Chapter the Twenty-Fourth
In which a Deception begins
Delia and Alexander turned and looked at the other. They hadn't been worried with Cecile, but with their father home, this was real now; this would be their everyday lives. They had several options laid out before them, but as they stared at each other, they realized that they really didn't have a choice. They wanted each other too much to call it off and they both knew that if they told Damien, he would do whatever was necessary to stop them. So they looked away and each took the desire they had for the other and put it in a box; they would do whatever was necessary to keep being with each other.
They heard their father's dog give a gentle bark and soon, he was leading his master into the kitchen where Alexander was preparing a snack for his father.
"Well, if it isn't Christopher Robin and Tigger."
"So, if we're Christopher Robin and Tigger, who are you, then?" Alexander continued to put together a plate of cheese, fruit and crackers for him.
"Right now my stomach is growling so loudly, the driver turned around and looked at me, so I guess that would make me Winnie-the-Pooh."
Delia began shaking with laughter.
"Yeah, somehow I don't see you as Winnie-the-Pooh."
"Okay then, I'm the Big Bad Wolf." He narrowed his eyes to slits and his voice contained a dark tone that both of his children knew was as dangerous as it sounded.
"D-man, if you're the Big Bad Wolf, then I'm sure as shit not Tigger." Alexander handed the food to his father. "If you're still hungry, I can make something else."
"And I'm not Christopher Robin. Xander told me I look like a flapper. Do you think so?" She put her hands on her thighs and began moving her legs, pretending to cross her knees dancing the Charleston.
Alexander laughed. "He's the perfect one to ask, he's certainly old enough."
"He is not. Damien, don't you listen to him." She handed her father a bottle of mineral water and kissed his cheek.
"I can still write you out of the will, son of mine. This is fine. I'll be in the study. Call me when dinner's ready." Damien headed out of the kitchen.
"Sí."
"Is that a clue as to what we are having for dinner?" The kitchen door closed on Damien.
"Sí." Alexander raised his voice so he could be heard over the closed door.
They waited until they were certain that Damien was nowhere near the dining room door and then Delia turned to her brother. "Why do I feel like I've just done the most horrible thing that I've ever done in my life?" She put her arms around her stomach, which was doing somersaults.
"Because we love him and we rarely lie to him or not tell him things." Xander was thinking of their exploits outside when their father was in bed asleep, which was, up to that point, the biggest secret that they kept from him. He stepped in front of Delia and she looked at him. "I love you and I always want to do right by you and I know that it's especially difficult for you to disobey Damien. I want you to know that we can always stop, no questions asked, ever."
She frowned, teasing her brother. "But if we stop, who will see me in my matching pink lace and silk unmentionables?"
Alexander's eyes closed at the thought of her sitting in class wearing her frilly underclothes.
"Just promise me that we'll talk about things and not hide our thoughts and feelings about this and we can do it. We're Thorns, we can do anything."
"I promise and yes." He gave her a reassuring smile.
"I'll go get our work and I'll start my part and you can do yours while I clean up after dinner."
"Sure." Alexander watched her take off out of the kitchen. He was at the stove cooking the beef when she returned with their work, which she had stuffed into her knapsack.
Delia sat at the table, pulled out her notebook and got to work translating the Greek into Latin.
...oOo...
Nobody had had to come and get Damien for dinner. "It smells delicious. Can I do anything?"
"No, we're good." Delia was grabbing cans of soda from the fridge for her and Alexander. She had decanted some red wine for her father.
"You just cop a squat at the kitchen table, daddy-o." Alexander was putting food into serving dishes.
Delia helped her brother bring the food to the table and once it was all there, they sat and the Thorns began dinner.
Alexander and Cecile had made shredded beef soft tacos with all the fixings and Mexican bean salad with corn bread with jalapenos.
They ate and made small talk, but it was Damien who commented on dinner first. "I don't know what to say." He gave his stomach a few pats. "Getting old has already made me loose my girlish figure. Having a son and a cook who are as good as you both are, it's eventually going to take a crane to get me out of my bed."
"It's his plan, father. He's going to feed us until we're both too fat to leave the house and then he's going to take over the business."
"What nonsense...more tacos?" With a devilish grin on his face, Alexander pushed plates of food towards Damien.
"La comida es muy deliciosa, annoying one." Delia wanted nothing more than to kiss him, or, at the very least, to let him feel exactly how appreciative she was of his meal. Instead, she kept as much as she could to herself...for now; they would be alone later.
"Estoy muy feliz de que te guste, nagging one." Like his sister, he kept most of what he was feeling to himself.
"Damien, I'd like to take you on up on an offer."
"Which offer is that?"
"Well, we talked about me or Xander or both of us moving behind the chapel, so I'd like to be the first one; but I was thinking of making it one of the rooms upstairs, in one of the wings, if that's alright."
"Of course. Is everything copacetic between you two?" Damien cast his eyes from one child to the other.
"Yes, but I just want to be up there. I thought I could go first, test the waters as it were and then when and if Alexander felt he was ready, he could join me, if he wanted."
"Sounds like a plan to me. Have you thought about what you want to do to the room?"
"No, but I'll call one of the interior designers at Thorn tomorrow and maybe we can have it done before we go back to school."
"It'll just be us men on the second floor, now."
"We can leave our dirty jock straps and smelly socks all over the hall." Alexander clinked his glass with his father's and then belched.
Delia could do nothing but shake her head and continue eating.
Once dinner was over, it had concluded with flan, Delia got to work cleaning up while Alexander sat and got started on his work and when she was done, she sat at the table, joining her brother and that's where Damien found his children when he came in to refill his glass of wine. He checked on the progress they were making.
"I think I'm going to have to give you both harder assignments. I want an essay from each of you about what we did in England. It has to be more than six, single spaced pages. I want it from you in Latin." He pointed at Delia. "I want it from you in Greek." He pointed at his son and then took a drink of his wine.
They smiled at each other and then Alexander turned to their father. "What if we don't know how to say 'we stood on the bridge where two priests who thought they were so smart because they thought they had trapped the Antichrist, but the joke turned out to be on them because he killed them first' in either Latin or Greek?"
Damien had that smile on his face, the smile that only came when he thought about one thing. "Then I'll help you. Delia, are you coming to work with me tomorrow?"
"Nope, but I'll come the day after...before we begin the slow march towards death...I mean going back to school."
"I know I haven't spent much time with both of you this week, but we can try that new Thai restaurant for dinner tomorrow and I'm all yours this weekend...and Xander, I'll talk to you tonight, okay?"
"Okay." Both younger Thorns returned to their work.
Delia went up to bed first, but eventually the whole house turned in for the night. Even Damien, who normally could be counted on to awake until the wee hours, shut off his lights before midnight and was asleep not long after his head hit the pillow.
...oOo...
Delia's watch alarm went off at one. Just to be sure she was awake, her dog stuck his nose in her face, chuffing and nudging her until she sat up. She reached over and turned on the lamp on her bedside table. She went into her bathroom, peed, threw water on her face and looked at her reflection.
Much had happened today and she had hardly had any time to think about it. Delia put her hand up to her mouth and touched her lips. She could still feel Alexander's mouth on hers...how good it had felt and the things it had made her feel when he had touched her. She moved out into her bedroom; he had kissed her in here. Her fingers again moved to her mouth.
Deciding to move had been a spur of the moment thing. The door between their rooms was way too much of a temptation. Once they had a handle on what was going on, Alexander would suggest that it was his turn and he would move upstairs where it would be only them...if that was the best way to keep their secret, secret.
And there was that horrible feeling in her gut again; she hated lying to her father. Apart from keeping minor things from him, like the excursions outside, she rarely kept things from him, but...her eyes went to her bedroom door. She had never known anything like the feeling of Alexander's hands on her body, his mouth on hers, how he had felt against her when he had gotten...Delia inhaled, shook her head and got dressed in dark clothes and made her way to the door that separated their rooms. She listened, in case he was doing something beside sleeping, but there was only silence so she made her way into his room.
When she reached his bed, she pulled down the covers and she felt a pang in her chest. He was the most gorgeous boy she had ever seen and all she wanted was to touch and kiss him, but for right now, there were other things to do and Delia was suddenly gripped by worry. What if Alexander didn't want to do stuff like this anymore? He had said he liked her being girly; what if this wasn't girly enough? She put her fears aside for now. They could talk once they got outside.
She gently shook him. "Xander, get up," her voice was a harsh whisper in his ear.
"Delia?"
She quickly clamped a hand over his mouth; he had been louder than was necessary. "No, the tooth-fairy. Come on, get dressed. It's one. I'll wait in my room."
Alexander sat up and watched as she made her way back to their shared door and just like that, she was gone.
He threw off his covers, went to the bathroom, pissed and washed his hands and took off his pyjamas and began rummaging for his dark clothes that he wore when they went out at night, but he stopped as his eyes landed on their door.
She was behind the door, sitting on her bed and he wanted nothing more than to go in there and make love to her...though in reality, he knew he'd get as far as taking off her top and it would be game over.
He understood her decision to go upstairs, but he would have been the one to volunteer if they would have discussed it first, but that was Delia. They would get things under control and then he'd see about moving up there, though he had taken her hint and he knew that it might be that as long as they kept their relationship secret, they might never be able to be beside each other.
Alexander got dressed and stood with his hand on the doorknob when he was suddenly seized with fear. He hadn't expected that Delia would still want to go out. What if this was her way of telling him that she wanted to go back to the way things used to be? He shook his head and turned the knob and opened the door. Delia was sitting on her bed and she got up and smiled at him; he didn't know what he'd do if she had suddenly changed her mind.
"Hey, annoying one," she whispered.
"Hey nagging one," he whispered back.
Alexander had been the first to make a move earlier so, Delia went first now and put her arms around her brother's waist and pulled him to her; Alexander put his arms around Delia and the two of them kissed, attempting to keep the intensity of their feelings to a minimum. They let go of each other and as usual, made their way out Delia's door.
Both of their dogs followed, Alexander's dog would wait in the kitchen until they came back, and they all moved out into the hall and anyone, including their father, would have been hard pressed to have heard anything.
Damien's dog, who was dozing in the hall, spied them and stood up.
The pair of them and the dogs were halfway down the stairs when the Thorns heard the chuff and looked back.
Neither of them could remember Damien's dog wanting to go out, but he sensed that were shenanigans afoot and tonight for some reason, he didn't want to be left out.
Delia looked at her dog, who nudged his mistress' leg, not wanting to give up going out. She did not break her stare with the dog, and he let out a sigh of resignation and went up and lay down in front of Damien's closed door. Damien's dog joined Delia and Alexander at the bottom of the stairs.
The four of them made their way to the kitchen and Delia could feel trepidation from Alexander, but decided to wait until they were outside before saying anything. Once in the kitchen, Alexander's Milo stopped at his water dish to get a drink and then settled under a chair.
With no noise, Alexander opened up the back door and the three of them stepped into the night. It was warm. August was half way done and Delia and Alexander did not want to miss any chances to be outside. That being said, they rarely went out on the weekends; it was more likely that Damien would still be awake, so they tried to limit their adventures to the weekdays.
She inhaled the night air and Alexander looked at her. He had been glad that they had not gone out that night after the pool party, he wouldn't have been able to handle it.
"What is it?" She looked at him.
"I was scared that you changed your mind about us...you still want to come outside?"
Delia smiled. "I was scared about that too. Why didn't you think that I'd want to come outside?"
Alexander shrugged. "I don't know, I still like us doing other things together. When it comes down to it, I'm worried that things will change between us."
"I still want to come outside, let off cherry bombs and build blanket forts. Of course, if we build blanket forts when Damien is out of the house, we get to do new, naughty things inside of them." She leered at him.
Xander held up his right hand and spat in it; Delia spat in her right hand and the two of them grasped hands. "I promise, no more worrying about mind changing and I promise nothing else will change between us."
"I promise, no more worrying about mind changing, and I promise nothing else will be different between us." One pump and Delia wiped her hand on Alexander pants. "Was I too forward this afternoon?"
"What do you mean?" He wiped his hand on his pants.
"Too...aggressive. I don't know, don't men usually like to be in charge? I just did what I wanted to do. And then I thought that maybe you didn't want to come outside because you wanted me to be more of a girly-girl."
"My sister is perfect the way that she is. Deedle, I'm happy that you want to build blanket forts and come outside; it wouldn't be very much fun just me and the dog. That being in charge crap...that's them, not us. Jackals do things together, but I don't know, can't we take turns on who's in charge and who decides what happens?"
"I'd like that."
As they made their way past the stables, a thought occurred to Alexander that stopped him in his tracks. "This isn't just us, is it?"
"Does that bother you?"
The tone in her voice let him know that right from the get go, it had done more than crossed Delia's mind that there was more going on than just the two of them. "I don't know how I feel about that."
"Xander, we're at different places right now when it comes to the whole idea of acceptance and I don't know how to proceed without going against father's wishes about letting you sort out certain out things on your own."
"I love you and I won't use you, Delia, or hurt you, I don't care what I'm supposed to do." Alexander was implacable in this.
"And I wouldn't let you. Maybe, God wants us to be happy."
"How can we know that?"
"As always, we open ourselves up to Him. If I was meant to be just a plaything for you, do you think it would have mattered that we're both attracted to each other?"
"No."
"Then I don't care. I like what we did, a lot, and I want more. I'm not ashamed of sex, or afraid of you, or any part of your body. I want to explore you, and I want you to do the same with me. I want us to do whatever we want to do, whatever makes us happy. I want us to make love, eventually, and I want us to do all the fun things that will lead up to us having sex. Do you want those things, too?" She was nervous, hoping that she hadn't scared him.
"More than anything." His voice was husky and raw with want of her. "I remember something you told me about jackals."
"Just one thing? I think we could sit and, at the drop of a hat, write an encyclopedia about what we know about jackals."
"They mate for life."
At that moment, the ache for him was so strong for him, in her heart, and other places, that it took all of her self control not to have him, someway, right then and there. Delia closed her eyes and centered herself and when she opened them he was smiling at her. "Yes they do."
"Deedle, I think we need to do something that isn't of a sexual nature."
She laughed. "I agree. I told father that I wasn't coming into work with him because I figure we'd be getting back to the house just about the time he was getting up so vamonos."
Alexander sat on his haunches and reached out and pet Milo. "Okay, dog, here's the skinny. We go and hang out with the coyotes, nothing more to it than that, really. We don't chase them, we leave them alone and let them do their thing. We don't tell father because he might not approve, so it's yet another thing we keep to ourselves, okay?"
The dog sat perfectly still, as if to show the youngest Thorn that he could be counted on to do what he was told.
As if on cue, the coyotes who inhabited the woods out behind their house howled and Delia and Alexander turned their heads towards the direction of the sound. The last time they had come out, they had gotten a young male to come to them. He had let them touch him before he had gotten skittish and taken off. They wondered if they would see him tonight.
The dog also had turned his head, but apart from that, sat still, awaiting instructions from his masters.
The Thorns and the dog made their way down the path towards the woods. "I'm going to miss coming out here once school starts; it's beautiful out here."
"Yes it is."
"Okay, never mind all this romantic crap. Hurry up and tie your shoe lace and let's get going." Delia crossed her arms across her chest.
Alexander had no more than put his head down to tie his shoe, which wasn't undone, then she took off full tilt towards the woods.
Milo looked up at him and whined; he didn't know whether to stay with Alexander or go after Delia.
"Let's both go get her."
The dog reached Delia first and Alexander eventually caught up with his sister as the moon lead all three of them deeper into the night.
