“What?”
“Your phone.” I motion for her to fork it over. When she does, I hold the screen in front of her face to unlock it and go to her contacts.
Her brow lifts. “What are you doing?”
“Getting to the bottom of this.” I stick out my tongue and hit speakerphone. “Councilmember? I’d like to report a crime.”
“Oh my gosh!” Miriam falls back on the couch and holds her chest in a fit of laughter.
“Antonio? I know good and damn well you aren’t playing on my line at ten at night,” Marcela spits.
I glance over at the clock on the oven. “It’s nine forty-seven.”
“Boy!”
I mush Miriam’s head when she reaches for the phone and jog around the couch. “This is an important district matter.” I dodge a smack to my chest.
“For the last time, I’m not your councilmember,” Marcela grits out. “Where is my sister?”
“Right here, cheating.”
“I didn’t cheat!” Miriam cries.
“What kind of household raised her to be a liar and a cheater? I’m calling your mama next. Aye! Watch my nuts.” I raise the phone over my head, out of Miriam’s reach.
She uses the couch to climb up my shoulders. “I promise I didn’t cheat!”
I swat her hand away. “How do you explain killing me for two hours straight, huh?”
The beatdown was a massacre if ever I saw one. I never stood a chance and had to keep pausing the game to make sure Dr. Engineer over here didn’t rewire my system during my quick shower.
“Miri,” Marcela sighs.
“Dime,” she responds, strangling my traps with her thighs.
“Mátalo y vayan a culear.”
Miriam gasps. “Deja de joder. Solo somos amigos!”
I don’t catch anything but “friends” in the sibling exchange before I’m falling backwards to catch Miriam from breaking her neck. I grip her thighs, which are now smothering my face, and brace us for impact. She uses her bodyweight in a last-ditch effort to flip us onto the couch.
She snatches the phone and tells Marcela, “I’ll call you tomorrow,” before hanging up. “Are you okay?” Her chest is heaving, her thighs still around my face.
I tell myself that the sharp inhale of her center is for breathing, but that would make two liars in this house. I’m fighting the urge to replace my nose with my mouth.
My apartment door smacks into the wall. Quincy rolls inside with a Nerf gun, followed by Bread in full tactical gear. Don’t ask me where he got it from.
Quincy lifts the visor on his helmet. “You good? We heard a thud.”
Miriam squeaks when I bench-press her weight. I slide her off of me and adjust my sweats. “We’re good.” I picture my granny at her eighty-second birthday last year to deflate my erection.
“If you say so,” Bread says. He motions to Quincy. “Let’s roll out.”
“Don’t forget to pack—and close my door!” I shout.
“Yes, Papa Smurf,” they say on their way out.
I look back at Miriam. My eyes are on her face and not her sharp breaths stretching my jersey across her chest. “You sure you’re okay?”
