by Jade Alyse
Brandon leaned down to pick up a few puny twigs stuck to moistened fallen leaves, and he sighed. “This is not going to build a fire…”
“No kidding,” Natalie agreed, squeezing his hand tighter. “I wish there was an axe around here or something…”
“What for? It’s not like any of us can chop wood…”
Natalie looked at him. “Speak for yourself…”
“You can chop wood?”
“Maybe…maybe my granddaddy taught me…”
“Are you kidding?”
“Nope,” she said. “My granddaddy Joe was the outdoorsy type. He’s the only man that I didn’t mind getting dirty with. I’d help him rake leaves and he’d give me a little money for it…and when I was about twelve, he taught me how to chop wood…”
“You surprise me more and more each day,” he chuckled. “So, you’re telling me that if I found an axe around here, you could chop up some wood for us?”
“Well, yea,” she said with a shrug. “I think I could get the job done…but I don’t see any stumps or anything…”
“Maybe you should wear the pants in this relationship from now on,” he teased, nudging her with his elbow.
“Oh, don’t be overdramatic, Brandy,” she said with a wave of her hand and the roll of her eye. “I’m wimpy with everything else…”
“How can I be so sure?”
She turned to face him, reached for the collar of his jacket, and pulled him into her.
“Shut up,” she whispered to his lips, leaving a kiss against them. Yes, being alone with Brandon, beneath a shadowed red-leafed oak, and the moon watching overhead, made her feel that the world was just as it should be.
They settled in front of a fireless fireplace following dinner, beneath a set of four blankets, that Asha brought from the apartment back in Athens. Brandon popped a cap on a bottle of Heineken, looking at Natalie as she sat on the wooden floor, curled up with Asha, beneath a patchwork quilt and a wool blanket.
“Brandon’s got taste, I must say,” Asha commented, raising her head from its place on Natalie’s shoulder. “How’d you come up with this place, Bran?”
Brandon shrugged his shoulders and took a long swig from his bottle before answering. “I just looked it up,” he said quietly, keeping his eyes focused on the brown glass before him. “It just looked really nice…and Tallie deserves something nice…”
Natalie met eyes with him. She peacefully mouthed Thank You in his direction as she tugged on her quilt a little. He nodded in return.
“How rude,” Asha began, looking in Scotty's direction. “How dare you not offer me a beer…?”
“I didn’t see you put any money up for some,” Scotty interjected, popping the cap on his second bottle. “And we don’t supply alcohol to minors.”
“I’ll be twenty-one in two weeks,” Asha defended. “I might as well start the celebration now…”
“I’m not sure I want to see what alcohol would do to you,” Scotty said. “And the last time that I checked, we were here to celebrate Nat’s birthday…you can’t stand to let anyone else have the spotlight, can you?”
“Oh, God, here you guys go again,” Brandon said lowly, rolling his eyes.
“What are you trying to say, Scott? Of course I can…it’s Natalie’s twentieth birthday…of course I’m here to celebrate her birthday! All I wanted was a bottle of beer…”
“Why, Ash? So you can be even more annoying than you already are?”
“Take that back, you skinny bastard…”
“What for? Because you know it’s true…”
Asha then looked at Natalie. “You know, this cheap son of a bitch wasn’t going to put any money forth for your present, but I made him…I made him for being a cheap, country bastard…”
“Not all of us get our money from our rich daddies, now do we, Asha Castile?”
“Great, now you have two things to take back,” Asha said, folding her arms.
“You know that I’m not going to do it, so why don’t you just hush,” Scotty said. “Could you do that for me, Ash? Could you hush for once?’
“I won’t,” Asha said. “I won’t ever shut up...cheap bastard..."
"Why don't you both try shutting up for once?” Natalie said. “It would do you both good, I think…”
“I will if she will,” Scotty mumbled.
“She will,” Natalie assured him. “If you give her a bottle of beer…”
Asha smiled in Scotty’s direction, appearing pleased with herself and the outcome.
Scotty hesitated for a moment, rolled his eyes, and said, “Alright, alright…they’re in the fridge…keep in mind that I’m only doing it because it’s Nat’s birthday…”
“And it’s almost midnight,” Brandon reminded them, looking at the clock on his cellular phone. “I say we all drink to that…”
Natalie’s eyes widened in his direction as he winked at her. “Brandon!”
“Baby, I’ve seen it in your eyes,” he told her with a teasing laugh. “You want to try it…”
“No I don’t,” she said, folding her arms. “You’ve seen nothing…”
Brandon held up his bottle to his eye level, jiggling the bottle gently. “Look, baby, I only have a swallow left…you can have this…”
“Oh, great,” Natalie began. “So, I can have your backwash as my first drink…”
“Glad you said that, Nat,” Scotty said. “There’s a brand new bottle waiting for you in the kitchen…”
“An even better idea,” Brandon agreed. “I knew you were my best friend for a reason…”
Brandon and Scotty looked at each other and laughed.
“Nat, you don’t have to drink anything that you don’t want to drink,” Asha said, rejoining them on the floor. “Don’t succumb to peer pressure…”
“Thank you, Asha,” Natalie said with a nod of her head.
“There you go, flapping your big lips again,” Scotty said.
“Oh, don’t give me that crap, Scotty,” Asha told him. “I’m simply doing my job by suggesting that she not drink if she doesn’t want to…”
“Why don’t you allow her to make that decision for herself?”
“She already has, you dummy,” Asha sneered. “I was just supporting her decision…”
“I have a proposition,” Natalie voiced quietly, raising one, delicate finger.
“Yes?” Brandon answered.
“If I drink a whole bottle of beer, then Asha and Scotty have to stop arguing,” she suggested with a grin.
Brandon nodded, and they both watched their friends look at each other.
“And,” Brandon continued. “You both have to kiss each other…and mean it…”
“Hell no,” Asha exclaimed. “I refuse to agree to those terms! When the hell did this become Truth or Dare?”
“Wait a minute, Ash,” Scotty began, waving his hand in her direction. “I see the game that Brandon’s trying to play…but I’ll up the ante a little…”
“By all means,” Brandon encouraged.
Brandon raised himself from his position across the living room from Natalie, and he planted himself beside her, gingerly placing an arm across her chest, reeling her into him. When they both got settled again, Scotty cleared his throat and continued.
“I’ll kiss that dragon, if Natalie agrees to chugging the beer…”
“No,” Brandon answered hastily before Natalie could even part her lips. “She’ll get sick…it’s her first drink, man…have a little consideration…”
“Fine, fine,” Scotty said, rolling her eyes. “Natalie will drink the beer…cautiously…and she will be an active participant in 10 Fingers…”
“Scotland Lee Kelly, you devious, devious man,” Asha said, smiling at him. “I think I love you all of a sudden…”
“That’s not fair either, and you know it,” Brandon argued. “This girl hasn’t done anything…she’s like a peach that’s never been bruised…”
“Nice analogy, Bran,” Asha
laughed.
“Why thank you,” he replied. “I try…”
“Back to the topic at hand, please?” Scotty pressed. “Maybe Nat’s not as innocent as she seems…maybe she’s got secrets that she’s never told you…”
Natalie made sure to give her boyfriend a look of security, a look that she hoped suggested that he had absolutely nothing to worry about. After all, it was like he said, she was as pure as fully-ripened, untouched fruit.
“I highly doubt that,” Brandon replied, shrugging off his friend’s suggestions.
“Isn’t this a drinking game?” Asha said.
“That’s how I’ve played it,” Scotty said.
“Me too,” Brandon agreed.
“Look,” Scotty began, getting to his feet and heading in the direction of the kitchen. “Since Natalie’s never done anything, you won’t have to worry about her drinking much…”
Natalie watched Brandon take a deep breath, and she reached up, rubbed his hand for comfort and sighed as well.
Scotty reappeared in the living room, with four wet bottles of the Heineken, passing it to each of the occupants in the room.
“Alright,” Scotty said with a strong exhale. “Are we ready?”
“Wait a second,” Natalie said. “You two need to get to kissin’…”
Brandon chuckled, squeezed at his girlfriend’s shoulder and replied, “I agree completely…I hope you remembered to brush your teeth…”
“Brandon Greene, you do realize that I’ll get you back for this one, right?” Asha snorted.
“Hmm,” Brandon began, placing a finger to the cleft in his chin. “Delivering idle threats means that you use tongue…and Natalie and I will tell you when to stop…”
“You’re just making it worse for yourself, aren’t you?” Asha told him.
“Ash, just shut up and get to kissin’...” Natalie cut in with a grin upon her face.
“I think I love to hear you say that,” Brandon said.
“Why thank you…”
Brandon and Natalie watched as Scotty chugged the rest of his beer, before hesitantly pressing his pink lips against Asha’s slowly. The connection was awkward initially; certainly lacking the same intensity that Natalie once felt when she kissed Brandon for the first time. But as the couple allowed them to kiss longer, she witnessed them meld into each other, and she could have sworn that she heard heavy breathing.
“Alright, alright,” Brandon said. “I think I’ve seen enough…let’s get this game going, shall we?”
“I’m not so sure that I want to know everything that you’ve done,” Natalie told Brandon, turning her head backward to look up at him.
“I’m not sure I want you to know either,” Brandon replied, attempting a smile in her direction. “Drink up!”
“That was by far the worst kiss I’ve ever experienced,” Asha said, wiping her mouth. “That moment only justified why I don’t date white guys in the first place…”
“Or any guys for that matter,” Scotty retorted, wiping his mouth, and then cracking open another bottle. “Now I must drown my sorrows in this drink…”
“Looks like we held up our end of the deal,” Asha said, folding her arms. “Now, it’s Nat’s turn. Crack open that bottle and have a drink, young lady…”
This was it. This was the moment that Natalie had dreaded. The moment that she finally succumbed to the peer pressures around her, with all these smiling, encouraging faces, surrounding her, especially Brandon, who wanted nothing more of her than for her to just relax. She could give him that much. After all, he did provide them with the most amazing little cabin, perched lakeside, under an adorning moon. She would assume for the moment that one beer bottle couldn’t harm her that much, and she was confident that Brandon wouldn’t let her go too far.
She gave the bottle to Brandon, watched as he opened it for her, and as he handed it back to her, he encouraged her to drink slowly.
She would adhere to each instruction that her beer enthusiast boyfriend gave her.
The game commenced, and four sets of ten fingers were each accounted for, and Asha began with the statement, “Never have I ever had sex…”
That was an easy one. Scotty, Asha and Brandon all lowered a single finger, signifying that yes, they’d each have sex before, and each took a three-second sip of their beers.
Natalie’s ten fingers were still accounted for and she took a deep breath as her friends all nervously laughed at each other.
Then, Scotty’s turn came. “Never have I ever…given or received oral sex…”
Another easy one for Natalie, while she again watched Asha, Scotty and her sweet, not-so-innocent Brandon lower another finger and take another drink.
“I’d like to know who, Asha Castile,” Natalie pressed, her eyes widened. “And whether or not it was an even trade…”
Natalie watched as her friend’s cheeks reddened, and she lowered her head, laughed, and replied meekly, “I played on both teams [the boys cackled and jeered at this]…and it was a guy that you don’t know…”
“Thank you for telling me…”
“Oh, Lord, I wanted to forget it as soon as I’d done it!”
Some few rounds later, Natalie had discovered some things about Asha and Scotty that she was sure that she never wanted to know. She’d heard enough about licking this and sucking that to last her a lifetime, as well as enough about Brandon to keep her from ever wanting to spend the night with him. She was sure that he sensed it too. What’s more, Asha, having downed her fourth beer in a matter of thirty minutes, was beginning to show the effects upon her face, and in her comical giggling. Moreover, a more alarming sign was that she was touching Scotty more than she normally would have. She was only left with three fingers. Scotty with two and Brandon with one. Sweet Natalie stood tall with eight whole fingers and only one-and-a-half bottles of beer consumed.
She couldn't help the sensation of feeling a little left out...
“Okay, okay, my turn,” Scotty said, attempting to compose himself from laughing at Asha. “Never have I ever…gotten a tattoo…”
“Yes! I’m still in the game!” Brandon said.
“Me too…” Asha chimed in. “No tattoos…”
“Me neither…” Scotty said.
Natalie hesitantly reached for her beer bottle.
She watched as each of her friends fell silent temporarily, and it looked as though they were trying to catch their breath.
She was seventeen, strangely absent-minded, reaching for change and rebellion. She’d overheard Sidney and her friends talking about it in her sister’s room next door, and she’d wanted to join. Oh, what her mama would do if she knew that her daughter had a tiny white lily inked somewhere on her brown skin, hidden in warmth and shadow.
Their sweet Natalie, tainted.
Natalie lowered a finger.
“Really? A tattoo?” Scotty asked, as a slow grin of curiosity formed on his face.
“I can’t believe it!” Asha said. “My baby has a wild streak! When? Where?”
“I was seventeen…in a tattoo parlor in Decatur…I can’t tell you where it is…”
“Can you at least tell me what it is?” Asha asked.
“A white lily…”
“I’m not sure if I feel betrayed…or turned on…” Brandon said.
“Why won’t you tell us where it is?” Scotty asked.
She didn’t want to sound completely trite in saying that she was saving that for her husband, in spite of her stupidity. So, she opted for a simpler phrase: “It’s just between me and the Lord…”
“Did it hurt?” Asha asked.
Natalie shrugged. “Not really…there’s a lot of…flesh…um…where the tattoo is…”
Brandon cracked open another bottle of beer, and said, “Natalie…just stop talking about your tattoo…”
She looked at her boyfriend, internally laughing at his nervousness.
“Aw, is she making you squirm?” Asha prodded him with a teasing smile.
>
Brandon took a long swig from his bottle, swallowed hard, and said, “Asha, I’d appreciate it if you shut up right now…”
Asha and Scotty, who’d allowed alcohol to make them quite a chuckling pair, laughed at Asha’s joke, as they fell all over each other.
“Well,” Scotty began, taking a sip from his own bottle. “I'd say after that little surprise, we could stop playing…I don’t think we need to know anything else about anyone…”
“Yes, I agree,” Natalie said. “Especially from those who you are in a relationship with.”
Brandon looked at her.
She wasn’t sure how many bottles of beer she’d consumed following the game, while the foursome laid on the wooden floor with the itchy oriental rug in the middle, while she lay on Brandon’s chest as he sloppily stroked her head, grazing his lips across the top of it. She felt his chest move up and down slowly. But she recognized her inebriation the moment that Scotty suggested that they all jump off of the dock outside of the house sometime in the middle of the night, and she was the first to accept the offer. She leapt off of her boyfriend, pulled him by his hands and headed toward the front door.
“Baby,” Brandon called after her, laughing. “Baby, slow down…baby…Tallie…you’ll make yourself sick…baby!”
But she didn’t listen. She felt the moon kiss her skin, felt the night's chill strike her cheeks, heard the crickets’ cry. The moon created a path of white light, and it smeared the black water, and the branches from the trees high above their heads created black shadows against its milky surface.
And she grabbed Brandon’s waist for warmth, allowing him to kiss her forehead again. They were completely unaware of the fact that Scotty and Asha were undressing as they enjoyed the view of the lake.
“What the hell?” Brandon asked, laughing at them the moment that he took notice. When Natalie tried to turn around and look, Brandon turned her head back toward the lake, telling her, “No, Baby, no…don’t look…there are some things that I don’t think you’re ready to see yet…Asha…are you crazy? Put your clothes back on…do you think I want to see those? Wait, wait a minute…I do want to see those…Asha, put those away! And definitely put that away….”