Playing It Safe (5 page)

I
pull into the driveway of their house an hour later. Having had to deal with toll traffic on the Rickenbacker Causeway due to the perfect beach day weather, it’s taken me a little longer than usual. My brother Darren’s Bumblebee Chevy Camaro is already here, and I park right behind him just in case I have to make a quick getaway. Ugh, I hate that car. It’s so … yellow. Reminds me of a school bus rather than a car that can transform into an intelligent life-form. If it was so goddamn intelligent, it should have picked a more appealing color to be seen in.

Walking toward the front door, I’m already on high alert when I hear my dad yell out a string of curses that aren’t suitable to repeat, even for me. And in case you’re wondering where I got my colorful language from, look no further. My dad has never been one to tone it down for absolutely anyone’s benefit for as long as I can remember.

One time, when I was eight, my parents were called to my school to meet with my teacher because I had gotten myself into a wee bit of trouble. Okay, so I called another girl a bitch because, well, she
was
a bitch. She moved my chair out from under me right before I sat down. The worst part was that I was wearing a skirt that day, and as I rolled over to get to my feet that sucker flew right up and left my panty-clad ass hanging in the breeze for the rest of the class to see. Anyway, when my teacher, Mrs. Black, told my parents the story about how I used foul language, I’ll never forget what happened next. My dad stood up, looked a
t me sternly, and asked if what the teacher had said was true. I nodded and kept my mouth shut since I was paralyzed with fear over what my punishment would be. He looked over to Mrs. Black and said, “That little girl
is
a bitch for pulling my daughter’s chair out.” He turned to my mother then. “Marilyn, let’s go.” Mrs. Black was appalled while my poor mother was hemming and hawing, watching my dad take me by the hand and drag me out of there. On the drive home, my dad said that next time I should try to say it more quietly, then proceeded to take me to Swenson’s for an ice cream sundae. It was the best day ever.

As quietly as possible, I open the front door and peek my head around the frame so I can assess the damage before throwing myself into the fray. My mom, God bless her, is sitting on one corner of the long chaise sofa, arms crossed and chewing away at her bottom lip. My dad is sitting on the opposite end, in the same manner, and sporting a look that could kill directed at my brother. Darren’s back is to me, and he’s pointing the now infamous screwdriver at my mother, and then he snaps his attention back to my dad, saying something about both of them being in a time-out so they can think about what they did.

Good Lord, if this isn’t the craziest shit I’ve ever witnessed.
My
parents in a time-out? I never thought I’d live to see the day.

“Julia Ann Boyd,” my dad yells when he finally spots me. “Close the door and get your ass in here before you let any more mosquitoes in the house.”

“Carter, take it easy,” my mom pleads. “You know you need to watch that blood pressure of yours.”

“Woman, if you hadn’t taken away my screwdriver, I wouldn’t be pissed off to begin with.”

“I did it for your own good, dear,” she counters.

“What do you mean my own good?”

“Well, I mean that you … well, you know you never were that good at fixing stuff,” my poor mother says, now stammering. My dad’s face starts to turn a hue of red that rivals that of a tomato before he launches into an obscenity-laced rant about how a man’s tools are not to be trifled with.

“Enough!” Darren yells. “For the love of God, would you both just shut up for a minute,
or ten
, and try to be civil? Julia and I are going to be right in the other room. Don’t even think about starting this argument up again while we’re gone.”

It’s then I finally get a good look at Darren as he turns around and envelops me in a big bear hug and then plants a sloppy kiss on my cheek. Even though he’s my baby brother by five years, he’s huge in comparison, towering over me easily, and I’m no slouch in the height department at five feet six inches. He’s built like a brick shithouse, and I’m sure the ladies all go gaga for him with his dark blond hair and sky-blue eyes, but to me he’s still the little guy whose diapers I’ve helped change.

“Come on, I need a beer after dealing with Laurel and Hardy over here,” he says, shooting a thumb over his shoulder at my parents, who are staring at their respective sides of the living room wall, ignoring each other completely.

We walk into the kitchen, and he immediately goes for the refrigerator, opening the door and pulling out two Coronas while I hop onto one of the stools. He hands me mine before leaning against the kitchen counter and taking a long pull from his.

“So what’s going on, sis? Anything new?”

“Nothing new to report. How about you?”

He shakes his head while taking another sip of his beer before asking, “How’s the dating scene?”

I roll my eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it, Darren. Change the subject, please.”

With a hearty chuckle, he steps forward and puts his elbows on the kitchen island. “Uh-uh. Tell your favorite brother
all
about it.”

“Fine, but there’s nothing really to tell,” I get out in a whoosh of breath before bringing the bottle to my lips again. “I have the worst luck ever with men, and I’ve resigned myself to living as a spinster with tons of cats and a house that smells like cat piss.”

“It can’t be that bad,” he says while laughing. “There have to be some prospects.”

How sad is it that my only prospect is an occasional flirting session with a man who once tried to get into my best friend’s pants? It’s pretty fucking sad.

“No prospects,” I confirm as I shift from side to side rather uncomfortably in my seat.

“I don’t believe you. There’s something you’re not telling me.”

“What’s with the third degree?” I blurt out, trying to turn the tables on him. “What about you?”

The corners of his mouth turn up, and he raises an eyebrow. “Keeping my options open. By the way, nice try trying to change the subject.”

“Whatever,” I mumble.

A staring contest ensues like we used to have when we were kids. I usually win these, but I’m not feeling as confident with all the thoughts swirling in my head over Alex and just how pathetic my dating life has been in the past year. It’s enough to drive a girl straight to lesbianism. Were it not for the lack of real cock on that front—not the fake ones, because sorry, they’re not at all the same—the idea of it is becoming more and more appealing. I did experiment once in college but quickly realized that it wasn’t for me.

Oh, please. Like you didn’t make out with your sorority sister while she felt you up to make a guy all hot and bothered. I’m probably in the minority on that one. Then again, I was feeling no pain after playing a few rounds of beer pong and thought it was the actual guy and not my sorority sister. So I don’t think that really qualifies as experimenting. I suck even with the ladies.

“I win,” Darren announces when I dart my eyes away from him for a second.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

“You’re losing your touch, sis. Are you sure nothing else is going on?”

I hate that he knows me so well and can hear my thoughts as if they were plainly written all over my face. And I’ve been trying my hardest not to think about it. About him. No, not Alex—it’s much worse than that.

Aiden.

“Julia?” Darren says, concerned. “What’s the matter? You know you’re eventually going to tell me, so stop dragging it out and just do it already.”

I let out a breath that I didn’t even know I was holding and focus on the bottle opener on the table between us. “I saw Aiden the other day.”

“Holy shit,” he whispers.

“Yup, that pretty much sums it up.”

“How did it go?” he asks.

I sigh. “Not well.”

“What the hell did he say to you?”

“Not much.”

“Julia, cut the shit and tell me what the fuck happened.”

I put the beer bottle down and lean forward until my elbows are resting on the countertop. “Darren, he’s getting married.”

“Who would be stupid enough to marry that asshole?”

“Oh, the story gets better.” I pause and look up at my brother, who is staring back at me in shock. “I helped plan his engagement party. As a matter of fact, that’s where I ran into him.”

“Jesus fucking Christ, Julia,” he mutters under his breath.

“Exactly.”

“So let me get this straight,” he says. “You knew he was getting married and helped plan his engagement party anyway?”

“Do you honestly think that if I knew it was
the
Aiden, I would have gone along with it? Come on, Darren, give me at least a little bit of credit here. I’m not that much of a glutton for punishment.”

“To be honest with you, I’m not sure.”

My eyes widen in disbelief that he would think that, and I open my mouth to defend myself.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa, relax,” he says quickly with his hands up in defense. “I just remember you telling me that he was like the one that got away or some sappy shit like that. So it wouldn’t surprise me if you had taken on the party knowing it was
the
Aiden.”

“He’s not ‘the one that got away’ for me, Darren.”

“He’s not?” he asks with a raised eyebrow. “Then what’s the problem? Why are you letting it bother you so much?”

What
is
the problem exactly?

This is getting ridiculous, even for me. When I’ve run into an ex in the past, I usually do one of two things: say a polite hello or run in the opposite direction. But I never let it bother me to the point of distraction like this. I have to wonder if there is possibly more to my unresolved feelings toward Aiden. Because there has to be more to it at this point.

I picture seeing Aiden at the engagement party again in my mind’s eye. And it hits me … the
engagement
party. Engaged. He’s engaged … to somebody else. Not me. And that’s okay because he’s a jerk. No, the answer is so simple that I almost want to kick myself for not seeing it sooner. He never had any intention of spending his life with me. I was just a pit stop for him, someone in his probably long line of women whom he strung along like a dog on a leash with empty promises of a future that would never come to fruition.

“Come on, Julia,” Darren says. “Why does it bother you?”

“Because,” I answer.

“That’s a child’s answer, Julia.”

I rub the heels of my hands against my eyes in frustration. “When did you become Dr. Phil? Jeez, psychoanalyze much?”

He’s smiling when I drop my hands from my face, still waiting on my answer. “Okay, fine. He’s not the one. He’s more like the unresolved one.”

“Sounds kind of like the same thing to me,” he says.

“Here’s the thing, Darren,” I say, taking a quick breath and lowering my voice. “He told me he was going to marry me one day, that I was his ‘one.’ Then from one day to the next, literally, he up and left me with not much of an explanation. For the longest time I convinced myself that it was because he was afraid to get married and settle down. And somehow I came to terms with that, or at least I thought I did. But the truth of the matter is that he just didn’t want to marry me.”

Darren nods as if he understands.

“What the hell is so wrong with me that he wouldn’t want to marry me?” I ask more to myself than of my brother. And that’s exactly what’s been really plaguing my thoughts since I saw him the other night all happy and in love with Sophia. Why her and not me?

“Nothing is wrong with you,” Darren says. “Did someone say there was something wrong with you? Because if they did, I’ll kick their ass.”

I roll my eyes at my little brother’s attempt at making me feel better. “Nobody said anything, that’s the problem. Why didn’t he want to be with me? Why doesn’t anyone that I date, for that matter, work out? What is so wrong with
me
?!”

I look down and pretend to concentrate on the condensation forming on the beer bottle. I can’t believe I just confessed all my relationship issues that I’ve been struggling with for years but have been able to bury under the rug to my little brother, of all people. But thanks to seeing Aiden, it’s all been brought back up to the surface and is turning me into quite the crazy person.

Darren reaches across the table and tilts my chin up to look at him. “Hey,” he says. “There is
nothing
wrong with you. You are one of the most amazing people I know, and I’m lucky to have you as a sister. You just haven’t met your match yet.”

I smile, and he lets go of my chin. Before taking another sip of his beer, he adds, “Plus, my friends won’t shut up about how hot my sister is, so you’ve got that going for you.”

I chuckle and stand up to empty out the rest of my bottle in the sink. As I move past him, something dawns on me. We’ve been in the kitchen for almost fifteen minutes and haven’t heard a peep out of my parents in the other room. I elbow him in the ribs and bring my finger to my lips to shush him before tiptoeing out of the kitchen with Darren trailing behind me. When we reach the end of the short hallway that opens up to the living room, we find the couch empty. But what we hear next coming from the direction of their bedroom will no doubt scar us mentally for the rest of our natural-born lives.

My mom, my angelic and pure-as-the-driven-snow mother, yells out a muffled, “Harder!” This is followed by a quick succession of pounding, which I
soooo
don’t want to know what the hell that is and have no intention of sticking around to find out.

“I’m going to be sick,” Darren says as we both bolt for the front door. It’s a race against time when we start our respective cars. He sticks his head out of his window yelling, “Go, go, go!”

I end up pulling out of there so fast that I may have left skid marks in the driveway. And if I didn’t, I’m certain Darren did as he flew past me down the street in his car, easily reaching sixty miles per hour in no time at all.