Berries and Greed

“I texted him,” I muttered, dumping the coats on the little chair next to the table. “And he replied with, ‘thanks, d-bag’.”

Kiti snickered, patting my cheek as she sauntered past, making me scowl at her. “You are a d-bag.”

“Takes one to know one.” I immediately cringed after saying it, hoping Beryl hadn’t heard from the living room.

Oh god. Beryl. How was I going to explain—

Mom froze on her way to the kitchen, and I realised Beryl had come out of the living room and was standing there watching us. Shit, so she’d heard me acting like a little kid. But that wasn’t my fault. Kiti and I were the two youngest, and while we weren’t exactly young anymore, we tended to devolve into bickering children when we were together.

“Who’s this?” Mom asked slowly, turning her head to freeze me in place with her piercing gaze.

Before I could say anything, Beryl stepped forward and held out her hand. “I’m Beryl.”

“Beryl,” Mom echoed, clasping Beryl’s hand with both of hers. “Lovely to meet you, darling. I’m Una, Greid’s loving mother. Although apparently I wasn’t loving enough, seeing as he didn’t even feel the need to call me and tell me about his new… friend.”

“Mom,” I grated as Kiti snickered and shoved my arm.

She stepped forward and shook Beryl’s hand, drawling, “Nice to meet you, Beryl. I’m Kiti, Greid’s much better-looking older sister.”

“You’re older by, like, thirty seconds,” I muttered. As Mom bustled Beryl into the kitchen, I added in a whisper, “And you’re not better looking than me, assface.”

“Gonna tell Beryl you said that,” she sing-songed, then tweaked one of the space buns I’d forgotten about. “Nice hair, by the way.”

I didn’t answer, more concerned with what my mom might be saying to Beryl as I trailed after Kiti into the kitchen.

“Still no dining table, kushka.” Mom tutted the moment I entered. “Soon I’ll start thinking you don’t actually want to have us all over for dinner.”

My eyes met Beryl’s, and her mouth twitched. I could tell she’d rightly guessed that was the precise reason why I did not have a dining table.

But then, to my horror, she curiously asked, “Kushka?”

“It means tiny baby,” Kiti eagerly supplied before I could say anything. She grabbed my cheeks, squishing them even as I slapped at her hands. “Tiny, little ugly baby, because Greid was the smallest.”

“He was not an ugly baby, Kiti,” Mom admonished, rifling through her handbag. “He was a precious little chubby-cheeked darling, just like all of my children were. Beryl, do you want to see pictures?”

“Yes,” Beryl said immediately.

“No,” I blurted in horror at the same time.

“Laki—one of my other children—showed me how to put them all on my phone,” Mom told Beryl, finally extracting her phone from her handbag and brandishing it like the weapon it was. “Now, just give me a moment to get to them. Greid, are you going to offer us beverages at any point during our visit, or should we expect to stop for coffee after we leave so we don’t die of thirst on the way home?”

My eye twitched as I slapped Kiti’s hand away from where she was poking one of my buns. “I’ll make coffee.”

“I’ll do it,” Beryl said.

“No, Beryl, you don’t have to—”

“I don’t mind.” She gave me a small smile that told me she’d like to have something to do. Mom and Kiti were… big personalities.

And my annoying sister was watching our tiny, meaningless interaction with laser focus.

“So, Beryl. How did you meet my grody brother?” she asked lightly, giving me a smirk that told me she was only getting started with the questions.

My eyes met Beryl’s, and my gut squeezed when I saw her gaze fill with worry. She licked her lips and hesitantly parted them. “Um, well—”

“We met at the coffee place,” I blurted. “Around the corner. Deep Brew. I go there every morning at the same time. Nine-fifteen. One morning, a Friday morning, as I was leaving I tripped and spilled my coffee over the newspaper Beryl was reading. She was sitting at one of the tables, the one by the door that’s... Um, so I apologised and noticed she’d been circling listings for apartments and rooms to rent so, um, I asked her if she was looking for somewhere to live and we started talking and, you know, I have spare rooms so…”

As I trailed off, I realised Beryl was wincing and my sister was staring at me with a flat expression. I felt a little sweaty, but I thought I’d done a pretty good job lying, hadn’t I? I’d offered lots of details. Details made lies believable.

“Uh-huh,” Kiti said without any inflection, sly gaze darting over to our mother. Thankfully, Mom was too busy frowning down at her phone to have listened to any of that.

“Kiti, how do you take your coffee?” Beryl asked brightly, turning to get mugs from the cabinet.

“Black with two sugars. Thanks, sweets. Mom will have cream and one sugar.”

“Kiti, how do I get to my photos?” Mom asked irritably. “These damn claws. Why did I let you talk me into this ridiculous manicure?”

“They look good.” Kiti wandered over to Mom and tapped on the screen with her own inch-long, bright pink claws.