Jasper leaned against the railing on his parents' balcony. If he'd had the will to turn himself around, he'd see Goldie's adjacent balcony from here. Instead, he stared down towards the narrow alley. Black tar and garbage bins. Pigeons on concrete window frames. An unbroken stretch of asphalt where a body had been.

It might be time to mix himself a drink from Becca's sideboard. Alcohol beckoned but his body remained motionless, as it had in the wee hours of the morning, a sentinel to despair and loss and growing anger about the fact that he was helpless to undo this. If he couldn't move, he could at least shut off the visuals.

Behind closed lids, memory did what reality could not. Years peeled back to a time when Jasper was a teenager, soon after his sixteenth birthday. A house at the end of a cul-de-sac in Redonda Beach. His father had recently moved in and wanted Jasper to see it, but Jasper wanted Paul to practice driving with him so he could get his license. This house was another excuse to keep Paul from doing the only thing Jasper required of him. He entered it with regret and a sizeable attitude.

The house had a vaulted ceiling, an open floor plan, and a seventies vibe, like a smaller, less idyllic version of the Brady Bunch home, if the Brady family had failed to make any renovations in the last forty years. It appeared lived in already, which was when Jasper realized his father wasn't newly moved in but had only now gotten around to telling him about it. And this place was no bachelor pad. An attractive woman in her early forties rose from the couch and walked over with arms outstretched. By the time Jasper realized what was happening, it was too late. She had wrapped her arms around him, telling him how happy she was to finally get to meet him.

Finally. His dad really had been holding out on him.

Jasper's body went stiff at her touch. She didn't seem to acknowledge or care that he was uncomfortable. When he finally broke free of her grip, his father had more fabulous news for him.

"This is Becca," Paul told him as he placed an arm around the woman's shoulders and pulled her close. Her platinum hair jostled in time with the rest of her. "Your new stepmom."

Jasper's body remained ridged. "What the fuck, you're married again?"

Becca's plump lips broke from a smile to a rounded O of surprise. "Did you not tell him?"

"Sure, I did," Paul patted her arm. "You just heard me."

"That is obviously not what I meant." Becca stayed under Paul's arms but her own arms crossed in front of her. She huffed, an audible signifier that the honeymoon was officially over.

Jasper contemplated how much swearing he could get away with. In truth, this wasn't a complete surprise. This new woman was bride number four, if he was counting correctly. But Becca was the first to marry Paul before Jasper even knew she existed, much less met her.

A tension formed between the two adults. Like watching feral cats gear up for a fight. Becca didn't seem to appreciate surprises any more than Jasper did. The best thing he could do now would be to ice Paul out for a bit. "Do I, like, have a room here or something?"

Paul's eyes danced. "Of course!" He pointed to a wooden staircase separating the living room from a hall leading to the back of the house. "there are two room on the left. One is yours."

"Which one?"

Paul had already stopped paying attention to him in favor of mitigating Becca's irritation. "You'll see. Go on up. I'll join you shortly."

"Don't bother." Jasper glared at them for what he hoped was a long, punishing moment, and then ascended the stairs. He opened the first door to his left and slammed it closed again.

Shit.

Wife number four had brought baggage with her.

"Hello?" A muffled voice called out. The door opened again. A spindly girl with dark coils framing large eyes and an unreadable expression stood facing him. "Oh, it's you." Her tone fell flat, like she'd been expecting him for so long, all her enthusiasm had died before he arrived.

"Let me guess, you're Becca's daughter."

"Did you think I was the maid?" She cocked her head to the side. "Why is your face like that?"

"It's the expression you make when you learn in the span of five minutes that your father has a new wife and now in addition to another stepmom to add to my list, they send me upstairs to discover for myself that I have a stepsister as well."

The girl nodded. "Those bastards." She let her door slide open. "Come in and have a seat. We have a lot to discuss."

He did as she instructed, folding his long body into a purple beanbag chair that made him feel like the ground was trying to swallow him.

The girl sat three feet away on the edge of her bed. Posters of K-pop stars plastered the wall around the headboard. "My name's Goldie. Goldie Finch—don't laugh."

Jasper was still too shocked to do that. Her name didn't register to him as odd until a beat later. "I'm Jasper."

"Jasper Thomas DeAngelis. Unlike you, I've been filled in on the details. "You're three years and eleven months older than me and Paul is supposed to see you every other weekend. Sometimes he forgets and never picks you up but, of course, he loves you more than anything and I'm going to love you too and we'll be a happy blended family. The end."

The part about his father forgetting their time together stung but he tried not to let it show. "Your mom's a hugger."

Goldie laughed, clear and girlish, but not without a tinge of anger. "She's a boa constrictor."

She swung her feet back and forth. "She forgets too, sometimes."

"Forgets what?"

"She forgets that she's my mom." She stilled her feet and folded her ankles. "Maybe that's why they like each other. They forget that they forget. They're completely clueless about what shitty parents they are. Like that saying about ignorance being bliss? They don't want to think too deeply or experience anything but whatever makes them comfortable."

Jasper attempted as best he could to lean forward in his squishy chair. "You're pretty smart for a girl three years and eleven months younger than me."

"I'm not so sure about you yet." She pursed her lips. "You have kind of a dumb look to you, but I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and hope you got your intelligence from your mom's side."

He couldn't help but grin. "You live with your mom all the time or part of the time?"

"With Becca one hundred percent of the time," she said. "Bio-Dad's been AWOL for the last decade. He's worse than a Paul-Dad."

"That sucks."

She touched the tips of her fingers together, forming a steeple shape with her hands. "It's a pathetic situation when Becca is the sounder of two parents, but it's important to face facts. I'm alone with two morons for parents who like to pretend I don't exist."

"You aren't alone anymore," he told her. "You have a dumb looking older stepbrother who sympathizes with your plight."

"Yeah?"

"Sure. I may not have known you existed before ten minutes ago, but here we are. Together with two self-absorbed idiots to contend with until we're old enough to be legally released from their lack of care."

Goldie hopped off her bed and walked over to a silver desk. She pulled something out of its drawer. "I made you something. Close your eyes and hold out your hand."

Normally, Jasper didn't go for this sort of game. His mom had given up on the "close your eyes, I have a surprise" approach to gift giving by the time he was five. But Goldie's hopeful face almost broke him. She had to live in this house of idiocy with his father twenty-four seven. If all he had to do is humor her with this to make her happy, he would.

Eyes closed, he waited as she dropped something light into his hands.

"Okay, open them!"

A strip of multicolored strings woven together rested on his palm.

"It's a friendship bracelet," Goldie told him.

"Wow!"

"Does that mean you like it?"

Jasper preferred blacks and browns and greys. Bright unicorn fairyland colors didn't suit him. Life wasn't that cheerful. "Can you tie it on me?"

She obliged. "I have one too." She waved her wrist at him. "It matches."

She brought her wrist down so that it rested side by side with his. "So, how long you want to guess this is gonna last?"

"The bracelet?"

"No, our parents' marriage."

"Let's see... Paul was married to my mom for four years. Then there was Angela, who he left my mom for. Angela DeAngelis from Los Angeles if you can believe it. That only lasted eight months. After her was Gina. I honestly believed that one might be long-term. But she sent him packing after six years. I'm going to give your mom about two years."

"So, like, three Angelas?"

"Sounds about right."

"My mom's never been married before, not even to my dad. She's had lots of boyfriends though. Most lasted about half an Angela."

Jasper bumped his wrist against hers. "Here's to three Angelas of being stepsiblings."

"Uh-uh, Jasper." She grabbed his hand and wrapped her fingers around his. "It doesn't matter what happens with our parents. Let's make a pact. You and me, for life. We look out for each other, always. Are you in?"

Memories folded into the fabric of time. Jasper opened his eyes to the concrete jungle of downtown LA. They'd grown up and their parents had remained together. Jasper twisted the faded bracelet. He'd had to fix it three time to keep it on his arm. Goldie's had fallen off years ago. He'd never asked her if she still had it. Probably not. Jasper used to believe that meant she'd broken the pact they'd made the day they met but the bracelet was only a symbol. Jasper had done plenty that any reasonable person could assign blame to. And he'd broken the core tenant of their pact.

We look out for each other, always.

He hadn't done that, and now she was dead. A couple of cops who probably thought of Goldie as a vapid internet starlet were supposed to bring her killer to justice. It seemed unlikely. They didn't understand half of what he did about her life.

The heat of the afternoon beat down on him. He'd need to retreat inside soon, wait for his parents to return in the relative comfort of their airconditioned living room. As he swiveled towards the door, he caught Goldie's balcony out of the corner of his eye. There wasn't much to see. A chair, knocked over. A small potted orange tree with wilting leaves.

A fist of grief delivered a punch to his gut. She'd never sit out there in the evening again. She'd never make another EpiGold. Everything was over. But maybe their pact lived on. He'd failed her, yes, but someone was responsible for her death and if anyone could discover who that was, it was Jasper.

He walked inside craving vengeance instead of a brandy old-fashioned.

-----

I hope you enjoyed this trip down memory lane. To tell you the truth, getting a glimpse of Goldie and Jasper in their earlier days has me feeling a bit weepy. How about you?

Thank you for being amazing and showing this story some love! XOXOXO