A.N.: Okay, I asked my friend what to name this chapter because it's two brothers fighting, and she said, "just chuck a bucket of water on them. Or mud."
Rose Amongst Thorns
Chapter Twenty-Three
Throw a bucket of mud on 'em…
The painting fell with a bang to the floor as Finn dived for the shed door, Rose hot on his heels, still holding the unfinished half of her grilled-cheese sandwich. She saw a baseball bat go flying, and little Caleb pelted towards her, tangling in her legs as she ran toward the scene of the argument; Ian had fled the scene.
Doug and Evan were going toe-to-toe in the centre of the patio. Evan's eyes were wild as he glared down at Doug, whose skin was blotchy and red with anger. Their faces were millimetres away from each other, their noses almost touching. Rose handed her segment of grilled-cheese to Caleb as he clung to her free hand.
"Tell me, man. Tell me what happened!" Evan said, shoving Doug with both hands.
"Evan!" Finn shouted; they all made their way up the garden toward the brothers.
"You already know, man. Why you doggin' me?" Doug shouted, stepping toward him again.
"'Cause I wanna hear you say it," Evan replied, bellowing. "I want my little brother to tell me to my face that he banged my girlfriend, that's why!"
"What?" Finn breathed, his expression falling slack. Caleb huddled against Rose's leg, the grilled-cheese gone, hugging her knee.
The back door of the garage opened, and Sean walked out, one greasy hand wrapped in an even greasier rag, the other curled around a sweating soda can. He shot Finn an inquisitive look and Finn just shrugged.
Rose had forgotten—well, she had spent the better part of twelve hours trying to block the image from her mind—to tell Finn the scandal that had occurred at Christian Todd's party. Apparently she was the only one here who knew what was going on.
"Come on, man! Come on!" Evan shoved Doug again and again until Doug was tripping backward.
"Fine!" Doug shouted, slamming Evan in the chest with both hands, with enough force to send Evan backward, taking a few steps to steady himself. "Fine! It's true! I banged your girlfriend and when I was done, she begged for more! Is that what you wanted to hear?"
Evan screamed and launched himself at Doug, tackling him backward and slamming him into the patio. Rose jumped, shouted, and surged forward, Caleb releasing her in terror, as Finn and Sean raced toward the smack-down. By the time they got there, Evan had already slammed his fist into Doug's face multiple times; his knuckles were bloody, and Doug's nose was a wash of red.
"Get off him, man! Get off him!" Sean shouted, trying to grab Evan's flailing arms.
"I hate you, you selfish little punk-ass loser!" Evan shouted as he pounded on Doug like a man possessed. "You make me sick!" Doug managed to kick a cheap-shot between Evan's legs that distracted his older-brother long enough for Sean to grab Evan in a two-arm lock and haul him bodily off Doug, kicking and shouting the whole way.
Finn helped his little brother sit up. There was blood everywhere. Finn ripped off his Truffle Shuffle t-shirt and balled it up, holding it under Doug's nose.
"What the hell happened, man?" Finn asked, catching his breath. Evan had managed to punch out the brothers trying to stop the fight, as well as Doug; Rose knew there would be bruises and bitterness all round at dinner tonight.
"Who the hell do you think you are?" Evan shouted at Doug. Rose had seen fights before. But never any that had gotten this far, and never between two people she knew. And never two brothers. Evan's callousness and his treatment of his little brother shocked her more than anything else. How could he do that to Doug? Forget what Doug had done, he was Evan's little brother. Some things were more important than who had slept with whose girlfriend.
"Caleb, go get your daddy," Rose whispered to him, and he ran off as fast as his little legs could take him.
A sudden flare of anger and upset made her hackles raise, the fine hairs at the back of her neck prickle, and her anger riled; she would not sit around and let Evan get away with beating the hell out of his little brother. She strode over to a flailing, determined, red-faced, irate Evan McGowan, and dealt him her best bitch-slap. He fell slack in Sean's two-arm hold, momentarily stunned.
"Don't you ever, ever do that again!" she half-shouted, eyes narrowed to slits as she gave Evan her patented Harpy glare. Nobody dared be mean to their siblings around Rosalie Helena Meade, and these McGowan boys were not going to be the exception to that unwritten rule.
Doug pushed himself clumsily to his feet, catching the t-shirt to his face. "You're such a hypocrite asshole," he spat at Evan.
"I'm an asshole?" Evan shouted. "You had sex with my girlfriend in the friggin' woods and I'm the asshole."
"You were swapping spit with new girl, playah!" Doug yelled, throwing a hand toward Rose. "Hailey threw herself all cryin' and shit. Whaddaya want me to do?"
"What?" Evan spat; Rose blurted it out in surprise.
"You moved on, brotha," Doug said, pointing at Evan. "Don't blame your fickle ass on me."
"Who told you that?" Evan said, shaking Sean off; Rose pressed a hand firmly against his chest when he tried to advance on his little brother again. "Who said I was messing around with Rosalie?"
Doug's touch demeanour faltered for the first time. "Hailey. Hailey did. She said you cheated on her. You guys were done." Rose's jaw dropped. Evan stared at the ground.
"I don't freakin' believe this," she heard him murmur. Then, shouted; "I don't freakin' believe this!" He turned and blew past Sean, heading for his car outside the barn.
Standing there, dumbfounded, shocked to their cores, they heard the Saab groan to life, heard Evan peel out of the property, the angry honk of a horn, and didn't move until the sound of his engine had faded into nothing. Rose turned to stare at Doug.
"Doug, what exactly did Hailey say to you?" she asked quietly. Doug stared back at her.
"She said she caught you and Evan swappin' spit in the kitchen; she said that her and Evan argued and they were done," Doug said. That sounded like Hailey, alright.
She licked her lips, feeling suddenly sick, as if the hangover she knew she'd gotten rid of during her run had returned, full-force.
"It's not true," she said finally. "Evan and I were talking in the kitchen. Talking." A crippling sadness settled in her stomach, weighing her shoulders down, leaching every good moment of the last hour from her. "Whatever she thought she saw or told you she saw, it was a lie. She lied to you, because I'd never kiss another girl's boyfriend, no matter how many times she'd injured me during practice." And that was the truth. She had never been unfaithful in a relationship, and she had never coerced anyone else to be either. That wouldn't change now just because she'd changed her home-address.
Doug just stood there for a moment, breathing rapidly, looking so confused Rose felt a swell of sympathy for him. Behind those usually contemptuous blue eyes, he was rapidly rethinking every decision he'd made over the last twelve hours, agonising and guilt-tripping over what he had done because of those decisions, and realising how far up that creek he was without paddles.
"I didn't—I didn't know…" Doug stammered. For a split-second, Rose could see the depth of regret in his eyes. He knew he had made a mistake. A really huge, potentially relationship-ending mistake. The relationship between him and his brother, that is.
"Come on," she said, hooking her arm around his waist, seeing how wobbly he was on his feet. "Caleb's gone to find your dad. Let's see if we can salvage Finn's t-shirt."
As soon as they had entered the house, Caleb came towing John along into the kitchen, still wide-eyed and panting. John took one look at Doug and demanded to know what happened; when Finn and Sean had finished explaining about the fight, John went literally white, a line receding down his neck past the neckline of his t-shirt, taking his colour with it, and he didn't seem to be able to speak.
"How did you stop him?" John asked.
"Douggie kicked Evan in the balls," Caleb spoke up.
"Sweetheart, don't use that word," Rose said quietly.
"I don't know another word," Caleb said innocently. He turned to Finn. "What's another word for balls?"
"Hey, why don't you go and get us a soda?" Finn said quietly, rumpling Caleb's white-blonde curls. Caleb meandered to the internal garage door, his expression thoughtful. He disappeared into the darkened garage, and they heard him rummaging through the outside fridge-freezer for soda cans, then the loud thunk of him slamming the door. Rose had to smile a little bit; there was nothing like an innocent six-year-old kid and the things they could come out with. She knew that; she missed that, terribly.
Rose coerced Doug into giving up Finn's t-shirt, replacing it with a hand-towel, and soaked the t-shirt in warm water and detergent to get the blood out before it stained. John got his keys and took Doug to the hospital to get his nose checked out.
Finn let out a shaky breath and sat down at the kitchen-table as soon as the sound of John's Mercedes softened to a low hum and disappeared, looking pale and trembling, hanging his head.
"Are you alright?" Rose asked softly. Sean passed his little brother a new soda-can he'd just half-drained, and Finn took a sip, steadying his nerves. He passed it to Rose, who took a sip, and passed it back to Sean.
"I've just never seen them like that before," Finn said, his expression slack, eyes large and strangely hollow. Rose had to think that was a good thing, but at the same time, a horrible sense of foreboding crept over her.
"You haven't had fights before?" Rose asked.
"Not like that," Sean put in. Rose bit her lip.
"We'll have the occasional throwdown over a trashed skateboard or a lost CD, but nothing like this," Finn said, his expression haunted.
"So, to say this isn't good—"
"Is a definite understatement," Sean said, downing the last of his soda.
"Sean, what's another word for balls?" Caleb asked innocently, his expression still pulled into a thoughtful frown.
"Go play with Ian, that's another word," Sean said, sending Caleb to the kitchen door with a pat on the butt to jumpstart him into moving. At the doorway, Caleb turned around, his expression jubilant, snapping his fingers.
"Nuts!"
The sound of movement outside her bedroom window woke Rose at midnight later that night. She hadn't really been sleeping; her brain had been too preoccupied with what had happened to rest, but she had been in that place between sleep and awake when the imagination takes over and everything is possible. And she was imagining nice things about shirtless Finn.
But those delicious thoughts were replaced by prickling nerves and raising hairs as those footsteps below her window made her contemplate which Supernatural monster it could be. She crept out of bed, and without turning on the lamps, tiptoed to the window, peering down into the yard through the curtains and blinds. Something was moving just beneath her window; a large cloth flicked out like a sheet and fanned out on the ground. She blinked, and everything came to focus in the crisp silvery moonlight.
It was Evan. And he was laying out a sleeping-bag.
Evan had been gone all of the afternoon and most of the evening; while Doug had sat sullen and quiet through dinner, Evan had been gone until after dark, and had gone directly upstairs. He hadn't apologised for almost breaking Doug's nose, for the two enormous black eyes he had given his brother…he had just gone upstairs, slammed the door, locked it, and put his music on so he no doubt couldn't hear his father's shouts for him to come out.
Well, he was out of his room now, and just because John was in bed didn't mean Rose was going to let the opportunity fly and not give Evan McGowan what he really needed—another huge verbal spanking.
She grabbed her pink cotton robe from the back of her door and stumbled around her bedroom trying to find her slippers, then caught sight of her reflection. She had put rollers into her hair so it'd be curly tomorrow morning. Oh, well; can't take them out now, she thought. The boys had seen her first thing in the morning with a hangover; they could deal with her hair-rollers. She pulled on her robe, slipped her feet into her slippers and tiptoed downstairs.
Evan looked up when he heard the kitchen door open. He was just pushing his legs into his sleeping-bag.
"Hey," he said.
"Hey." Arms folded across her chest, she felt that righteous indignation she'd been feeling all afternoon, every time she thought about him beating the hell out of his little brother, and wondering how he could bring himself to hit Doug, no matter what he did. She walked over to him and looked around the garden. There was no light illuminating the cracks of the shed door, nor the skylight, so Finn was probably upstairs doing homework or reading one of the art books she had let him borrow from her bookcase. "What're you doing out here?"
"My family used to do this at least once a summer, sleep out here under the stars," Evan said, directing her attention to the glorious night sky. The stars were bigger than Rose had ever seen them, twinkling and giggling, the moon enormous, gilded with silver, glowing. "I thought this might be one of the last warm nights."
Rose nodded and bit the inside of her cheek, still observing the stars. She wondered if they gazed back at her, and felt the desire to watch Stardust.
"So, I went to Hailey's this afternoon," Evan said quietly. Rose glanced down at Evan.
"What did she have to say for herself?" she asked coolly.
"Nothing. I never got to the door."
"You just sat in your car in her driveway for hours without saying anything to her?" Rose said incredulously, glancing down at him again. "Well, you've succeeded in giving her enough time to get her story straight, that's for sure." Rose knew from experience (well, second-hand experience, observing Pogue's many, varied, failed relationships) that you nipped a confrontation in the bud before either of you could come up with excuses or stories.
"I just don't get it," Evan said. "Why would she tell him that I hooked up with you? Do you think it's possible she actually thinks she saw us doing something?"
"I don't believe this!" Rose blurted, staring down at him. "You're actually looking for a plausible reason to forgive her for this. Evan, we were in the kitchen, drinking, we were talking about you two. Whatever she saw or thought she saw was only in her imagination; ask anyone in that kitchen with us if we even touched that night. The only contact we had was you handing me a drink."
Evan hadn't expected her to react like that; had he been hoping she'd help him sugar-coat this whole thing and enable him to forgive his girlfriend for sleeping with his brother. Well, she wasn't going to; she had seen how contrite and quiet Doug had been at dinner, had seen those two blossoming black eyes, and she wasn't going to forgive Evan for beating up his family.
"But, I mean…she told Doug we were done, and I know we never had that conversation," Evan said, frowning. "She's just…making things up."
"Mm," Rose said.
"I just don't get it," Evan said. "How could you do all this to someone you cared about? I mean, obviously she doesn't give a crap about me. That's obvious now, right?"
"Well…based on my knowledge of high-school relationships, I'd say what she's doing is trying to protect herself," Rose said. She'd been thinking this over. Why would Hailey go and have sex with Doug—or anyone, for that matter.
"What do you mean?"
"She's trying to hurt you before you hurt her," Rose shrugged. "It's a classic move. Or, you know, she could've woken up today and not remembered a thing because she'd drunk so much."
"Do you really think so?" Evan asked hopefully.
"No!" Rose scoffed. "Like you said at the party, she knew what she was doing when she walked into Christian Todd's house."
"You know what? I don't want to talk about this anymore," Evan said. "Let's talk about something else."
"Like what?" Rose asked.
"Like, I don't know, what do you want to do after high school?" Evan asked. Easy question, complicated answer. She was going to college; there were no ifs or buts about it; she was going. After that, all she really wanted was a family, the kind she'd had to live without.
"College," Rose shrugged.
"Any idea where?" Evan asked.
"Mm…I was thinking, maybe, Brown University," Rose said. Rose was a legacy; her mother had been a Manhattan debutante from a very old Connecticut family; they had been some of the first settlers. Rose had inherited all her ancient family's fortunes, and she could go to college anywhere she wanted, and if she didn't want to go to college, she could live in luxury for the rest of her life without lifting a finger. But she wasn't the type.
"Brown? Wow," Evan said, looking mildly impressed.
"What about you?" Rose asked.
"Well, I want to get the hell out of here, that's all I know," Evan said. "BC and New Hampshire are both trying to recruit me for hockey, but I'm thinking Michigan or Northwestern. Someplace that's at least a day's drive from here."
"Don't want any visitors, hm?" Rose said.
"At this point, I wouldn't mind never seeing this family again," Evan replied. Rose felt that like a blow to the chest. A great swell of anger and hurt swept over her.
"Take that back," she whispered—because a whisper was all she could manage with the blistering, tightening of her throat and the burning in her eyes. Suddenly, she remembered her purpose in coming down here—giving Evan McGowan an earful. And telling her that he never wanted to see his family again—that would do it. "You forget you're talking to someone who has woken up in the middle of the night and told by a complete stranger that the only family she had in the world was dead. Don't you ask for that—don't you dare ask for that," she cried softly, tears streaming like little rivers of lava down her cheeks, "not in front of me—don't you dare. You've no right to ask for that when all I've ever wanted is a family like yours."
"Rose… I… I didn't… I didn't mean…" Evan stammered, his eyes wide, his expression mortified. "I… I'm just so angry at him."
"You're angry at Doug," Rose half-hissed. She had been thinking this over all afternoon. "You just asked me, how could Hailey hurt someone she was supposed to care about, didn't you. Let me ask you a few questions. How could you ever be angry or hurt enough to raise a hand against one of your brothers/ In ten years, Hailey Farmer will be nothing more than a bad memory you think of when you think about your worst ex-girlfriends. In ten years, Doug will still be your brother—and that's if he forgives you for what you did to him today. You want to know what your life will be like without a family, I'll tell you, or maybe you can ask your mother how she's felt the last fifteen years not being able to talk to her sister."
"Rose, I—"
"I'm not finished!" Rose snapped. She was getting into her stride. Oh, this felt so good. "You're mad at Doug for having sex with Hailey. Let me ask you; are you mad at her? Because unless it was statutory rape—which I highly doubt, because for all he's an ass, he's not an idiot, and he's not vicious—she spread her legs, she didn't have them forced open. It takes two to have hard-core sex. She made the decision to have sex with Doug. Most likely, she'd drunk enough she didn't even know who it was. It could have been anyone. It could have been Darnell. Would you have beaten up your best-friend? You know you wouldn't. So why would you beat your little brother—your brother, Evan—into a bloody pulp?"
"Rose, I—"
"I'm still not done," Rose said, raising her voice slightly. She thought she heard a noise in the house, but ignored it. "Tomorrow morning, I want you to take a good long look at Caleb, and think how you'd feel if doctors told you his heart was broken, and you had to watch him die. And when you see Doug, I want you to look at his black eyes and I want you to ask yourself whether you think he'll ever forgive you. And when you see Hailey next, I want you to do two things; I want you to ask her to tell you the truth. Would it have mattered to her what guys he let fuck her? And you look at her and decide whether you'd give up your brother, your family, for her. Because you put her first today when you beat the shit out of your brother, and just remember it was she who spread her legs and invited him in the first place."
Propped up on his elbows, Evan's jaw was slack as he stared up at her, clearly lost for words. She waited for him to say something, anything, and when he just continued to stare, and blink occasionally, Rose huffed and stalked back to the house.
She felt good after that little rant. She might have felt better if he'd argued, so she could rip into him some more, but she would take what she could get, and tiptoed back upstairs.
A.N.: There are so many things wrong with Evan's priorities in Kate Brian's book (I actually had to go searching through the book for the author's name, as I only know it as Megan Meade's Guide!).
