Ways To Avoid My Sister - Chapter 3

Whizzy attempts to keep his twin sister and his best friend separated.

After breakfast I paced around my house waiting for Phillip to arrive. I was bored out of my mind. Sitting still isn’t one of my best traits. I would sit on the couch in the basement for a couple of minutes. Then, I would walk around the couch before sitting back down again.

When the doorbell rang, I dashed upstairs leaping three steps at a time, which is a lot for my short legs.

“I got it! I got it! I got it!” I yelled at my sister as we both reached for the door handle. “I got it,” I said in a little bit calmer voice.

“Alright,” Rachel replied while giving me a peculiar expression. I think she was questioning my sanity at that point.

Rachel stood next to me waiting. I didn’t open the door though. I glanced at her, then the door before looking back at her again.

“What?” She snapped. “Open the door.”

“Are you gonna stand there?” I asked.

“Whizzy, what’s wrong with you?”

“What? Nothing’s wrong with me. Don’t you have to go do your hair or something?” I sounded like an idiot. Then, the doorbell rang again.

“I wanted to say ‘hi’ to Phillip,” Rachel replied. She seemed hurt that I was questioning what she was doing, like she was Phillip’s best friend.

“Well, he’s here to see me!” I almost couldn’t believe I said it. I was fighting with my sister over my best friend…who just happened to like my sister.

“Whizzy, can you open the door?” Phillip’s muffled voice came through. “It’s really cold out here.”

Suddenly, I snapped out of my haze and opened the door.

Phillip was bundled up in a light green jacket that had “GHS” embroidered on the chest in large white letters with a gold trim. The letters stood for Greenville High School. His floppy brown hair was hanging out from underneath his winter hat, which matched his jacket. He was now over six-feet tall and really skinny. I only came up to his chest.

Phillip had adjusted to high school much better than I did. I wouldn’t be caught dead in our school’s jacket.

“It’s freezing out there,” Phillip chattered. He rubbed his cold hands together.

Phillip Harper had been my best friend for as long as I could remember. He had also pined for my sister nearly as long.

“Hey, Rachel,” Phillip smiled.

He wouldn’t have been able to speak around her last year, but Mistasia changed him…all of us really. Last year Rachel wouldn’t have been standing at the cold front door when Phillip got here either.

After a couple of awkward moments of them looking at each other I pulled him toward the basement and told Rachel she could talk to him later.

        I spent most of the day attempting to avoid my sister. Every time Phillip and I would start something she would check in on us. First, we played bowling but only finished three frames. She came downstairs with sodas and pretzels, and the next thing I knew, her and Phillip were sitting on the couch together. Then, when we started watching a movie, “The Captain’s Loot”, an awesome story about pirates, she joined us. She even flopped right down between us. At one point, I thought she and Phillip were holding hands. Then, we played basketball…or maybe I should say dodge ball because I spent more time avoiding getting drilled in the face with the ball than anything. Phillip kept blocking all my shots. In my attempt to get Rachel to leave us alone, I had asked Phillip if he would play basketball…which I never do for two reasons. One, he is really tall, and two, he’s on the high school junior varsity basketball team. Whenever we play, he kills me. Sometimes I don’t even score. So technically, Rachel ruined my game with Phillip without even playing. Finally, I dragged Phillip upstairs to the one place that I figured my sister would never go…my bedroom. She says it smells funny, which I like because it keeps her away. However, our alone time didn’t last very long. It was dinnertime.