“I’d rather not go to prison.”
“Yeah, me neither. I’m too pretty and I have soft hands. Damn, it was a thought. Come on man, don’t let her get to you.”
“I’m trying.” We walked on home and I stewed the whole way. I hated her. I always would.
I had to figure out a way to bring her off her pedestal, and soon.
Chapter Eleven
Junior year. I was seventeen, and counting down the days until I would be free of the cancer in my life named Brielle. She and I fought every morning over who would drive the car. It was almost like we were brother and sister. Almost. Occasionally I’d catch her looking at me funny with something in her expression I couldn’t identify. Other times I’d accidentally brush her hand and we’d both audibly suck in air. There was no denying what we both felt. But neither of us were willing to mess up our family for it. We just weren’t.
We knew our places at school. I had finally graduated from social pariah to semi-normal guy again. Kirby and I fielded off the honeys with a stick. Yeah, that sounded good in theory, right? We were losers. Without girlfriends. Still. I still wanted Brielle. I compared every girl in the world to her. No one could compare. No one could measure up. No one was her. Except her.
Carla had gone back to Brazil, and even though we still talked online, it wasn’t the same. She and I had really become friends. I was miserable. All Kirby and I had was each other and music. We were boring as hell.
“Eleventh grade sucks,” Kirby grumbled between slurps of his chocolate milk.
“You said it,” I agreed.
“I thought things were going to be awesome.”
“Well, welcome to club zero. The drinks are milk, the food is shit, and the atmosphere sucks.” I held up my milk carton and surveyed the cafeteria. “These, our peers, are idiots, who think that today’s music rocks.”
“It’s not all bad,” Kirby laughed as I lowered my carton.
“Dude. I want to rip out my ear drums ninety-nine percent of the time.”
“I get that. I do. You’re all into classic rock.”
“The good stuff. Yeah.”
We finished our lunch in silence and shuffled off to our next class. His was biology, mine was calculus. Brielle was in my class too, not that she paid a minute’s worth of attention. Instead she spent the hour texting, and doing god-knows-what for Mr. Farley after class for a passing grade. I didn’t ask, she didn’t tell.
I had to stay after school while she showed her school spirit on the football field. She’d been newly accepted into the cheerleading squad, and since we shared the car, I had to wait on her.
“If you got team spirit give a yell, give a Y-E-L-L!”
I snickered and mumbled, “Instead why don’t you go to hell? H-E-L-L!”
“Rah rah rah!” the girls chanted and I amused myself by making fun of them the whole time.
Finally they were done. “Can we please get home?” I whined.
Brielle jangled the keys and grinned. “You can walk. We are going to the mall.”
“Fuck that! I waited on you! We’re supposed to ride together.”
“Sucks to be you, doesn’t it?” She sashayed away and all the cheerleaders followed her, giggling and pointing at me.
I fumed as they crawled in the car and cranked bubblegum pop. She peeled out of the parking lot and I was left standing there looking like a moron.
That was it. I would talk to my dad about her not using my damn car anymore. It was ridiculous. I stormed home and saw Lisa’s shitty car and my dad’s in the driveway. That was unusual; they both should’ve been at work. I stormed inside and yelled, “Dad!”
He hurried down the stairs and put his finger to his lips. “Hush.”
“Don’t tell me to fucking hush!”
He grabbed my arm and pulled me outside. “Where’s Brielle?”
“That’s exactly what I wanted to talk to you about! She took my fucking car after cheerleading practice and I had to walk home. Her and the robosluts are at the mall! This really sucks, Dad, and I’ve had enough. I’ll pay you for the fucking parts you bought but I want my car back!” I screamed and ranted, and he let me finish.
“Are you done?” he asked softly.
I deflated and nodded. “I’m done.”
“Lisa had a miscarriage today.”
Air whooshed out of me as though he’d sucker punched me in the gut. “A miscarriage? I didn’t know she was having a baby.”
“She was ten weeks along, we were going to tell you guys once she was twelve weeks. She was at work and started bleeding and well, I’ll spare the gory details but the doctor says she lost the baby.”
“Shit…Dad, I’m sorry.” Now I felt like the world’s biggest asshole.
“Me too.”
“Is she gonna be okay?”
“She just needs some rest. She’s really tired and sad. So if you could keep your car drama to a minimum for a while, that’d be great. I know it’s not the ideal situation, Carter, but sometimes, we have to take one for the team for the good of the team. Do you understand what I’m saying?” He squeezed my shoulder and I nodded.
I did know what he was talking about. I had to get over it and let her walk all over me until I got out of here. The team mattered more than my problems. “I get it, Dad. I’ll go upstairs and study.”
“That’s my boy.”
Yep. Good little Carter.
Lisa lost three more babies over the course of our junior year. She withdrew further away from us each time. I knew it affected Dad, I could see it in the tired lines in his face. Brielle was oblivious, or maybe she was really hurt by her mother trying for babies and decided to act out more.
You never really knew with her.
I stayed to myself, becoming even more of a hermit, only hanging out with Kirby occasionally and working hard at the garage. I planned out a future to get the hell out of Marysville, Nebraska. I thought often about calling my mother and asking if I could move out to California, but Dad needed me, so I stayed.
“Carter,” he called my name and jerked me from my thoughts.
“Yeah, Dad?”
“The oil has been drained out of the car for at least five minutes. What’s on your mind?”
“Nothing.” I took another one for the good of the team and buried my feelings and thoughts. It was easier than burdening him with my bullshit. He didn’t need it.
“Then finish up her car please, yeah?”
I hurried to do as he asked, not wanting to disappoint him.
Brielle had taken full ownership of the car, but I was the one footing the insurance and gas most of the time. I was also the one doing all the repairs on the car. Like the brakes she burned out in two months - she kept her foot permanently attached to the brakes so she was constantly tapping them.
I never said a word. I just changed the pads and rotors, on my dime. By the end of the year, she was dating someone new, again, and was never around anymore. She basically lived at his house. He was bad news, twenty-one, with a rap sheet longer than my arm. Burglary, arson, petty theft. Did her mother or father seem to care? Nope, they were both wrapped up in their own little world. My dad couldn’t say shit to her either, what could he say? He wasn’t her father.
I was the only one who seemed to be worried. She came to school less and less often, and soon she had flunked her classes and Dad received letters about truancy.
“Did you know she wasn’t at school?” he asked me later that night while we ate dinner at the table, alone. Lisa was at work pulling the evening shift and Brielle was who knows where.
I shrugged. “Yeah.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It wouldn’t matter if I had. No one can do anything with her.”
“I’ll be surprised if she doesn’t end up pregnant before she graduates.”
“If she graduates.”
Dad tipped his glass toward me and smiled tiredly. “That too. I’ll talk to Lisa. I don’t like her being over at this guy’s house
all the time. We don’t know him.”
“He’s not so great.”
“She’s almost eighteen, but that’s not old enough to be dating a guy his age.”
“I couldn’t agree more.”
“I’ll get this straightened out even if I have to go to her father to get something done.” Dad nodded and tucked back into his spaghetti, my specialty. He had this look in his eye like he’d finally had enough, and maybe he had.
Chapter Twelve
The August before our senior year sweltered around us and our air conditioning was dead. Lisa was laid off from the grocery store and we couldn’t afford to get it fixed. Even at eight o’clock at night, it was ninety degrees in the house. My fan tried to suck in muggy air from outside my window, but it didn’t help.
We had just turned eighteen and I couldn’t wait to finish school and get the hell out of Marysville, Nebraska. It was all I thought about. I was a man obsessed. I’d take my fucking car and drive off into the sunset flipping everyone the bird.
I could hear Brielle in her room. She’d been home for a couple of months, and she was angry and snapping at everyone all the time. Her boyfriend skipped town with another girl. The cops were hot on his heels. I guessed she was pissed she wasn’t in the car with him.
I heard a soft thud, and knew she was breaking out. That was the screen coming out of the window. I had to know what she was up to. I jumped out of bed and pulled on a T-shirt and my shorts, then I popped my own screen out of the window. Ducking my head out, I could just barely see her blonde hair in the moonlight.
“Wait,” I hissed. Throwing my leg out the window, I stepped out onto the roof and climbed down the trellis to the dew-soaked grass.
She hadn't stopped and and I had to run to catch up with her. “Where are you going?” I asked.
“To swim. Wanna come?”
“Sure.” She hadn’t said anything to me in months other than ‘pass the salt.’ We walked down the sidewalk for a few minutes in silence. Finally my curiosity got the best of me. “Where are we going to swim?”
“The Johnsons have a pool.”
“Do they know we’re coming?”
She chuckled. “You’re so cute. No, they don’t.”
“So…we’re going to ask, right?”
“No, we’re going to climb the fence, get naked, and swim. If you don’t have the balls for that, then go back home and get in bed for the night like a good little boy.”
I gulped. Not at the thought of breaking into their yard. But at the thought of Brielle being naked in water. I was going, even if that meant I would go to jail for trespassing. I wasn’t a minor anymore and I could get in major trouble...it would totally be worth it. “I’m coming.”
“Try not to in the water, okay? That’s gross.”
I snorted. “I’ll be fine.”
She pulled a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of her shorts and stuck one in her mouth. Lighting it, she took a long drag. “Ahh…” she breathed out.
“They’re bad for your health,” I remarked and she shrugged.
“Anything that’s good is bad for you.”
“You’re different.”
“I’m not a little kid anymore. Neither are you. Now we’re eighteen and the real world is coming for us.”
“Are you okay?”
“Okay is such an ambiguous term, Carter,” she said drolly.
“I’ve been worried about you.”
“Again, so fuckin’ cute. Don’t worry about me. Worry about someone else, anyone else. Not me, Carter.” She took another long drag of her cigarette and blew out a menthol-scented cloud.
“I care about you, though.”
She stopped and turned to face me. “I know you do. I’m telling you to stop.”
“I can’t. I’ll always care about you.”
“If you knew me, really knew me? You would hate me.” She walked faster this time, and I could almost imagine her demons chasing at her heels.
Catching up with her easily, I touched her elbow. “I do know you, Brielle. I’ve known you since kindergarten.”
“Look, if this is going to be an episode of Intervention or something, could you just go back home? I’m hot and I want to get wet. Is that so wrong? I don’t need to be quizzed about my fucked up life.”
“Okay, fine. Just know that I’m here for you.”
She blew out another lungful of smoke and murmured so softly I could barely hear, “I know you are.”
We ended up at the Johnsons’ house a few minutes later. The house was dark and Brielle snickered. “Yes, the old bastards are asleep. Let’s go swim. Come give me a boost over and I’ll unlock the gate for you.”
“You’re not going to leave me out here by myself are you?”
“You wound me.”
I hefted her up and tried not to focus on how silky smooth her legs were. The gate popped open with a soft squeak and she waved me inside. “Easy peasy.”
She had stripped off her clothes and I followed suit, watching her out of the corner of my eye to see how naked she got. Brielle Harper did nothing by halves - except her schoolwork - and stripped down to her birthday suit.
I was instantly hard and decided to keep my shorts on to keep myself in check. Even if I had to walk home with wet shorts and risk chafing it was better than embarrassing myself. She dove off the side of the pool and I stared in fascination. The moonlight gilded the pool with shades of silver and I could barely make out her form in the water. She broke the surface and grinned.
“Come in.”
I knelt by the side of the pool and put my legs in the water before pushing off and joining her in the icy liquid. It felt heavenly. “Damn, I wish we had a pool,” I whispered.
“Why are you wearing your shorts? Are you hard?” she giggled softly, and I ducked under the water to avoid her question.
When I surfaced she splashed me. I’m not sure how long we were in the pool playing, but apparently we got a little loud because the porch light flicked on.
“Busted!” Brielle shrieked, swimming fast for the ladder to climb out. I put my hands on the edge of the pool and hefted myself out. She grabbed her clothes and I found my shirt near the edge of a bush.
We ran down the street, her still mostly naked and holding her clothes. I caught her elbow and pulled her into the cemetery behind the old Baptist church. “Here, get dressed,” I whispered.
Before I could react, she had me pressed against the back of the church and her mouth was on mine. Even though she tasted like her shitty menthol cigarettes, I didn’t care. Her skin was hot and wet and she was still very much nude against me, only wearing her panties.
Her tongue slicked along my bottom lip and I groaned out loud. “Touch me, Carter.”
“I-I…”
She grabbed my hands and placed them on her breasts. “Touch me.”
I would be going to hell, and I loved every second of it. My hands worshipped her flesh, kneading her breasts tenderly. I plucked at her nipples, first one then the other. She kissed my jaw then took my hand and slid it down her belly to the edge of her panties.
“Right there,” she murmured against my neck. Her tongue flickered slick little patterns on my skin and I bit my bottom lip as my fingers slowly dipped under the black satin panties.
She wasn’t bare like the chicks on late night cable porn, she had a soft bit of hair there. My fingers stilled. I didn’t know what to do. She seemed to sense my ineptitude and she whispered in my ear, “It’s okay, I’ll show you.”
Her hand followed mine into her panties and she pushed my clumsy fingers between her wet lips. Gripping my wrist firmly, she rocked her pussy into my hand. I guessed I was doing it right because she moved faster and faster, just like the girls on TV. Her pussy was soaked by that point and I throbbed with need.
“Carter, yes, God dammit,” she cried, and her body spasmed around my hand. I’d just made her come.
What happened next, though? I wasn’t prepared for it. At all.
I was near death by the time she pulled my dick out of my underwear. I died, then came back to life, and died again when she licked me and drew me between her lips.
Her tongue was hot and her mouth even hotter. She sucked me like a Popsicle and I lost control. I’d never had a blow job before. I’d never even had a hand job by anyone but myself. That was the best orgasm I’d ever had. I exploded and cried out, “Shit!”
She sucked me dry before carefully putting me back inside my pants. Zipping me up and buttoning my fly, she rose to standing and kissed me softly. “Thanks. This didn’t happen, right, Carter?”
“Right!” I squeaked. I wasn’t able to say anything else. My mind was blown right along with my balls.
“Good.” She rummaged around for her clothes. She dressed quickly and walked away, not saying another word.
It was for the best. I wasn’t exactly good for conversation right that minute. I wasn’t sure why that had just happened, or even how, but it had. I couldn’t forget that. It would be fodder for many, many torrid nights.
We’d made each other explode behind the Baptist Church on Maple Street.
It was every eighteen year old boy’s fantasy.
Chapter Thirteen
We never talked about that night behind the church. It was like it had never even happened, just like she said. Except, I knew it had. I fantasized about it frequently. What I would have done differently if I'd had the chance. What I’d say. How she’d react. I replayed those few hot moments over and over in my head like a bad movie.
She and I lived together but we moved in separate circles, nodding casually like acquaintances when we saw each other in the hallways of school. I didn’t even bother asking for rides in my car anymore. I didn’t trust myself to be alone with her.
Things at home weren’t much better. Dad and Lisa fought all the time, she was miserable because she couldn’t have a baby. She wanted another chance to get it right. I also wondered if she was jealous that her ex-husband’s new wife had two babies and she couldn’t even have one.
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