Chapter 2

Ava's POV

Five years ago, summer

I was eighteen and everything felt like the start of a movie. Dad had just married Sarah, and suddenly I had this whole new family. A stepmom who actually seemed to like me, and a stepbrother who looked like he'd walked straight out of one of those college romance novels I definitely didn't read.

Okay, fine. I totally read them.

The first time I saw Alex, he was sitting in the living room of our new house with sunlight streaming through these massive windows, reading some thick textbook. He looked up when I walked in, and I swear my brain just... stopped working.

Holy shit.

Dark hair, sharp jawline, and these incredibly focused dark eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses. He was wearing a simple gray t-shirt that somehow made his shoulders look amazing, and when he looked up at me, he had this little crease between his eyebrows like he'd been concentrating really hard.

This is what smart looks like, I'd thought, completely dazed. This is what I want smart to look like on me.

I'd always been attracted to the brainy type, but Alex was like someone had taken my ideal guy checklist and brought it to life. Glasses? Check. Looks like he reads actual books for fun? Check. Has that whole "quietly intelligent" thing going on? Double check.

And now he's going to be my stepbrother. Perfect. Very perfect.

"Hi Alex!" I'd said, way too enthusiastically. "I'm Ava! I'm really excited to be your sister!"

Sister. God, even saying that word felt weird.

He'd looked at me for a moment, and I caught something in his expression that I couldn't quite read. Then he smiled, polite but distant.

"Hi Ava."

God, I was so obvious back then.

The memories are flooding back now, all these moments I'd buried because they hurt too much to think about. Like how I spent that entire first month trying to figure out what Alex liked so I could... what? Impress my new stepbrother? Bond with him?

Or maybe I was already developing feelings I had no business having.

I'd lurk around the kitchen when he was making coffee, trying to learn his routine. I discovered he liked his coffee black, that he always ate toast with just butter, never jam. So naturally, I started getting up early to make him breakfast.

"Alex, I made you toast!" I'd announce proudly.

He'd always thank me, always eat at least one piece, but then he'd grab his backpack and disappear to the lab or the library or wherever it was that Alex went to avoid spending time with his overly eager new stepsister.

I thought he just didn't like my cooking.

Then there was the time I found out he was majoring in biochemistry. I'd spent an entire weekend reading Wikipedia articles about molecular structures just so I could ask him intelligent questions about his work.

"So, what's your research focused on?" I'd asked over dinner, trying to sound casual and definitely not like I'd been cramming chemistry facts for forty-eight hours straight.

"Neurotransmitter pathways," he'd replied, giving me that same polite smile.

"That's so cool! Like... dopamine and stuff?"

His smile had gotten a little more genuine then. "Yeah, and serotonin, norepinephrine, some others. It's pretty fascinating actually."

I'd nodded enthusiastically, even though I barely understood half of what he'd said. "You should tell me more about it sometime!"

"Maybe," he'd said, but he never did.

I'd suggested so many activities that first year. Movies, hiking, going to that new coffee shop downtown. Alex always had a reason why he couldn't make it.

"I've got lab work."

"Meeting with my advisor."

"Catching up on reading."

After a while, I stopped asking. It was pretty clear he wasn't interested in hanging out with me, and I didn't want to be the annoying little stepsister who couldn't take a hint.

But despite everything, I kept actively getting closer to him. I thought I was doing amazingly well, even his friends praised me as a wonderful sister. Until that day when I heard those words, and I could never approach him the same way again.

Three years ago. Alex invited some friends over to watch a football game, and I'd been so excited because maybe, finally, I could be part of his world.

But when I came downstairs, Alex took one look at me and said, "Ava, don't you have studying to do?"

It wasn't mean, exactly. But it was clear: you don't belong here.

So I'd gone upstairs, but I didn't go to my room. Instead, I sat on the stairs where I could hear them talking. I told myself I was just curious about what college guys talked about. I definitely wasn't hoping to hear Alex say something nice about me.

"Dude, your stepsister is cute," one of his friends had said. "You guys seem close."

I'd perked up at that. Close? Did we seem close?

"She's always around," another friend added. "Following you like a puppy."

My cheeks had burned with embarrassment. Was I that obvious?

Then Alex spoke, and his words carved themselves into my memory like they were made of acid.

"I don't think of her as my sister."

The conversation had continued after that, but I didn't hear any of it. My ears were ringing like I'd been slapped, and there was this awful hollow feeling spreading through my chest. All those months of trying so hard to belong, to be part of his world, to make him see me as family... and he couldn't even pretend I was worth calling his sister.

Of course he doesn't. The thought tasted bitter and humiliating. You're just some random girl who moved into his house. Why would he claim you?

I pressed my back against the stair railing, hoping it would stop me from shaking. Every stupid breakfast I'd made him, every carefully researched conversation about biochemistry, every hopeful smile when he walked into a room, it all felt so pathetic now.

I'd crept back to my room and cried myself to sleep.

After that night, everything changed. I stopped trying so hard to connect with Alex. I stopped making him breakfast and asking about his research and suggesting family activities. If he didn't want me as a sister, then fine. I could be polite and distant too.

And you know what? He seemed to accept it. We developed this careful routine of civil coexistence. Pleasant small talk at family dinners. Polite greetings when we passed in the hallway. Nothing more.

I convinced myself I was okay with it. Better to know where I stood than to keep embarrassing myself, right?

But now I'm wondering... what if I got it completely wrong?

Now, I pick up my phone again and start scrolling through our recent messages.

Me: Caught in the rain without an umbrella again 😅

Alex: Stay put. I'll come get you.

I'd texted him from outside the campus library, and he'd driven twenty minutes to pick me up. I'd thought he was just being nice, fulfilling some kind of big brother obligation.

Alex: Did you eat dinner?

Me: Coffee counts as dinner, right?

Alex: Ava. Real food. I'm ordering you something.

DoorDash had showed up forty minutes later with Thai food from my favorite place. The place I'd mentioned liking exactly once, six months ago.

Oh my God.

Suddenly I'm seeing three years of my life from a completely different angle. All those times Alex seemed distant and uninterested... what if he wasn't being cold? What if he was being careful?

The thought is so big and terrifying and wonderful that I can barely breathe.

I grab a notebook from my desk and start writing. If I'm going to figure this out, I need a plan. And given all the stupid, misleading things he said, I've decided to name this plan the 'Nerd Project'!