Knowing there was NO chance Dionne would invite him up to her room to share her shower—this time—Aidan sighed, and pushed back from the railing to reluctantly headed for his own shower in that lonely basement room.
“Aidan?”
“Yeah, Dad?”
“Didn’t you have swimming practice today, Son?” Dad asked curiously.
Aidan had already made it to the door to the basement and held it open, but he paused as he looked at his father. “Yeah, but I didn’t feel like going.” He shrugged. “Besides, it was just routine practice. I’m thinking of giving up swimming, what with all the meetings I have lined up with university scouts. It’s really no biggie.”
“Oh.” Arnold nodded. “Okay.” He turned to go to the kitchen to help Betty with lunch, thinking he’d get that box of candy later on, but then he paused again as a troubled look appeared on his Asian features. “Aidan!”
Aidan was already inside the door to the basement, but he stopped as he poked his head out to look at his father. “Yeah, Dad?”
Arnold allowed a brief pause to fall, needing his son’s full and undivided attention. When he saw he had it, he said, “She’s not a toy, Son. She’s older, and she’s nothing like the girls you’ve been knowing. You know? You think about that. Think about that real hard, okay? Don’t hurt her.”
Aidan stared silently as his father for a moment. Then he swallowed and cleared his throat as he looked calmly back. “Who, Dad? Who’re you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the one who keeps giving you that.” And he nodded down his son’s tall length to the level of his hips.
Aidan, feeling a little off kilter as it was, looked stupidly down to see what his father was referring to, but when he did, he quickly shot hands in front of the telltale bump in his Bermudas before he raised his head and smiled sheepishly at his father.
“Dad! Come on!”
“You just make sure that shower’s a cold one, Son. We don’t want you scaring your brothers and sisters, OR you mother, do we?” Dad said with a wry look.
Aidan nodded, and then stepped back inside, closing the door behind him.
There was no doubt anymore. Their father was aware of them, and if Dad knew then Mom did, too! But then again, Aidan reasoned as he peeled off his Bermudas in his small bathroom, slowly smiling, was that such a bad thing?
“Nope,” he answered verbally. “Not such a bad thing at all.”
In fact, it could actually work in both Dionne’s and his favor as he strived to take the place of Dionne’s main man, and start on a new relationship together.
After what happened by the pool, it was clear they’d outgrown the sibling thing.
He soaped his tall body under the warm spray of the shower, and he looked down at his member that was still at “half mast”, dripping with soapy water. In his mind’s eye, he could still see his pretty sister’s lips wrapped around it, sucking him with a gentle passion that made his body tingle all over again.
“Oh man, Dionne,” he whispered in the steamy shower stall, and then he wrapped his lean hand around his rising shaft before he closed his eyes, and relived those amazing moments by the poolside. “I love you,” he whispered.
And he meant it with all his young but determined heart.
**~~**
Chapter Nine: If At First You Don’t Succeed…
Aidan was slumped down in an armchair looking pretty upset. He was frustrated about a lot of things, but mainly because he hadn’t made one iota of progress with Dionne after that soul shattering event by the poolside.
And then there were the more mundane problems he had to deal with.
Finding the university he wanted to attend wasn’t working out, for one. Then there were his friends pressuring him to go to the beach or some lame camping trip up in Arrowhead or Big Bear. And there was Candace. There was always Candace, but she was being extra clingy those days although he was pretty sure he’d told her at least twenty times he wasn’t interested. The girl was thick in the head. She didn’t seem to hear anything she didn’t want to hear. Spoiled brat.
Pff! As if he’d want Martin Phillips’ sloppy seconds.
But there was something much more frustrating he’d been forced to struggle with. He had been feeling as if he were in a constant battle with his own body. Or better said, in constant battle with the unwelcome, uncontrollable physical reactions he’d been experiencing.
Ever since the event by the poolside, he discovered he’d been suffering a perpetual hard-on nearly every minute of every day. One, that just wouldn’t fucking quit.
That alone was enough to make any guy grumpy.
The whole situation was enough to drive him mad, actually, and this just ONE single week after he was convinced his dreams had finally come true. He had thought his secret suffering had finally come to an end.
But no.
Was it just eight days ago when he’d felt life couldn’t be more beautiful, more perfect, and any more sweeter? His future had seemed so crystal clear; one that included his sweetheart, Dionne. After the way she reacted to him by the poolside, he had been convinced she agreed with him that they belonged together. He had every reason to hope she no longer saw him as her brother, and that she’d finally understood he didn’t see her as his sister.
So, what happened between that soul shattering moment and more than a week since?
He wished he knew. But he had NO clue. He was simply . . . stumped.
Something made Dionne go from a fiery, sexy vixen, who had made his blood boil with a promise for more, to a frigid ice queen in less than twenty-four hours! In fact, it was even less than that. But it took a hell of a lot more time for it to sink in with him although he had sensed her eventual 180 degree change the moment she had returned from her shower that afternoon.
Although he fought it tooth and nail, he had to eventually come to terms that she really did have a change of heart. Whatever it was that made her do it, didn’t really matter because the end result was the same: they were back to square one.
Damn it!
But if she thought things could go back to way things were between them, she had another thing coming. Even if he could, he wouldn’t let that happen. You just can’t go around doing what she did and then think everything was going to stay the same. It just didn’t work that way. And he was going to make that very clear to her. She needed to understand going back to how things were was no longer an option. Not after what had happened between them.
That incredible, unforgettable day was forever seared in his brain. If he can’t forget it then he’ll be damned if he’d let her. It just wasn’t fair of her to think she could play with his emotions that way, leaving him confused, angry, frustrated and in limbo once again while acting like nothing happened and not giving any explanation why she felt she needed to.
He was back to feeling as insecure and afraid as he had before, and he hated it. But he wasn’t planning to mess things up, either. Despite everything, he believed the situation was still salvageable. He knew, though, that if he pushed too hard, she’d bolt. But if he didn’t push hard enough, she just might get comfortable with pretending that Saturday never happened. And he wouldn’t let that happen, either.
“This is a fucking nightmare,” he grumbled.
The most painful part of it all was, Dionne didn’t seem to notice. Or if she noticed, she didn’t seem to care. She went about her daily routine and was, those days, very little around the house and him, as if what they had shared meant nothing to her. And that hurt.
Another hurtful thing was, she hadn’t broken up with that blond gorilla.
After what they shared that afternoon, he expected she’d at least do that. Even if she didn’t want to be with him, he would’ve expected her to break up with Helmutt. Girls like Dionne just didn’t do what she did and go on their merry way! And they certainly didn’t go right back to their boyfriends afterward. It just wasn’t done.
Well, not only did she not break up with He
lbutthead, she didn’t make any overtures his way. It was as if she suffered acute amnesia about what they shared that afternoon by the poolside. It was as if her memories went down the drain with her shower water that afternoon.
At first he thought she was acting like a big sister again because she wasn’t ready to let their family in on their changed relationship. It wasn’t inconceivable for her to want to keep it a secret for a while longer. He could understand that, and he had been willing to give her that time, reasoning that she wasn’t around when Dad made clear he damn well knew what was going on.
So after a couple of days passed and she was still acting as if nothing happened between them, he decided to help her out a little. He’d decided he was going to tell her about that little conversation he and Dad had after she’d gone upstairs to shower.
He recalled approaching her in the kitchen where she was busy helping herself to a piece of fruit. She just got home and was on the verge of going out again when he saw his chance to catch her, so he followed her into the kitchen. He surprised her that he was home—something she clearly didn’t expect—and he immediately told her what Dad had said to him. He also told her he was certain Dad and Mom both knew they felt more for one another. But her reaction then and there should’ve told him there was something horribly wrong.
She just . . . didn’t. React, that is. It was as if she hadn’t even heard him.
“Dionne?” he recalled saying, and he recalled her pause in step, unable to look at him.
“Yes, Aidan?”
“Did you hear what I just said?”
“Yes.” Then she looked over her shoulder at him with almost blank eyes.
He recalled growing increasingly impatient and frustrated. “So, don’t you think we should both go and tell them how we really feel? Get it out in the open?”
“Really feel, Aidan?” she asked almost cool now. “What do you mean by that?”
“Damn it!” he cursed beneath his breath, but that didn’t even get a reaction from her! Instead, she merely looked at him as if she hadn’t heard him. “You know what I mean by that, Dionne. I’m talking about how we really feel about each another.”
“That’s the question, isn’t it?”
“What?” he had cried in disbelief, but beneath his breath. “What do you mean “that’s the question”? I thought that question was answered last Saturday afternoon.”
She had looked down at the apple in her hand. “Yes. I guess you’re right. It was.”
And with that, she simply exited the kitchen leaving him more mystified than when he’d entered. It was as if she’d been invaded by a body snatcher or something as strange as she’d acted toward him. She just wasn’t herself.
He just couldn’t understand what could’ve gone wrong. But damn it! Now he realized her aloof behavior meant exactly what he was afraid it would: she’d rejected him. He should’ve known it then, but he was too confused to get it.
In the following days, when she began avoiding him whenever she could, he could no longer deny she was trying to send him a message that she’d reconsidered. Now, over a week later, he was slumped in one of the big leather armchairs, outwardly lazy, inwardly furious and frustrated, and not knowing what to do, but still unwilling to give up.
He had a lazy arm over his head with his lean hand hanging listlessly down the other side of it, over his ear, while he listlessly zapped through the many channels on the television. He wore a simple tee and jeans with one muscular leg lazily hanging over an armrest. He was sitting exactly where he’d been sitting, even exactly in the same position, when Dionne came home and tried to strike up a friendly conversation with him.
But by then he was so frustrated, he was in NO mood for it.
He knew it troubled her, maybe even hurt her, when he pertinently ignored her. She had finally given up and went upstairs, not knowing what he’d set up for her to find. But he needed to know just how she really felt about him and there was only ONE, sure fire way to find out.
It wouldn’t take long for her reaction as she stalked right back down the stairs on angry, swift stamping feet.
Angry? Hell. Dionne was furious!
She was still wearing her white tennis, so she had to be really pissed off. She usually removed her shoes the moment she entered the house, but she was apparently too pissed off to either even notice or bother.
“Aidan!” she had called to him with barely contained temper. “We really need to talk.”
Yep. She was pissed off. “GOOD!” he thought vengefully. Now she’ll know how he’d been feeling . . . and he was very happy to know he could thaw that polite iciness of hers because it was really beginning to get on his nerves.
He’d rather have her angry than nonchalant any day.
But before that explosion happened, he had a great deal of time to think about the past week. It didn’t help his mood any, but he fought to understand why his sister had been acting so crazy when they should’ve been busy celebrating their newfound love.
Before she entered the house, he’d seen her walking up the path to the front door with a fucking bounce in her step. He was so pissed off by then that he decided he was going to ignore her usual chipper greeting because she looked too damn smug since she appeared to be under the wrong impression he’d given up pursuing her.
Maybe she was right. Maybe he was, subconsciously, finally coming to terms that it was best to just let it go. But the moment that thought rose, he had felt his heart sink, and he knew he could never go back to the way things were.
So instead, he did what he can only do in a situation like that.
He moped.
When she had entered the living room that Sunday afternoon, he’d completely ignored her chipper hello. He didn’t even bother taking his stare off the television. He had wanted her to feel how she’d upset him, and he wanted her to know she couldn’t make a week’s worth of agony right just by being her perky, cheerful self.
Did she think he could just forget what they’d shared? Just like that?
When he didn’t respond, she’d quieted. He could feel hurt bunny eyes on him, and it delivered a pang of regret for acting like such a jerk toward her. But damn it. He was hurting, too. And it wasn’t as if she were in any hurry to talk about that. It was as if she just didn’t care about his feelings. So, he reasoned, why in the hell should he care about hers?
She’d given up and quietly left him alone. He’d listened to her soft footfalls as she climbed the stairs to her room before he allowed himself to look into her direction. Although he knew she knew he was ignoring her to prove a point, while also being as belligerent of an ass as he possibly could just to vent a little, she didn’t try to reprimand him.
‘Damn it!’ he’d cursed inwardly. She was simply going to act like nothing ever happened! “Yeah, well,” he scoffed with an evil twinkle in his eyes, “we’ll see about that.”
He KNEW he should’ve returned the favor that day when he had the chance! She was laying right smack on top of him and she really couldn’t get away. Not if he really didn’t want her to. He should’ve put more effort into seducing her, and to let her body feel the pleasures he could give her. She wouldn’t be able to just dismiss him after that. He was sure of it.
But dumbass that he was, he was so goddamn cocksure of himself that he lost focus of his goal. He believed he’d finally had her where he wanted her because she’d behaved like his former girlfriends in the past. That turned out to be a big mistake. He missed another golden opportunity to solidify their newfound relationship, and he had no one else to blame but himself.
He should’ve known something was up the moment she came down again that afternoon. She was showered, dressed, and the prettiest girl he’d ever seen, but she was also a helluva lot more aloof than when she went up. He would’ve noticed were he not distracted by her Dove soap scented skin that filled the house, making him dizzy, and scattering his thoughts. The sight of her conspired with her scent to wreak havoc with his insides, a
nd he just couldn’t think straight.
Had that not been the case, he would’ve paid closer attention to her change of demeanor.
Dionne had always been so hard for him to read. One moment, she was all sweet smiles and cuddles, and the next; she’s quiet, somber, contemplative, and unapproachable. So he wasn’t all too worried when she seemed less jovial when she came back downstairs that afternoon.
But when it looked as if she were braced to run the moment he had walked up to her by the stairs, it began to dawn on him something was really, really off. It still didn’t sink in completely, but he had gotten a nasty gut feeling.
Then she ended up getting picked up by Helgut! That day of all days. He couldn’t sleep that night, waiting for her to come home, but she had dealt him another surprise blow when she’d spent the night at Helmutt’s parents’ house!
Then, making lemonade out of lemons, he had thought she just might take this opportunity to tell her boyfriend, and his parents, it was over between them.
That didn’t happen, either.
Since she wasn’t home all day the following day, he didn’t get a chance to ask her if she had finally kicked the guy to the curb. But when she arrived home later that night, with Helmutt in tow, he knew for a fact she hadn’t.
Okay. So she needed more time. She needed to get used to her new daily schedule, what with classes three times a week, doing her internship—the noc shift at Santa Teresita Hospital in Eagle Rock—and, of course, her part-time job at that the video store.
Not to mention, she also needed to come to terms with the change between them. It must be hard on a girl as shy as she, he had surmised, and he didn’t want to put undue pressure on her. He had wanted to take things slow; prove to her he was mature enough to be patient, and that it was his love for her that had given him the strength to give her the room she needed.
Now he was sure exerting patience was a fool’s errand. It had killed what he should’ve fought harder to nurture. He should have had a clue and immediately got to work to strengthen what was growing between them the moment he’d noticed her changed demeanor that afternoon. But he didn’t. And now he missed his chance. Now he wondered if it was still even salvageable.
Loving Siblings: Aidan & Dionne Page 12