The first thing I noticed when I went upstairs was that the door to my room was closed, but I had left it open when I left. Then I heard the noises coming from behind the closed door. I marched over to it to give them a piece of my mind for using my computer to watch porno movies when Connor had his own computer. I threw open the door and stormed in only to stop dead in my tracks at the shocking sight before me.
At my entrance, the girl screeched while Jake reared up off of her and approached me. In those interminable first couple of minutes my eyes didn’t know where to look. All I could see was flesh. Jake stood at least six feet tall, and there were no clothes to break up my view of his seemingly endless expanse of flesh.
I paid scant attention to the mortified girl and directed my anger squarely where it belonged. “You. In my room,” I sputtered. “On my bed!”
His attitude only intensified my rage. He made no apology or explanation, and he didn’t even look embarrassed about being caught having sex in my room. I tried to punch him, but he anticipated my move with apparently lightning fast reflexes as he grabbed my arm before my fist could connect with his face. After all, he had been the one who taught me how to throw a punch after I insisted on getting a punching bag. He had watched my feeble attempts for a while before he stepped in to show me the proper form. That had been two years ago.
Now he seemed to have completely forgotten about the other girl in the room as his gaze locked with mine. His blue eyes were darker than usual, and the way he was looking at me made me understand what they meant by the word smoldering.
“Let go of me,” I hissed.
As soon as he did, I spun around and sprinted out of the room and down the hall to Connor’s room. I ignored Jake shouting my name as I flung open the door. Thankfully, the girl was on top this time, and I was spared getting an eyeful of my brother. I screamed in rage and slammed the door shut. Jake was standing there when I turned around. He was still very much naked. Even worse, he was laughing at me!
“Ow!” Jake cried after I kicked him in the shin.
“Get out of my house,” I yelled.
He followed me back to my room. At least the girl had enough sense to have made herself scarce. “How dare you? This is my room, my bed.”
“I thought you were sleeping over Kyle’s house,” he said as he put on his underwear.
“So that makes it okay? You’re so gross. Were you even going to change the sheets?”
“These are my sheets. Yours are over there.” He pointed to my desk. “You wouldn’t have even known the difference.”
“How thoughtful of you,” I said sarcastically. Then I had a horrible thought. “How many times have you had sex on my bed?”
“Well, I was planning on at least three times tonight, but I didn’t even get to finish once.” He stripped his sheets off my bed and made a move to grab my sheets.
“Don’t touch them!” I ran to the bathroom and came back with a can of Lysol. “You never answered my question,” I said as I sprayed my mattress.
“Don’t you think you’re going overboard? How many people do you think have had sex in the same bed you sleep in when you go to a hotel?”
I suddenly had an entirely different view of past vacations out of town. “Stop trying to change the subject. How many times have you used my bed for sex?”
“I’ll tell you what. I promise not to have sex in your bed anymore until it’s with you.” He pulled on his pants.
“If you think I’ll ever let you touch me, you’re crazy. If it were up to me, you’d never set foot in this house again. I’m warning you to stay the hell out of my way. Don’t ever come near me or my room again. I hate you!” I was trembling with rage by the time I finished my rant against him.
He was infuriatingly calm as he put on his shirt. “We’ll see about that, Cam. Goodnight.”
I slammed the door after him. Connor, I knew, wouldn’t dare face me until the next day. Jake was wrong if he thought this was just going to blow over. As far as I was concerned, he was now my enemy.
Chapter 3
I stood fuming in my room as I waited. Soon enough I heard someone go into the bathroom. My guess was Connor, and I waited until he left and everything was quiet again. Then I finally carried on with my plan to take a shower. As I began to take my clothes off in the bathroom, I spotted condoms in the wastebasket. The idiots hadn’t even thought about concealing them from view. I threw a few tissues on top of them. Despite how mad I was, the instinct to cover for the guys was automatic. Unbidden, an old memory surfaced in my mind.
We were eight years old. Daddy had promised not to drink anymore. He had promised! Yet we were once again woken late at night by our parents yelling at each other. Connor crept into my room and cuddled with me as we listened to the familiar argument.
The next day was Saturday, and Connor’s friend came over to play. Mom said to go to the playground, because Daddy was still sleeping. The boys wanted to play baseball, but I was just going to climb on the playground equipment. Connor said that he had to go to the bathroom, so Jake was waiting for him in our yard. I grabbed a baseball and marched toward the backyard.
Jake followed me. “Wanna play, Cam?”
“No,” I answered tersely. Then I threw the baseball with all my might into my parents’ bedroom window. It made a satisfyingly loud sound as it broke the glass.
“What the hell?” Daddy yelled. He appeared at the window a minute later and looked out at us. “You,” he said to Jake, who was holding a baseball bat. “Haven’t you been told not to play baseball in the yard?”
I opened my mouth to confess, but Jake beat me to it. “I’m sorry sir.”
“You’re damn right you’ll be sorry. I’m gonna call your parents.”
“What’s all the commotion?” Mom asked as she came up behind Daddy.
“That damn kid broke my window,” he said as he scowled at Jake.
“Watch your mouth in front of the children,” Mom admonished. “It was an accident, Paul.”
“How many times do we have to tell them not to play baseball in the yard? This is the third broken window. You’re too soft with these damn kids, Dana.”
“That wasn’t Jake’s fault. Connor broke the other two,” Mom reminded him.
“And I paid to fix them, so now his parents can pay to fix this one.”
“What’s going on?” Connor asked when he found us in the backyard.
“Go on to the playground now kids,” Mom said.
Despite Mom’s objections, Daddy stubbornly followed through on his threat to call Jake’s parents. They paid for the window and grounded him for disobeying our parents’ rules. During the entire ordeal, Jake never said a word about what had really happened. I told Connor, and he said he knew that Jake was no tattletale.
I approached Jake on the playground since he wasn’t allowed over our house while he was grounded. “I’m sorry I got you in trouble.”
“It’s okay.” He smiled at me.
“Why’d you do that?” This had been bothering me since it happened. Why would anybody want to get in trouble on purpose?
He scuffed his shoe on the pavement as he looked down. “Just because.”
Connor called to Jake to join the game he was playing. “Wanna play too, Cam?” Jake asked me.
“Okay.” Now that I knew he wasn’t mad at me, my guilt evaporated.
That was the only time we had ever talked about it. Jake never brought it up, not once, in all the intervening years. So he had done me a favor a long time ago, I thought. That didn’t mean that I should forgive him for what he had done in my room behind my back. It was disgusting, and he hadn’t even apologized.
I finished taking my shower and walked back to my room wrapped in a towel. This time I encountered no one in the hallway. After I put on my pajamas, I didn’t even bother making up the bed with my sheets. There was no way I could sleep in it tonight. It was the couch for me, and I fell asleep while watching TV.
I woke up grouchy the
next morning. “Don’t talk to me,” I snapped at Connor when I walked into the kitchen.
He gave me that puppy dog look with his brown eyes. “I’m sorry, Cam.”
“You owe me a new mattress. How could you let him do that on my bed?” I kept my voice low so I wouldn’t wake up Mom.
“He needed a place. You know his house is always full of people. Besides, he always uses his own sheets.” As soon as the words were out of his mouth, Connor realized his mistake.
“Always?” I pounced like I hadn’t already thought of that last night. “How many times has this happened?”
His eyes slid away from me. “A couple times.”
I knew that he was lying, and I suddenly had no appetite for breakfast. “You jerk! How would you like it if my friends were having sex on your bed?”
“You don’t understand what it’s like, Cam. You’re not a guy. You don’t know what it’s like when you’re desperate for a place to be alone with your girl.” This time he looked away in embarrassment. “Uh, last night.”
I knew immediately what he was getting at. “Don’t talk about that. I’ve blocked that from my mind permanently.”
“Just knock next time.” He sighed. “Not that it matters. I don’t think Jen will ever come over again. It freaked her out pretty bad.”
“Poor baby,” I said with no sympathy at all. “That never would have happened if you hadn’t let Jake use my room. Don’t tell me he has no place to be alone, because he has his car.”
“That’s not exactly comfortable for guys our size,” Connor said. He saw my expression and laughed. “Not size that way. I meant we’re tall. I’m six foot, and Jake has two inches on me. Height wise,” he clarified again.
Talking about this was making me extremely uncomfortable for the first time in my life. I had seen Jake’s size in more ways than one. My guy friends were always talking about inappropriate things, and it had never fazed me. I had told the truth when I said that I had blocked out what I had seen when I walked in on Connor having sex. For some reason, I couldn’t seem to do the same with my memory of Jake from last night. My mind kept returning to the way he had looked, and the way he had looked at me.
“I’ll forgive you this time, but I’m warning you that I’ll seek revenge if you ever let him set foot in my room again. I promise you that you won’t like it.” I narrowed my eyes at him.
He put up his hands in surrender. “Never again. He’s on his own from now on.”
I perked up. “Does that mean he’s banned from this house?”
Connor looked affronted. “You know he’s my best friend. Besides, he’s your friend too.”
“Not anymore,” I said with finality.
“He makes one mistake, and he’s out just like that? That’s cold, Cam.” He was obviously eager to put the shoe on the other foot, because he brought up something from last year. “What about when you took his car?”
“That’s not the same.” I thought back on that restless night shortly after I’d gotten my driver’s license.
For some inexplicable reason, I had decided to go on a joyride. Jake’s car was parked last in our driveway, so I’d swiped his keys and took off without telling anyone. I had driven around for a good hour while singing along to the radio before a flat tire had put an end to my fun. The only spare in the trunk was the little doughnut one that came with the car. Fortunately, I wasn’t that far from home since I had already been on my way back. Sneaking back into the house, I almost had a heart attack when I ran into Jake in the dark.
“Where have you been?” He spoke quietly, so I couldn’t tell if he was angry.
“For a ride. I got a flat and—”
“Shh.” Jake brought my attention to footsteps upstairs. “Your mom got home early,” he whispered. He led me downstairs into the basement.
“Crap! I left the door to my room open,” I whispered. Now she might see that I wasn’t there.
“I closed it for you,” he whispered. “I got up to go to the bathroom and noticed you were gone. Then I heard her come home. She was in the shower when you got home.”
We waited until we thought she might have gone to bed and cautiously made our way upstairs. I pulled him close and stood on tiptoe to whisper in his ear. “Thanks.”
It was weird how loud his breathing sounded right then, I thought before I pulled away and eased my door open to slip into my room. He wasn’t mad at me the next day about taking his car. I offered to pay for a new tire, but he wouldn’t take my money.
“You used his car without permission, and he used your room,” Connor said now.
“That’s different. I didn’t have sex in his car.” I had to stop saying that word, because it made me think about last night.
“You could have,” Connor reasoned. “And he never would have known the difference.”
“I’m done with this conversation,” I announced and stood up.
“Aren’t you going to eat anything?” Connor gestured at the cereal box with his spoon.
“Not hungry.” I walked upstairs to my room. My bare mattress was an unwelcome reminder of what had happened here last night, so I resolutely put my sheets back on my bed. Then I got dressed and brushed my teeth. That’s when I realized that I had to get out of the house, so I went for a walk. When I came back, I was finally ready to eat something.
Later that day, Kyle called me to tell me that he had gotten back together with his boyfriend. It was great to hear him sounding like himself again. “Sorry I ditched you last night. I’ll make it up to you with a fun sleepover now that I’m not such a drag. Is your mom working tonight?”
“No, she’s off. Maybe we can do it next Friday night.” My mom was big on all of us eating our meals together when she was home. It was our time to catch up with each other and have some family time.
“So, how was your night?” Kyle asked.
“I can’t talk about it while Mom’s home,” I said, lowering my voice for that part.
Kyle’s voice got louder in my ear. “What did I miss? Did something happen with Jake?”
“You could say that.”
Apparently, my sour tone didn’t register with him. “Are you freaking kidding me? It finally happened!”
“Do you want me to go deaf? Calm down. It’s not what you think. And on that note, is that all guys think about?”
“You’ve been around us long enough to know that’s all we think about,” he answered at a normal volume. “It’s never bothered you before, so what happened now?”
“I’ll fill you in when I can. My mom’s calling me for lunch. I’ll talk to you later.”
We had a nice day with Mom, just the three of us. After dinner, she suggested that we kick back on the couch and watch a movie. Connor said that Jake was coming over, and they were going to hang out in the basement. Mom said that she and I could watch a chick flick then. She occasionally insisted that I needed some girl time. Those were the only times that I watched romantic movies.
Mom got a phone call from her boyfriend and told me that she would be down soon to watch the movie with me. She went upstairs to her room to talk in private while I turned on the TV and idly flipped through different channels. I heard Jake arrive, and he stopped in the living room to talk to me while Connor went downstairs to the basement.
“What are you watching?”
I stared unseeing at the TV. “Nothing yet. Mom and I are going to watch a movie. You know, I thought you’d have enough decency not to show your face here for a while, but I should have known better.”
“Something’s different about you.” He was silent for a moment. “Why won’t you look at me, Cam?”
“Maybe because I hate you.” I continued to ignore him, but I felt his eyes on me. I shifted on the couch, suddenly unable to find a comfortable position. “Aren’t you supposed to be hanging out in the basement?” I asked in irritation.
He stepped in front of me and leaned down until I was forced to make eye contact with him. “You can’t stop
picturing me naked. Can you, Cam?”
Chapter 4
Damn him, but it was true. Last night kept replaying in my mind, but it was having the wrong effect. It was getting hard to tap into the fury I had felt then. What was wrong with me? I managed to glare at him. “Get out of my face.”
He ignored that demand. “I would have walked around naked in front of you a long time ago if I knew that’s what it would take for you to see me.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” Now I was down to scowling at him. All I could see were his eyes. Had they always been that arresting shade of blue?
“You see me now the way I’ve seen you for a long time. You’re finally aware of me as a guy the way I’m aware of you as a girl.” He sat down beside me on the couch. “Will you go out with me, Cam?”
“What?” My brain seemed to be in some kind of fog. Nothing was making sense anymore.
“On a date, Cam. Will you go out on a date with me?” He was sitting close beside me but not touching as he waited for my answer.
“Date?” I asked stupidly. It was almost like he was speaking a foreign language with how slow I was at comprehension. His eyes seemed to be drawing me in, and I realized that I had been leaning unconsciously toward him.
I shot out of my seat like a rocket. “You expect me to go on a date with you after what you did?” I had belatedly remembered that there had also been a naked girl in my room last night. “Get it through your thick head that I don’t want anything to do with you.”
He stood up. “I only heard want and you.” Then he smiled at me the way he had once before.
My brain was alert now and sending danger signals to me as he stepped closer. My entire body seemed to be alert the way it was when I was about to do something slightly dangerous while skateboarding. I was dismayed to realize that I felt the same kind of rush of anticipation.
“Sorry I took so long,” Mom said as she hurried down the stairs.
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