes flashing.

My hands tightened on the steering wheel, and I glanced again at her too-tight jeans. Her tank-top was cut low, and now that I was looking more closely, she was definitely wearing make-up. A light sweat broke out across my skin as my mind started spinning on everything Bri might be doing with Bradley after school while I was stuck at the office. Brianna would always, always be a wide-eyed, innocent little five year-old girl in my mind, and she'd never shown any interest in boys before this year. But I couldn't deny that my little sister was starting grow up, and I didn't like it one bit.

I controlled my voice very carefully despite the strong surge of emotion behind my question. "What exactly do you mean by that?"

Sullen silence.

"You're grounded forever."

"Michael!"

"Forever."

"You're being ridiculous."

"Am I? You're not on birth control."

More silence.

"Wait. Are you on birth control?"

She turned bright red and stared out the window again. "We are so not talking about this."

"Uh, I'm pretty sure we are. What the fuck, Bri? Why the hell would you be on birth control? Where did you even get it?"

I was fuming. I had half a mind to turn the car around right now, drive back to the mall, and make damn sure Brad never talked to my little sister ever again. But before I could say anything else, Bri exploded at me.

"Jesus, Michael! It's a normal thing. Most of the girls in my class are on the pill. They go on dates, and they have boyfriends. And not that it's any of your business, but since I can see you're so freaking curious, no, I'm not having sex. I got the pill from my doctor for acne. I also get straight As, I don't drink or smoke, I don't stay out all night, and the reason I ignored your texts and had to sneak off to hang out with my boyfriend in the first place is because you're so freaking controlling that I knew you'd flip out and lose your shit if you knew I was with a guy. Turns out I was right! I just didn't think you'd come raging into the mall like a lunatic and embarrass me like you did anyway, but I guess I'm the dumb one for thinking I could have anything resembling a normal life."

She finished her tirade breathing hard, and I stared at her in stunned silence. The 'normal life' comment cut deep.

"I'm not controlling. It's called parenting."

"Yeah, well, you're not my dad."

That cut deeper.

I cleared my throat and stared straight ahead. "I know that, but I'm what you have. I'm doing the best I can, okay?"

"At least you got to have a normal childhood," she shot back. "It's not fair."

I swallowed the lump in my throat. "No, it's not."

I couldn't even be mad at her anymore, because I knew she was right. I hadn't been a wild teen by any measure—there was a lot more nerdy gaming in my teens than sex, drugs, and rock 'n roll—but it was true that I'd been more or less free to do what I wanted, hang out with my friends, and go to the occasional party at someone's house to get blasted. I'd even gotten high once or twice with Tommy McKinney behind the school. As long as I kept my own A-average rolling, my parents had been way too busy with Brianna to pay attention to a teenager who was only too happy to do his own thing. Those were pretty good years, and now I looked back on them as one of the best times of my life. My only regret was not spending more of that time with my parents while I had the chance.

Compared to the teenager I'd been, Brianna was a saint. She helped keep the house clean, did her share of the chores, got all her homework done without nagging, and I couldn't remember a time that she'd gotten into trouble at school. Part of the reason I'd freaked out so much tonight was because it was totally unlike her to vanish like she had, although lately she'd been pushing my buttons and being cagey with the texts a lot. Having a rebellious teenager on my hands was an adjustment for me, but I reminded myself that it was hardly unusual. Rebelling was what teens did. I probably should have been surprised that it took her so long.

If the only reason she hadn't texted was that she'd been afraid of how I would react... I sighed. Now I really felt like a jerk. This was all my own damn fault. It was true that I hated the idea of her hanging out with boys, especially a Harris brother, but I also wanted Bri to have as much normalcy in her fucked-up life as I could give her. My parents had always started by trusting me to do the right thing, and nine times out of ten I'd repayed that trust by making good decisions. I did trust my sister, even if I didn't trust Bradley, and it was probably time I eased up and paid back her good behavior with a longer leash. Anyway, a guy who played Soul Calibur II and hung out in arcades decades after they were cool couldn't be all bad, could he?

"You let him win," I said.

"Huh? What are you talking about?" Brianna blinked at me in confusion.

"Bradley. Soul Calibur II. Backing up to the edge of the ring like that? Missing your guard timing on a lazy cross-slice? That was too sloppy not to have been intentional."

She blushed again and dropped her gaze. "My friends say boys don't like it when you beat them at things."

"Well, if he's as good of a guy as you say he is, he ought to be secure enough to handle a loss to a better opponent, even if she's a girl. Next time, don't go so easy on him."

"Next time?" She peeked up at me, her sullen slouch suddenly straightening into taut, cautious excitement.

"I trust you to make good decisions, Brianna." My father had said almost the exact same words to me once, and now his voice echoed in my ears as I repeated them to my sister. "But you need to tell me where you're going and respond when I text you. Is that clear?"

Her whole demeanor had transformed as I spoke. Now she sat straight-backed and smiling at me, hands in her lap, nodding eagerly. "And I'm not grounded? Does that mean you'll let me see Bradley?"

"You're not grounded." My mouth twisted into a grimace. "And I'll let you see Bradley, yes. As long as you promise me that you'll stick to the library and the mall with him and you're home by 8:00pm."

"9:00?" she asked in a hopeful tone.

"8:00pm on school nights," I replied firmly. "And your homework needs to be done first." Then I relented. "But you can stay out until 10:30 on Fridays and Saturdays."

Bri lurched across the car and hugged me tightly. "Thank you thank you thank you, Michael! You don't know how much this means to me."

I smiled awkwardly and patted her on the head before gently disentangling myself. "But if that twerp does anything, and I mean anything, to upset you or hurt you, you need to tell me right away."

She shook her head. "I'm telling you, he's nothing like his brother. We're in the same coding classes at school, and he's always been a perfect gentleman to me. We just like to play videogames and talk about movies together."

"Hmph," I grunted. That actually made me feel a little worse for some reason. I had always been the one who Bri played videogames and talked about movies with before now.

"Hey, Michael..."

"What?"

"I'm sorry for what I said before. About you not being my dad. It was mean."

Just like that, the lump in my throat was back. "It's okay. We were both mad. And I'm not your dad."

She reached out and squeezed my hand. Her grip was warm and reassuring.

"But I want you to know that I appreciate everything you've done for me. Really. I do. I love you, Michael."

I nodded, momentarily unable to respond. It wasn't something we said out loud very often. I released her hand and slipped the key into the ignition.

"I love you too, Bri," I choked out, and then I quickly looked at my phone to have an excuse to change the subject. "It's getting late. We should go."

Bri nodded, I started the car, and we slowly rolled out of the parking lot and headed for home.