Drift (Lengths) by Steph Campbell, Liz Reinhardt

uh, ice. You want to come with me, Lyd?” Cece asks, eyeing our brother and Maren, who are paying no attention to us at all.
    I’m glad whatever crap Cece and I had between us has smoothed over. I’m also not interested in watching Maren and Cohen christen our parents’ lawn furniture. My sister and I head into the quiet house. Our parents are in the den, watching movies snuggled on the couch. Ugh. Love is all around me, and I hate feeling like that kind of contentment is out of my reach.
    Lydia gestures me to her room, the one we shared for years growing up. I got my own space when the addition was added, but there were many long, giggly night where Cece and I strung frozen juice can phones between our beds and whispered secrets long into the night. Since Cece got her on-campus place and stripped all the posters and knick-knacks she could actually use, what’s left makes the room feel very childish. I sit on the narrow twin bed with the flouncy cream bed skirt and run my hands over the rosebud wallpaper.
    “Why didn’t you ever change the wallpaper? Or just paint?” I ask, suddenly wanting to know like it’s the most important question in my life and I absolutely need to know the answer.
    Cece drops on the floor, reaches under the bed, and finds a pack of American Spirit cigarettes. She pulls one out, pops it between her lips, and fishes under the bed for a lighter. “I guess I wanted it to stay the same.”
    “Why?” I press, accepting a cigarette she hands me. I really don’t smoke at all, but this feels illicit and secretive. Not all that far from hearing Cece’s thin, raspy confessions through the orange juice can when we were just girls.
    She lights up, holds the flame out to me, and takes a drag. The cigarette seems stale to me, but I puff on it anyway. “Because it was our room for so long. Maybe I just wanted you to know it was still your room. If you wanted to come back to it.”
    I think about my chic teal and black room in the new addition, the one Cece wrinkled her nose at and called an ‘eighties horror show.’ I felt so grown up back then. I take another drag and cough a little.
    “I forgot the smoke bothered you.” Cece pops her window screen out and blows the smoke out in a dispersing cloud. “You don’t have to smoke.”
    “I want to,” I lie. “I’m sorry I was a bitch at the art show. I was just worried. You know, with the internet, things are forever and all that.”
    Her smile is weary. “That’s kind of the point, Lyd. Think of all the art that’s been lost because there was no way to mass share it. I love that what I did will still be around, getting stumbled on, for years to come. Hopefully.” She holds her smoldering cigarette between her lips and ties her hair up in a loopy ponytail. “Forget it anyway. I overreacted. I was being a brat. You know champagne makes me edgy.”
    “I’m glad you’re not pissed,” I say, letting my cigarette burn close to the window as I avoid smoking it. I flick a long cylinder of ash and watch it float down into the backyard.   
    “Not about that.” Cece pulls her knees up to her chest and frowns. “Lyd, what the hell is going on at work?”
    “I don’t know,” I whine. “I feel like I have no option but to wait it out.”
    “Are you going nuts?” she asks, taking a long, deep drag. I’m worried about the health of her lungs. How much does she smoke? “I know you like to be in control of stuff.”
    I roll my eyes. “You mean I’m anal retentive?”
    “You’re focused. You graduated magna cum laude and made junior partner by the time you were twenty-four. When I was twenty-four I decided to get off my ass after a two year break post-undergrad degree and stop procrastinating about filling out my PhD program paperwork.” She blows out a long breath. “I know we haven’t always gotten along that well, and it’s probably my fault. You’re intimidating, Lyd! And sometimes you’re a goddamn know-it-all.”
    “Sometimes