Oh, hell no.
“And there is… stuff on the coffee table.”
Stuff? Christ, if I had to see his congealed spunk where I liked to eat my dinner, I’d fucking castrate him.
“I didn’t want to wake him up and embarrass him. What should we do?”
Embarrass him? I snorted like a bull about to charge. Embarrassment was the least of what I planned to do to his disrespectful ass.
My mom’s eyes, the same shape and color as mine, practically overflowed with anxiety. Why? Why did she treat Kenny with kid gloves, like he was a cute, helpless puppy insteadof a man old enough to go to war? Why had I never received the same blasé treatment? I loved my mother with all my heart but didn’t understand her. The only thing I could think was that she went so easy on Kenny because she carried extra guilt over becoming sick when he was so young. At least I had a decade with a healthy mother. I could remember the effort she put into Christmas morning, the way she loved to bake us homemade chocolate chip cookies, and how she never missed an event at school. Kenny never even had that much, and what he did have, he’d been too young to recall. To make up for it, she allowed him to do whatever the hell he wanted, leaving me to be the bad guy.
I tried to exhale my fury but only managed to bring it down to severe annoyance. “I’ll take care of it, Mom. Why don’t you go get ready for church?” I didn’t attend, but a neighbor always accompanied Mom to Mass every Sunday.
Her gaze shifted toward our living room. “All right, but try not to make him feel bad.”
Heaven forbid he feel a moment of remorse for his actions.
She patted my hand. “We all make mistakes.”
“Some more than others,” I muttered.
“What’s that, honey?”
“Nothing.” I grabbed the handles of her wheelchair and rolled her to her room. “You just worry about what you’re going to wear to church, okay? And holler for me if you need some help.”
“You’re such a good boy, Alex. Thank you.”
“Sure, Mom.” I kept my lips curled upward until I shut the door behind me. Then the smile flipped. This bullshit ended today. I spun toward the mouth of the hallway, bumping my shoulder against the white stucco wall. Why on earth would anyone ever put a wall with hard, pointy lumps in a house? That damn stucco had been responsible for dozens of injuries throughout my childhood. I still had a scar on my elbow fromwhere I’d busted the skin open when I was nine, so I knew how the spurs would dig into my palm as I pressed it against the wall as hard as possible to release some frustrated energy, but I did it anyway. It was either that or punch a hole through the wall, and that would not only alert my mom to my anger but also destroy my knuckles. Not something I had time for. I couldn’t carry trays of alcohol all night with bruised and bloodied hands.
As the pain registered in my palm, I blew out a breath. It didn’t work. I still wanted to murder Kenny. My pounding footsteps down the hall would have woken the dead, but when I reached the living room, there slept Kenny prone on the couch with his pale ass on full display. “Lovely,” I muttered. A second later, I noticed the sleeping female curled up on one end of the couch. Thankfully, whoever she was, she had a blanket over her because the bare shoulder peeking out didn’t lead me to believe she wore clothes either.
Waking Kenny would suck. Dread filled my gut. Who wanted to start their Sunday with an epic battle? As I bent to retrieve a tattered sofa pillow to whack my brother, I caught sight of something on the coffee table. Mom’s warning aboutstuffcame back to me.
I shut my eyes and then rubbed my fingertips back and forth above my eyebrows where the ache was brewing.Please don’t let that be what it is.Despite my earlier thoughts, Kenny’s congealed jizz would have been preferable.
When I opened my eyes, my stomach plummeted, and my shoulders sagged.
Still there—a burned spoon, lighter, and a length of rubber tubing. The scene was right out of every cop drama ever aired. Cliché and accurate.
Every inch of my skin flashed hot and prickly. I snatched the pillow off the floor and brought it down on Kenny’s head as hardas I could. “Wake the fuck up, you selfish shit.” I hit him again. And again.
“Jesus, what the fuck?” The slurred words were heavy with sleep and remnants of a powerful high. “Alex? Ow! Stop fucking hitting me.”
I whaled on him again. “Doing this shit in Mom’s house? What the fuck is wrong with you?” As I lifted my arm to hit him again, he rolled over, giving me a prime view of his junk. “Oh, come on.” I tossed the pillow at him instead of hitting him. “Cover that shit up.”
“Hey, watch the goods.” The pillow landed on his crotch. “You sure you’re a gay dude? It shouldn’t bug you out this much to look at a dick.” He covered the offending appendage with the pillow as he shoved hair out of his face.
I grunted. “I just don’t wanna look atyourpencil dick. Who’s your guest?”
“Huh?” He blinked up at me from flat on his back.
“Your guest.” I pointed toward the end of the couch, where the girl was still sleeping. Knowing my luck, she’d overdosed and wouldn’t ever wake up.
Kenny struggled but eventually got himself sitting. Thankfully, he was kind enough to keep the pillow over his crotch. “Huh. Who is that?”
Seriously?
“You’re naked and asleep on the couch with a woman, and you have no idea who she is?”
