But in the seconds after, my body still faintly spasming, it felt hollow. Lonely. I stepped out of the shower and toweled off. Once I’d momentarily satisfied myself, I was determined once more, for the millionth time, to enjoy seeing Tanner and getting to know him again as a friend and nothing more, and somehow find a way to keep my body from betraying me.
Still, I got dressed paying more attention to what to wear than I usually do. Put on skinny jeans instead of a dowdy old pair of cords. A tight shirt instead of something baggy and comfortable. Some cool earrings I thought he’d like.
It was still only 8:30 in the morning. What was I gonna do for all the long hours until he gets here? It’s not like we have the kind of parents you want to hang out with. My mom is a jerk, to be honest, and if Tanner wasn’t coming home, I’d have stayed at school and studied through the Thanksgiving holiday. She’s the kind of person who gets angry, I mean really angry, at any little thing. You never know what’s going to set her off. All you can do is try to avoid her as much as you can.
And my stepfather, Tanner’s dad? He’s not much better. He drinks too much and is usually slumped in an armchair sucking down beers and watching sports on TV, not talking to anybody. But he’s like an unexploded bomb ticking away, because at some point—you can never guess when—he’ll explode, raging at someone on TV if we’re lucky, and someone in the house if we’re not.
It’s a miracle those two ever got together—a real testament to the idea that there’s someone for everyone. It’s not like getting a stepfather improved my life, even a little bit…well, except that maybe there was another target for my mother to aim her poison at. The best thing about that marriage was Tanner coming into my life, for sure. On rainy days we played Monopoly for hours, and I even think that’s what got me interested in a business career, trying to win against the unbeatable Tanner. Even as a kid he wasn’t interested in money, but he crushed in Monopoly anyway.
And when it was sunny, he took me outside, patiently teaching me how to shoot an arrow with a bow he made himself, or showing me how to track deer in the woods behind the house. Before Tanner and his Dad came into our lives, I was alone with my crazy mother, since my father disappeared before I can even remember. And while I’ll probably never get over his abandonment, a little part of me understands. If I’d been able to leave my mother, I might done it too, and to hell with the consequences.
These parents of ours are a big reason Tanner and I got so close. We clung to each other during the storms; he was my safe place, my protector. We knew, even when we were arguing fiercely, that we had each other’s back. But then we were separated, and childhood was over, and everything changed. In his absence I wondered all the time who he was turning into, what kind of man was he going to be, but we had no chance to get to know each other again, thanks to school and his endless trips into the wild.
What he doesn’t know, and I’m determined he never will, is that my love for him goes way past stepbrother and stepsister. Way past. I long to run my hands over his sculpted chest, to touch my lips to his tender mouth, even…even wrap my hand around what I imagine must be the most beautiful cock in the universe…these thoughts are practically all-consuming, but I know none of it can happen and I have to get control of myself.
But still, I can’t stop myself from standing at the window, praying his battered old car covered with hideous bumper stickers comes rumbling down our street. Anticipating the moment when I see his friendly familiar face light up when he sees me.
The last time I saw Tanner was in August. I was getting ready to go off to college and he was packing for one of his crazy wilderness trips. He stood in the doorway while I was making a pile of all the stuff that had to get squeezed into the car, stuff I’d saved up for and lovingly picked out, like matching towels and bathmat, and a little rug, plus a lamp with a pretty shade.
“That’s quite a pile,” he said, glancing at my things. He was bare chested, wearing hiking shots and boots, his beard scruffy. His intense green eyes swerved over to meet mine, and I let my gaze sweep over him again, lovingly taking him all in.
He was gorgeous as ever.
“I like nice things,” I said, and it came out all prim but I didn’t mean for it to. This was an old argument for Tanner and me. He was all about not having too much stuff, about traveling light, and I wanted to surround myself with beautiful things. I wanted to make lots of money and he said he didn’t care about it at all. We’d gone around and around on it so many times, we knew exactly how to hurt each other, feel disappointed, keep pushing until somebody stalked off too mad to continue.
I had sworn to myself not to do that, not that day, when we were saying goodbye for almost three months. When he was younger, he’d been packed off to boarding school, so we’d had a lot of goodbyes to deal with.
I never managed them well.
I stayed up my room for hours, partly to avoid the ’rents and partly to watch for Tanner. Okay, mostly to watch for Tanner.
The first three months of college had been brutal in a lot of ways, but one good thing was that all the work distracted me from thinking about my brother. Stepbrother. I was pretty sure I had an A average so far. God knows I’d put in the hours, barely seeing the sun at all, just parked in the library with my laptop and a stack of textbooks, working my ass off. I was going to make sure I did everything I could so I could get a great job once I got out of school. Or if not great at first, at least something steady with the promise of advancement.
The idea of a steadily swelling bank account made me grin. It would mean getting out of this crazy house for good, and give me the feeling of security that I’d never, ever had.
I stood there by the window like an idiot, peering out between the tacky curtains my mother insisted on, expecting Tanner’s ugly-ass orange beater to come around the corner any minute.
I watched the usual parade of cars go down our street: lots of Toyotas, a few Fords, a truck, a couple of Priuses. Then this bad-ass SUV came into view, a black Lexus. It had mud splashed up the sides, and it looked awesome, like one of those ads where the vehicle is driving in the wilderness where no vehicle, maybe even no person, has ever been.
And that Lexus pulled right up to the curb outside our house, and Tanner hopped out.
I swear my heart practically jumped out of my body and the car was immediately forgotten. I didn’t think about anything but seeing him. I tore downstairs to the front door, forgetting all about how I’d planned to act cool.
“Tanner!” I yelled as he came through the front door.
“Namaste, Margaret,” he said, the faintest hint of a smile on his beautiful lips. He was the only one allowed to call me by my real name—I liked it, actually, though I never let on.
“What, so you’re a yogi now? And my name happens to be Maggie,” I said, sticking my nose in air, joking.
“Is that right,” he said, leaning in to kiss me on the cheek. He had never done that before, and god, it practically knocked me back against the wall, the combination of feeling his body heat and his earthy, masculine smell. I closed my eyes, dizzy for a second, overwhelmed with how good it felt to be close.
“Mom and Dad home?”
“Oh they’re out, off to a round of parties,” I said.
Tanner cracked up, knowing full well our parents never went anywhere and for sure didn’t get invited to any parties. “So it’s just you and me then,” he said, throwing an arm around my shoulders and pulling me close.
I melted. I absolutely melted.
In a flash I could see all those times as kids, huddled up in some fort we’d made in a closet, how he made me laugh by imitating his dad. How he made me feel safe from my mother’s fury.
And at the same time, I’m right here, right now, his rough cheek brushing mine, his hair falling into my eyes, and I get hit with a surge of lust so powerful I almost jump his bones right there in the front hallway of the house, not caring who would see or hear, not caring that I had no idea how to
do it, or if he would even want to.
Suddenly he pulls away, and his expression goes from warm to cool, just like that.
“What?” I said. It wasn’t like him. It was usually me who runs all hot and cold, while he stayed the same, always steady, always strong. I was worried he could read my thoughts, could see plain as day the ravenous need I was feeling for him…and wanted nothing to do with it.
Distractedly he looked down and let his arm drop from my shoulders. My heart sank through the floor. All these feelings—I try so hard to push them down—but when they insist on bubbling up, it hurts for him to shove me away.
“Nothing,” he mumbled. “I better go say hi to the parents. Make me lunch?”
“Make your own lunch.” I glared at him, even in my hurt and irritation seeing how he’s gotten even more buff. His skin was glowing, his chest almost bursting out of his well-cut shirt. He looked incredible.
Wait a freaking minute. I hadn’t noticed before. His clothes were nice, almost trendy. He was wearing a tight shirt that made his chest look massive, and I could see the muscle definition in his shoulder and his abs. What was Tanner doing dressed in something other than some raggedy T-shirt anyway?
I followed him to the family room where Mom and Dad were hunkered down over Doritos and beer. They didn’t get up when they see him, rude as usual.
Still stung by his withdrawal, I fled up to my room and closed the door. I actually wished I had studying to do. Because stuff in a textbook, it all makes sense. You know what you’re supposed to do and you can just do it. It’s not all messy and complicated, where what you want to do is wrong, and hurt and pain are around every corner.
Oh, Tanner. Why can’t it be simple? Can’t we just live together once I finish school? Just as brother and sister, sharing a house but not a bed?