The thing was, that Cortney was just being so unfair, he thought. Unfair, making it a choice between her and Julliard. He cared about her in a completely different way than he cared about Julliard. A part of him did want to stay with her in the house that they shared together. Wanted to keep sharing it. But he couldn't give up on his music. That was like saying goodbye to who he was. The foundation of everything.
Making it a choice between his dreams and her was just so.. selfish of her, he thought now with anger. Second choice, she had said. Second choice, my ass. It wasn't like he wouldn't have wanted Cort and Mason to come with him. But how could he have asked that of them? He didn't want to not choose her but he also didn't want to not choose Julliard. Really unfair, everything. Or maybe he was an ass, he didn't know. He did know he grew tired thinking about it so he decided to stop.
And immediately his inner voice traveled miles away to juvenile hall. It was like it got sucked out of him and into that cell he knew she must be sleeping in right now. He wanted to tell her it was going to work out. But he didn't think she was going to appreciate that, being a person who never relied on hope. He had had his fair share of hope squashed himself, so he could relate. But he just wished he could make her feel less alone. Her life was coming crashing down and she shoudn't have to face it by herself. He'd thought that part of her life was over when she became a part of his family, became his sister. Imagining Callie not being able to sleep, alone in the dark, it made him furious. It all just felt so pointless. Just when her life seemed to be going well the universe ripped it away like som cruel joke.
He didn't want to think about this anymore either. But this, he couldn't seem to just shut out. Her frightened doe eyes kept staring at him behind his closed eyelids. Fine, he thought. I'm not going to sleep then. And he headed straight for Marianas room. It was one o'clock in the morning on a school night and the only other thing he craved besides sleep was suddenly to play the guitar. So he went to Callie's bed ignoring the emptyness of it as best he could as he retrieved it from under it. This was always calming for him, in a way that piano wasn't. Playing piano was always a thrilling challenge while the guitar was a way for him to relax.
He made sure to close his bedroom door behind him and sat down on the floor beside the bed with his back leaned against it. Not wanting to wake up the rest of the house, he pulled on the strings like they were made of glass. Altough strings made of glass didn't quite sound as good as shoes made of glass.
The melody he was starting to develop was soothing but not as soothing as it needed to be. His sister was in jail. And she needed her brother. But there were bars of steel between them, visitation rules between them and mile after mile of actual distance. If he ran there right now there would be the metal fence preventing him from even coming near the building and even if he screamed her name at the top of his lungs he doubted she'd her shit.
There was desperation in his thoughts now. And it was pulling him towards a place he didn't want to visit. He could hear himself, 16 years old and stuck there."I wanna see her."
He'd left that place and he didn't look back.
He thought about Cort again just to have something else to think about. Maybe he'd call her tomorrow. Because he just didn't want to let her go. She was wrong about being second choice and he would prove it to her. And if she didn't let him prove it to her he'd go to the house and sit there and wait all day if he had to.
He'd stop at nothing to get to her, to see her. He needed to see her. To be with her... where she lay in the dark on a bed that probably made her back hurt... in juvie.
He stopped playing and let out a short, forceful sigh. He wanted to crush the instrument he held in his hands. It only reminded him of Callie and he started regretting even giving it to her in the first place. He wanted to crush it now to make it go away. The desperation he couldn't seem to put back inside tonight. He saw it now. Looked at it, really looked at it for the first time since Idyllwild. It was as enormous as it had always been and now it seemed to be angry at him for not wanting anything to do with it anymore.
"I wanna se her", it screamed at him and he didn't know what to say back. Because he knew that and there was nothing he could do about it, but here it was demanding things he had no power to give it. He almost wanted to applaud it for being so sneaky. Here he thought he'd defeated it. But of course not. It was calculating, not making its move until it found the right time to strike. When it could disguise itself as worry for a sister for him to let it in.
And when it did, he saw life as it was. Not how he wanted it to be. And he hated it for it.
He saw that Cortney was right. She was second choice. Every girl in his life always would be, because they weren't her. Maybe that's what Cortney meant, anyway, but she was kind enough not to ruin the careful facade he'd put up where Callie was his sister. But he saw now that it was never about Julliard for Cort.
The really screwed up part is that he probably would have objected in any other moment, but this one. He would have told Cortney that he loved her the most because in a fucked up way it was the truth. The Brandon that loved Cortney wasn't the Brandon that loved Callie. This Brandon was a Brandon that he'd created in order to go on living. It was a Brandon that was a brother to Callie and was happy that she was his sister now. It was a Brandon that knew nothing of hope or heartbreak or painful longing after a girl he had to have. This Brandon was fine. And this Brandon had met Cortney and fallen for the safety of giving his heart to someone else for it meant he was one more step away from that other dude.
The Brandon that wished he was in the cell with Callie right now. That he was her partner in crime and in every other way. This Brandon was sitting by the bed now, with her guitar in his hands. Desperation for wanting her safe, wanting her home, wanting her with him had brought him there.
Great, he thought as he felt the pain, the anger, and the hopelessness all over again.
The pain of not being able to be with her. Really be with her. They didn't even hang out anymore as friends. Legally, they were family but he'd never felt her farther away. Because everytime he saw her he had to leave in order for him to keep up this ridiculous picture of her as his sister in his mind.
The anger at his moms, at Aj for stealing her away from him. In different ways, but still. Moms for refusing to see what was right in front of them and telling him there was something wrong about feeling this way. And Aj for taking her into his room and stripping away her clothes and then leaving her bra on the couch for him to see. Bragging that Callie was his. Or worse, maybe not even seeing Brandon as a threat, thinking it wouldn't be a big deal for him to see it there. But it was. He should remove her bras. Not Aj.
And he felt the hopelessness fill him to the point where he couldn't breathe. Because he couldn't remove her bras. He couldn't. Because this world was twisted and cruel and turned something that made him happier than he'd ever been to something that needed to be a secret.
Anger agin. He just wanted to show them all he couldn't care less about their stupid fucking rules. He was going to grab Callie the first chance he got and kiss her senseless in front of everybody. Preferably in front of moms. Give her a good kiss. Maybe even grab her ass. That would show them.
Assuming she still wanted him to kiss her. The desperation came again as he needed her to want it. Needed her to want it to be him kissing her, to want it to be him taking her to his room, giving it to her. He pictured her closing her eyes in AJ's bed, seeing himself on top of her instead. Feeling him inside her. And he hoped that when she opened her eyes she couldn't escape the moment of disappointment when she had to come back to reality.
If she wanted to, he'd do it. Take her on the kitchen table as soon as she got home again. Not giving a fuck about someone walking in on them. Let them see it. How she wanted it. How he needed her. Let them see how they wanted their relationship to be like. Loving, intense, and non-apologetic. Hard. Slow. Loud.
He would dare anyone to call them brother and sister after that. They wouldn't. And no one would dare say he was some sort of.. Liam again. Not after seeing Callie crave him like that. Like she did in Idyllwild.
He wanted to cry when his anger subsided and he knew they'd never do anything like that. Because it was just.. Crazy. A good way of showing everyone just how crazy she made him but not something they could actually do. No matter how much he wanted his moms to go fuck off for this they were still moms who he loved. And Callie. She needed her family.
That was all that mattered
He sighed and started strumming the guitar quietly again. The hopelessness was there again but he knew that by the time he'd wake up tomorrow the other Brandon would be back. He'd had enough practice to shut this Brandon out that he'd be back to normal tomorrow. Back to being her brother who made sure not to spend too much time with her so that he could keep up this facade of a sister in his mind.
He didn't want to sleep yet, though. He wanted to think about her a bit longer. Wanted to miss her a bit longer. Love her a bit longer.
When he finally went to sleep that night it was with a freshly written note on his bedstand that read:
Don't call Cort. She deserves someone who sees her as first choice. Because she isn't yours. Not really.
Hi people, I really hope you feel like this was true to Brandon's character. And also that you liked the story:P