Because Ellie seems like the kind of sister you’d love as long as she wasn’t yours. And that’s the kind of sister I am.

So I guess this is sometime in..psh, February (I had to go back and read it to make sure) if you've read 'Do Not Open Before Christmas', and the snowball incident is actually set after this in like, September or something, and now I just screwed up but I can't bring myself to care. Crap.

Wind blew softly across the treetops, stirring leaves in their places like tiny maracas. The sun smiled warmly at the earth, offering its condolences today in form of heat instead of irrational cold. This November noon brought strains of music to ears formerly filled with the simple murmurings of nature, changing the background to include the presence of man as well.

Stretched out on his stomach atop the sun-baked shingles of his roof, Caden did his best to identify the song playing from somewhere below him. He knew it was one of the many songs Joseph was currently in love with because Joseph had it on repeat, sitting in the backyard and doing something Caden couldn’t quite see from here.

“Cadie?”

Caden flipped over abruptly, changing his position so he was firmly on the rooftop. Ellie just grinned at him, flipping a red-brown bang out of her face as she sat down.

“Ellie,” he responded, giving her a small smile. His sister just tilted her head, leaning forward a bit to better see what he’d been gazing at. Caden flushed pink when she turned her attention to him, knowing exactly what she’d seen. “What’s up?”

“Just wanted to see how my adorably confused, oh-so helplessly in love brother’s doing,” Ellie said mischievously, her hands twitching into the shape of a heart.

“With who, Ells?” Caden asked innocently, raising his eyebrows questioningly. “I haven’t said anything about liking anyone.”

“You didn’t have to,” Ellie replied simply, shaking her head. Her gray-blue eyes glinted with insight Caden didn’t knew she had, insight he probably didn’t want to know about. “It’s obvious, Cadie. Y’know?”

“No, I don’t know.” Caden sighed, turning his head to the blond below. Joseph was reading, he realized, currently crosslegged and singing to the song on repeat bleeding from the speakers. Familiarity nagged at Caden’s mind, telling him he should be able to identify the song by now, but he couldn’t. “Enlighten me, Ells, please.”

“Alright, little brother,” Ellie began, and Caden rolled his eyes. He wasn’t about to point out the fact that he was older than she, even if it hardly seemed so, and she continued. “You are obviously and obliviously in love with Seph down there, who adores you but wouldn’t dare to make a move if he thought you wouldn’t appreciate it. So, you being an idiot and him being a gentleman, between the two of you you’re never going to get to first base, much less hit anything.”

Caden choked on his air at his sister’s blunt phrasing, eyes wide. “Are you serious?”

“About what?” It’s was Ellie’s turn to roll her eyes. “The baseball puns or the ‘you’re an idiot’ part?”

“The–” Caden had to stop and consider this for a minute before finishing his sentence. “All of it, Ellie! What do you mean?”

Ellie sighed with the air of someone who worked at a facility full of people with no common sense. “Okay, we’ll go through this slowly. You and Seph are in love, and I guess neither of you are smart enough to realize this. Secondly, I don’t think the baseball thing needs any explanation unless you don’t know what the term ‘hit it’ means–”

“Yes, I know what that means,” Caden said impatiently, cutting her off. “But what makes you think he likes me?”

“You sound like a middle-schooler obsessing over her first crush,” Ellie told him, grinning at the blush that dusted his cheekbones. “How does Seph love thee, Cadie? Let me count the ways: one! He’s always there for you. Like, always. Every time you need him, you call him and whoa” Caden jumped at the sudden emphasis on the last word “–what do you know, he’s there.”

“That doesn’t mean anything,” Caden defended, although somewhere deep down he was hoping that she was right. “It’s just that we’re good friends, that’s all.”

“There was that thing with you getting sick,” Ellie said firmly, as if to make a point. She succeeded; Caden quieted down, blushing harder as the memory unwillingly forced itself to the surface of his mind. He, Jordyn and Rory had all fallen through a hole in the ice at the pond not too long ago, and out of the three of them he’d ended up with pneumonia. Joseph, who’d been throwing snowballs at them from the bank at the time, had felt awful and ended up staying with Caden until he healed while his parents were out.

“Again, just good friends,” Caden protested weakly, wanting Ellie to poke a hole in his argument. She didn’t disappoint him with her next theory, tapping her fingers against the rough shingles.

“The way you guys look at each other sometimes, it’s like there’s no one else in the world.” Her voice had dropped softly, and she was smiling. “How you don’t need to talk to know what the other’s thinking...how you’ve got him totally whipped.”

She ended the last note on a laugh and Caden couldn’t help but join in. That last part he couldn’t argue with at all; even in the dead of night Joseph would do whatever Caden asked of him, something Caden had found confusing and utterly pleasing in the past.

“You just might be right, Ells,” Caden said, swiveling around to dangle his legs over the lip of the roof. Ellie moved to sit beside him and he pressed his shoulder to hers affectionately. “You just might be right.”

“When am I not?” Ellie cracked, flashing a teasing smile. “Because, y’know, Cadie, it would be easy if you’d only try.”

And as the conversation segued into a different topic, Caden finally realized what song Joseph was singing to on the grass below.

The moment you decided to let love in...