The Sister

My friend's sister, Ivy, had been trying to talk to me for months now, but would suddenly giggle and run away, leaving me feeling like I had my fly open or half a pie stuck to my face or something equally embarrassing. If she wasn't talking to me, she was staring at me, brown eyes boring into the back of my skull, only to look away when I turned around.

If I didn't know any better I would think she had a crush on me. Which was sweet, and highly inappropriate. I was well over twenty. She was only sixteen, and in the grip of puberty. I was surprised she's interested in me and not some celebrity, or boy more her age. When she grew older, and her hormones died down, she would forget about me and move onto someone else.

Time passed. Weeks turned into months; a year passed. She, um, developed. Body trimmed by time spent preparing for local dance competitions; her walk was smooth and feline, as her burgeoning breasts and hips drew the eye like lightning, and worst of all, she had two good friends that were unfortunately cut from the same cloth. As I entered the living room the former girlish chatter would suddenly stop, and three pairs of eyes would watch me as I walked across the living room to the kitchen, grab a cold glass of water, and wander back. As soon as I left the room, the voices would start up just as soon as I was around the corner. I thought nothing of it, after all, I was probably just as weird when I was that young.

As seventeen became eighteen, her mother worried about her lack of boyfriends. I would reply that sometimes it took some longer to sort themselves out than others. Following the lead of the women in music videos, her clothing became more provocative. Her mother and father disapproved, but only nagged her to put more clothes on as the communal laundry basket in the bathroom, across the hall from the washing room, started filling with thongs, and other skimpy panties not much more than the merest suggestion of lace or silk.

My friend was getting close to graduating, and mercifully, her ardor for me cooled and she found a boyfriend, a goofy looking kid with so much metal embedded in his face that I just wanted to run an electromagnet over it and see what popped off. Now, being a friend of the family for a while now, I was leery of her choice. He looked shifty, greasy, and entirely too untrustable, but I kept those thoughts to myself as her parents worried, drinking Maalox by the bucket when she skated out on a date with that angsty boy-band reject.

Time moved on. I stopped my friend from killing himself when his relationship dissolved with all the grace and style of a supernova. I cleaned him up, and kept him at my house that night, watching his chest rise and fall under the sheet, hoping that the next day I wouldn't have tell his family he was dead. It was a very long night, but his luck held, and the next morning he woke up looking like death warmed over, and we both tactfully agreed to never mention this to anyone.

Soon enough finals were over, and my friend held a party. All his friends and family were invited, and he held it at my apartment instead of his house, because, well, there could be alcohol there without parental repercussions. I blew some discretionary funds on a butt-load of alcohol and my friend decided to play bartender after his last brush with the sauce. The party was great, despite the fact I tend to live like a nomad, with little in the way of furniture that cannot be easily packed up. We even had a pool on the patio. Sure it was an inflated kiddy pool, but at ten feet by six feet by a foot and a half, it was large enough to need a lifeguard, which I did happily, in my swim trunks, and a floppy, wide brimmed hat with a rose stuck into the band, drinking my German lager and sneering down my nose at the American piss-water the others chose to swill. As the sun set and the gibbous moon rose high in the sky, I was feeling distinctly mellowed.

The sliding glass door opened with a squeak, and two long gorgeous legs pick their way through the bottle-strewn floor. "So, are you drunk enough yet?" Ivy called, and stepped into the pool. She had changed into a racing cut blue and white striped one-piece swimsuit that adhered tightly to her body like a second skin--and a very thin second skin at that.

My eyes roamed once, my lips cranked into a sly almost-smirk before I remembered who I was looking at, and snapped away to look at something less... embarrassing, like the wall. Damn the beer. "Not drunk. Quite yet. Buzzed though. Good buzz." I said with only a tiny slurring of the z's.

"So how are you doing?"

"Eh, s'allriiite."

"Heard you haven't had a girlfriend in a few years."

I looked at the bottle to not look at her. I paused, thinking slowly, "Eh, s'allriiite. How's the cylon?"

"Ronnie and I broke up a few days ago. He turned out to be a real jerk."

"Lotta that goin' 'round." I muttered darkly, draining the bottle and groping around the cooler beside me for a new one.

"Hey, get me one."

"You're not old enough."

"I'm old enough to smoke, get drafted, drive, married, have sex, and vote, and not drink?"

"Dem's the rules." I said, catching the bottle opener hanging from a string tied around my wrist and popping the top with a satisfying hiss.

"The rules suck."

"Yep." I said, tossing the bottle cap over my shoulder and off the patio.

"Rules written by desiccated white guys suck who got religion suck."

"Yep."

"So when's the last time you had sex?"

Aspirated lager flew the length of the patio.

"Shit, that long?"

I fixed her with the best quelling stare I could under the circumstances as I finished coughing. "That. Is not. Your business." I gasped.

"Aw, Owen's worried about you. My brother keeps saying that 'if that idiot doesn't get laid soon, he's going to explode'. From where, I leave up to you."

"How touching."

"So how long? Inquiring minds want to know!"

"Don't you have a curfew or something?"

"So defensive! It has been long then."

"Or I'm not willing to discuss my sex life, or lack thereof, with my best friend's little sister."

"Aw, I'm not so little anymore." She smiled mischievously, preening a little as I gave her a very old look.

"Best friend's younger sister, still."

"Aw, even mom's worried about you. Says you should find a nice girl to settle down with."

"Yep." I said, looking at the bottle. Trying not to let something as petty as my problems ruin a good buzz.

"Drunk yet?"

"Nope."

"What do you think of my swimsuit? The old one was too small. I think this one looks good."

I ran a professional eye over her as she stretched, hands above her head, feet pointed at the far wall, her breasts flattened against the suit, "Looks good." I said, drained the bottle, and looked away as I groped for a new one.

"You know why I broke up with Ronnie?"

"Nope."

"He became a total freak."

"It happens."

"All he could talk about was drugs, and ask me again and again to suck his dick. It was a nice dick. Five inches long, biggest I've ever seen in real life."

"It happens."

"All guys are horny freaks."

"Even your brother?"

"No, he's just weird. Is it true what they say?"

"'bout what?"

"That that crazy bitch broke up with him?"

"I heard something about that."

"So did she?"

"Ask him, he's in the living room, after all."

"I'd rather talk to you."

"I'm flattered."

"Here, I'll make it easier. The last time I had sex was a few hours ago."

"With who?"

"Myself, silly." She said, splashing the water with her hands.

"Is that even considered sex?" I wondered.

"I do. So when's the last time you had sex."

"Last night. What's with all the questions?"

"I'd like to know what it's like."

"What what's like?"

"Y'know..." she said, blushing.

"Sex? You want to know about sex? Why would you want to know about sex?"

"Isn't it obvious?"

"You're curious?"

"I'm a virgin!"

"Oh. Virgin and you're curious. Woah, feral combination. Okay, well, what do you want to know?"

She stopped for a moment, playing with the water, "What's it like?" she blurted suddenly.

"I, ah, um... it's good. Next question."

"No, wait! What do you mean 'good'?"

"It's... hard to explain. It's like masturbating, but more so, and not. It's... you're just going to have to do it. It's usually good. It can be bad, and it can be mind blowing if you do it right. Next question."

"How good are you?"

"I get by. Next question."

" 'I get by?' " She said, making quote marks with her fingers.

My lips quirked, "We usually have some fun. Next question."

"Why haven't you found a girlfriend?"

"Don't have time. Next question."

"What do you mean, you don't have time?"

"I work a lot, and I don't have the interest or the energy to go bar crawling for sex."

"I didn't say sex, I said girlfriend."

I sighed. "I guess I just haven't found anyone yet." I muttered to my bottle.

The silence stretched before, "I have."

"Oh?"

"Yeah, he's a great guy." She said defensively.

"If our places were reversed, she's probably already be married." I said morosely.

"Ah, you're just looking at the wrong people."

"I guess." I raised my bottle in salute as I sank lower in the pool. "Good luck for both of you. Now if you don't mind, I have to take a piss." I said, slowly rising to my feet. The world shifted suddenly and I grabbed the patio railing to keep from falling on the cooler. Hands gripped my shoulders as breasts flattened against my back. If I wasn't so nauseous, I'd probably be aroused.

"Here, let me help you." Ivy said, pulling me gently away from the railing.

"Thank you. I think I might have doo much to fink." I said leaning against her as my face went numb.

"Are you drunk now?"

"Yessh." I slurred, and lvy chuckled as she steered me through the open patio door, down the hall and into the bedroom, where the only bathroom is.

"Are you going to be okay in there?"

"I'll be fine." I said, closing the door behind me.

"I'll be out here, in case you need me." She called hopefully, her voice muffled by the flimsy door.

Not trusting myself to stand over the toilet and not fall down, I skimmed my shorts off and sat down, holding my head. Well, I thought, this was an unexpected development. I didn't plan to get this drunk until after the party. I pissed quietly into the bowl, resolving to drink some water and eat something before I became completely shit-faced.

After a minute, I finished peeing, but sat on the bowl for a little bit longer, enjoying the silence and the solitude with my world spinning on a broken top. And then, just to make my life complete, an argument started in my room between Ivy and someone else. Male voice, familiar... When I heard the sound of flesh striking flesh, I stood and pushed the door open, more out of drunken curiosity than anything else.

Ronnie was standing, with even more metal in his face than the last time I saw him, if that was possible, threatening Ivy a few steps away who was holding the side of her face and trying to back away.

"What the fuck is going on!?" I thundered. I think I set the world's record in sobering, as in the space between heartbeats I went from numb and drunk, to sober and pissed.

"Fuck you!" Ronnie said, in a fit of, at best, miscalculated courage. "You sleepin' with my 'ho, cracka?"

I stepped further into my bedroom, "What I am, you misogynistic simpleton, is rather pissed." I said, reaching behind me and grabbing onto the nodachi standing along the wall behind the ironing board.

Ronnie, perhaps high on something, or just stupid, reached into his pocket. Since I couldn't tell if he was pulling a gun, I planted my feet and swung. The ironing board exploded away as the nodachi swung in long arch terminating at his left ear, the lacquered wooden sheath sliding off as it moved, but thankfully, the sheath hadn't come completely off when it hit with a satisfying thunk.

Ronnie recoiled, hands over his ear, howling fit to wake the dead. The sheath finally came off when I pulled the nodachi free and recovered to low guard. Then the door burst open as Owen charged through, hesitated, and then continued the charge into Ronnie with a snarl.

Owen and Ronnie wrestled around my dirty laundry for a second, until Ronnie got on top, punching Owen in the face once before I vaulted over a pile of dirty underwear and put one foot on the center of Ronnie's back and pressed him down, slapping the side of his face with the flat of the blade before I drew back, digging the point into the ceiling, and raining little chips of drywall on my back and shoulders, ready to take his head off. "Now," I growled, "Option one: I take your fucking head off. Option two: You disappear--Now."

"You won't kill me." He bluffed.

"Fine." I hissed, planting my feet before bringing the nodachi down in a move that was less kendo, and more baseball. Ronnie, his head turned to regard me out of the corner of his eye, yelped and pressed himself into Owen, who looked up at me with the widest eyes as the nodachi swished harmlessly through the space Ronnie's neck was, and continued into the wall before I could stop it, punching another hole in the drywall. As I recovered, showering myself with little bits of drywall again, I absently made a note to buy a bucket of spackle, and a can of paint to patch the holes with.

A long moment passed in silence. "Hey," Owen croaked, licked his lips and started again, "Hey, you want to get off him?"

I paused, my thoughts coming slowly, thinking it through before I relented, thinking that this was an excellent idea, lowered the nodachi, and backed away. My friend helped pull Ronnie off the floor, and half frog-marched; half keep him from fleeing out of the room. "Get some clothes on, would you!" Owen shot over his shoulder as he left.

I stopped and looked down, remembering fuzzily that I had my bathing suit on, but instead saw that indeed I was naked. Very, very naked. My eyes shot aside to Ivy standing on my bed, pressed against the wall, staring at me, mouth wide. I blushed, and fled back into the bathroom as fast as I could move.

I looked at my reflection in the mirror as I swallowed bile, I willed my shaking hands to stop. My reflection stared back at me, calm looking only a little worse for wear. What a fucking lie, I thought, slipping off the bottle opener on my wrist and tossing it into the sink. I slipped my suit on and cleaned the small drop of blood and drywall powder carefully from the tip of the nodachi before I walked out the door.

Ivy sat on my bed, hugging herself. She looked up when the door opened and watched me silently as I picked the sheath up off the floor and carefully resheathed the nodachi. I paused, and bowed. "I'm sorry." I said, unable to think of anything else to say before I turned and left. I walked out and noticed the party had died down, people staring at me as I walked out into the living room. My friend was sitting on the table, sucking one of my lagers down. "Owen, I'm so sorry." I said.

"It's all right."

"No, no it's not. I should have stopped."

"No, I should have stopped him when he came in. I didn't think he'd hit her."

"Neither did I. We both should have known."

Owen took another long pull from the lager, burped. He shook his head and said quietly, "He was bleeding from a cut on the back of his neck. You nearly cut his head off. You would have cut his head off."

"Eh." I shrugged, "Nearly only counts in horseshoes and hand-grenades."

Owen looked up at me with a crooked smile, "You always have been one crazy motherfucker."

I smiled back, "I've been told that before. Go check on her, would you?" I said, offering a hand up. Owen nodded, and clasped my hand. With a grunt, I helped him lever up and pushed him in the direction of the bedroom, whispering in his ear, "If I'm going to do that again and not get a hernia, go on a diet, fat ass."

"I'm not fat, you're just weak, wide load."

I grinned as I sat down in the seat he just vacated, finishing his bottle in one gulp and propped the nodachi against the wall. Only the greatest parties have a near beheading, I thought nastily as everyone started bludgeoning me with questions. I staved them off with a curt, "Wait a few minutes, I'm sure the police are coming." Ten minutes passed, then a half hour, then forty minutes. As the party died down, I shrugged and guessed that he hadn't called them--so much the better.

After an hour, Owen emerged from the bedroom and looked me up and down, as I was trying very hard not to pass out, or vomit on my nice clean floor. "She okay?" I grunted, leaning forward in the chair, my head held in my hands, eye to eye with his belt buckle.

"She's fine. We talked."

"Good."

"You okay?"

"Hangover's gonna be a cast-iron bitch."

Owen looked around at the debris of the party, his hands ineffectually twitching at his sides nervously, "Let me clean this place up..."

"Nah, I'll do it tomorrow. I need something else to do other than feel miserable."

"You goin' to work tomorrow?"

"Nope. Takin' a vacation."

"That's a big sword."

"Owen, I love you like a brother, but if you don't stop making inane chit-chat, I'm going to vomit on your shoes."

"You look like you're going to do that anyway."

"Yes, but now it's not because I'm drunk, it's because you made me do it."

"Uh-huh." He said skeptically. "Whelp, we're going to go home."

"Have a safe drive home."

"Yep."

"Um, before you go, could you help me to the bathroom?"

"You're helpless, you know that?" Owen's chuckle turns to a grunt as he helps me up, "and you need to loose some weight, tubby."

"Yes, mom." I grunted as we staggered off to the bathroom. I sat once again on the toilet and they both bade me goodbye. I heard the front door slam, and I skimmed off my swimsuit, took a bath, cleaned my teeth, nearly putting my eye out getting the toothbrush in my mouth, and staggered to bed. As I pulled the sheet over my head, I groaned, the pillow and sheets reeked of Ivy. Unsettling.