You Cheated on Me, So Why Are You Jealous of Your Brother?

JULIAN'S POV

Nora sat across the kitchen island, both hands wrapped around a white ceramic mug of black coffee.

She stared into the dark liquid without drinking, her shoulders drawn inward as if trying to take up as little space as possible in my apartment. Even in the pale morning light, the purple shadows under her eyes looked like bruises.

We had returned from her apartment less than an hour earlier. Watching her sit there made an ugly weight settle in my chest, pulling me back to their wedding anniversary three weeks ago.

It had been their fifth anniversary. I had driven past the Italian bistro downtown around eleven at night and spotted her through the front glass. The staff were already flipping chairs onto the surrounding tables. Nora was still sitting in a corner booth, wearing a dark green velvet dress, two untouched water glasses and a cold basket of bread resting in front of her.

Ethan hadn't shown up.

I had walked into that restaurant intending to take her home, wanting to tell her that my brother wasn't worth five minutes of her time, let alone five hours in an empty dining room. But when I saw the quiet humiliation on her face, my own anger and bitter jealousy had twisted the words in my mouth.

"Haven't you waited long enough?" I had snapped as I pulled up a chair. "Or are you planning to lock up with the bussers?"

Her eyes had turned rimmed with red, her bottom lip trembling before she pressed it flat.

I had wanted to take the words back the second they left my mouth. Instead, I had stared straight ahead at the dark road the entire drive home, letting the bitter silence fester because admitting I hated seeing her waste her life on him felt too dangerous.

The memory burned worse than a punch to the ribs.

Over the last two years, Ethan's neglect had become harder to ignore. I kept confronting him and snapping at her, as though either had helped.

Like the night in late November when she caught the flu. She had told the family chat she was running a hundred-and-two fever and shivering under three quilts. Ethan had texted the family group chat claiming he had a massive breakdown with the bakery's cooling units and couldn't leave the floor until morning.

Ten minutes later, I opened my phone and saw Tessa's public social media story.

It was a short video taken inside Tessa's sleek high-rise kitchen. Ethan was standing over her polished stove in his socks, carefully stirring a pot of herbal broth, laughing while Tessa zoomed in on his face with the caption *My personal chef when I feel under the weather.*

My hands had shaken with rage. I forwarded the clip to Nora and called Ethan. He insisted Tessa was testing a recipe for a promotional video. Nora said she would deal with him when she could get off the couch. She had seen the same clip I had; neither of us yet had an admission of the affair.

I left my job site early, bought chicken soup and fever reducers from the twenty-four-hour pharmacy, and drove straight to Ethan and Nora's place.

When Nora buzzed me into their building and opened the apartment door, Nora was curled on the living room sofa beneath three heavy quilts, coughing so violently she could barely draw air. Her phone was pressed to her ear.

"Ethan, please remember to feed the sourdough starter before midnight," she had whispered into the receiver, her voice rasping and weak. "And the corporate breakfast trays need the cranberry scones, not the blueberry. Don't let the supplier drop off the wrong flour..."

I had crossed the room, ripped the phone right out of her hand, and ended the call.

"Stop being his unpaid babysitter, Nora," I had snarled, shoving the medicine and hot broth onto the table in front of her. "The man doesn't even know what you take for a fever, and you're scheduling his morning bake from your deathbed."

She had looked up at me with fever-glazed eyes, hurt and defensive, clutching the blanket to her chin like a shield against my harsh voice.

I had hated myself for yelling at her, but I hated Ethan more for making her believe that was what love looked like.

A sharp clink pulled me back to the present.

Nora set her mug down on the dark stone countertop. She had barely taken three sips.

I pulled two slices of toasted sourdough from the rack, set a plate of scrambled eggs in front of her, and slid the butter dish closer to her elbow.

"Eat," I said quietly.

She picked up her fork, hesitating as she looked at the food. "Julian... you don't have to cook for me every morning."

"I cook for myself anyway," I replied, leaning against the counter across from her.

I watched her take a single bite. The sharp, biting defenses I usually wore around her felt useless now. She was already broken; she didn't need another sharp edge in this room.

"I was out of line," I said.

Nora paused, looking up with a faint frown. "What?"

"Three weeks ago. At the restaurant." I looked directly into her eyes, refusing to hide behind the usual excuse that I was only stating the obvious. "I shouldn't have spoken to you like that. You didn't deserve to sit there alone, and you didn't deserve me mocking you for waiting."

Nora stared at me, the fork resting loosely in her fingers. The silence stretched between us, thick with the weight of five years of unspoken tension.

Her gaze dropped to the edge of the plate. Her fingers tightened on the handle of the fork.

"He wasn't always like this," she said, her voice barely louder than a whisper. "When we first started the shop... when we had no money and the pipes burst in the middle of January, Ethan stayed up all night with me mopping the floors. He used to wrap his coat around me when the kitchen got too cold. We really were good once, Julian."

A younger, angrier version of me would have scoffed. I would have told her that the neglect of the last two years erased whatever sweetness had come before it.

Instead, I looked at the raw grief in her eyes and kept my voice level.

"I know," I said. "That's why you're hurting so much."

Nora's breath hitched on a quiet, ragged exhale.

She didn't cry, but the rigid line of her shoulders softened, the tension draining out of her frame as if someone had finally stopped demanding that she defend her own heartbreak. She nodded once, swallowed hard, and went back to eating in silence.

***

By ten that night, the apartment had gone completely quiet.

I finished reviewing the structural blueprints on my laptop at the dining table and stood up to stretch my stiff back.

In the living room, Nora had fallen asleep on the dark gray sofa.

She had spent the afternoon organizing working copies of her mother's recipes into a blue ring binder. The original leather journal and yellow notebook lay safely beside it. Now, she was curled on her side, one arm tucked beneath her cheek, her body hidden under the thick wool blanket I had brought out earlier.

I walked over, stepping softly across the hardwood.

The tall floor lamp next to the sofa cast a warm, golden circle over her face. She had asked me earlier not to turn off all the lights, admitting that waking up in total darkness made the walls feel like they were closing in on her.

I reached down to pull the blanket over her exposed shoulder, making sure she wouldn't freeze during the night.

As I started to pull my hand away, her fingers shot out in her sleep.

Her hand caught my wrist, her grip sudden and surprisingly tight.

I froze.

Nora murmured something soft and unintelligible against the cushion, her brow furrowing in the middle of a dream. Her fingers dug into the skin of my forearm, clinging to me as if she were falling off the edge of a cliff and needed something solid to keep her grounded.

My pulse jumped under her palm.

She was right there. If I leaned down, I could brush the loose strands of hair from her cheek. I could sit on the edge of the cushion, wrap my arms around her, and give in to the impulse that had been eating at me since the hotel launch three years ago.

I looked at her pale face, resting peacefully in the golden glow of the lamp.

She didn't need a predator taking advantage of her exhaustion. She didn't need another man using her vulnerability to satisfy his own selfish desires.

I lowered myself quietly onto the dark floorboards beside the couch, leaning my back against the base of the sofa without breaking her grip on my arm.

I left the floor lamp glowing bright against the shadows.

Sitting there in the silence with her fingers locked around my wrist, I realized for the first time in my life that keeping my hands to myself was a hundred times harder than throwing a punch.