A Little Bit

Chapter 8

Chapter Eight

Warren

I check my watch again, making sure to adjust the cuffs of my dress shirt so they fit perfectly over the cream-colored sweater, then brush my hands down the navy trousers.

Mother had this outfit sent over for her event today, ensuring that we all looked like a family of complementary colors. I hate these things. Where I have to stand up on stage and act like I’m the perfect addition to this All-American family. When I’m not. I’m the black spot marring the otherwise flawless tapestry. I’m the thing that doesn’t belong. The one who can’t seem to ignore his perversions. The one who’s lying to everyone. About more than one thing.

I squeeze my eyes shut tight, hitting the heels of my hands into my forehead.

Stop thinking about it. Stop thinking about it.

My fingers seek out the rubber band and quickly retreat when they find an empty wrist.

After SJ found my notebook, I made some changes. Changes that I had been meaning to make for a while. She was just the force that pushed me over the edge.

We threw out the notebook together. She made me go out to the sidewalk to do it, saying she didn’t want me to dig it out of my own trash the moment she left. Both of us stood on the timeworn brick walkways, watching as I stepped up and dropped it into one of the public trash cans on the street.

She had let out a “whoop” into the night air, which I promptly shushed her for, before she pulled out a tiny bottle of some clear alcohol and poured it all on top.

I shook my head at her. “You didn’t have to do that. I wasn’t going to go get it out here.”

She reared her head, giving me an incredulous look. “Sure you wouldn’t have, little bro,” she muttered with a smirk. “But I know you definitely won’t come get it, because I’m not even done yet.”

Then, like the slightly crazed, anarchist that my sister is, she flicked her lighter open and threw it in the can making the garbage ignite with a soft whoosh .

I immediately ducked my head when the flames burst, only lifting it once they had settled to a quiet blaze.

When I looked over at her, she had taken a step closer, smiling wildly while the small flames danced in her eyes.

“Oh my god,” I muttered while pulling her arm back in the direction of my townhouse. “You’re actually certifiable. Do you know that?”

She laughed insanely, then started running ahead of me, forcing me to start running too, a smile creeping onto my face.

After that night, I told myself I would try to stay away. I blocked his number. Avoided the bookstore. And so far, I’ve been successful.

The black SUV sent by Mother’s team rolls to a stop in front of my stoop.

I take one last look at myself in the mirror hanging next to the door, adjusting my hair.

A fucking liar looks back at me.

I rub at my wrist, closing my eyes and taking a calming breath. I don’t have time for this right now.

I meander my way outside, jumping into the SUV and enjoying the quiet ride to campus.

She’s speaking at AU today. I don’t know what about. Those aren’t details they concern me with. My job right now is just to show up and look the part. When it’s my turn—when I’m the one standing behind the podium—then I’ll have to know things. Until then, I’m a vessel for them.

And I always show up. I always look the part.

I owe her that.

She often has speaking engagements at the university. She donates a ton of money to ensure she keeps that opportunity. And I’m always on stage with her, reminding everyone that I’m her son. The next in line. Drawing more attention to myself that I wish I didn’t have.

When we pull up to the curb, I quickly exit the car and start heading toward the area her team has set up outside. A big black stage with a tall red curtain wrapped around the back of it sits in one of the courtyards on campus. Mother’s face, strained and smiling aggressively, is plastered on a banner above the curtain. There are rows of folding chairs set up in front of the stage, most of them filled, which sends a tendril of dread through my body.

I try not to look at them as I pass to find the rest of my family milling about behind the curtain. I’m a professional. I know how to fake it to the audience. But I don’t want to flip the switch until I have to.

SJ stands off to the side, a similar outfit to mine, but with a skirt, and her attention firmly trained on her phone. When she sees me approach, she looks up and winks, before flicking her eyes back down.

Dad stands close by, face trained on the trees. He’s honestly been a side character in my life. There, but not really an integral part. I’m not sure when it happened, but he’s pretty much checked out on this family. He’s here for the stability, making sure to do whatever Mother wants to solidify his place, but spends most of his time golfing with his buddies he meets from her campaign fundraisers.

He’s never been the focus. My mother is. The legacy is. Grandaddy set him and Mother up just to create an heir. That’s how it works in this family and many of the ones we rub elbows with.

That’s how it will be for me too. I’ll get told who my future wife is, and I’ll have no choice but to agree with it. It’s not my decision.

Mother faces away from me while members of her team flit around, handing her notecards and adjusting her cream suit jacket. She bobs her head, practicing her speech, while gesturing with her hands.

“Where’s Warren?” she grumbles loudly to her assistant, David. David has been working for my mother for as long as I can remember. He’s the one who feeds her any important information she needs, so he’s almost always around.

“I’m not sure, ma’am. We sent the car to get him, he should be here—oh.” He spots me and walks over, pushing me toward my mother without asking my permission. “Here he is, ma’am,” he chirps before walking away to deal with a crisis about the prompter.

Spinning to me, she stretches her red lips into a wide grin and sets her notecards down to gently put her arms around me in a barely-there hug, assaulting me with her powdery scent. “Oh, sugar.” Her voice comes out extra southern in preparation for her speech. She’s always had a twang, much more than the slight inflection my sister or I have, but she consistently bumps it up a notch whenever she has to be in front of an audience.

Delicately removing her arms from me, she holds my face in her perfectly manicured hands. “Baby, it’s been too long. I’ve missed you. You need to come by the house more and see your family. Grandaddy and Sarah-Jean miss you too.”

SJ perks up behind my mother at hearing her name, but she just sticks her tongue out at me and throws her middle finger up.

I smile and turn my attention back to Mother as she lets go of my face. “I’m sorry. Starting law school has just been very tiresome. There’s a lot of coursework and it keeps me really busy.”

Her lips tip down in a slight pout and she raises her arm to pat me on the shoulder. “Oh, I know how hard it can be, baby, but family is everything. We taught you that.”

I slowly nod my head. “Of course, Mother. I’ll make an effort to stop by more.”

David comes back to her side, studying a clipboard while she beams back at me and presses her hands in a prayer motion. “Sugar. I heard you broke up with Victoria. And that’s fine.”

David leans into her ear and murmurs, “Vivian.”

“Oh, right. Vivian. Well, it doesn’t matter now.” She waves her hand dismissively and leans toward David. “You know her daddy’s publishing company is about to go bankrupt, right?”

He nods his head while still looking at the clipboard and snarkily adds, “I know. How embarrassing.”

She nods back at him while dragging her blue eyes back to mine. “ So embarrassing, we don’t want that in our family, anyway. Good job. Best to cut off any contact with her. We don’t need any lingering messes with that. Now listen, I’m not asking you to settle down right this moment, Warren, but we have to get someone serious on your arm. You’re twenty-four already.”

David interjects quietly again, “He’s twenty-three.”

She shakes her head and swats him away from her ear. “Of course, I know that. Can you back up, please?” she says to him, slightly agitated. He nods and takes a step back, before she turns back to me. “You’re twenty-three already. I’m not asking to hand pick your wife. It just needs to be someone nice. From a good family.”

“Southern,” David adds, taking a step closer to us again.

Mothers eyes widen. “Oh, of course. Definitely southern, sugar. We want you to be with someone who’s going to carry on the legacy well. And no one does like us in the South.”

She lets out a little giggle at the end.

That may sound like she’s letting me have a say in who I’ll be forced to marry, but that’s not it. She and Grandaddy will set me up with viable candidates and push their favorites. It’s not really a choice, because if I make the wrong one, it will be swiftly corrected. It’s only a choice if I make the right one.

I plaster a smile on my face. It feels tight, and she must see it too, because she pulls me away from David and levels me with a serious look. “Warren. You know I love you. I only want what’s best for you. For this family. You remember what I do for this family, Warren?” she questions, tilting her head at me.

Of course I know. No amount of writing or hurting myself can make that leave my mind completely. It always lingers. And she knows that.

I nod.

Smiling again, she slips back into her extra-southern accent and continues, “I think I’ll have one of my aides look into some nice girls who go to your school. Set up some dates.”

I stifle a groan. “Sounds great, Mother. Thank you for doing that.”

She straightens her jacket and looks around my head, waving at someone, her attention barely on me. “Oh, it’s no problem, sugar. They’ll set it up and I’ll let you know. Now, I have to go and do some last minute prep. Why don’t you go stand with your sister? We’ll be on in a few minutes. “

Without waiting for an answer, she air kisses my cheek and breezes away.

Trudging over to my sister, I shove my hands in my pockets and angrily stare at the trees around us, getting lost in the Spanish moss’s dance with the wind.

SJ nudges me with her elbow. “What did she do to you? Want me to cut her?”

I snort a laugh. “Nothing crazy. Wants to set me up on a bunch of dates.”

She nods thoughtfully. “This is what you do: You go and then be the worst date possible. Make them run for the hills.” Leaning against the stage behind us, she smiles at her idea. “I haven’t had a man sit through an entire date with me in years. One time I set the flowers on the table on fire.”

I raise my eyebrows at her. “What the hell is with you and fire?”

“It’s wild and chaotic,” she says to the ground, then whips her head up at me, beaming. “Like me.”

“I won’t argue with that,” I say on a laugh. Clearing my throat, I switch back to our other topic. “I can’t run away forever.”

“Sure you can,” she answers immediately.

I shake my head. “No. I don’t have the same back bone you do.”

Smacking my shoulder, she points her finger in my face. “Don’t give me that self-deprecating bullshit, Warren. You have one. You just need to find it.”

Before I can say anything back, David claps his hands and starts corralling us toward the stage.

Groaning loudly, she puts on a ridiculous smile and speaks through her clenched teeth. “How do I look? Happy?”

I laugh, giving her a genuine smile before putting on my fake one. “And me?” I ask.

“Perfect,” she says, but through her closed teeth it sounds like “ferfect.”

Dad walks up to us, pushing us toward the stage, making sure he keeps Mother happy. “Let’s go, kids. Keep up with your mother.”

We walk up the stage steps behind our mother, followed by our father, all of us smiling and giving a small wave to the clapping crowd.

Mother takes her place behind the podium and I see the aura shift around her. She’s not my mother anymore. She’s Senator Baker. She stands tall. Poised and powerful. Head in the sky. She commands the crowd she faces with just her presence.

She was made for this.

Imagining myself standing in her place, even years from now, seems utterly impossible and causes my insides to shift uncomfortably.

“Hello, Astorville University!” her voice booms through the PA system. “How are y’all doin’ on this fine October evenin’?”

They erupt in cheers and whoops for her.

“That’s so good to hear. Have y’all met my family?” She gestures to us standing in the corner of the stage behind her, while the crowd continues to cheer.

I brush my eyes over the crowd, not really seeing but acting engaged and politely waving, until my eyes catch on a mop of dark hair standing beside the crowd, leaning against a tree and smoking. Because of course he’s smoking a joint in front of all of these people.

He truly doesn’t care what people think of him. And I think that’s part of the allure for me. He’s the complete opposite of me. Living exactly how he wants without an apology to anyone who doesn’t like it. While my life is completely out of my hands. If I’m around him, maybe he’ll radiate some of that energy and I can get a taste of it, even though I’ll never truly have it. On his skin. On his tongue. On his…

Shit, shit, shit.

I snap my head away from him, trying to focus on what my mother is talking about, but I can’t seem to make out any of the words she’s saying anymore. They all fade to the background. All the colors drain from my sight.

Everything is quiet and dull.

Except Eli.

He’s loud.

He’s colorful.

My eyes go back to him even though I tell them not to.

Now he’s smirking at me, bringing that glowing cherry up to his lips, parting them, giving me a peek of his glistening tongue, before closing them and inhaling, his cheeks hollowing while he pulls the smoke into his body.

A sharp pinch to my side pulls my attention away from him.

Snapping my head toward SJ, I glare at her widened eyes, before all the sounds come trickling back into my consciousness.

“Warren?!” My mother’s annoyed voice sharply stabs to the forefront of my brain.

I turn my head and give her what I’m sure is a slightly dumb-founded smile.

Keeping her body angled toward me, she turns her head back toward the audience, a big smile on her face. “My goodness. That amazing law school is just killing him here. He’s as tired as a race horse after the Kentucky Derby, y’all.”

The crowd erupts in laughter while Mother looks back at me expectantly, but I still have no idea what she said in the first place.

Slightly leaning into me, SJ mutters, “Say you love law school.”

I clear my throat. “Oh, I love the law program at AU. Can’t wait to keep going.” I end my statement with a wide grin and the audience gives me a few claps in return.

Mother’s smile is strained as she faces forward again, clearly not impressed with my answer.

I try to stare at Mother talking, her stiff head of blonde hair bobbing, but she’s right in the sight of him. My eyes do little flicks to him. Only briefly. Not even enough to really look at him. Just to scratch at the itch. Satisfy some deep desire in me.

SJ ribs me with her elbow, hissing, “Would you stop it? You’re being really obvious. Who the fuck are you staring at?” She flicks her eyes past me. “Who is that guy?”

I snap my eyes back to the front, shaking my head at her line of questioning.

I do well the rest of the speech, picking three different points in the crowd to shift my eyes to every two seconds, never once looking back at him. His eyes are on me the whole time, though. I feel it. Burning into the side of my face, but I welcome it. It makes me feel alive in a way that nothing in my life has.

Her speech comes to an end and as we shuffle off the stage, Mother finds me and roughly pulls me to the side. “Warren, where in the world was your head out there?”

SJ side-eyes us, intently watching our interaction.

“I’m sorry. I just got distracted. I’m tired, I think.”

She shakes her head at me. “No, sugar. You can’t be tired when we’re out there. You have to be on. Always on . You need to start practicing that. Before you know it, you’ll be preparing for your first?—”

She’s interrupted by a collective gasp, and when we follow the noise, we’re met with the sight of SJ, bent over and picking at the grass in front of her, a group of some shocked and some intrigued college students staring at what I’m sure is most of her ass hanging out of her skirt.

Mother rushes into action, scurrying away from me and grabbing onto SJ’s arm, pulling her upright. SJ puts on this bewildered expression, looking behind her and innocently saying, “Oops.”

I catch snippets of my mother’s conversation with her as they pass me. “Dear lord, girl. You were put on this Earth to test me. Why do you need attention so badly?”

SJ ignores her, turning her head to me and winking. “See ya later, baby bro.”

I take the out, ambling for the black SUV that will take me home.

But not before I take a few steps around the stage, feeling a twinge of disappointment when I see the empty tree.