dylan ivy conklin went back to cousins beach every year hoping to see that one familiar face from seventh grade latin convention. but when she does, he's into her fraternal twin sister isabel.
"and then he left me for someone who looks just like me...
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— 005. fair and square —
DYLAN SAT ON THE couch scrolling mindlessly as she clicked belly's instagram story. it was a picture of her and cameron at the drive-in movie theaters. she then threw her phone to the next couch over as she it accidentally hit steven in the head.
"ow dylan!" he exclaims as he holds his head. he then picks up her phone as he sees the picture of belly and cameron plastered on the screen. "seriously?" he asks as dylan covers her face with a blanket.
she then spaces out for a while but then peeks out of the blanket as she hears the boys coming up with a plan. "there's no way y'all are crashing belly's first date.." she says as they all groan.
"you act as if actually you're happy that she's on a date with him..." jeremiah says as steven smacks his head. "it doesn't matter how i feel about it. she's out on a date with him and nothing we say or do will stop it." dylan says as the three boys give each other a look.
"unless...." steven and jere say at the same as they walk out, conrad giving dylan a sympathetic look, following them out as she groans and trails behind them.
as they drove, the boys, meaning jeremiah and steven, all chatted about how funny it would be to see the anger on belly's face but dylan stayed silent until steven pulled up a few cars down from cameron's car.
as soon as it was in park, dylan threw the door open and walked over to the concessions stand. "hi, can i get one pretzel and...." she begins, taking a second to think about what familiar scent was clouding her thoughts. "a dr.pepper." she hears a voice say behind her as they hand the cashier five bucks. who was it and how did they know?
"hey dylan.." cam says awkwardly. "hey." she mumbles as she awkwardly waits for her food. "i hope it's not weird i payed for your stuff." he says instantly. "no! it's cool.. thank you." she says quickly as she grabs her pretzel from the cashier.
"you haven't changed.." cameron mumbles with a laugh seeing dylan beginning to destroy her pretzel as they begin walking back to the cars. "huh?" dylan asks, a bite of pretzel in her mouth. "i mean you have changed but you haven't changed." he says as she nods.
"like always drinking dr.pepper." he says poking her cup as she rolls her eyes. "not even your twelve year old self could convince me with the 'dr.pepper turns your insides black' so there's no stopping me now." dylan says as cams face lights up.
"you remembered that?" he asks quietly. "yeah, you had me scared shitless for like a week. then i went back to my regular routine." dylan says with a shrug as cameron lets out a laugh. "you never failed to spill it during rehearsal. i kinda missed your clumsiness when you gave your part to your sister." he says truthfully.
"my clumsiness or me?" dylan says jokingly. "eh, mainly you.." cameron says, awkwardly scratching the back of his neck as they approached where most cars were parked. "well, have fun with my sister." dylan says in a rather sarcastic tone.
"thanks?" cameron says confused as they part ways. "dude what the hell took you so long, we wanted to crash their date minutes ago but we had to wait for you!" steven complains. "i was getting food dumbass." dylan says as she shuts the back door.
as she was pushing conrad away for taking a bite out of her pretzel jeremiah spoke up. "it took ten minutes to get two things?" he asks curiously. "it was five minutes, but that's not even important. don't hate on my free food." dylan says as she sips her drink, earning looks from the boys.
"free?" all three boys ask. "yeah, cameron payed for it." she says as if it was nothing. "this is getting too confusing let's just go." steven says as they pull out and park right next to cameron's car.
dylan sat in the back silently munching on her pretzel as they ruined belly's date. she did feel like a bad sister but she kinda felt like belly was being a bad sister by being on this date in the first place.
she then heard belly yell at them to go home as jeremiah quickly drove off. soon they got home and dylan threw herself on the couch. about an hour passed as belly walked through the door and faced conrad.
as soon as dylan saw the sight of them two, she got up and shuffled up the stairs. she eavesdropped the whole time listening to their fight. as soon as she heard belly walking in her direction dylan ran up the stairs and jumped on her bed.
she lay for a minute before she heard her door swing open. "i bet you're really happy that they crashed my with cam." belly says angrily as dylan sits up. "what are you talking about isabel?...." dylan asks as belly scoffs.
"you're mad over some stupid seventh grade crush." belly points out. "it wasn't a stupid seventh grade crush and you know that." dylan says as she sets her phone down.
"you knew i had feelings for cam, i talked about him all the time. whether he had or has any for me doesn't matter. because you're my sister. and you know it was deeper than that. i talked to him for years belly... years. until one day he just... stopped responding and i stopped seeing him around cousins." dylan says.
"cam's not like that dylan. it must've meant he didn't wanna talk to you anymore." belly says "oh, so now you know him so well?" dylan asks as she stands up. "yeah, i kinda do." belly says as dylan laughs.
"well did you know that when you missed that date he planned- you know, with the whales.. he was probably crushed. because that's his passion, and he must've actually liked you enough to share it with you. bet you didn't know that.." dylan says as belly stares at her.
"great, you have nothing to say now. what about conrad?" dylan asks. "what does conrad have to do with this?!" belly yells as dylan sighs. "do you truly like cam?" dylan asks. "what do you mean by that?" belly asks as dylan scoffs. "do you like him like the way you like conrad." she says simply.
"don't do that. you know nothing about the way "i like conrad." you don't even let yourself have a crush let alone be in love dylan." belly says as dylan laughs at her. "so you do love conrad?" dylan asks belly. "i never said that- you see.. you don't even know what loves looks like dylan!" belly yells, instantly regretting it.
"well guess what belly? i was in love. i was a stupid kid in love. i was stupidly in love. but honestly i think i was just stupid. but you don't seem to care, for what it's worth... i guess you won him fair and square." dylan says as she opens her drawer and grabs a swimsuit before pushing past belly.
