“I was thinking we could stop on the way out of town to grab something to eat,” Mom suggested with her arms locked around Aunt Zoey. The two squealed like they were fangirls at their favorite pop concert. “Then we’ll be on our way to the beach!”

“The beach!” Aunt Zoey clapped her hands. “Oh, we haven’t been since before the boys were born, right?”

Uncle David nodded. “Last we went was right after we graduated college.”

“That was so long ago. I wish I still had the body for a bikini.”

I already knew what was coming and finally faced the last equally as uninterested face; Beau. Always the charmer with his textbook scowl or grimace, he could easily be described as a porcelain doll. He had fair features and a pale complexion to match. The narrow eyes though, those were what really caught attention; the same brilliant green as his dad’s but haunting as a horror house. In other words, he was super popular for merely existing, the dumb sack of shit.

A silver nose ring hugged his nostril when it twisted in annoyance long before Uncle David responded, “What are you talking about, honey? You still look amazing in everything!”

Our faces of disgust mirrored each other. This was one of the very few things we saw eye to eye on, neither of us were interested in our parents flirting. So it was no surprise we both rounded the van to the other side. Getting away from the folks was meant to be some sort of safety, but in all honesty, nothing was safe between Beau and me. We were a catastrophe waiting to happen, the calm before the storm.

He slid the door open, slipping in when I was about to. His shoulder knocked into my chest, brushing me rudely aside in the process.

“Jackass,” I whispered.

Beau sank into the back seat with his cold stare piercing through the dim early sunlight. “I bet your bag wasn’t even packed this morning,” he taunted.

Thin lips curled into a smirk that would make the Joker jealous when I hesitated to bark back, “I hope you choke on your breakfast.”

Beau hummed, uncaring of my dream to see his face turn blue and eyes bulge out of his skull before the demons of hell dragged his corpse to an eternity of pain. And that came from someone that didn’t believe in hell!

But perhaps he shouldn’t choke on his breakfast because then our vacation would be cancelled. I’d have to pretend to care through a funeral and even wear an uncomfortable penguin suit. As much as I hated the fucker, I didn’t hate him enough to ruin this trip, or put in that kind of effort. He felt the same considering our agreement, which Beau reiterated when we both settled in the last row.

“Truce for the next two weeks. No pranks. No purposefully pissing the other off—”

“How can we tell if it’s purposeful? Honestly, pissing you off is like breathing to me by this point.”

“That, for example, is purposeful,” he spoke through gritted teeth. The long tuffs of his dirty blonde hair, slightly damp with sweat, were brushed back by his hand. “We agreed to play nice or have you changed your mind?”

“If either of us were to change their mind, it would be you,” I accused. “Nice isn’t exactly part of your vernacular.”

“Spell that.”

“I got one better. How about you spell go fuck yourself?”

Our eyes locked, a silent competition to see who would cop out first. Beau was good at that; maintaining an apathetic facade or playing the charming prince. What face was shown was determined by the audience. Once, in elementary school, he stared a girl down until she cried for stealing his favorite purple crayon. Fun times. Another instance in high school, he joked his way out of a detention. I was not as successful.

Inevitably, I was the cop out.

My hands raised in surrender. “Truce is still in place. Play nice and avoid each other at all costs. Besides, once this trip is over, there won’t be much time left before we won’t have to put up with each other anymore.”

Because not only was I moving to the college dorms, but Beau was also going to a college out of state, close to a ten hour drive so I heard. We both knew that the most that would happen was a visit over break when our parents would see each other and insist we do as well, but that was that. No more multiple conjoined family dinners every week. No more game nights on Friday’s. No more shared holidays. No more forced birthday invitations. No more bickering at school.

No more Beau Young.

Now that was something to truly look forward to.

“Boys, do you have everything?” Aunt Zoey’s voice sliced through the tension. She peeked her head into the van. The fact that she was the mother of the piece of shit next to me was almost comical, if not kind of sad. Aunt Zoey was a breath of fresh air and Beau was a rancid pack of rotting meat. Their child was clearly switched at birth.

“Good to go, Aunt Zoey,” I answered with a smile.

“Yeah, Mom,” came Beau’s quiet reply.

“They said they’re good to go!” She giggled when taking a seat. Mom quickly joined. Our dad’s were up front until the inevitable switch of driving duties hours later. The van revved to life. The door shut. The radio wasn’t even turned on since the car was filled with chatter, well, at least from the front two rows.

Beau had a pair of headphones in, arms crossed and temple pressed to the window. When he caught my stare, the bridge of his nose wrinkled, eyes narrowed, and upper lip crept up into a snarl. Then he peered out the window as if he didn’t somehow insult me with a single look.

That rotten son of a crack biscuit. He pissed me off; from the sound of his voice to the constant pissy nature of his bad attitude. Everything about Beau put me on the defensive, waiting to strike, such a contrast to our parents that get along so well. If one were to ask how that happened, I wouldn’t be able to give a proper response.

Thinking back, there wasn’t an exact moment where we decided, “yeah, I fucking hate you.” In fact, as a kid, I thought Beau was pretty. Pretty in the sense that he reminded me of the dolls my grandma had at her house, the ones in glass cases that she said I couldn’t touch because they were expensive (I still ended up breaking two.) But then he grew up and became, whatever the hell he was. We were always around each other because our parents, and yet, we were drastically different.

Beau liked drawing in a corner or reading a book while I ran through the backyard, tracking mud and twigs into the house after a long day outside. He was quiet and I was loud. He didn’t know what colors were while I looked like someone’s rainbow acid trip. He hated sweets and I loved them. He was top of the class without much effort and I barely passed with the help of friends. Like night and day, but there were a few similarities that really dug that nail of hatred into us; pride, stubbornness, and competition.

We were both competitive as hell. Neither of us liked to back down. Neither of us wanted second place, so when there was a chance to prove ourselves above the other, we went for it. We battled over video games, outplayed each other on game night with the folks, purposefully took opposing sides for any class debates even if we didn’t agree with what we were arguing about. If we could make it into a competition then we would.

However, a truce had been set that came down to two simple rules; play nice and avoid each other at all costs. We had to survive for 14 days, a challenge that would test us in ways we never could have fathomed.

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