She was my best friend’s sister. She enrolled at the university, two years below us. I was studying abroad in London during the semester that she was introduced to our friend group. I met her when we came back to school the next year. We moved into a house off-campus. She came over a lot, asking if my best friend was home, but he wasn’t usually. So we started to spend time together. Not much at first. She’d linger in the kitchen, take something from the fridge, sit down on the couch, look at art on the walls. One afternoon, I was in the kitchen cooking dinner. She came in through the front door without knocking. I turned around and there she was in the doorway. I can’t remember if she said a word. Maybe she said, “Hey.” And I said, “Hey.” Then she walked across the linoleum tile and gave me a hug. And that was what did it. There was electricity and warmth. It was the most natural thing. But it still wasn’t appropriate. She was my best friend’s sister. She was two years younger than me. We had the same friends. We had never thought of … So she dropped her arms and picked through the fruit bowl and I turned and kept chopping onions on the cutting board. We talked about my day and her day and if my best friend would be coming home soon. Then she left. It was a week later, maybe a month, when we found ourselves at the local sports bar, eating dinner, just us. I think that was the first time we were alone together. Then we were back at her apartment. The living room was psychedelic. Multi-colored lighting. Posters and paintings all over the walls. She lay in the corner of the couch. I sat nearby. We watched music videos and documentaries on TV. The only bathroom in the house was upstairs. I asked her where it was and went up there. When I came back down, she had her shirt off, and she was sitting up straight on the couch, looking at the stairs, waiting for me to come back down.