This is a work of fiction and all characters - both of them :) - are of legal age. Originally I hadn't intended for this story to be about a brother and sister, but story-wise it was just better that way than when it had been two close friends.
I would like to thank Bert_Fegg for his editing and helpful suggestions to make this story even better than it was before.
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"Are you okay?"
Brad looked up at his sister briefly. "Yeah." He let out a brief sigh. "No. I don't know." He felt Brianna plop down next to him on the couch, her arm immediately coming to rest behind his neck, her hand on the other shoulder, pulling him just a bit closer to her.
"What's going on," she asked.
Brad simply shrugged, not feeling very comfortable about talking about the hell that was his life, especially to his sister. "Just... stuff." At her slightly raised eyebrows he added, "At school."
"What stuff?" she asked, not letting him evade the subject. When he remained silent, she tightened her arm around him briefly. "Hey, I'm your big sister. You can talk to me about anything, you know that."
She was right, of course. Despite the eight year age difference, Brianna and he had always been close, could always talk about anything. That had only changed when she'd gone off to college, the distance only growing when his parents decided to move from the east coast to the west coast. He'd only seen her during the holidays, and while that had always been great, it just wasn't the same.
After college she had moved in with her then boyfriend, deciding to stay back east. Then suddenly two months ago, his sister had announced she was coming to the west coast. Without her boyfriend. Brad still wasn't sure why they had broken up, but he was going to figure it out soon. The point was, her moving here and, at least temporarily, living in the same house again, had seen their closeness return almost immediately.
"I bet you're looking forward to prom night," Brianna said, probably in an attempt to get his mind off of his problems, but unknowingly hitting on what was bothering him the most right now.
Brad sighed. "Not really." He didn't even have to look at her to know she was now frowning. "Jen... She broke up with me." Though he wondered if you could even call it breaking up when one party had never considered it to be a relationship in the first place.
"Oh, Brad," Brianna said, once again pulling him close. "Well, it's her loss for letting go of the best guy she could ever hope to be with."
He turned his head and glared at her, immediately feeling bad for it, since she wasn't aware of the circumstances. "I was just a bet," he ground out, the revelation still raw. "Her friends bet her she couldn't stand to date me for three months." He shook his head and stared ahead of him. "I should've known. Why would a hot girl, any girl really, want to be with a dorky nerd like me? She just laughed in my face, Bri. I asked her why she couldn't at least have waited until after prom, and she just laughed. I mean, God, my first girlfriend wasn't even my girlfriend. How pathetic is that? I'm the biggest loser on the planet!" He turned to look at Brianna and noticed anger, something he had expected. He was taken aback by the intensity of her rage.
"I wanna go over and rip that bitch a new one," she said, anger evident in her voice. She remained on the couch, her arm still around him. "But, Brad, sweetie," she said gently. "You're not a loser. What she did is fucked up, but you can't blame yourself for that. And you're not a dorky nerd, either."
"I'm sure everyone at school knows about this by now," Brad said. "Do you really think they're not thinking I'm a loser? I'm sure she's told her friends and God knows who else everything I told her..." He suddenly blanched. "Oh, God, I told her I'm still a virgin!"
"Sweetie, that's nothing bad," Brianna told him gently. "It's pretty cool to save yourself for someone special."
Brad glared at her again. "Nothing bad? I'm eighteen and still a virgin! And I wasn't saving myself! I just can't get a girl to be with. And even Jen managed to hold off on the sex for those three months, though I now understand why. God, I can never show my face again around school! And I sure as hell am not going to the prom."
Brianna looked at him, remaining silent for a while as if she was trying to figure out how she could fix his problem. Then an odd grin appeared on her face. "Maybe you should go to your prom. Show off with a really hot girl, one who's willing to show copious amounts of PDA."
Brad snorted. "Yeah, like I can find a girl like that. And within a week, no less."
"I'm available," Brianna said.
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Brianna kept her gaze firmly on her baby brother, trying to show him she was very serious with her offer.
"Yeah, ha ha, good one," Brad said, clearly not believing her.
"No, I'm serious. You could take me to the prom."
He looked at her for a little while. "Are you crazy? You're my sister!"
Brianna nodded, her gaze never leaving his. "Yeah, but the only friends I made around here are in a serious relationship, or I would've asked one of them. And nobody you know has ever seen me, not even... that bitch," Brianna finished her sentence, her anger toward the girl rising, but she pushed it down. "So, really, nobody would know me, or that I'm really your sister." She smiled as he gazed at her, as if trying to determine if she really meant it.
"Wouldn't that be a little weird," he asked. "For me to show up with someone new, barely a week after I was dumped?"
Brianna shrugged. "Not necessarily." She counted it a small victory he wasn't thinking that taking
her