For the First Time: Twenty-One Brand New Stories of First Love (43 page)

I sometimes feel she is at an advantage being blind. That is, until she reminds me she must rely upon me to describe the shade of our gray-green eyes, her red and my black hair. How different I look from her and inversely, how many features we share. Explaining color to a blind girl, or trying to describe what the world sounds like to a deaf boy, is a lesson in irony and none more so than all of it coming from me. I’ve never cared about what it’s like to ‘hear’ but I still remember six-year-old Kylee being despondent over my lack of ability to properly describe color. It’s her reliance upon me, her thirst for knowledge, which spurs me to learn and read whenever I have the time.

Despite what many perceive as a weakness—we don’t feel
disadvantaged
and we reject any society that sees us as inherently inferior. Kylee has never been able to see; I can’t remember being able to hear. We don’t miss it because it wasn’t something we lost; our adaptation is simply different. However, I do feel that Kylee and I, being closer than most, never fit into either group. I have never lacked for my deafness—not with Kylee at my side and I have always been her eyes. Together, we can see and hear the world of which we are a part of and apart from, but also the opportunities waiting to be exploited on our terms. That’s why we decided early on that we would attend regular school and our special studies once a week.

“I’m finished,” I say. The bathroom in our trailer is too small for two people. It consists of a toilet, corner sink, and stall shower. The only way to not soak the entire room is to step into the stall and close the shower curtain as snug as possible. It takes a bit of navigating to keep my genitals away from her as I step out of the shower. Kylee thinks my ‘accidental boners’ are hilarious. She has nicknamed my penis, Capt. Underoo, because it is almost always at attention. A fact I find less than amusing. Sometimes I’m an ass and tell her I’ve dressed her in mismatched clothes. I think it’s
hilarious
the way she blushes.

The bathroom is pitch dark. I can’t see a damn thing as I wrap myself in my towel and head toward our room. The sun has set, but there’s just enough light to be able to get dressed without trouble, thanks to the outdoor lights.

By the time Kylee is out of the bathroom, her long hair damp and short pajamas clinging, I’m already under the sheets. “Couldn’t you at least dry off better,” I gripe. “You’re going to get the bed all wet.” She grins slyly as she slides in next to me. She reaches for my hand and places my fingers against her lips so I can feel her words in the dark:
“Whatever, Old Faithful.”
I laugh and she laughs just as hard against my fingers. She always says I sound like ‘a barking seal with the hiccups’. I have no idea what that actually sounds like but she finds it funny, so I do too. The reference to Old Faithful comes from a very humiliating time when I had a tendency to wake up soiled every morning. Worse, Kylee took sick pleasure in recounting what I sounded like just before I erupted like the famous geyser.

“Whatever, Bloody Mary.” I’ve been around for all of my sister’s embarrassing puberty moments as well. So far. I sometimes fear she will want what everyone else seems to want, the kind of attention I can’t give her. There are times when she seems completely
aware
of herself. I don’t always understand and it’s unnerving and sends an odd, not uninterested, quiver through me. Our connection is such that I see her as a part of myself and yet…there are things about her that remain a mystery.

While I mused, our laughter died.
“Are you still thinking about Defbobby? You’re quiet.”
No. I had been staring at her in the dim light. I had been thinking about the warmth of her breath against my fingertips and the plump texture of her lips. Did she really not know? Or did she see more than she let on?

“No,” I replied, distracted. I’ve got enough cash in my pocket from odd jobs to get us some groceries for a week if we stick to soup and sandwiches. If I turn a few tricks, I can probably get the water turned on; it’ll be cold, but it’s better than using a pitcher. I’ll buy candles for the evenings. The problem will be convincing Kylee to let me do what I must do, so we can survive. It’s not like I enjoy it. People my age get paid shit and I’ve got grown up problems. Tomorrow is going to be a long day. I feel her body shift against mine, with impatience at my incomplete answer. “I was…I have some stuff I have to do tomorrow, groceries, shit like that. Do you think you can use Seemore tomorrow?” Kylee is fully capable of getting along with her walking stick, the same as I can read lips and communicate when necessary. We’re not helpless apart, just better together.

She nips me with her teeth and I suck in a breath.
“Liar!”
I know she’s yelling from the twist of her face and the forceful vibration of her mouth.
“I know what you’re going to do.”
She swats my hand away from her face and turns away. The angry line of her back smacks of judgment. How nice of her to have the luxury when all I’ve ever done is for her. Always for us. My eyes sting and my nose tickles. But then Kylee reaches back for my hand and wraps my arm around her.

We don’t often bother with phrases like, ‘I love you.’ Instead, my sister pulls me close, even when she’s furious with me, because she knows I’m vulnerable in my sleep. I forgive her instantly. I can never allow myself to forget that all her anger and worry is for us.

Settling in behind her with our pillow lodged in between us, I wait patiently for Kylee’s body to go soft in my embrace. It isn’t long before we’re asleep.

R
ed is the
first thing I see.

The bright sun is coming in through our twelve by twelve window and beaming right onto my face and Kylee’s brilliant hair.
Defbobby
never came home, or if he did, it’s the first time he hasn’t stumbled into the trailer so drunk and loud that Kylee has to scramble to wake me. It would be a great omen for the day if I didn’t know better. If he’s not dead, he’s on a bender.

It’s sunny outside, but it’s also January and anything below sixty degrees Fahrenheit is considered jacket weather in Florida. I spare a thought for Kylee. She really shouldn’t come to bed with wet hair. She caught pneumonia two winters ago and I’ve kept a watchful eye ever since. I mentally scroll through her minimal number of outfits and decide on a black three-quarter length sweater. I’ll pair it with her plaid, burgundy schoolgirl skirt, tights and her steel-toed boots. My sister’s taste in music suggests she’s a little Goth. I’m more of a t-shirt, jeans, and flannel kind of guy but enjoy dressing her up. Kylee would much rather be the hot girl than the blind girl. And so, I have watched countless hair and makeup tutorials on YouTube. The smoky eye is my bitch.

Today wouldn’t be a bad day for me to reach into my sister’s makeup. I’ve got goals for the day and I stand a better chance of reaching them if I cover up some of our father’s love taps. Some tricks are turned off by my roughed-up appearance. It messes with their ‘horny teenage boy’ fantasies because it’s okay to pay for sex with a seventeen year old boy if he’s a slut. Being tall and lanky, and androgynous when I choose to be, I can be anyone for a lot of people. And I’ve ceased to be surprised by the number of people who are aroused by my deafness. There are some who keep up a steady stream of filthy talk while I read their lips and hold my legs back.

Mr. Sandusky, the park manager, likes to refer to me as his poor, dumb whore and I pretend not to know it when our rent is past due. The sick son of a bitch is sweet as apple pie during business hours and an active member at the local church. I know, because we, as the most ‘misfortunate members of our community’, are often the recipients of their smothering generosity. I’d tell them where to put their ‘salvation’ but some of those old women have been perfecting the casserole since Eisenhower was president and we never turn away a good meal.

I sigh. I hesitate to wake her.

Kylee is going to be angry with me today, righteously so. My mind reaches for last night and the simple joy of being sheltered away from our cares, just my sister and I in our custom-made world of two. Things are never so simple in the morning when reality takes over.

However, we need food and shelter. We need water and heat. We need money. I don’t know why she insists on creating a problem where I only see a solution. I’m always safe. I know how to defend myself. I do not suffer from low self-esteem. I
do
occasionally post ads in the personals offering my services as a ‘cute deaf boy in need of a mommy/daddy type to take care of me’ and I never forget to mention how turned on I am by valuable gifts. And truthfully…shamefully…I don’t mind the women as much. I’m intrigued by all their soft, round, wet, and squishy places. I sometimes become fixated by a lock of fiery hair, a pair of dainty breasts crowned with pencil eraser nipples, or plump lips forming words in an oddly familiar way. But I don’t tell Kylee any of that. The fact remains, I’d still be a virgin too if we’d never needed the money. I do not seek out sexual relationships outside of necessity. I don’t want to encourage that kind of behavior on her part.

“Kylee.” I shake her gently in my arms half hoping she’ll sleep the day away. “Time to get up. I’ll walk you to school.” The school shares a parking lot with the public library; a mutually beneficial relationship I take advantage of when needed. I use their computers to anonymously post my ads. We also study there a lot since the library received funds for the purchase of software and accessories that allow my sister to use the computer on her own. Kylee must have surfed the entire Internet the week they installed them. I remember her smile, wondrous and joyful. I have taught her many facial expressions, feeling my face as I pantomime. But her emotional reactions, like her smile, are unconsciously beautiful and genuine.

“Kye,” I say a little louder. As children, Kylee taught me how to connect the vibrations I feel when I speak with a ‘volume level’. Too loud and she would wave her hand in the air, bringing it down, down, and down, until I knew what passed for conversational. My favorite volume is whisper. It feels like tiny carbonated bubbles popping in my ear. “Wake up,” I whisper into her ear. She grins and lazily lifts one of her hands to give me the finger. “Real classy, Kye.” I swat her hand playfully.

It takes a few seconds for Kylee to come fully awake, and for the events of yesterday evening to fall into place in her mind…and then…she’s awake. And pissed. She bolts up too quickly and trips over my towel from last night. “Shit! Sorry, Kye. It must have fallen off the end of the bed.”

She turns toward the sound of my voice and her eyes pierce me dead on. In the same way she taught me about volume, I vocally coached her on how it feels to have your eyes fixed on something or someone. It’s eerie when she’s angry. She signs:
“Stupid place to put it, Parker!”
And she’s right. Everything must be in its place or accidents can happen in an instant.

“I said I’m sorry. What else you want me to say?” She throws up her middle finger again and stomps toward the bathroom. I roll my eyes and lie back in bed to stare at the water stained ceiling. The day is already off to a crappy start. I exhale forcefully and goad myself out of bed to begin setting out our clothes for the day.

Kylee enters the room and pauses just inside.
“Is it safe to walk or are you still determined to get rid of me?”
I don’t dignify her with a response. I ball up her tights and throw them at her face. She catches them like she knew it’s what I would do.
“Thanks,”
she signs with a scowl on her brow.
“You better not be sending me out looking stupid.”
She begins undressing so she can pull on her tights. Her lips are still moving.
“I’m going to have a shit day as it is without you at school. They’re going to make Miss Wendy walk with me and you know….”
She pulls her top over her head and I lose her lips but gain a view of her perfect breasts. For a few moments, I allow myself to look and pretend they belong to someone else. God is a strange entity.

Why create a world to inspire curiosity and then make it the first sin? Why demand we look but not touch, touch but not taste, and taste but not swallow?

Kylee snaps her fingers impatiently in my line of sight. I’ve been caught. Again. I hand over her bra a little sheepishly but laugh anyway. There is an endless supply of teasable offenses between us. We choose our moments carefully.

A tiny fissure of mirth breaks through her anger and Kylee grins.
“Pervert. No fair looking when I’m not allowed to.”

“Gross,” I exaggerate. “You look with your hands.” I ignore the tingle along my shaft and the swelling in my briefs. My morning masturbatory ritual beckons, but there’s no water to shower and I’m going to need my stamina anyway.

“Please,”
Kylee continues, all trace of our little moment dispelled by her remembered rage. “
Like I don’t know every inch of you anyway? Everyone else our age is having sex.
You!” She stresses the point by jabbing her finger in my direction. “
Are having sex. How come I haven’t even kissed a boy yet? Maybe I want to!”
Her hands and fingers are flying and I can barely keep up with all her wild gesticulating.
“Maybe I can help you. I can let people pay to touch me. You ever think of that? You could auction off my cherry.”
I lunge for her wrists and pin them to the wall above her head in three quick steps.

She’s mad at me for selling myself.

She worries for
my safety and is infuriated by the hypocrisy that has surrounded us all our lives.

I understand.

But there are some things I won’t put up with from her and she damn well knows. Just the fucking thought! I press our foreheads together, hard. The soft curve of her breasts kisses against my chest with each furious breath.

“Don’t,” I say. The word is a deep bass chord in my chest. Kylee licks her lips like a snake tasting the air, the tip of her tongue barely brushing against mine. My fingers tighten around her wrists. I don’t know which idea I find more incendiary: that my sister is willing to have me sell her body, or that she wants,
desires
, a type of affection I cannot provide. Who the hell is it she wants to kiss? I can conjure at least a dozen boys, and men old enough to be our father, who covet
my
twin. But the thought of her wanting them in return…I tremble with sentiments I don’t want to analyze. Who am I without Kylee? Who is she between the gaps of our combined existence? “Don’t say that.”