“You kissed me, and I’m not a doctor.”
I groan as I start blushing. “Oh God, I thought you forgot that. And I didn’t kiss you myself.”
He laughs and moves in front of me. “It was seventy-thirty.”
I swat at him. “Come on, an even fifty-fifty.” We laugh until he agrees.
I am glad we can laugh about it, though, between the hard stuff. It was last year when his dad died. It hit too close to home for both of us, and we were both very emotional and collectively hadn’t left the house for a few days. So… cue kiss. It was nothing, and it didn’t mean anything. We fell asleep after if I remember correctly and went about our normal days, somewhat normal. It took him a little while to even smile again. He and his dad were close. He was a great dad and a good man.
“You thinking about kissing me again?” Carson smirks at me.
“No.” Even though my blush is creeping up, it isn’t my fault. Carson is making eyes. His lids will droop, his eyes will go soft as he draws them upward—it’s unfair, really.
“Girl moment.” I stuff my mouth with ice cream, so he will leave me alone.
“Don’t worry about the doctor thing, just date. Find your plus one. And I will be your Maid of Honor.” He presses his hands to his chest and feigns a smitten face at me.
“Right. Thanks.” I play-punch his shoulder, and we eat more ice cream.
“So, what were you doing when you called? You got here really fast.”
“I was doing… my date.” He snorts.
“You don’t date.”
“My lady of the night.”
“Now that makes her sound like a prostitute.”
He glowers at me. “She wasn’t.”
“Yeah, I know. You don’t have to pay for it. It comes free.”
“Yeah, and sometimes stressful. I called to expedite her leaving.”
I gape. “Oh my… Carson, that’s so mean.”
He shrugs his shoulders and helps himself to my fridge.
“It isn’t. I let her stay long enough to ask to see me again. That’s a record.”
“What was wrong with her? Why is seeing her again so bad?”
“Nothing was wrong with her. She’s a junior partner at a law firm. Very smart and capable, but you know I am not ready to settle down.”
“Carson, we’re twenty-three, we aren’t children.”
“You are way more mature than I am.”
“Carson.” I wait until he turns and looks back at me.
“You run one of the most powerful holding companies in the nation… the entire American continent. You are very mature. Just not relationship savvy.”
“I know I’m an incredible business person, but that has to do with my head and not my heart.”
I roll my eyes at him but relent the conversation. It’s a losing one. Carson likes to have fun, people our age do. Not everyone is ready for a relationship, and I get that.
“But you don’t have to kick them out.”
“I didn’t kick her out.” He laughs. “Before we even got back, I told her what it was. She agreed. But thought she had the entire night.”
“Okay. Fair enough. What did you tell her when you called me?”
He stutters. I laugh and egg it out of him. He always has a crazy reason, we both do.
“I said I had to make sure my grandma got in bed on time and took her meds. So, I was actually pretty stoked when you asked for ice cream.”
I laugh out loud bouncing off the walls.
“Wow, Carson. When was the last time you even called your grandma?” Only his maternal grandparents are alive, and they live abroad a lot. I haven’t even met them, and they spent maybe one holiday at home. I think Ana, his mom, has a thing with her parents. Lifetime worthy, but I don’t know the specifics.
“I don’t know. They change their number a lot. You know that.”
I laugh. “Yeah, I do.”
“But she was hot, I’ll give her that.”
“Aren’t they all?” I ask rhetorically, but he answers anyway.
“I’ve had solid twos in my lifetime.”
“Oh God, I thought we agreed you wouldn’t rank women with numbers anymore.”
“I was referring to the past, totally allowed.”
We talk more over the stellar ice cream. He got me the good stuff, the ten-dollar pint stuff.
“How come we don’t have a pact?” I ask him as I clean up.
“A pact?” He looks over his shoulder as he washes the spoons.
“Yeah. Like… if we are single when we’re both forty, then we get married and have kids.”
He laughs again. “You, single at forty? Yeah, right. Second of all, women stop making eggs when they’re thirty-five so unless you’re talking about adopting…”
I hip bump him. “It’s hypothetical, Carson. Just for fun.”
He finishes off, dries his hands, and leans on the counter to look down at me. I wish he wasn’t so tall, it makes it hard to look him in the eye.
“Okay, so are we doing this for real?”
“Yeah.” I perk.
He fakes a pondering face. “Okay. The year we both turn forty if we’re single and have no complicating factors, then we get married. Kids are in question.”
I laugh. “Okay. Sounds good. How do we seal the deal?”
“We could actually seal the deal.” He wiggles his brow.
“Hell no, ugh.” We laugh together.
“All right, a kiss then. Right cheek just like the Romans.”
He smiles, and I join him.
“Deal.”
I kiss his stubble-covered cheek and then he kisses mine. It’s funny because it is completely hypothetical, and with my personality, it will never happen.
But it’s nice to know that someone will have you when you feel like no one else will. Exactly what a best friend should do.
* * *
The next morning, I calm myself with yoga before accompanying Carson to the football game. Loud crowds, way too much cheering. Way too much everything. But I secretly love football games. It reminds me of high school. I was cheering on Carson at the time, but I had other fun friendships that didn’t make it past high school. But still fun.
This is so much different, though. Fletcher is at the top of his game, he actually signed a five-year renewal contract with his team for millions of dollars. Wildly insane, but I guess he deserves it and all considering how many hits he takes as a linebacker. The sky room is plenty huge, big enough for all of us, and we get waited on instead of waiting in the concession line. I get a pretzel that is ridiculously large, and Carson keeps trying to take a piece.
“You two are so cute. I missed seeing you together.” Ana comes out of nowhere. She does that a lot.
Carson hugs his mom as he blushes. I don’t know why he gets so mad about his family teasing him about us liking each other. They do it to me too. I laugh about it.
“Emma, when will you make an honest man out of my brother?” Evan plops next to me on the couch. He does the name thing on purpose.
“Yeah, right. Nice to see you, too.”
“I see you at work every day, and that’s not what I asked.”
Carson punches his shoulder from behind me. I try to hold a conversation with his mom as they argue.
“Don’t mind Evan. He is just a funny little fool.” She laughs. I join her. Their mom has a regal beauty to her that could pass for royal too. Her honey brown hair falls past her shoulders, starting her slight frame. Ana has aged like a fine wine, if I can even call it aging. I can only hope I still look that good after having ten kids, not that I would. Her jeans trace her motherly frame, and her team jersey for Fletcher is like a royal gown on her. She is so proud of her kids and supports them. It’s pleasant to see.
“I know.” I smile.
We catch up over the last time we saw each other, but it’s a lot of the same stuff. Who are you dating and a subtle why don’t you date my son? I don’t mind it, I know she appreciates
our friendship, and she does it mostly to joke.
His brothers, though?
I am so in for it today.
5
Carson
Fletcher is only eight years older than me, but somehow, he manages to act like he is eight years younger. Maybe it’s the football thing, I don’t know. I can’t say that all football players are the same, or that they match a certain persona. It would be like saying all rock stars are endless womanizers and will never settle down—Brant is living proof that isn’t true.
But Fletcher… in the first quarter alone, the network has taken it upon themselves to show off each and every person—woman—who has made a sign just for him. I don’t know if we call them groupies or not, what are they called in football? Super fans maybe. But Fletch, he swears he doesn’t go for them. Not even at the rooftop parties and team gatherings. I don’t buy it, none of us do.
“You just had that huge pretzel, now you’re getting nachos?” I lean over Emily on the couch. I haven’t gotten used to her new hair yet, bright brown highlights or something. Usually, it’s just black. She changed a lot of stuff after her last break up, part of the process. I would know since I have seen her through at least three serious ones.
“It’s a football game. I’m supposed to pig out.”
“Yeah, but it is barely past noon, and we have a dinner party at the house after.” I hop over the couch to sit next to her.
She laughs and finishes chewing as she does when we are in public. “But I don’t want to eat myself into a coma later… at the dinner party.” She blinks too much, and I know she is lying.
I know all of Emily’s tells. She blinks when she lies, like it will fan a good lie her way. When she is nervous, she picks at her nails like she is giving herself a manicure. And then when she is happy or excited, sometimes it goes hand in hand, she rambles on about anything and everything. But what hurts most is when she is sad, and she barely says anything, barely smiles or laughs which is a shame because her smile is so beautiful, and her laugh is so wonderfully obnoxious. When she thinks, most of the time I see this at work or back when we would study together, she would get this look, she only has it when she is in her ‘zone’ as she likes to call it. Her left brow will raise, her lips pout into a peachy heart shape, and she doesn’t relax until she resolves whatever is going on in her head.
“You could wear sweats to the dinner party, no one would care. It’s just the family.” I take a meat-covered, cheesy chip from her bowl. At least it tastes good, no wonder she is eating so much.
“Yeah, but I can’t be the only girl who looks a mess. Alec and Brant have super pretty women by their sides now.”
“Yeah, they’re married. You don’t count.” I laugh, but she gives me a face—the semi-hurt face, brows turned up, and lips parted mid-breath.
“That damages self-esteem, you know.” Emily licks off her index finger and turns back to the game. We’re winning.
“I don’t mean it that way. I just mean they know I think of you as family. Anyway, I’m not putting you off wearing something hot. Nope. Never doing that.” I smile and wink at her. She holds her poker face for only a few more seconds before she smiles.
“I like Mia better anyway. Cora is way too pretty for me.”
“I’m shocked, someone out of your league? Besides her, you know, being married to your brother. And older than you.”
We laugh.
“Yeah, there’s that.”
I look over at Mom laughing with Jeffrey. He is probably telling some story about a surgery he did again. He became an attending physician last year, officially done actually training. I thought we would have a grace period or something before his ego shows up. Alec is cocooned over Mia on the other futon, her belly is as big as Cora’s now, and they are sitting next to each other, so it looks like some sort of club. Brant is next to her doing the same thing as Alec, absently caressing their wives’ bellies. This feeling I get, it makes me smile, and I don’t know what it is. It isn’t jealousy, I could never feel that way about my brothers. But it’s something like a sudden deep thinking, and I don’t know if it is because I want what they have or if I am happy for them. It reminds me of how Emily feels about dating doctors—people who save lives when her mother’s life couldn’t be saved. I don’t think either of us are really ready to talk about it.
“They are already winning by two touchdowns. Can’t they call it?” Emily sits with her legs crossed and huffs with impatience.
I chuckle. “No, it doesn’t work that way. You love football, though.” I turn and look at her.
She starts to talk before her phone goes off with a text. Whoever it is must be better than food because she puts the nacho bowl down and replies, smiling at her phone the whole time.
“Who is that?” I ask her. Not in an entitled way, but curious. Or maybe she doesn’t take it that way.
“Kevin.”
“Who is Kevin?”
She finishes and faces me with her sweet tea in hand. “Kevin. The guy I have been seeing. Well, it has only been two dates, I don’t know if that counts.” She giggles.
“Oh. You’re seeing him again, though, right?”
We are interrupted by a loud cheer from everyone actually watching the game to see Fletcher sack the quarterback on the other team, I tune in fast enough for the replay. Emily gets up to look out the sky-view window hitching a conversation with Dylan. I can tell by the hunch in her shoulders he has already said something bitter and could be mistaken for sociopathic. He has always been kind of dark, like Alec—but it got worse after Dad died. It took him a lot longer to come back to work than it took Evan or Holden, and I took a bit longer than them too. Maybe because I am younger, but Dylan is three years older than me so that theory is out the window. They weren’t even that close, him and Dad. Maybe that is it. I let him and Emily chat about whatever, probably work, before I get up to join them, but I’m road blocked.
“Headed over to lust over Emily?”
“Say that louder, why don’t you, Evan?”
“Come on. It’s a joke.” He hands me a beer, and I gladly take it. We don’t all drink Michelob because we bought stock in them, it’s good beer.
“You joke about it too much. You all do.” I try to escape him by going over to the second sky window on the other side where I see Brant from behind either whispering in Cora’s ear or doing something else—probably something else.
“It wouldn’t hurt so bad if it weren’t true. Which it is…”
I side eye him, and he laughs. I get a few good sips of beer in before I retort back at him. “It isn’t, she is my friend. My best friend.”
“I thought I was your best friend,” he whines.
“You’re my idiot big brother, I’m obligated to like you.” I lean over the silver bartop and watch the game or try to. Fletcher is on the big screen again. They love his pretty face.
“Emily is just my friend. If my best friend was a guy, you all wouldn’t be irritating me about it so much.”
“If you were gay, we would, which is fine. Is that why you’re blind to Emily?” He nudges me, and I shake my head.
“No, I’m not. And again, I’m not. I know she’s hot. I grew up with her and watched her turn into a beautiful woman. That doesn’t mean I am in love with her. I do love her but not like that.”
“If you say so. But we can all see. Hell, Grayson can see it all the way from Baghdad.”
“I don’t, Evan.” I sigh, dropping my head and rubbing at my eyes because this broken record is giving me a headache. “And he’s not in Baghdad.”
“Okay. Fine. Holden is looking at promoting her. It’s that or hiring out. You know he is all about the family element.”
“Yeah, I know. She’ll be happy about that.” I force a smile for her because I am happy for her despite being irritated at the moment.
“She should be. Executive is a big jump. It isn’t senior executive, but she will get there one day. Hopefully with us.”
“
I don’t think she wants to go anywhere else if that’s what you’re asking.”
Evan steps back with an ‘ah ha’ noise that is equally irritating. I shake my head at him and finish my beer. I need the liquid patience.
“So, that’s the angle. You don’t want her to leave the company, or your friendship, so that’s why you’re stepping back.”
I laugh out loud from the ridiculous reach he has gone to. I look around, but no one is here to help me. Holden and Jeffrey are now entertaining Mom. They are arguably her favorites.
“No, Evan. Jesus. You just don’t quit. Why don’t you worry about that princess you ran off?” I roll my eyes at him. About a year ago, we had a high-profile case with a small territorial country that still practices some weird, old stuff. One day with Evan, and the equivalent of a royal family came back and canceled their business with us. I’d like to think it had something to do with the woman tagging along with them. But I could be wrong.
“I do worry about her, trust me on that. But it doesn’t mean I can’t worry about you.”
“I’m fine. Remember when we used to talk about normal stuff and not invisible love you made up?”
He laughs.
“Okay fine. I’ll stop.”
“Swear on the glove.”
“The glove?” He gapes, blue eyes wide with shock. He is the only one with blue eyes, and we haven’t brought up the glove in years—an old baseball glove we all used at some point when Dad would play catch with us in the backyard or at Evan’s actual baseball games. He was the only one to pick it up and play in high school and college, almost went pro. But the essence of the glove is that it’s the only thing we all used, at one point or another, even Isaac. It was covered with rips, tears, and burn spots from when we went camping with it. It’s a shared experience between us, and we all treat it for what it means to us.
“Yeah, the glove.”
He laughs and claps my shoulder dramatically. “Yeah, I’m not doing that.”
Wilde About Carson: The Brothers Wilde Series — Book Three Page 4
