by Tia Siren
“Mary.” He sighed, his voice so sad that it arrested me a moment. “I’m sorry. I do want to have a date with you. It’s just hard sometimes. You have no idea. All these girls chasing me, saying nice things…it’s hard to resist. Especially when everything else in my life is so shitty…”
My restraint or whatever was left of it at that point, exploded. “Your life is shitty? Your life is shitty? You’re an NFL superstar. You make millions of dollars a year. Men and women worship you. It’s the life my brother always wanted!”
“Yes,” he interrupted tragically. “It is the life your brother deserved too, but he did not get it. All my success—sometimes it is just as painful to me as his failures.”
I wilted. My anger vanished, like a pot of boiling water once the flame had gone out. I blinked at his sadness, his grief, his despair.
“You’re not happy with the way things turned out?” I asked astounded.
“No, Mary,” he said. “I am not happy. Every moment, of every day, of every year of my life, I live in regret. All I can think about is what would have happened if that night had gone differently.”
He stood there, his massive shoulders sagging, his great strength and athleticism bowed by the burden he carried.
“I had no idea,” I said and meant it.
“But,” he replied hesitantly, his hand creeping into my own, “When I’m with you, I feel better. Like maybe, one day, everything will be okay.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I just gazed at him in awe that such a giant could be interested in someone as meek and unimportant as me. I smiled a shy smile at him and he smiled a glorious one back.
“Mary Taft,” he said after a moment, “will you consent to be my date—my only date—tonight?”
He looked at me with his big puppy dog eyes that were filled with equal parts of mirth and suffering, and I could not resist.
“Damn you, Jesse Valen,” I cried, slapping him good-naturedly on the shoulder. “You know how charming you are, don’t you?”
He chuckled. “That I do. And it’s gotten me out of stickier situations than this, let me tell you. Want to go back inside?”
Nodding my head, I allowed him to take my arm and guide me back into the crowded apartment.
Chapter 4
The rest of the party passed in a whirlwind of smiles and clanking drinks. The first thing Jesse did upon reentering was replace my discarded drink. This time he fetched me an expensive but delicious favorite: a Washington Apple. Afterward, he kept his arm around me and started introducing me to his friends as “his dear friend Mary.” It was a title I liked, and for much of it, I felt like I was on display.
In all honesty, I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it. As Jesse’s companion, I caught a little bit of his glory and glow, and for a moment, it was like I was famous and universally loved as well.
Soon we found ourselves outside. Many of Jesse’s friends were smoking, but he did not partake—he had the NFL to worry about, after all. Instead, he entertained the group with crazy football stories. Some were heroic and featured glorious touchdowns or great catches, while others were downright silly.
One I particularly enjoyed—at least, from what I could piece together in my drunken state—was about the team’s bus breaking down in the middle of Arkansas. According to the story, they were forced to stay at a bed and breakfast that had an overload of flowery bits, uncomfortably soft mattresses that were shared between teammates, and the most delicious sausages and pancakes Jesse had ever had. I liked the story because it seemed sweet, less show-offy than the rest.
Eager to prove that as least some of me could hold my own at a party like this, I stole a cigarette from some guy’s mouth, inhaled deeply, and released a series of beautifully formed, concentric smoke rings that flew through each other. It was yet another skill I’d earned working as a waitress—busboys were surprisingly crafty with their smokes during the long, boring shifts.
The crowd oohed and aahed in appreciation, and Jesse turned to me with an impressed grin and said, “I wonder what else you can do with your mouth.”
Feeling bold, I leaned so close to him that my lips grazed his cheek when I whispered, “Wouldn’t you like to find out?”
My boldness made me wonder who this sexily clad girl whispering scandalous implications into a professional football player’s ear was. Whoever she was, I decided I really liked her.
Jesse grabbed me, pulled me close, and kissed me hard. The feel of his lips on mine was everything I had ever imagined it would be. His mouth was warm, firm, demanding and perfect.
The crowd catcalled and giggled, then eventually dispersed, leaving us alone to our privacy under the eaves of the house. Once we parted, we sat close enough that our shoulders touched, and looked up at the sky.
“This is really nice,” I said, pretty drunk and proud of myself.
“Yes, it is,” he replied. “I wish it could be this way all the time. It’s great playing and all, but I feel like I don’t really have a home base, you know? Like I don’t belong anywhere.”
I giggled. “Home base. Don’t you mean end zone?”
“Ah, whatever, Taft,” he murmured and rested his head on my shoulder. Overhead, the stars twinkled over the lights of the town.
“You know what would make this moment perfect?” he asked after several moments of sweet silence. “If your brother were here.”
I scowled. In my mind, that was precisely the thing that would ruin this moment.
“I don’t mean here, specifically,” he said, seeing the look on my face. “I mean, wouldn’t it be nice if he were okay with us being together, and like…having a relationship?”
Earlier that night, I would have protested vehemently. I would have claimed that my brother would never be okay with the two of us being together, that he would never enjoy Jesse’s presence. But now, after several strong drinks, I was feeling optimistic.
“You know what, Jesse?” I bubbled drunkenly. “Maybe, if we just go talk to him, he’ll get over it and be okay.”
Jesse gazed at me in happiness. It was a look that made me feel both drunker and sober at the same time.
“You think so?” he asked hopeful. “Oh, that would be amazing. Do you think he’s still awake?”
I glanced at my watch and saw it was three in the morning. “Most definitely,” I deadpanned.
“Great!” Jesse exclaimed and leaped from the curb on which we sat. I followed suit, though a bit more unsteadily. As much as I had started to enjoy looking fabulous, I continued to regret my shoes.
“Where do you live?” he asked, like a dog excited to go to a park.
I shrugged and pointed vaguely down the street.
“Awesome!” he cried and bolted toward my place.
Jesse was about half a block away when he realized how far behind I was. He stopped, turned, and galloped back to me.
“This will be a lot quicker,” he declared as he seized me around the waist and tossed me upon his back. I winced as I felt my dress ride up, but at this point in the night, I was almost too drunk to care.
“Giddy up!” I cried and poked the ends of my stilettos into his thighs as if they were spurs. He laughed, whinnying and snorting as if he were a real horse before taking off into the night.
I giggled the entire way. Part of me decided I was way too drunk for this sort of movement, while the rest of me relished in his strength and manliness. As previously mentioned, I was generally regarded as a big girl. In all the sports I had played in high school, I always was the strong, sturdy type. The center. The goalie. The shot putter. And yet Jesse threw me around as if I weighed no more than the skimpy little dress I was wearing. For me, it was a rare and exquisite feeling.
At last, we made it to my apartment.
For a moment, I was ashamed of its dingy appearance. The clusters of weeds growing around the mailbox, the overflowing recycle bin, the cracked paint were all very embarrassing, but Jesse’s face showed no disgust. Instead, he gazed at it
with supreme contentment, as if there was nowhere else in the world he would rather be.
Jostled not only by my drinking but by my recent horse-riding activities as well, it took me about three tries to fish the keys out of my clutch and stick them in the door. A giggle and a kiss later, I was inside the apartment. However, just as I was about to hustle Jesse inside, it occurred to me that Bill might not want to be surprised. Just as I had not liked being startled in my T-shirt and messy bun at the grocery store, I was sure Bill would like an opportunity to put on something more decent than his boxers before his old frienemy ventured inside.
I asked Jesse to wait outside and stumbled into the kitchen. “Biillllllll? Helllooooo?”
In retrospect, I realized that this sort of greeting wasn’t the best way to ingratiate myself with my brother. However, it did get him to his feet, which was a good thing.
He shuffled out from the living room, holding an open box of cereal in his hands. “Hey, Mary,” he said and sniffed the air. “Whoa. What the heck have you been drinking?”
I tittered, leaning far too much on the kitchen table. “Oh, I don’t know…whiskey, gin, rum…some Washington Apples. You know, the usual.”
I laughed at my own joke. It was, in fact, quite unusual for me to come home in this state.
An awkward smile found its way across Bill’s face. “Oh, yeah? I’m glad you’ve enjoyed yourself. You don’t get nearly as much fun as you deserve.”
His reaction caught me by surprise, and I blinked at him a few times. Once the shock wore off, my optimism grew, continuing to buoy me. Remembering our previous fight, when he had been upset that I made “too big a deal” of things, I used a neutral tone when I thanked him for the comment and received a smile in return.
For a moment, he looked like the brother I used to know. Then, without quite meeting my eye, he said, “You’re welcome. Actually, I’ve been thinking. I wanted to apologize for our fight earlier. I know that sometimes I can be mean. I just wanted to say that I’ll…I’ll try to be better.”
“Hey, Mary!” Jesse’s voice interrupted our little moment. “Is that asshole dressed yet?”
The smile on my brother’s face froze. Suddenly, it became stiff and strained, like glass bent nearly to the breaking point.
“Who…” he started. “Who is out there?”
“Come on, Mary!” Jesse called. “Let me in.”
Bill’s eyes widened, first in recognition, then in horror, and finally in rage.
“Is that…” he rumbled like a lidded pot about to burst. “Is that Jesse Valen?”
“I…I…met him at the party,” I stammered, struggling to lie in my drunken state.
“Party?” he smoldered. “I thought you said you were going out with some friends?”
“I…” I started, but there was nothing I could say. I had no defense. My guilt was evident in the euphoric happiness that had, only moments before, been blooming across my face.
“Goddamn door,” Jesse swore as he burst inside. He had the decency to look sheepish as he stumbled into our house, but then he ruined everything by grinning at my brother. “Hi, Bill.”
“Get out!” My brother’s face contorted with rage.
This was no look of annoyance or even embarrassment. It was a look of pure hatred, and it scared me.
“C’mon, Bill—” Jesse tried.
“No!” he thundered. “I do not want you here. You are not welcome. Now get out!”
Jesse’s cocky, charismatic grin faltered, like a beautiful flower taken out of the sun.
“Come on, buddy,” he said. “I just wanna talk to you. Look, I know what you’ve been through. I know what it’s like to have your whole life turned upside down by a single night—”
Before I could realize what was happening, Bill strode forward and struck Jesse right in the face. He stumbled backward with a look of pained horror on his face. I knew he was a man who could take a hit. I had seen him play in every one of his games, so I knew the small impact of my brother’s fist was not what was hurting him.
It was the rejection of a once beloved friend.
The strike not only bruised Jesse but it also instantly sobered me. “No, Bill,” I cried, rushing between the two of them. “It’s my fault. I brought him here. It was my idea.”
This time it was Bill’s turn to wince as if he had been struck.
“But I told you I didn’t want to see him,” he said.
Although he didn’t yell, I think it would’ve been better if he had. The slow, steady hiss of his voice, made me feel like I was a gas leak and he was about to light a match.
“I know,” I implored, gripping the collar of his shirt. “But…after talking to him, after realizing that he feels just as bad about the whole thing, I thought that maybe we could find a way for us to all be friends.”
Back when my family was whole, we used to go on camping trips. I remembered one time when I was wondering through the woods and saw a rattlesnake coiled in the shadow of a rock. Its head rose as if ready to strike, while its tail quivered. That was the impression I had now, as I looked at my brother. There was no question that if Bill had a tail, it would have been rattling. If he had fangs, he would have been preparing to strike.
Then, an evil smile I had never seen before spread across his face. I imagined a forked tongue poking its way from between his lips and got ready for the poison.
“It’s because you want to fuck him, isn’t it?” he sneered. “The big, strong Jesse Valen comes into town, and you immediately want to bang him because you know you’ll never have a chance like this again.”
Unbidden, a blush crept up my face.
“No!” I exclaimed. “It’s not like that at all. You guys used to be the best of friends—”
“Ho, ho, ho, not as good of friends as you two are now,” he mocked.
“Hey, buddy,” Jesse interrupted, “your sister has been perfectly respectable. I don’t think you should be saying things like—”
“Shut up, you traitor,” he barked. “Backstabbers don’t get to tell me about my sister’s respectability. Now get out.”
“Bill,” I murmured, “please…”
“Out!” Bill yelled.
There was no arguing with him. He was as hard and cold and scaly as a reptile, glaring at us, waiting for us to leave.
“Come on, Mary,” Jesse muttered after a long sigh. “I’ll take you somewhere safe.”
With that, he took my hand and led me out the door.
Chapter 5
I did not cry when we left the apartment. Nor did I cry when Jesse huddled us into the back of a cab. The elevator door dinged open on his hotel room floor, and still, my eyes were dry. However, once we were hidden inside his room, Jesse took me into his arms and held me tight.
“I’m so, so sorry,” he whispered into my hair. My forehead was pressed against his shoulder, my arms around his waist. Only then, enveloped by his warmth and his manly scent, I began to cry.
“It’s not fair,” I mumbled, hiding my tears into his shirt. “I do everything I can for him, but it seems like the harder I try, the more I piss him off.”
Jesse rubbed my shoulders and held me against him. “Why do you try, then?”
“Because we’re family,” I replied with a shrug. “I know it’s what my mother and father would want of me.”
“Maybe,” he said, “but I don’t think they’d want you to be this unhappy.” Ever so gently, he pushed me away from him and took my chin beneath his fingers. He guided my face up so that our lips were nearly touching, and whispered, “I know I don’t.”
Then he kissed me.
His lips pressed gently against mine. They felt familiar now, comforting, and somehow, with that one kiss, Jesse managed to peel off a layer of sadness from my heart and warm it just enough to make me want to stop crying.
Come on, Mary! I urged myself. Stop crying. No one wants to kiss a crying girl.
To my surprise, Jesse seemed like he did—or at least like he
did not mind the salt, running nose and all else that my outburst entitled. It warmed my heart even more.
“Come with me,” he said after a moment.
Confused, I took his hand and allowed him to lead me to the bathroom. There, he brushed the hair off my forehead, kissed it, and then undid the belt around my waist. I stared at him with a hurricane of emotions in my eyes. I was a little nervous, still pretty hammered, and really upset about my brother’s reaction to the two of us. As much as I wanted to get naked with Jesse Valen, now was probably not the best time.
“I don’t know, Jesse,” I stammered. “I’m not sure if now is the best—”
“It’s okay,” he interrupted me as he shimmied out of his clothes. “Trust me?”
The question lingered in the air as he removed each item of clothing and tossed it to the floor. It had been a long time since I had trusted anybody, but as he stood naked and magnificent in front of me, I decided I wanted to trust him.
He stood still and stared at me for just long enough for my eyes to drift down his body. My body grew warm and wet at the sight of his sculpted, rippling muscles. Unable to help myself, I bit my lip and allowed my eyes to drift down, right between his legs. He was not yet hard, but I could tell by what was there already that he would be massive.
Before I was completely done looking at him, Jesse turned the water of the shower. Once it was hot and steaming, he stepped inside. Seconds later, a warm, sopping hand emerged from behind the curtain, beckoning me in. Feeling—sort of—brave, I shrugged off the rest of my clothing and stepped, almost warily, into the steaming shower.
I was not sure what to expect. A part of me thought he might slam me against the wall, turn me around, and fuck me from behind, while another imagined him burying both hands in my hair, driving me to my knees, and offering himself to me. Don’t get me wrong, on most days, I would have enjoyed that, but tonight, after seeing my brother’s face I did not feel riled, confident, or empowered.
I felt sad and lonely and small.