A Little Bit

Chapter 6

Chapter Six

Warren

I stumble out of the party, walking back to my townhouse on autopilot.

My mind is on fire. I can’t think straight. Every time a normal thought enters my brain, his raspy voice barges its way in, whispering sailor and good boy in my ear. My cock twitches inside my wet boxers, making me take an awkwardly large step to try to unstick everything in there.

Why did I even go? Why do I listen to everything he tells me to do?

When his text came in, telling me to come to the party, I told myself that I categorically would not go. I sat around the house watching mindless shit on Netflix, trying not to let my brain wander to what he was doing. Why he wanted me there. What would happen if I went.

And I gave in. Of course I gave in. That seems to be a trend with me when he’s involved.

How the fuck did I even get to this point? I didn’t even know him a week ago. I was happy. Or content. Or at least at a comfortable baseline. Now, everything is a mess. I’m being reckless. Doing things that my mother would… well, I don’t know what she would do, and that’s even scarier.

I’m done.

No more. No more. No more.

I’m going to go into my place, delete and block his number, and write all of this shit out of me. I’ll write it all fucking night if I have to, anything to purge it from my mind.

And the rubber band.

I slow my steps to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk, just a few houses down from mine, and raise my hand to look at the offensive object. I’ve kept it on my wrist, but haven’t snapped it since the first time. It’s there just in case. In case it gets to be too much. In case I need a release. In case I can’t control myself.

And honestly, I deserve to snap it right now, after I’ve just come in my pants because another man was rubbing on me. I squeeze my eyes shut tight, trying to make the thoughts go away. But they don’t. They scream at me to remember.

His full lips a breath away from mine, smelling like rum and weed. The heat of his skin as he grabbed my throat. The first zing that shot through me when he thrust against me. How it felt so incredibly right despite knowing it was wrong.

I shake my head and grab onto the rubber band. My hand has a slight tremor to it. I breathe in deeply and pull the rubber, making it taut, then release the breath and begin letting it slip through my fingers.

“Warren? Is that you?”

I still my movements then quickly lower the band to my wrist without snapping it, my skin still buzzing with anticipation without the usual sting to quiet the chaos.

Hiding my arm behind my back, I crane my neck to see who’s calling me from my porch.

SJ leans against the wrought iron railing of the stairs leading up to my door, a lit cigarette hanging from her hand and glowing in the darkness.

“Uhh, hey, SJ. What are you doing here so late?” I ask as I briskly walk toward her, deciding it’s better to shove my hands deep in my pockets to hide my wrist from her.

SJ can’t know. She was the only person who could tell what was going on when I first started using this.

As I approach her, she straightens and throws her cigarette on the step, stomping it out with her thigh high black boots. She’s wearing this tiny skirt that I’m sure Mother gave her so much shit for, and her blonde hair is messily piled into a bun on top of her head, the vibrant violet streaks that made Mother’s left eye twitch when she saw, starting to fade into a soft lavender color.

She throws her arms out at me. “Baby bro, it’s been too long. I missed you.”

I greedily walk into them, embracing the familiarity she brings with her. “I missed you too, but you’re only twelve minutes older than me, Sarah-Jean.”

She immediately pushes me away and scoffs, “Ugh! Don’t use my full name. You know I hate that shit. Sounds like I should be arriving at a debutante ball with my virginity still intact. Which I actually did do when I was sixteen. Besides the virginity part, of course.” She widens her eyes and shrugs her shoulders.

Where I’ve always treated sexuality like a scary monster to keep hidden in the closet, so to speak, SJ embraces it. Brings it out into the light and does what she wants. Absolutely no shame. Much to our mother’s chagrin. I’ve always admired her ability to not care what anyone thinks of her, often giving an actual middle-finger to anyone who questions her.

“Will you open the door already? I’ve been waiting here forever and I’m hungry.”

I begin pulling my keys out of my pocket and walking past her toward the door. “Well, you should’ve eaten something at home.”

“Fuck no. There wasn’t—I didn’t have time. Had to get out of there. You should’ve seen Mother’s face. God. That vein in her forehead was fucking pulsing an EDM beat.” She cackles behind me and begins pushing me in the moment I have the door open, letting out a dramatic sigh when I close the door.

For some odd reason, SJ still lives at home with Mother and Dad. When I graduated with my undergrad last semester, I was allowed to move out of the house before starting law school. I did so immediately, needing to gain some independence in my life, because once school was over, that would all be gone. I’d have to get married and get ready for my Senate run, my life completely out of my hands.

SJ didn’t, though. She stays in that house, despite how stifling it is for her. When she told me, I had pressed her to tell me why, but she just got irritated and said it was what she wanted. Something then and now had told me that I wasn’t getting the full truth.

But she isn’t getting it from me, either. So who am I to judge?

I turn back to her, making sure to keep my hand with the rubber band in my pocket, and take her in now that we’re in the light.

Her face has the tell-tale signs of crying, black lashes spiked together with mascara, two lines down her cheeks, absent of the makeup she previously had there.

“SJ,” I whisper, bringing her back into my arms. “What happened tonight?”

She playfully shoves me, blinking rapidly and waving me off. “Please. Same old, same old.”

“But you’ve been crying,” I counter. SJ doesn’t cry. Well, not in a long time. She’s the strong one. My rock. Sheltering me from everything ugly we’ve had to endure. Except for that one night. Only Mother could protect me then.

“I’m good,” she clips back, pulling down the long zipper on her boot and flinging it next to the door.

“It’s past midnight. Does Mother know you’re here?”

She grumbles dramatically while pushing past me and heading toward the kitchen. “Who is the older sibling here? Don’t worry so much. It’s fine.”

“Again, you’re barely older.”

She ignores that and throws my fridge open, grabbing a string cheese and shutting the door before jumping up on the counter to start opening it. Looking around at the living room in front of us, she grimaces. “Why in the actual fuck would you let Mother decorate this place?”

I look around with her. The floral wallpaper. The tufted, uptight chairs and sofa. The gaudy white and gold medallion in the center of the ceiling that holds the crystal chandelier. The tasseled gold curtains. All of it is stuffy and antique.

It definitely is Mother’s style rather than mine. I’m not even sure what my style would be at this point. I’ve been told what to wear and how to look for so long. I am what she wants me to be, while SJ tries desperately to let her true colors show. I don’t think I have true colors underneath.

“You act like I had a choice,” I answer back, a little melancholy lacing the edges of my voice.

She snorts, nodding her head and then taking a huge bite out of her string cheese, instead of peeling it like a sane person.

I start backing away from her and toward the hallway. “I just have to change really quickly, and then we can hang out or whatever. The remote is on the couch over there if you want to watch TV,” I say evenly, attempting to not make her suspicious. I have to go hide some things.

She flicks her eyes up at me, for a just second, before pulling her phone out of her bra and muttering, “Okay.”

I scurry back to my bedroom, quietly closing the door behind me. I peel my pants and boxers off of me, doing my best to wipe up the mess Eli and I created with one of my other shirts. I throw on some sweats and take off my shirt, tossing it into the hamper in the corner of the room. Now the rubber band. I remove it and stuff it in one of my shoes in my closet. I’m not going to use it again. I don’t need it, but I just feel safer that it’s still here. Just in case.

Looking down at my wrist, the red mark still contrasts against my skin. Not obvious to anyone else, but SJ will know what it is. I grab one of my long-sleeved henleys and throw it on, making sure to pull the sleeves all the way down, covering my wrists.

My notebook sits innocently on top of the ornate wooden desk in the corner of the room. Snagging it, I clumsily try to lift my mattress to stuff it under there when the door bangs open behind me.

SJ stands there, staring at my hand still clutching the notebook, a snarl on her face. “You son of a bitch,” she mutters quietly, stomping over to me and yanking it from my grasp. She angrily sits on the edge of my bed before ripping the notebook open, vigorously flipping through the pages while tears start leaking down her face, following the same path already carved for them earlier tonight.

“Goddamnit!” she screeches, abruptly flinging the notebook across the room, making me wince.

“You promised,” she mutters, her voice hoarse.

I don’t answer her, keeping my eyes trained on the floor, trying to pour all my shame into the old wood below us.

“Warren,” she says softly, commanding my eyes to meet hers. “There’s nothing wrong with who you are.”

“It’s not who I am,” I answer immediately, ejecting what I want to be my truth.

She takes in a long breath and lets her head hang, still perched on the edge of my bed, hands digging into the comforter. “You don’t know what I do to keep them away. You can’t repay me like this.”

My brow lowers in confusion, but before I can ask what she means, her head snaps up. Her eyes briefly dart down to my wrists before going back up to my eyes. “Pull up your sleeves.”

“No,” I say haughtily, raising my chin.

She stands and takes another step toward me, readying herself to fight me for it. “Fucking do it, Warren.”

I scoff and flap my arms, like she’s being the unreasonable one. “You don’t believe me? Come on, SJ. I learned my lesson, and I wasn’t even wearing long sleeves when you first got here. You didn’t see anything then.”

Acid burns through me once I’ve finished talking, reminding me that only a disturbed, sick person would lie and gaslight someone who cares about them like I just did.

Her eyes soften, the tension melting out of her, allowing her body to sag against the mattress. “You’re right. I’m sorry. Just… please. No more of this.” She pauses a moment. “You should talk to someone about this.”

I raise my eyebrows at her, because she should know we can’t.

“I know,” she says to my silent statement. “But, you could still go. They don’t have to know. You need… something.”

I just nod my head, because she doesn’t get it. I can’t. She’s a part of this family too, but because I was born a man, I automatically have a set of expectations that don’t apply to her.

Mother became a senator because Grandaddy had no choice. He only had a daughter. If he’d had a son, she would’ve never been allowed to go down that path. That’s just not how things work. Her circumstances are special because the legacy had to continue.

Don’t get me wrong, SJ has her own expectations that are pressed upon her—marry into a good family, have no aspirations other than bearing children, be a good and proper woman. All things SJ viciously bucks against.

But being the future senator in the family, the one who will carry on the legacy, I can’t step out of line.

“I’m sorry.”

Getting up from the bed, she walks over and wraps her arms around me. I welcome the warmth, remembering all the times she’s been my source of comfort.

Resting my chin on the top of her head, I feel her voice vibrate through my body. “I love you, Warren. You’re all I have against Mother and all the other shitty people I’m stuck with in that house. One day… you’ll see it’s okay. It’s not a fault, despite what Mother or fucking Grandaddy makes you believe.”

She’s wrong, but I nod my head anyway, hoping to get this conversation closer to an end.

Backing out of my embrace, she holds me at an arm’s-length in front of her. “Okay. Can you at least think about going to talk to someone?”

“Sure.”

“You’re gonna stop with the fucked up journaling?”

“Yes.”

“What is even making you spiral again? Whatever it is, you should stay away from it.”

That gives me pause. She must think it’s some homophobic friends or something, making off-handed comments about the few people in this town who are out and proud.

If she knew the truth, that it’s actually because there’s some guy who I can’t stop obsessing over and following around like an idiot, she’d push me out the door and right into his arms.

“I’ll stay away,” I murmur back to her, even though I’m not sure if I actually can.