Brandon
Connor is waiting in the same chair, looking thoughtful. He raises one eyebrow at me but says nothing. It’s the technique he uses to get people to talk.
“I don’t need a ride,” I say. “I’m gonna make sure she gets home safe.”
Connor nods and stands. “You’ll come by the bar later?” he asks, but it’s not really a question, it’s an order filtered down from Adam.
“Yeah.”
I turn to walk back out the door and he follows. “See you,” he says, turning to leave down the busy road.
Sammie is leaning against the wall with her hands in her pockets, waiting. She looks classy and sexy. I’m a man and I can’t help noticing how good she looks but I feel like a shit for it. She used to be my stepsister – technically, I guess she still is – and those kinds of thoughts have no place between us.
“You ready?” she asks, stepping away from the wall towards me.
“Yeah, let’s go and grab that coffee. Somewhere that’s got food ‘cause I haven’t eaten all day.”
“Great,” she says, and slips her hand around the inside of my arm so we can walk close.
When we were younger I would give her piggy-back rides and we’d wrestle and muck around. Everything is innocent when you’re a kid, but her touching me doesn’t feel innocent now, at least not for me. Her hand is warm and her grasp is comforting and I want to pull away as much as I want to draw her closer.
We stroll along the road, not talking at first. I wonder if she’s as lost in her thoughts as I am in mine. I wonder if she feels that things are weird between us. Different.
“Where do you live now?” she asks. “Did you get married?”
“I’ve got an apartment but it’s nothing special,” I say, avoiding telling her where. “And there’s no one sharing it with me. What about you? Someone snap you up yet?”
“Nah,” she says, with a hint of sadness in her voice. “I dated someone for a while but it didn’t work out.”
“He must have been an idiot,” I say, prickling at the idea that someone might have had the gall to reject her.
“Yeah,” she laughs, squeezing my arm. “How’d you know?”
“Most men are.” I include myself in that statement because I’ve spent most of my adult life working my way through women and trying to avoid them the next day. People in my walk of life tend to be the type with issues and I’ve got enough of them myself, I don’t need to be taking on anyone else’s.
“So, what happened to you when you left?” she asks and I must flinch because she looks up at me with a frown creasing her brow.
“I went to live with my dad. You know that.”
“Yeah, I know that. I mean, what did you do? Where’d you go to school?”
“There was a high school not far from his house.” I say. I don’t tell her how rough it was or that I dropped out before I should have, to avoid the intimidation. That, and my dad didn’t see the point of me studying if I could be out with him making money. As soon as I hit six foot he had me down at the gym, lifting weights and getting trained by his friend who’s a boxing coach. My fists are what make me useful in my world, and my cool temper, although last night it wasn’t that cool.
We come to a café that doesn’t look great but I want to end Sammie’s line of questioning and need food. “How about this place?” I ask, stopping us both on the pavement outside. She wrinkles her nose and looks up and down the road for a better alternative. There isn’t one so she shrugs.
“I don’t know. It looks like food poisoning waiting to happen.”
“There isn’t anywhere else,” I say as my stomach clenches with an accompanying growl.
“We could take a cab back to my place. I’ve got steaks in the fridge that I brought for when my dad comes visiting, but I can get more tomorrow.”
“You wanna cook me a steak?” I say, laughing.
“What?” she says shaking her head, confused at my reaction.
“I thought you were a vegetarian!”
“Nah,” she giggles, realizing why I was shocked. “That only lasted a few months, then my dad kept cooking bacon in the mornings and I couldn’t resist.”
I look into the dive behind us, thinking about the dirty hotdog I would probably order in there. Going back to Sammie’s wasn’t on the agenda but I’d be escorting her back there later anyway. No way would I put her into a cab by herself. The prospect of a home cooked meal and a chance to check out her place isn’t something I’m going to pass up despite my reservations about this whole thing.
“Come on,” she says, putting her hand out to flag a passing cab. We get in and she tells him her address which is in an upscale neighborhood. Sammie’s done well for herself and I’m so damn happy to see it.
We try to talk a bit during the ride but the driver keeps interrupting with curses about the other road users and useless, uninteresting details about his life. Sammie politely joins in but it leaves me frustrated.
We pull up outside a nice block. The outside is new and well maintained, the grounds lush with tended grass and shrubs. I get out first, reaching to help her out of the cab. Her palm is dry and her smile warm as she comes to stand in front of me, straightening her clothes and hitching her bag up onto her shoulder.
“Come on, Bran,” she says, leading the way into a spacious lobby with an elevator at the back. It smells fresh and expensive and I’m glad she suggested we come here rather than go to my place. My stairwell smells of weed and ramen noodles and I’ve never taken a woman there before for that very reason.
In the elevator I check my cell phone, finding a missed call from Adam. I guess he must be pissed that I haven’t returned to business right away, particularly since he footed the bill for my representation. Fuck him. I’ve picked up enough of his shit and dealt with it over the years. He can wait while I have some decent food and a dip a toe into a life I was ripped out of against my wishes. Then I’ll be his all over again and I’ll make sure that Sammie understands that she can’t come looking for me no matter what.
When I look up, Sammie’s watching me with that frown again. I want to stroke my thumb over it and ease it away. Worry has no place on a pretty face like hers and I hate that I’ve put it there.
“Something wrong?” she asks and I plaster on a smile and shake my head.
“Nothing at all,” I say.
The elevator stops and the doors open, then we’re walking through a bright corridor filled with plants and nice artwork. Sammie’s door is at the end and she looks up at me when she unlocks it, hesitating to push it open, as though she’s remembered something in there that she doesn’t want me to see.
“What?” I ask.
“Nothing.” She shakes her head and I follow her in, closing the door behind me, feeling like things are getting more uncomfortable between us the longer we spend together.
“Let’s get the food going. You must be famished.”
Her apartment is something else. Floor to ceiling windows on one side showcase a stunning view. The kitchen is open into the den. She drops her bag on the counter and heads for the fridge, pulling out a big pack of steaks and some vegetables to make a salad. I walk around, scanning the shelves that line one wall. Sammie was always a big reader and her shelves are packed with books, some names I recognize and others I don’t. There are massive legal books there too and a pretty big CD collection. I’m pleased to see she still likes some classic country although I wonder if it’s hard for her to listen to like it is for me, a reminder of bittersweet happy times.
I stand in front of a shelf of framed photos, looking at Sammie with friends on nights out and on sandy beaches, making funny expressions and smiling like her face might crack. She seems so happy but inside my heart clenches. I want to feel good about the way her life has turned out but there’s a tiny, horrible worm in my chest that resents it too; resents that it’s not me next to her with the megawatt smile, sharing all her good times. Lower down there’s a gathering of family photos and I reach out and pick up one that’s slightly faded, like my memories of the day the picture was taken. It’s me and Sammie in our yard, dressed in our swimsuits, holding our arms in the air and sticking our tongues out. We’ve got the scrawny bodies of preteens, ribs showing through our skin, and skinny legs. Sammie’s hair is plastered to her scalp from where we’d been dancing in the sprinklers and I’ve got mud on my cheek. We look like two urchins.
The photo is perfect.
“I remember that day so clearly,” Sammie says from over my shoulder and I jump because I hadn’t realized she’d come so close.
“Yeah?”
“Yeah. I was so damn happy…I felt invincible.”
“You were something alright,” I say and she elbows me in the ribs.
“Watch it, Bran,” she says grinning.
I raise my eyebrows and nod back to the kitchen. “Those steaks aren’t gonna cook themselves you know.”
“Are you ordering me back to the kitchen? Caveman!”
“Hey, you promised me a home-cooked meal…don’t try and wriggle out if it now that I’m standing here salivating like a dog!”
“Okay, okay,” she says, strutting off.
I get a lump in my throat when I spot a photo of my mom and her dad on their wedding day. Mom’s looking at the camera with shining eyes and a smile that’s just like mine. Sammie’s dad is in profile, gazing at Mom like she’s his dream come true. The moment snapped in time seems like a dream. Happiness has always seemed like a fleeting thing to me. It’s never stuck around for very long and afterwards, when things are back to their usual greyness, I wonder if it’s me, if I scare the good times away or somehow don’t deserve them for more than a moment.
I hear the sizzle of oil in the pan and turn to see Sammie lowering two big slabs of meat into a skillet. She’s put her hair into a messy bun and is wearing an apron tied tight around her middle. It’s the picture of domesticity and so damn weird for me to see.
“How’d you like your steak?” she asks, turning with tongs in her hands.
“Rare.”
“I’d have guessed well done.” She laughs and shifts the steak around so it doesn’t stick.
“Why well done?”
“I don’t know. I remember you always eating the most burnt chicken from the grill.”
“Your dad burned all the chicken. He was a terrible outdoor cook.”
“Yeah.” Her mouth is soft when she says it, her expression warm. “He still is.”
“Is he doing okay?”
“He’s getting a bit forgetful but he’s good.” She studies me for a second and I can almost see her mind working, considering whether to say what she’s got brewing in her brain. “You know he’d love to see you.”
I shake my head.
“Why?”
“Because it’s just better this way.”
The frown lines are back on her forehead and she turns back to the stove, turning the steaks and then dressing the salad. I run my hand over the marble counter, the coolness soothing against my skin, but inside I’m burning. All the frustration is there, eating away at me. I have this urge to slam my fist hard against the rigid surface, to split my skin open again and let out some of the seething fury I’ve been suppressing. I’ve never wanted the life I ended up with. I’m like a square peg in a round hole most of the time, but I’m in too deep to get out unscathed.
“You wanna beer?” Sammie asks and I nod, pushing it all back down again. I gulp down half the bottle and tell myself I’ll get through dinner and then make my excuses and leave. And when I’m out of Sammie’s door I won’t look back again. It’s too hard being reminded of the past when your present is a grind and the future isn’t somewhere you want to travel to.
Sammie puts our delicious looking meals on the counter and we sit on bar stools. Everything she’s put together in ten minutes tastes amazing and I barely talk outside of a compliment until the plate is clear. She’s watching me when I put the cutlery down with a satisfied expression.
“You know what they say about the way to a man’s heart?” I ask, and she nods. “Well, don’t go cooking for any old idiot unless you want him to fall in love with you.”
She blinks and then blushes and that swell of awkwardness is back between us. I kick myself for my stupid mouth as she gets up to put our plates near the sink.
“Can I show you some stuff?” she asks.
“What stuff?”
“Call it a trip down memory lane.” She starts walking towards a door in the back corner of the den and I follow into a short hallway and further into a bedroom. I know it’s hers because it smells of the perfume I keep catching on the air around her. The bed is huge and made up with white linens and a chunky grey blanket. The floors are dark wood and match the dark wood of the furniture. It’s not very girlie but I hadn’t expected pink cushions or hanging butterflies. Even her childhood bedroom was painted blue.
She goes to the closet and disappears inside, emerging seconds later with a box. She sits on the bed, cross-legged, and motions for me to join her, the box between us.
“What is it?” I ask as she lifts the lid. Inside it is a mess of papers and photos and trinkets. She pulls out the things on the top and shuffles through them, handing me a picture. It takes me a moment to realize it’s something I drew when I was about ten years old. A lioness curled up around her three cubs with my attempt at the arid landscape of Africa in the background. It’s childish but detailed. I look up as she passes me more, all things I’d drawn and left behind. All pictures of things that had fascinated me as a child, and maybe still did. Not that I’d admitted that to myself in years.
She passes me a packet of photos, and her expression is worried. “What?” I say, suddenly nervous of what I might find inside.
“They’re just pictures,” she says. “Family pictures.”
From her tone I know that she’s concerned about how I might react but I can’t tell her I don’t want to see. I have only one picture of my mom and me as a child, and none of Sammie and her dad. I open the packet and start to flick through. The more I look, the greater the burning sensation at the back of my throat worsens. We all look so damn happy and I can’t stand it. I can’t bear remembering all that contentment because it’s gone and it’s never coming back. The packet wobbles in my hand and I drop it onto the comforter and walk out of the room, needing time to steady my shaking hands. I stand at the window in the den looking over the city that has housed us both for years and kept us apart so well.
I hear Sammie’s bare feet padding on the hardwood but I don’t turn. I feel her hand rest lightly between my shoulders and all the love I feel for her seems to spill out of my heart and into my chest, pulled by that small touch of her palm against my t-shirt covered skin. I swallow and it’s so damn quiet in the room that it’s audible.
“Bran,” she says rubbing my back. “It’s okay.” When I don’t turn she places her other hand against my cheek and draws me until we are facing each other. I can’t hide anything from her. I never could. Sammie’s always been my best friend and my home. We stare at each other, her eyes so sad and filled with a yearning that I know is reflected in mine. It’s like the threads that had bound us together when we were kids are fusing back together. She licks her lip and the sight of her tongue makes my dick prickle. It’s a tiny reaction but it freaks me the fuck out. But then she’s got her hand around my neck and she’s pulling me towards her and we’re hugging and it feels so good, so perfectly right. She soothes me with her hand that rubs up and down my back and her words that she whispers in my ear.
“It’s okay, Bran. You’re here now. We’re back together. Sammie and Bran Bran, best friends forever,” she says just like she used to. But it doesn’t feel like friendship when I’m distracted by her soft breasts pressed against my chest and the curve of her hip under my palm. When her lips graze my ear I think it’s an accident. She’s whispering close after all. But the soft feel of it, that little graze, makes me sigh and then she sighs too and I know it wasn’t an accident. “I love you, Bran,” she whispers, her mouth now so close to my neck I can feel the wetness of it against my skin.
The air feels alive with something. It’s our history swirling around us like a vortex that’s drawing me closer to her when I know I should be pulling away. Fuck. None of this was part of the plan but I can’t stop the way my hands want to feel the skin of her back and slip inside her blouse. Her hand grabs at my shoulder, molding the muscle there as if she needs something firm to keep her grounded. I can hear her breathing hitch as I stroke across the silkiness of her back. With my face pressed into her neck I can almost pretend this isn’t really happening. It feels like a dream, a fantasy that will be gone when I open my eyes. She’s like an angel visiting me in purgatory and her sweetness and strength just make me want more.
I know I shouldn’t.
I shouldn’t be here. I don’t belong in her perfect life.
I shouldn’t want her. She’s my stepsister and it’s wrong.
I shouldn’t. But I do and I can’t stop myself.