Page 4

4

*NOT* JACK

BACK TO REALITY

W aking up Sunday morning with a strange combination of dread and exhilaration coursing through my veins, I groan at my white pillowcase turned black from lack of makeup removal.

Stumbling into bed at three a.m. and doing nothing but tearing my clothes off and falling in face first, I’ve ruined a perfectly good pillowcase, and my hair has turned into a rat’s nest.

Awesome.

Sitting up, I grin at the dull ache pulsing between my legs and the memory of being fucked by, quite possibly, the sexiest man I’ve ever seen in my life.

It was exciting!

I was out with my girls, I spy a sexy guy across the club, there were no strings attached, just a good ol’ time and no consequences; exactly what this repressed little sister needs.

I wasn’t a virgin before last night, but neither was I quite ready for what he had hidden in his pants.

My experience pre-Club-188-Guy was with Ernie, my math teacher’s nerdy son in senior year. His dick was smaller than last night’s single finger, and though I was thankful my first time didn’t hurt, it was still quite anticlimactic for a girl who’d waited what seemed like forever to go all the way .

First there was Ernie, then there was my brother’s friend, my girlfriend’s brother; much bigger dick, he was thoughtful and gentle, but it wasn’t a relationship.

We did it… just because.

It was fun, and I don’t regret it, but it was never going to last, since neither of us were committed to an us enough to lie to my brothers’ faces like that.

Brothers; plural. Two of them, both older, much older, both pains in my ass.

The day they find out, is the day the world implodes.

As far as I know, he’s never told them, and there’s not a chance in hell I’ll tell them.

There’s just no need to be the cause of the universe’s downfall like that.

After him, there was my third and final; Shane… Sean? Steven?

He was my first attempt at… random . My attempt at being a little wilder, a little more fun, and a little less the-baby-sister-to-the-two-crazy-overprotective-brothers- and -all-their-crazy-overprotective-friends.

I’ve spent my whole life toddling after them and being the good girl. They shoehorn me into angel status, but I don’t want to be her. I want to be me. So this year, my twenty-third year, is my year of self-discovery.

I can be wild.

I can be fun.

I can attract men a little… manlier than Ernie Casprie.

If I die tomorrow, I’d rather my headstone read something a little more interesting than ‘frigid good girl.’ Even at the expense of my brothers’ hearts and any potential heart attacks.

Climbing out of bed and tiptoeing across the timber flooring of my upstairs bedroom, I approach the door and pray no one is in the hall.

Technically, my mom and dad own this house, but now that I’m an adult and independent and the youngest of three kids, they’ve basically flown the coop to tour Europe and spend our inheritance while they’re young enough to enjoy it.

But their disappearance essentially makes this my oldest brother’s house now, and that makes him the biggest pain in my ass; I live here, not because I’m a mooch, but because he’s an overprotective bear who sees no reason for me to leave until I’m forty-five and married.

My middle brother left home a decade ago. He was barely out of high school when he packed up and ditched, but his apartment is barely five minutes away, so it’s not like he’s not up my ass three times a day, too.

Our house is basically just a hangout; it began while we were kids, our friends came over to play, this is where everyone wanted to be, and now… grown-ups or not, they never really left.

Years ago, the front yard would be littered with bicycles and skateboards, and now, the street’s littered with cars and motorbikes.

I like it.

Honestly, I love it.

I love the hustle and laughter that fills my home.

But today… not so much. Right now, familiar male voices drift upstairs and along the hall and they basically say they know I was a bad girl last night.

I need a shower.

Bad.

Silently opening my bedroom door and peeking into the hall, as soon as I make sure it’s empty, I make a run for it and sprint to the one and only bathroom in this house.

The floral hall runner muffles my steps, and the six million framed photos on the wall remind me of the good girl everyone expects me to be.

Slipping into the bathroom and slamming the door, I turn the lock and lean against the wall like I just ran through no-man’s-land under heavy fire during World War Two.

That’s how dangerous it would be to be discovered by my big brothers while I still wear the scent of stale beer, cigarettes, and Club-188-Guy.

Stopping in front of the mirror and studying my reflection, I groan at the mess staring back at me. I look like a rabid raccoon. I look like a rabid raccoon that mated with a rat in a dirty sewer.

The guy from last night was either legally blind, or he just didn’t care.

Flicking the shower on and peeling my underwear off, I throw them to the floor and step under the hot spray. Lathering up the shampoo and working it through my long hair, I close my eyes and enjoy the heavy pulse of a fancy showerhead blasting boiling water at my aching muscles.

My brother is cheap as hell, but he was onto something with this fancy showerhead. Leaning against the wall and risking my life, I doze and smile and think about the last twenty-four hours of my life.

It’s already almost the middle of Sunday. I have half a day to get my life back together, to eat something mostly made of oil, to clean the spatula’d on makeup off my face, then it’s Monday again and I go back to being a good girl.

Exfoliating from top to toe and washing my hair three times to get the stench out, I step out of the shower and wrap a fluffy towel around my pale body. Removing my nose ring and storing it in my bathroom drawer, I stop and sigh at my drawer of shame.

My brothers don’t go into mine, and God knows, I don’t want to know what’s in theirs.

Combing my hair out and stepping back into the hall, I walk out of my room dressed and presentable a few minutes later and head downstairs.

“Hey, Brat.” My oldest brother stands from the dining table with an empty coffee cup in his hands. Stopping in front of me and dropping a patronizing kiss on my forehead, he’s blind to my eyeroll as he steps away and drops his mug into the dishwasher. “You’re up late. Not feeling well?”

Stepping to the fridge and taking out a carton of orange juice, I chug until my belly turns sloshy. “No. I’m not sick. I got home late.”

“We didn’t see you leave last night,” my middle brother grumbles. Long curly hair hangs in his eyes, and his scruffy chin – though intentional – makes him look like an unemployed bum.

He was at the club last night, but we don’t hang out. He hangs with his friends, and I hang with mine.

At home, we’re all one group.

But in the club, we keep it separate.

“I left with Jess and Laine.” Sort of…

My brother’s friend frowns. “What about Kari?”

I shrug and throw one of my best friends under the bus to draw attention away from me. “She left later.”

Stormy eyed, he has me regretting my cheap move instantly. I don’t know what she was doing, nor do I know with whom , but it can’t possibly have been as bad as fucking a strange muscled man in the club without ever exchanging names.

Note to self; text Kari. Stat!

Grabbing his phone and wallet and tucking them into his pockets, my oldest brother stops at the door and steps into boots. “What’re you doing today?”

“Dunno. Probably just laundry and sleep.”

“You nervous for your first day back tomorrow?”

I press the button on the coffee maker and inhale the sweet aroma of caffeine. I’m so tired, I could sleep standing up. “Nah, not nervous. I’m excited.”

Pulling on his second boot and smiling, he strides across the kitchen and pushes me aside playfully. “Alright, well, I’m off to work. I have a mess to clean up. Catch you guys later. ”

We nod and wave, but we’re lazy and too slow for him to even see, since none of us got home before three.

Making toast and coffee, I carry my stuff upstairs and dramatically throw myself into bed. Sipping the nectar of life and nibbling on dry toast, I check my phone, only to find it blowing up with a group chat.

Kari: Who was that guy from last night?!?

Me: Where the hell are you? I think I just got you into trouble!

Jess: Which guy? I think I’m developing a thing for ink and muscles.

Me: Wait. Are you talking to me or Jess?

Laine: I can taste vomit and tacos. I don’t remember either…

Me: What time did you get home?

Jess: She’s not home yet!

Laine: I’m not home yet…

Jess: You whore. Bring fried chicken on your walk of shame.

Me: You’re gonna be in soooo much trouble when you get home. He isn’t here.

Laine: Shit!

Jess: Don’t worry. He’s not here, either.

Kari: How’d you get me in trouble? What did I do?

Me: He knows you didn’t leave with us! Where are you?

Kari: Dammit!! Crap! Shit! What does he know? He’s gonna kill me.

Me: I think they’re heading out soon. They’re up and eating, so maybe he’ll forget you’re a whore.

Kari: Tell him I slept at the twins’ place!

Jess: But you didn’t… -_-

Laine: I can’t find my thong.

Laine: Leaving without it. Stall the guys.

Jess: Don’t forget my chicken!

Laine: STFU! Get your own damn chicken.

Me: Damn, she’s cranky today.

Jess: I want biscuits, too. And Coke. Lots of Coke.

Laine: You’d be cranky, too, if you could still taste vomit, you had to walk home like a common whore, and you couldn’t find your phone.

I snort and send toast crumbs all over my blankets.

Me: You can’t find your phone?

That missing thong must be seriously messing with her head.

Laine: Seriously, I can’t find it! I can’t leave it. I can’t afford to replace it.

Jess: You’re a moron. Check your hand.

Laine: Fuckkkkk .

Me: Wanna get dinner tonight?

Kari: I’m going home in a minute. Then I’m sleeping until I’m on shift tomorrow. I neeeeed sleep.

Jess: Saaaame.

Laine: You still didn’t tell us who your giant hunky man was. And where he took you for those twenty-ish minutes.

I smile and squeeze my thighs together.

Me: He took me for seven minutes in heaven.

Jess: That guy’s dimple… looked like heaven to me.

Kari: And his shoulders.

Laine: And his ass! I was thinking of your guy’s ass while hooking up with my guy.

Jess: Why is nobody else wondering where Kari slept last night? Did someone finally take your… purity?

Kari: Hush. I’m leaving now. Be home soon.

Throwing my phone down, I don’t finish my coffee or my toast. And I don’t go out to dinner, either. I simply fall asleep and dream of dimples and blue eyes.