Bewitched by Bella's Brother (10 page)

fiercely, Sebastian was worried she might break her teeth. It didn’t help—her lower lip was quivering anyway. Sebastian sighed and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, and she pulled her legs underneath her to sit down. When she was done, she leaned her head against his chest.

“Well, we’re on your old stomping grounds. Show me the

bastard and I’ll sic your brother on him.”

Bella smiled faintly. “You won’t kill him yourself?”

“I could bitch-slap him to death.”

“
That
I’d pay to see,” she quipped, but her voice was Bewitched by Bella’s Brother |
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brittle, and they were both ignoring the fact that his “Gaydar Offline: Grope Everyone” T-shirt was slowly getting soaked.

“Besides, Asa already beat him up.” She shrugged. “He didn’t drug me—I just… you know, I’d never had a beer before, and we both got pretty wasted. It was just two kids, being

dumber than a box of diapers, you know?”

“You didn’t tell your parents?” She’d said only Asa

knew.

“No. Asa was the oldest. We all worshipped him. So, I

woke up half-naked and called him, and he came—no

questions asked, you know? I poured the whole mess out on him, and he held me and told me it would all be okay, and took me to the clinic for the morning-after pill. Then he lied to Mom and Dad because I begged him to, and took me to

the abortion clinic when the morning after pill didn’t take.

And the whole time, he didn’t judge and didn’t yell, and he was just this awesome stand-up guy, but….”

“But he was your big brother and you worshipped him.”

“And he got to see me as a pathetic disaster. And I felt like I let him down so bad. He was so wonderful, Sebastian, and I just stopped talking to him. Just… I don’t know, made him a big blank spot in my life. I became all about school, I blew off my friends, and I… I just stopped talking to my brother, and he was the one who made it all right… how

could I do that?”

“You were embarrassed,” he said, not sure why she

couldn’t see it.

“I was stupid and self-centered and pissed off and….”

“And embarrassed, and young, and your brother forgave

you a long time ago. Was the tenth the day of the party?”

“No.” Her voice was a mess—all the initial sounds in her Bewitched by Bella’s Brother |
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words sounded like “B”—and Sebastian was pretty sure he

would have to burn this shirt, but he didn’t care.

“It was the day of the abortion—and I felt like crap,

because I never thought I’d get one, and I still don’t know if it was the right thing to do, and he… he didn’t… care. He said that it was my body and my life and everybody got a do-over. He took me to a baseball game afterwards,” she said, wrapping her arms around his waist and holding him until his ribs groaned—but that wasn’t why Sebastian wanted to bang his head against the wall to make the pain go away.

“Who was playing?” he asked after a moment.

“Giants and Dodgers. Dodgers won.”

“Fuckers.”

“Yeah.”

“This game’s against the Padres.”

“They suck this year.”

“Yeah.”

“Wanna go?”

There was a terrible quiet then, and for a moment, he

was afraid she’d fallen asleep.

“Yeah,” she said after a moment.

“You guys seem to function pretty good, you know. Even

with this hanging between you.” They had—maybe it was

just that Bella had grown up in her family, where every

member was valued and had a job to do.

“We used to laugh a lot more,” she said. “In fact, we

used to be a lot like you and me.”

Sebastian couldn’t decide whether to feel honored or

depressed. Then Bella said, “Except I picked you and I got saddled with him,” and he decided it was definitely honored.

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“Yeah—well, I lucked out with you, Princess. Nobody

shops Abercrombie & Fitch like you.”

“If only you’d wear something besides gay-T-shirt chic!”

She sat up then, and wiped her face with her hands. Her

face was blotchy and red and, for once, not inhumanly

beautiful as she looked woefully at his shirt.

“It’s a look,” he said mildly, and she nodded.

“They show off your chest,” she conceded.

They sat there, just sat there, quietly, until the

blotchiness on her face faded and the faintly cynical curl to her lip had been restored.

“I don’t think worse of you, either, you know that,

right?” he said quietly. “You’re still my Bella-love.”

Bella smiled a little, in spite of herself. “You… you were my first real friend after high school. Pretty much my best friend ever. It was easier, you know, keeping it from you, because you were a boy. I told myself you didn’t tell your gay friend that shit.”

Sebastian widened his eyes, thinking about it. “I have to admit, it didn’t even occur to me, you know? I don’t know if that’s the gay thing, or the diva thing—I just was okay with leaving you alone.” He looked away. “Doesn’t say much for me.” He paused. “Says volumes for your brother, though.”

Bella leaned her head against his shoulder. “It says

you’re my best friend. And it says I might actually have to talk to him about this some day.”

“Doesn’t have to be now.”

They sat there for another moment, not looking at each

other, just being quiet and warm. Finally she looked at him and nodded shakily, and he stood and kissed her forehead.

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“Here—you go wash your face and tell your brother we’ll go, and I’m going to go change my shirt, deal?”

She nodded. “He always fucks up the pasta anyway. He

cooks it way too long.”

Sebastian shrugged. “Little kids like it mushy.”

“Not like us adults, right?”

“Naw… we like it spicy.” He grinned, and she grinned

back, and then—another Bella surprise—she hugged him

again, and harder.

“I love you, Sebastian. Really love you. Like family, but better.”

Sebastian melted a little inside. His whole life, his family had been two voices on the other end of a telephone. Bella was his family now, and her family was too.

“That’s an honor, Bell—I mean that,” he told her, not a

trace of snark in his voice.

“My family really is great, isn’t it?”

“If you could make it legal, I’d let them adopt me.”

“Mm….” She had been going to say something—he could

hear it in her noises—but then she put her hands on his

arms and shoved. “Go change. I got boogers on your shirt and it’s grossing me out!”

She sounded so much like herself that he figured the

other thing had been his imagination.

“Bella?” he said, as he put his hand on the doorknob to

the shared bathroom.

“Yeah?”

“I really love you too.”

By the time he heard Asa’s knock, he’d thrown the shirt

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in the hamper and was looking through the pile of clothes on his dresser. (They were
on
the dresser because putting them
in
the dresser had never been his style. This helped to explain the tight T-shirt fashion sense—when they were

tight, you couldn’t see the wrinkles.)

“Come in! Oh shit!” Oh shit—he wasn’t wearing a shirt.

Wasn’t that suggestive? The night before had been an

experiment, a simmering undertone to all of their dealings until now… how presumptuous was it that he would let this man into his room when he didn’t have on a shirt?

Asa chuckled as he opened the door, and then stopped

short with wide, amused eyes when he saw Sebastian

holding a Placebo concert T-shirt in front of his chest like a virgin girl.

“I’ve, uhm, I’ve seen a man’s chest before,” Asa said

drolly.

Sebastian glared at him, sniffed the pits, decided the

shirt was clean, and put it on hastily. When he was done, he crossed his arms and glared at Asa some more.

“I hate family drama,” he said when Asa just looked at

him. “I hate it. I don’t know how to deal with it. Part of the reason I hang with Bella is that she’s not the dramatic type.

I’ve had more family drama in the last two days than I’ve had in my entire life, and I blame you!”

Asa looked instantly contrite, and Sebastian felt like

shit. It was hard to pout like a diva when the guy had just had his heart put through an industrial cheese grater.

“As you should,” Asa agreed. “You’re right, it was a little much so soon.”

“Why? Why did it have to be today?”

Asa blinked and thrust his hand through his hair. It

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was down from the braid and fell appealingly down his back and over his shoulder, framing his lean face on one side when he was done.

“Because that’s when I bought the tickets,” he said, still musing on the question. “Why wouldn’t it be today?”

And now Sebastian felt incredibly childish. “Because I

was all happy and high today,” he said, as though that made any sense.

Asa’s eyebrows went even higher, and he gave a little

quirk of his chin as though to say,
Proceed…
so Sebastian did.

“You… you touched me last night. I… you know. I was

riding that… weren’t you?”

A tiny corner of that tightly compressed mouth lifted up, and Asa’s eyes softened. “Yes,” he said quietly. “Yes, I was. I just know how to juggle, that’s all.” He took two more steps into the room and closed the door.

Sebastian rolled his eyes. “I don’t. Bella’s miserable, and my day is supposed to suck from beginning to end. I’m

happy and getting”—well, it wasn’t laid yet, was it?—

“touched, and my day is supposed to rock.”

Asa frowned and advanced another step. “That sounds a

little co-dependent. You can’t do that when you have kids; you’d go insane.”

Sebastian shook his head. “Yeah—I figured that when I

got to know Jordan’s cousins. But they’re only a once-a-week deal. Kids—you know, they’re like roller-coasters, but when you get to be older, you don’t
like
the rollercoaster so much.

You keep going up and down and that makes you sick to

your stomach and eventually you think you’ve done

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something hideous to your neck and you realize that you

don’t like the rollercoaster anymore. The ferris wheel maybe, and the haunted house ride, absolutely, but not the

rollercoaster, right?” He caught himself in the middle of his rambling to realize that Asa had moved and that they were now standing closer together—in the daylight, at least—than they had since they’d met.

“What are you doing?” he asked.

“Offering you a hug,” Asa said simply. “You’re right. It’s been a rough couple of days. I appreciate everything you’ve done for us. Come here and let me hold you.”

Oh. “Oh.” Oh jeez.

It was everything a good hug should be. Asa’s shoulders

were wide, and he was tall but not too much taller than

Sebastian. Sebastian could rest his chin on Asa’s shoulder easily, and through slitted eyes, he got a nice look at that clean profile, long jawbone, faint, pale stubble, and all. He sighed and sank into the feeling of warm arms around his shoulders and a chest of iron against his, and then Asa

dropped a kiss in his hair and held him even tighter.

Sebastian actually groaned, like an old dog, and wondered if he could make Asa into a whole other skin—sort of a secret boyfriend coat. He made a sound of protest when Asa rubbed his shoulders and then stepped back.

“Dinner’s almost ready,” he said, his voice deep and

surprisingly regretful.

Sebastian nodded. “Asa?” he asked, taking his own step

back and feeling like his world had been put in order with one press of body to body, “why is it you don’t talk much, but you seem to say a helluva lot?”

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Asa’s mouth turned up at the corner again. “It’s an art,”

he said slyly. “Maybe you should write your next paper on it.”

He snickered and proceeded down the stairs, and

Sebastian threw a raspberry at his back and followed him.

But Sebastian had to admit, he felt a whole lot better about the family rollercoaster after that hug.

Jordan was excited that they’d both be going, and Bella

seemed to pull herself together after a while. It was hard to stay morose in the face of that quiet happiness, Sebastian thought, and he answered Jordan’s questions with enough

optimism for all three of the adults at the table.

Asa had said that the little boy actually used to

chatter—Sebastian was sort of hoping that with enough

encouragement, the kid might actually turn into a kindred spirit, and he wouldn’t be the only one with a mouth running at a hundred miles a minute.

Dinner was finished, dishes were done, and their small

people unit continued on in what Sebastian had to admit

was a soothing routine. A little pang yanked at Sebastian’s solar plexus as they all sat in the living room: Asa reading to Jordan, Sebastian and Bella sitting on the couch with their legs tangled, and alternative rock playing softly on the stereo behind them.

This was temporary.

It was hard to get back to his book after that.

Asa came by his room that night again too.

Sebastian had been sitting up in bed, poring over a

history text that discussed the process of making “indigo,” or

“royal blue,” and how the color itself had been the cause of a hundred years of warfare (which Sebastian thought was an Bewitched by Bella’s Brother |
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excellent point in his thesis), when he heard Asa go into Bella’s room.