On my way to the toilet, before I left school to go do homework with my friends at Mathilda’s, I saw a rare sight. Stephen stood alone, looking through a window with an elbow supported on the parapet as he held his head up. He and Mathew were kinda like me and Abby, a set. Where you saw one of us, the other wasn’t far away.

“It’s rare to see you alone,” he commented once he noticed me approaching.

“I could say the same.”

“Yeah, I wanted to do some thinking before we went to Mathilda’s place.”

“...Anything I can help with?”

He looked outside and I followed his gaze. Despite the freezing cold, there were lots of students outside. Some sat where there was a dry bench while a group of boys played with a football in a circle. A bit further from that group, a group of girls snickered and chatted in hushed tones, sometimes throwing a look at the boys, probably talking about which one they had a crush. It wouldn’t be too long until it got too dark for any of those activities, the sun barely peaking over the buildings surrounding the school. I was a bit surprised there were still that many people hanging around on the school premises. My mind wandered into thinking that I was now a lot like them. More interestingly, this was something I had to think about to even realise, showing me how used to it I had grown over the months. I wasn’t even bothered with having the other three around anymore. I dare say, sometimes during the weekend, I’d miss them.

“How did you two confess to each other?” Stephen abruptly asked, snapping my attention back to him.

There was no way I’d tell him about that night. Instead, I answered with a question of my own: why was he asking?

He wanted a feminine opinion on the matter. I was surprised by hearing him bluntly asking if he wasn’t misinterpreting signals from his childhood friend.

“Absolutely not,” I told him, lacking the patience to see them not getting anywhere. It was fun going through it with Abby but watching them and hearing Mathilda complain about it on the other hand was a huge pain. “You should simply ask her out already.”

He chuckled and returned my gaze. He told me he remembered me being more docile.

I laughed back as I told him the conclusion I had reached at that moment. I was only docile until I got to know someone or when they got on my nerves. He sat in the middle of those two conditions right now.

“Any suggestions as to where I should take her?”

I had a few I could provide him, yes, but I had business to attend to, so I excused myself after telling him I’d send him the names of some nice places for a date by the end of the day. Abby could also chip in with her own suggestions that way too. She might even mention some places we haven’t gone to yet, giving me new ideas as to where I’d take her during the weekend too.

I couldn’t understand why Mathilda suddenly pulled out a measuring tape as soon as the boys stepped outside on a snack run and said she wanted to take some measures of us. Not only that, but she also had paper, pen and her calculator out. They were all suspiciously at hand’s reach as soon as she announced it. My best guess had been her wanting to check if any of us had gotten fatter after the holidays, but she never measured us before so there was no way that could be it.

“What exactly are you going to measure?” I asked, a second guess forming in my mind.

“Just your overall height, your legs, arms and torso length and... nope, that’s it,” she told me as she counted the body parts with her fingers. “I’m curious to see how those ratios compare between us three.”

That was pretty weird. Still, it was innocent enough, I thought, and Abby also got curious to know that, especially about me.

“I don’t have to undress, do I?” I asked.

“I’d say yes, but your wifey would have my hide, so—”

“Hehe, wifey.”

“—no. And since you already took your shoes off before coming in, I just need you to stand up against a wall.”

She was talking to me like I was the only person having my measurements taken, leaving bare her intentions.

It was a quick process. Mathilda held the tape and took the measurements while telling them to Abby for my girlfriend to write down.

Abby was next, her excitement making it a bit hard for us to go through the process as she’d jitter without even realising it.

Lastly, it was Mathilda’s turn before she could finally do the math.

“...Did I measure your legs right?” she wondered out loud once she was finished.

“You did, my legs are just that freakishly long.”

“Hehe, legs for days. Ah! I grew a centimetre!”

I wasn’t sure how valid that centimetre was, and as it turns out, almost sixty per cent of my total height was legs. No wonder I always held the perception of them being abnormal. The normal, Mathilda told us, is between forty-five and fifty.

“If you don’t like them, can I have them?”

“No!” Abby told her as she hugged my arm and pulled me away from our friend. “They are mine!”

“No, they aren’t!” I stammered. “Also, I never said I didn’t like them!”

“What’s going on?” the boys asked, having finally returned from their soda and snacks run.

Mathilda ran straight to them with the tape measure ready and demanded them to take off their shoes and stand against the wall. The look on their faces said everything. “Another one of her bright ideas,” they were silently screaming.

They still complied, Mathilda humming in between telling us what to write down.

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“Huh, you’re taller than him and yet he has proportionally longer limbs,” she told to her cousin as she looked at the sheet of paper, adjusting a pair of glasses she didn’t have.

Mathew however couldn’t care less, sitting in his usual spot at the coffee table and taking out his homework, telling us to hurry up so he could go home and finish a winter event.

“What about you girls?” Stephen asked, trying to take a peek at the paper that Mathilda denied by pushing his face away and telling him that was a secret.

I had yet to see the results, so I took the paper from her. Abby now knew my body proportions and I was curious to know how she compared to me.

Huh, Abby kinda has long legs too.

They were far more proportionate than mine though. How much? Yeah, I’ll be keeping that to myself. I’ll just say that she was very well-rounded overall.

I also didn’t expect to find that Mathilda was taller than me, if only by a very small margin. It’d be far too much of a coincidence for us to share the same height anyway, but I had always thought we were the same height. Maybe I wear thicker soles?

As for the boys, I didn’t care much besides how tall they were. I’d say they were slightly above average.

“Coming through,” Abby announced as she sat between my legs and made herself at home.

The house wasn’t cold or anything. In fact, it was pretty cosy. I still wouldn’t tell Abby to sit elsewhere. I could focus better holding her, and I’d also sometimes use the top of her head as a chin rest.

“Ah! You guys got us Mikado? Nice!” Mathilda practically shouted. “Let’s play a game before we get to work!”

Mathew immediately protested his cousin’s antics, and we joined him. We had already spent a lot of time goofing around, but I was left curious about what kind of game could be played with that snack, but I’d eventually find out once we were done.

I didn’t see that much of a need for distractions after homework when we were all gathered. We’d be chatting as we went along with our task, turning what was a very monotonous task into something somewhat fun. Not that I preferred it over being alone with Abby, but after a while with us alone, it got a bit hard to stay focused on the paper instead of how warm, soft and fragrant she was. With them around my hands also tended to not wander off as much.

“Lucky you, dating the smartest person in the class,” Mathilda snickered once Abby was done explaining to her what she had done wrong. She didn’t have to tell me that, I was super aware I was lucky in that regard, along with everything else. I don’t think I’d be able to be passing some subjects were it not for her. Instead, I was flourishing... no pun intended.

“She’s pretty smart too,” Abby told her as she poked my cheek. “What was ruining her score was how stressed up she got before.”

“Hmm, yeah, I kinda remember seeing her sweating bullets every time before an exam last year,” Mathilda hummed as she grabbed the Mikado box. I think she was putting it mildly how messed up I got during last year. “Can we play the game now?”

“You play your game, I have yet three levels to grind to finally unlock this season’s prize,” Mathew told her as he stored his things in his bag.

Mathilda shrugged, not appearing too bothered as she followed him with her eyes. Once he was out, she went into explaining the rules of the game. As I should have expected, it was a stupid one.

Two at a time—me and Abby, of course—would hold the extremities of the stick with our mouths and we’d have to nibble until either our lips met or one of us gave up.

Abby would because she knew I’d get embarrassed midway, but I expressively told her not to do so. Having Mathilda always teasing and thinking I’d chicken out irritated me this time, so she was in for a surprise. And so was Abby.

She was beat-red and covering her lips, stunned that I didn’t stop until we kissed.

“Humph! Why should I care? A-Abby is my girlfriend after all!” I said, trying to sound as confident as possible while my face was hellfire. Now that I went through it, I was slightly regretting it.

“I guess it’s our turn,” Stephen said as he grabbed one stick and pointed it at Mathilda’s mouth. I know I told him to go for it, but wasn’t this going too far too fast? “If I win, we go on a date, and if I lose...”

“...And if you lose?”

His holding hand got a bit limp, and he recoiled back slightly while still holding the same expression. We girls were very curious to see what he’d say next.

“...I didn’t think that far ahead.”

Mathilda started laughing so hard that she clutched her sides as tears ran down her face. Stephen was laughing too, not letting his embarrassment become a hindrance. He messed up, but he also ended up winning in a way, and for that, he got my respect.

“This weekend?” she asked as she leaned on him, whipping away her tears of laughter.

“Sure.”

After Abby and I had such a messy start to our relationship, it was nice seeing them having a normal progression. I wasn’t jealous or anything, I just found this process more suitable for them.

“Oi, you still hadn’t had your turn,” Abby spoke, looking so mischievous, I could almost see horns protruding from her head. “Or are you all talk and no bark?”

I gave Abby’s head a light tap and told her to leave them be. They had just started dating this exact second after all.

She stuck her tongue out and reached her hand for another stick. This one was broken in half, one half for her to nibble and the other for me, my nerves thankful for that. I don’t think I could take kissing her in front of our friends one more time unless my life depended on it.

On our way home, my phone buzzed. Pulling it out, I saw that I had just received a message from Stephen. It was exactly as I thought, he was thanking me for having given him a push.

“Oh-ho? So, it’s thanks to you that we got to see that show. I see, I see. Good job,” Abby congratulated as she shook us side to side.

“I just got tired of that ‘will they or will they not’ that was going on between them,” I told her.

“Yeah, otherwise they might have done it the same way we did,” she told me with a wry smile.

I mean, it worked for us. It could have worked with them. Although I still think it was better this way for Mathilda in particular. Despite her occasional dirty jokes, she was still a bit pure and a total romantic at heart, so a traditional development suited her better.

“Pfft, hehe. Not to you though?”

“T-that’s erm...”

The way Abby was looking at me was a dare for me to come up with a retort. I decided to remain silent and not give her any more ammo to use against me.

That didn’t stop Abby from further teasing me, unfortunately. The next thing she brought up was my dad and her sister getting together.

“Or maybe even your dad and my dad.”

“Oh please, enough of that!” I begged her, having almost forgotten the idea of us becoming stepsisters.

“Seriously now, won’t you talk with my sister about it?”

Should I? I asked her that, but she only shrugged, not knowing how to answer that other than that it was up to me.

I saw the way Sophie looked at my dad. It wasn’t still love, but there was something there, it was undeniable. I’m sure that between those feelings and everything else she had going on in her life, she was feeling a bit overwhelmed. Maybe I should take the first step and talk to her about it. As to what I should say... that was a complete mystery. She could even be like I was and not having yet figured out her heart. Abby said multiple times that me and Sophie are very similar. Hopefully, that didn’t apply to this particular issue. Hopefully.

“Whatever you choose to do, do you think you can decide it before Valentine’s? I want to make my sister prepare some homemade chocolate to give him if you decide to go ahead with it.”

“Homemade chocolate?”

“Have you ever done any?”

A bit of an unnecessary question. Of course, I haven’t. It did sound like it could be fun, however. And since it’d be our first Valentine’s Day together, it kinda fit that we’d go that extra mile.

Hold on... Does Sophie even cook?

In all these months, I couldn’t remember a single time that I saw her in the kitchen preparing anything other than a piece of toast or a bowl of cereal to eat. That wouldn’t do. Call me old fashioned, but if she were to become my future stepmom, she’d have to at least know the basics so that it wasn’t always my dad doing the cooking.

“Pfft, you really are a mother,” Abby snickered.

Ironic, isn’t it? To have the daughter worry about that in the absence of his own mother? Anyway, I mean, I’m sure dad wouldn’t be too bothered by it—and by that, I mean at all— but still... And even if she didn’t get together with dad, wasn’t it a good skill to have as an adult?

Not that I'd cook if I had the chance not to...

“Hehe, I’m totally going to tell her that Papa Stan likes girls who cook.” Not even towards her sister did my dear Abby show any mercy. “Hehe, it’ll be fun to see her cook for the first time too.”