Brotherly Life

Brotherly Love (and life) continues!

Sixteen-year-old Emily Barnett cautiously pushed open the door to the apartment she shared with her brother Ray. The coast seemed clear. She turned back to face her boyfriend, Brandon.

"Okay, I don't think anyone's home," she said to him, "Let's go in."

They walked into the empty apartment, and Emily quickly checked Ray's room and the bathroom. They were indeed alone.

"Remind me again why we're sneaking around, acting like we're looking for a good place to go have sex?" Brandon asked her when she returned.

"Because I want to make absolutely sure we don't walk in on Ray and Neela having sex," she answered matter-of-factly. True, she had never seen them going quite that far, but she had still walked in on her fair share of make-out sessions.

"But aren't they at work?"

"Yeah, well that's where they were supposed to be every time I've walked in on them," Emily answered, shrugging.

"I have to say, you do take this remarkably well, as opposed to being, say, scarred for life!" Brandon said.

"Well, I never said anything about the not-being-scarred-for-life bit."

Scarred or not, however, none of it mattered to Emily right now. The day before she had been officially declared free of mono and all other possible medical ailments. She'd been looking forward to being able to spend some alone time with Brandon and, with a final look around the blissfully quiet room, they were able to do just that.

"Hey."

Brandon's voice very close to her ear made her turn, and when she did she was caught full-on, completely immersed in her lips.

"Maybe I should get sick more often," she murmured with a smile into his mouth.

"Definitely not," he murmured back as they continued.

How long they stood there together, Emily did not know, but the entire situation was so perfect, she couldn't trouble herself to keep track of such petty human details such as time. This ended up being a mistake as the sound of the key turning in the lock caused them to spring apart in a post-make-out haste.

It was Ray home from his shift.

"Hey," he said, seeing them both standing awkwardly in the middle of the room. "How's it going…?" he asked, allowing his question to trail off, informing them both that he knew exactly what he'd just interrupted.

"Bran came over after school. We had some things to work on…" Emily answered, trailing her sentence in the same way.

Brandon turned to her, "I thought we talked about the nickname?"

"What? What's wrong with 'Bran'?"

"Minus the whole Raisin Bran/Regularity-with-proper-fiber-intake connotation?"

"Eh, I never said it was an exact science."

Ray took this point to quietly slink away.

"Anyway," Emily continued, "Let's leave it. C'mon," she added, walking toward her room with every intention of continuing what her brother had interrupted.

"Leave that door open!" Ray yelled from somewhere nearby, as though he'd been expecting and waiting for the stop in their playful banter, and knowing what was sure to follow it.


Once Brandon left, Ray and Emily stood in the kitchen, pouring over menus for the weekly Take-Out Tuesday.

"Neela coming over tonight?" Emily asked innocently enough.

"Nope, not tonight. Just you and me," he answered. "How 'bout Chinese?"

"Fine by me."

After much haggling involving entrees and sides, they finally worked out their order and were soon sitting down at the counter, chopsticks in hand.

"So you and Bran seem to be hitting it off," Ray commented through his mouthful of lemon chicken.

"Don't let him hear that," Emily said thickly, through her chow mein. She swallowed promptly, "And don't chew with your mouth full!"

"Well listen to you!"

"Yeah, yeah," she replied, waving him off with a string bean.

"Anyway, I'm glad you guys are having fun, but I'm going to have to be the face of authority—" Emily gave a slight groan "—and implement the 'no guys when I'm not home' rule, got it?"

Immediately, many cogs began working rapidly in Emily's brain, weighing her options. Protest? Accept it? Scream and throw a fit? (that hadn't worked when she was six, and she doubted its effectiveness today) "Sure," she mumbled, "Fine, whatever."

"I mean it, Em," he added, with a flicker in his voice that sounded like he could be channeling their mother. Which was plain weird, Emily decided.