"And I know I'm technically not supposed to tell you anything, but I can trust you, right?" I asked Blaine.

"Um, obviously you can. I am the king at keeping secrets," he said, and even though we both knew that was a terrible lie, I let it go.

Since we were at his house (even though I technically wasn't supposed to be unless his mom was there), there wasn't anyone to eavesdrop, and at least I would be able to track who Blaine ended up telling.

I hadn't even talked to Viktor besides at his hockey game, but Blaine seemed to have Lukas all figured out the day we met him. Maybe he knew more than he was letting on.

"Okay, so you know how Lukas was at the girls' soccer game because his sister was on the team?" I asked.

He hesitated. "Yeah."

"And how he was at the hockey game earlier?"

Blaine nodded.

"Well, I don't like it. Apparently, he's the kid who punched Viktor in the face way back in the day, and no one is telling me why that even happened."

"I hate to say it, but I told you that he's weird, and you didn't want to believe me," he said.

"Is that necessary right now? Do you really need to remind me of that at this very moment?"

He nodded. "It is. I almost never win with you and Arti."

"Okay, well, congratulations. You win the prize of helping me figure out the whole entire situation." I smiled.

"That prize sucks. I want a different one."

I bit my cheek. Nothing was ever good enough for him, was it?

He laughed. "It's so easy to get you all pissy."

"That's not funny, Blaine. I'm trying to be serious."

He rose an eyebrow. "You're legitimately worried about this?"

I nodded. "I don't know what it is about Viktor, but he gets under people's skin, and it's hard to let it go. There's something about him that just drives me insane."

"What kind of insane?"

"I don't know. He just—he takes whatever he wants and doesn't realize what's going on half the time."

"You know what this sounds like?"

"Hm?"

"His own problem." He shrugged. "Come on, Amanda. Be real for a second. You've done enough to and for Viktor."

But the for things sure as hell didn't outweigh the to things. I took in a breath. However, it was also possible that Blaine was right (once again), and maybe I was just letting the obsession get the best of me again. That was it.

"You want to do something fun now besides planning for the apocalypse?" Blaine asked. Smartass. "Let's go for a drive."

"To where?"

"I don't know. Wherever we end up."

"Can you narrow that down a little further? I don't want to end up in Wisconsin with you, that's for sure."

He shook his head. "I can't promise you that. All I know is that there will be food."

Every day was a goddamn surprise with him, but he knew exactly how to keep me: food bribes.

"We could always stay here for a little bit longer and then get something to eat," I said.

"And do what? It's so quiet here, and there's never anything that goes on. Why the hell do you think I like you so much? You're loud, and you always have something going on in your head," Blaine said.

"And you don't?"

"Not usually, no."

I laughed. Dammit, there he was again, cheering me up and shit.

Even though the winter was truly beginning in early December, inside the house was so fucking hot, and I pushed up the sleeves on my new sweater. It must have been dark in the store when I got it because it made me look chunkier than usual, but I wasn't going to let it just sit there in my closet.

"Since when do you wear yellow?" Blaine asked.

I shrugged. "I don't know. I bought this while we were Black Friday shopping, but now I kind of hate it. I look like Pikachu or some shit."

"Amanda, come on. You know I fucking adore Pikachu."

I smiled. "You make everything better, you know that?"

He looked down at the floor for a moment, almost like he wasn't quite used to anything nice coming out of my mouth (even though we both knew I was super fucking kind), then back up at me. "I try."

But the truth was that he didn't try; he was just somehow amazing at knowing what I needed to hear, which was a gift I wasn't blessed with.

A lock of hair fell into his eyes, and he brushed it away only for it to fall back down. I always liked his hair and eyes, and apparently, he liked my Pikachu sweater. I leaned in a little closer to him, but apparently, his mind was somewhere else.

"You wanna watch me play Pokemon on my DS?" he asked.

"Not at all."

"Too bad. You got me started on this, and now it's all I can think about. It's been a while since I played. I wonder how everyone's doing."

I stared back at him. "Blaine, no."

"I'll let you take a turn and everything. Just don't fuck anything up, okay? One time, I let Arti play The Sims on it, and when I came back, they were all dead. She set my house on fire and burned them all." He shook his head. "She claimed it was an accident, but I don't believe her."

That sounded about right.

"I probably should go, though. It's a school night," I said.

"Or you can quit being a responsible square and—"

This time, I was the one who interrupted him with a kiss, and when I pulled away, he forced a smile onto his face.

"See? You don't like it when it's the other way around, do you?" I asked.

Blaine nodded. "Yeah, I totally liked that. Joke's on you, Pikachu."

***

The next day after school, I sat by the fireplace, just close enough to feel its warmth seeping into me to steal all of its heat away from Matt and Viktor. None of us really had anything to say, and Matt and Viktor both skimmed through books that they probably never actually read to finish up an essay for their English classes. Although I had another quiz in Spanish on Monday and wanted to get a little more information out of Viktor to help connect the dots, Fridays weren't very good for motivation.

Plus, I wasn't sure how the hell Viktor was doing so well in his English class. Maybe it was because the teacher felt bad for him, but it was definitely more likely that Viktor somehow dazzled her with his perspective on life.

Above the fireplace was a mantle with photos from family vacations and Christmases past, and I couldn't help but notice that they distracted Viktor from his homework. Some were of the triplets, but most of them featured Matt and me. Viktor had spent several months with us, and why they just now seemed to pique his interest, I didn't know.

"Is that you two?" he asked, pointing to one of the pictures. He brushed beside me and picked it up.

There were two little kids in the photo, a smiling boy and a girl with her arms crossed, standing outside the front door on the snowy porch. A wreath adorned the door, and Christmas lights hung from the roof.

"Yep. That's Amanda and me," Matt said.

Viktor smiled and held the frame in his hands. "That's so cute." He turned his attention to the one beside it. "And you're at the beach in this one."

The same two kids were a few years older in that photograph, wrapped in towels and with dripping hair. The boy held the girl's hand, but she turned her face away from the camera.

"Why aren't you smiling in any of these, Candy Cane?" Viktor asked.

I shrugged. "I wasn't that happy of a kid."

Viktor set the picture down, then turned to me. "Why not?"

"I just wasn't."

"But there has to be a reason."

I frowned and set my notebook down on the floor beside me. "I guess we just see two different things in the pictures. When I look at them, I see how close Matt and I have always been. I think they're happy memories."

"Then why did you look so upset in the picture?"

"That's just who I was, who I am. Do I really seem all that smiley now?"

"Sometimes you are, but other times you're still that upset little girl."

I bit my cheek. "I mean, I guess. But look at the picture more closely." I stood up beside him and pointed to the beach picture. "Look at our hands. Look at our fingers. They're completely intertwined like he can't afford to lose me on that beach, and I can't imagine going anywhere without him. When I see that, I realize just how happy I was, whether I looked like it or not." I pointed to the next picture. "And look at that one. I'm smiling, and so is Matt."

In that photo, the two of us were standing just outside the glass of the rink where I took Viktor to practice. He had a medal around his neck, and I held one in my small hand, smiling proudly.

"What's the story of this one?" Viktor asked.

"This was when he was seven, and I was six. Every Saturday, Dad worked early in the morning, so Mom had to drag me to all of Matt's hockey games. I didn't mind, though. I loved it, and I supported him more than anything."

I looked over at Matt. He smiled.

I continued. "Anyway, I took some paper, a clipboard, and some crayons to every single one of his games, and I would draw up plays, just organized scribbles that probably only made sense to me. I'd give them to his coach, and he got a huge kick out of it. He called me Little Coach. So I just kept giving them to him, and I waited for when he'd use one in a game. He never did because they sucked, but I had fun with it."

Matt smiled. "So after the last game of the season when we were all getting medals, Amanda got one too. Her face was honestly the greatest thing that day."

"Do you still have it?" Viktor asked.

I nodded. "Of course. God, that sounds so pathetic."

Viktor smiled. "It's not pathetic. Now it makes sense that you're so involved with the hockey team."

"I guess working with you before the season kind of gave me that feeling again." Dammit, Candy Cane, that still sounded pathetic. "I don't know, I just love supporting the people I care about."

"Whoa there, Amanda. Let's not just throw around the care word like that," Matt said.

"What's wrong with it? I've clearly always cared about him, just in different ways."

Blaine was right. I did have an opinion on everything and everyone. I thought something about every person I knew.

But he was wrong about my feelings. For most people, I felt nothing. They were just pawns in the game of life. But for the people that truly mattered, I felt everything. And Viktor was no exception.

Viktor glanced at me, a faint smile on his face, then turned to Matt.

"There's everything wrong with it. You have a boyfriend," Matt said.

"Okay, and what does he have to do with any of this?" I asked.

"It's not like that, Matt," Viktor said. I expected him to blush, but he didn't.

"Then what's it like?" Matt asked.

"What the fuck, dude?" I said, shaking my head. "Chill out. Am I not allowed to be friends with him?"

Matt sighed. "I would prefer it if you went back to hating each other for my own sanity."

I glared at him. "What's your problem?"

"I don't have a problem, Candy Cane," Matt mocked Viktor's nickname for me. He stood up from the couch and took his homework upstairs.

"He totally has a problem." I chuckled to myself.

"I'll go talk to him," Viktor said.

"Wait." I grabbed his forearm, and he stopped. I didn't let go of him, though. "Will you be completely honest with me for a second?"

"Completely?"

I nodded. "I just need to know what you did to piss Lukas off when you were kids."

"I don't know. Maybe he didn't like me because I was the new kid. That's all I can think of," Viktor said.

Well, I pretty much didn't like him for the same reason, so that checked out.

With that, I let him go upstairs to talk to Matt.

I wasn't convinced that it was Matt's typical brotherly over-protection of me. He pushed Blaine away from me without getting upset. The patterns didn't line up, and with that information, I had my mind made up as to what was wrong.

He was jealous.

Maybe it was that I had taken some of Viktor's attention, just like how I got jealous when Viktor stole Arti from me. But the tiny part of my brain that I had been cultivating to think with respect to emotion told me that wasn't the case.

And against my better judgment, I chose to believe that part of my mind.

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Hello everyone! I hope you're doing okay right now, and if you're not, please know that I'm here for you! Thank you so much for reading!

I'm in the mood for another fun question this time, so what is your favorite animal?

Mine is an elephant. I love them so much. And I also obviously love whales. Both of them are just so smart, strong, and majestic. You know, the opposite of me :)