Tethered

by L. D. Davis

  This seemed to really please Jorge. He grabbed my face a little too roughly, pulling my eyes away from Emmet’s flaming eyes, and put his wet, alcohol stained lips against mine. But it didn’t even last a full two seconds before his head was knocked sideways. I stumbled backward, watching Jorge’s mouth bleed. I looked at Emmet with my mouth gaping open. He had hit Jorge.

  Jorge was drunk, but Jorge was still a badass. He stood up straight and glared at Emmet. His hands curled into fists. He drew his arm back and threw a hard punch at Emmet, but since Emmet wasn’t inebriated, he was able to duck out of the way. Unfortunately, the guy behind him wasn’t so lucky and he was the one that got hit. Emmet latched onto my arm and yanked me away just as a brawl broke out. I followed without resistance, stumbling along the way. Emmy wasn’t moving any better than I was.

  The louder the fight got in the kitchen, the more people pushed at us in their effort to go join or watch it. Emmy fell down once. I tried to help her up with my one arm, but I was just as fucked up as she was and almost went down with her. I was alarmed. I thought she was going to get trampled there on the floor, but then big arms were around her waist, lifting her off of the floor. Tabitha’s older brother Tack threw his cousin over his shoulder and before I could understand what was happening, Emmet had done the same to me. The guys didn’t put us down until we were at Emmet’s car.

  “What part of don’t go to the party didn’t you understand!” he yelled at us as he unlocked the car.

  “The ‘don’t go’ part,” I snickered. Adrenaline raced through my body, but I was still very much drunk. Emmet glared at me so hard, I stopped laughing.

  “The ‘party’ part?” Emmy asked from the other side of the car. We both started to snicker.

  “Your mom is going to kill you,” Tack said to Emmet.

  “I didn’t bring them here!”

  He pulled open the back door of his car and pointed angrily for me to get in. Tack was a little nicer to Emmy and helped her in. I wanted Tack on my side of the car.

  “Get in the damn car, Donya,” Emmet growled.

  “Fu-uck you,” I said, swaying, but I got into the car.

  Emmet slammed the door shut. He stood outside for a moment, running his hands through his hair and trying to make the steam stop coming out of his ears. I giggled.

  When he got in the car, his hair was all messed up.

  “Your hair is messed up, pretty boy,” I teased.

  He glared at me through the rearview mirror but said nothing.

  “You can’t take them home,” Tack said to Emmet. “It’s not that late. Your parents are probably still up.”

  Emmet looked at the time on the dashboard. It was a little after ten. He looked in the rearview mirror again, not at me but at something behind me. His eyes widened a little bit.

  “We’ll figure it out along the way. The cops are coming.”

  He peeled out of his parking space and took off down the road. Emmy and I looked behind us at the approaching cruisers halting in front of Jorge’s house. Fortunately, none of them came after us.

  “Aww. I kind of wanted to see Officer Daniels,” Emmy pouted and then smiled. “He’s hot.”

  “Shut up,” Emmet snarled from the front seat.

  We drove around for a few minutes. The guys tried to come up with some way of getting us home without Sam and Fred being on to us. Emmy and I giggled and laughed and shrieked about things I can’t even remember. Emmet often yelled at us to shut up and we just as often ignored him. Finally, he had an idea. He parked at a 711 and got out to use the payphone.

  “I’m thirsty,” I said, running my finger over my dry tongue. I pulled the lock up on my door and practically fell out onto the pavement. I held onto the door laughing hysterically until I felt Tack picking me up.

  “Get back in the car,” he said with a little more patience than Emmet has had all night.

  “I’m thirsty,” I whined.

  “Me, too,” Emmy said from the front of the car.

  She had gotten out without my notice. Apparently without Tack’s too, because he said “How the fuck did you get there so fast?”

  Emmy stuck out her tongue and walked into the store. Tack leaned me up against the car and looked back at Emmet who was still on the phone talking. Emmet looked towards the store with more steam pouring out of his ears. I laughed again.

  “I’m thirsty,” I whined again as I watched Emmy stumbling around inside the store. She was trying to get a Super Big Gulp and failing miserably.

  Emmet finally hung up the phone and rushed into the store to get his sister. Tack pushed me back into the car and shut the door. He leaned against the door so that I couldn’t get out, like I couldn’t just climb to the other side.

  “Hey,” I said, smacking a hand against the glass. “Tack!”

  He looked at me expectantly.

  “Emmet stole my first kiss!”

  “What?”

  “Emmet stole my first kiss!”

  He looked confused. I motioned for him to open the door. He opened the door and leaned down to see and hear me better.

  “Emmet stole my first kiss,” I said one more time.

  He raised an eyebrow. “You’re drunk.”

  “No, listen, listen, listen,” I said, waving a hand and swaying in my seat. “Jorge was about to kiss me. His lips were on my lips and Emmet punched him. Gave him a bloody mouth. I didn’t want to kiss a bloody mouth, but then it didn’t’ matter because Emmet got all caveman on me and dragged me out of the party.”

  “Uh,” Tack said and scratched his head. “Isn’t Jorge a little old for you? I mean, you’re Tabby’s age.”

  I rolled my eyes. “We’re all about the same age,” I said. “You’re not that much older than me. I’ll be fifteen in days. We’re all still in high school. It’s no big deal that he’s a little bit older. What I’m trying to say is you can kiss me instead and make up for my lost kiss.”

  Tack looked very uncomfortable. He backed away from me and closed the door.

  “Aww,” I whined and rested my head against the cool glass.

  After some more random driving around, we drove towards Emmy’s house. Emmet had spoken to Fred and told him that he and Tack ran into me and Emmy at the mall and that they were taking us with them and not to wait up. Sam apparently was already in bed.

  The guys helped us get into the house and up the stairs. Emmet’s hand clamped over my mouth so many times, I started to like the taste of his skin. I licked his hand just to be bratty and then giggled at the faces he made. We were deposited into Emmy’s room. We both crashed onto the bed, giggling.

  “I’m taking Tack home,” Emmet whispered. “I’ll be back in a few minutes. Don’t. Leave. This. Room.”

  “Whatever, Kiss Ruiner,” I yawned.

  After one more warning, the guys left. Emmy and I lay on her bed laughing about nonsense for a little while. Then we were both pretty quiet.

  “I feel sick,” she said.

  “I think I’m going to hurl,” I said and clumsily rolled out of the bed. I stumbled over my own feet and fell to the floor a few feet away from the bathroom. I crawled the rest of the way and made it to the toilet just in time. I puked Aftershock and meatloaf and mashed potatoes and string beans until I thought my head would cave in.

  With much effort, I pulled myself to my feet and grabbed the toothbrush I kept at Emmy’s. I brushed and rinsed and brushed and rinsed until I could only taste the mouthwash and toothpaste. My head was beginning to pound and everything seemed off kilter. I slowly sloshed into the bedroom and found that Emmy was out cold and stretched diagonally across the bed, leaving no room for me. I tried to wake her, but she just groaned.

  I felt like crap. My head felt like it was going to explode and my stomach was still churning even though there was nothing left to puke up. My face was a little sweaty, but I was shivering uncontrollably. I thought I was dying. If this was what it was like to be drunk, I vowed to never drink again.

  I stum
bled into the hallway and closed Emmy’s door as quietly as possible behind me. It was still a slam to my sensitive head. I put my hands on my head and dropped to my knees. I was going to go sleep in Lucy’s old room, but I wasn’t going to make it. It was all the way down the hall, and even though it was seriously only a few feet, it looked like a few miles.

  I lay down in the middle of the hallway floor and waited to die.

  *~*~*

  “Hey,” Emmet’s voice was close to me.

  I forced my eyes to flutter open and found him kneeling beside me.

  “What are you doing on the floor out here?” he whispered. “I told you to stay in the bedroom.”

  “I puked,” I murmured and rubbed a hand over my aching head. “When I came out of the bathroom, Emmy was sleeping funny on the bed. There wasn’t any room for me.”

  “So, you were going to just sleep on the hallway floor?” he questioned.

  “No, dumbass,” I growled. It hurt my head. “I want to go into Lucille’s room.”

  “Unbelievable,” he said under his breath. Then his arms were under me and he was carrying me down the hall.

  It was only a short trip, but I curled up close to him anyway. I was freezing and he was warm even though he had just come out of the cold. As he pushed open the door to Lucille’s room, he gazed down at me with frustration, anger, and something else I couldn’t put my finger on.

  Emmet carefully put me on my feet and made quick work pulling the blankets back on the bed. Then he steered me to the bed and made me sit down. I closed my eyes, trying to ignore the spinning room. I felt Emmet pulling my shoes off of my feet and I thought how weird it was that he was pulling my shoes off. When I felt his hand on my cheek, I opened my eyes.

  “I told you not to go to that party,” he said softly.

  His hair had fallen across his eyes. It was a little too long, but I always liked it like that, even when we were younger I liked his longish hair.

  I smiled and pushed his hair out of his eyes with my fingers. I pushed my hand through it and gasped. His hair was soft, but a little thick. It felt right between my fingers and under the palm of my hand.

  Emmet’s eyes closed, and for a very short time, we stayed just like that – his hand on my cheek, my hand in his hair, his eyes closed and mine wide open. Then the moment ended.

  Emmet opened his eyes and pulled his hand back as if it burned him to touch me. He stood up, his hair out of my reach, and then he took a step back. He closed his eyes again, pinched the bridge of his nose, and then opened his eyes once more.

  “I need to check on Emmy,” he said, not looking directly at me. “Lie down and try to sleep.”

  “You stole my first kiss,” I told him quietly.

  The room was still spinning, more now than before. My heart beat uselessly in my chest, like it was dying. I carefully swung my legs into the bed and laid down.

  “That isn’t the kind of first kiss you want, Donya,” he said, studying me through angry eyes.

  “What kind of first kiss do I want, Mr. Know-It-All?” I challenged.

  “Jorge would have kissed you and he wouldn’t have stopped there,” Emmet said bitterly. “He would have convinced you to follow him upstairs and he would have done all kinds of things to you that you don’t need to know about at fourteen years old.”

  “You talk to me as if I am so much younger than you,” I snapped quietly. “You’re not that much older than me, Emmet. Girls my age date guys your age.”

  “Doesn’t make it right, and it doesn’t mean they’re…having sex.”

  “It’s high school, Emmet. We’re all still kids. It’s not like I was in middle school kissing a senior. I’m a freshman.”

  “And you think you know so much,” he said darkly.

  “Maybe I don’t know too much about anything, but that kiss wouldn’t have been so bad.”

  “It’s what would have come after the kiss that worries me, Donya.”

  “Why does it matter to you what I do?”

  I don’t know why I was so argumentative. It’s not like I was really interested in following Jorge upstairs and losing my virginity where probably several other girls also lost theirs. I just hated that Emmet was always being so…brotherly to me but then earlier in the night denied me that. And I was angry that I didn’t get that kiss. Not because it was something I necessarily wanted, but because it should have been my own decision, not my – whatever Emmet was to me – not his decision.

  “I care about you,” Emmet answered quickly.

  “Not like a sister,” I bit out. “You made that clear.”

  He was quiet for a long moment. And then “No, not like a sister, but you’re too young and too dumb to get it, which is exactly why I won’t be explaining it to you.”

  “You don’t make any sense at all,” I said flatly. “Go check on your sister and go away.”

  I rolled over, turning my back to him. My feelings really were badly hurt by his denying me earlier. After years of calling him my brother, he denied it when it probably could have mattered most.

  I didn’t hear him leave, but I assumed he did. I was mad at him and I was mad at myself for getting drunk with a senior male scumbag like Jorge. I was mad I didn’t get my first kiss. I was mad that it could have been worse than a kiss. I was mad at myself for crying.

  When did I start crying and why?

  “Your first kiss should be with someone who isn’t going to try to get into your pants immediately after,” I heard Emmet say.

  I froze and stiffened. My tears continued to roll down my face, but I didn’t make a noise.

  “I know it doesn’t always happen that way, but that’s what I want for you. And Emmy,” he said more as an afterthought.

  When I didn’t respond, I heard him sigh, and I heard the telltale sound of the door closing as he left.

  Chapter Four

  Emmy and I sat on the couch in the family room like mindless zombies, wearing sunglasses, sipping on water and watching mindless television. Occasionally one of us would reach for a saltine and nibble carefully on it. Samantha and Fred left early that morning before we rolled out of bed, thankfully, because then they wouldn’t have had to witness and then question our peculiar behavior. Then again, Sam was good at sniffing things out. From wherever she was, she probably could smell the alcohol in our blood.

  I couldn’t stop thinking about the epic mistake I had almost made with Jorge. He was cute, but that’s about as far as it went. I didn’t want to kiss a boy just because he was cute, and when I considered that he was probably prepared to deflower me…I sighed inwardly. I couldn’t consider it.

  If it was not for Emmet, I could have been in a world of pain and regret instead of just hung over. If I would have listened to him in the first place I wouldn’t even be hung over. If I would have paid attention when Emmet was whispering in my ear…warm breath tickling my ear…arm banded securely around my waist…

  I made a sound of disgust. Emmy looked at me, but I ignored her.

  I was making something out of nothing. Like, really, that whole hand in his hair and his hand on my cheek thing was nothing. Really, it was. I don’t know what he meant about me being too young and dumb to understand. I know I wasn’t the smartest person I knew, but I wasn’t dumb. He was just trying to come up with some excuse for announcing that he wasn’t my brother. Like there was any excuse.

  “Hmph,” I said.

  “What is wrong with you?” Emmy asked me.

  “Nothing,” I said and got to my feet. “I’m going to go skateboard.”

  Em picked up the remote and turned off the television. “Honestly, I don’t know why I even got out of bed.”

  Emmy went back to bed. I went into the garage and grabbed my skateboard. Fred bought me my very own a few years back and Emmet bought me a nice long board last year. Whenever I felt the need to shake my mind of the things that could possibly bother someone my age, I got on my board. Once in a while Emmet joined me, but those times were fe
w and far between as we got older. He was too cool to be caught skateboarding with his kid sister – or kid sister’s friend.

  I was boarding on the street for some time, letting my eyes settle on the pavement below as I tried to eradicate my brain of all of those weird memories and feelings from the night before. I sensed a car coming and automatically moved over to the side of the road and out of the way. I heard a car door slam and then there was a moment of silence. The pavement was all that I saw and I concentrated on the sound my board made over it.

  “Hey,” I heard Emmet say to me.

  I looked up. He was standing at the edge of the driveway with hands in his jacket pockets.

  “Hi,” I said, but didn’t stop.

  “I haven’t skated in a while. I know a pretty cool spot where we can board if you want to go.”

  I thought about this as I slowly rolled by him. “Why?” I asked. I was still mad.

  “I don’t have anything else to do,” he shrugged.

  “That’s a lie,” I said, jumping off of the board. I moved to pop it up and tucked it under my arm. I stood several feet away from him studying him. “You have friends you can hang out with. I thought you jocks always did something after a football game anyway.”

  He shrugged again. “I didn’t feel like sitting in someone’s basement playing video games and eating pizza all day.”

  “Did you win?” I asked, pushing my hair out of my face. It was a little windy. I wished I had a hat to keep my hair out of my face.

  “Yes, we won,” he smiled. “I’m going to go get my board, okay?”

  He started to turn away, but I asked “Why do you want to hang out with me?”

  My goodness was I pissed. And hurt. And if he said something stupid I was going to hurl my board at him. Why did I feel this way?

  Ugh. This is exactly why I wanted to be on my board.

  “Maybe I just want to spend some time with you,” Emmet said, all humor gone from his face. He looked at me hard. “Maybe I saved your ass last night so the least you can do is just skateboard with me for a little bit.”

  I gripped my board in my hands. His eyes flickered down to my board and he raised an eyebrow.