Why Justin?... Why? Ch. 01

/* The story below is fictional. Any resemblance to any person, place, object etc are purely coincidental. All constructive criticisms are always welcome. All rights reserved */

Chapter 1

I was going to kill my mother!

Not only does she go ahead and marry some European Vintner, who is a winemaker for the uninitiated like me, after a so-called courtship of just 3 weeks (can you imagine, just 3 weeks!),

but forgets to mention to me that this guy

(well, I better at least start acknowledging him as my Step-father),

has a grown-up son as well.

My new step-father, Big J, as he likes to call himself, is an decent guy.

He is large and beefy, the kind you see as the Russian mobster in movies, but he was a nice guy.

In the little time that I got to know him, he treated Mom right; with the correct combination of love and respect.

Theirs wasn't that middle-aged, lovey-dovey, stars-in-your-eyes kind of foolishness.

It was a mature love, ripened with time and experience but mixed in with the right splash of romance.

It seemed like they accepted each other to be the complements of themselves.

And most importantly, he respected me and my work and left me alone (which to me, was his biggest asset on the credit side).

I did joke with him once regarding his looking like a Russian mobster and he replied with a conspiratorial wink "You never know!"

But his asshole of a son was a different ball game altogether.

Not only did he not do anything

(and I mean any constructive utilization of time),

but to add insult to injury, this waste of space of a son of his was a party-whore, whose only claim to fame was visiting night-clubs in flashy cars with a gaggle of girls beside him and splashing this all over social media, behaving almost as if he were some celebrity.

Ok, so this "Step-Brother" of mine has a name, Justin, but that's all that my Mom tells me.

"I am sure you can dig something out about him from the internet" is her sage comment.

My mother has a boutique shop catering mainly to weddings, which is a minor success. And she has never adapted to the new social media opportunities (one of the reasons, that boutique shop has remained a minor success!) and prefers to do her business the old-fashioned way and thus her comments regarding the internet.

So I start checking out the details.

He is voraciously active on Instagram, Twitter, and all the other social media handles, having a punk-rock-like status complete with his collection of jazzy cars, groupie girls, and holidays in exotic locales.

(of course, his few million in the bank do help fund all of this).

He boasts having about half a million followers on each of these platforms. And I don't know when, if ever, he sleeps; as every day there is a post on some of those rag sites, with him celebrating into the wee hours of the night with a bevy of industry-produced simpering wannabe models, gracing some or the other night-clubs with his presence.

Don't think this Justin guy has ever done a day's honest work in his life.

And this is so, sooooo removed from my world.

I am hard-working, studious, and industrious.

A qualified Surgeon, doing my postdoc in Clinical Psychiatry.

I work about 12 hours a day and my weekends are spent at the medical school researching for my thesis.

I take my work seriously and don't have time for these social media hang-ups.

Whenever I do get a little free time I deposit myself in front of my large 55-inch plasma TV and watch the Hallmark channel.

Those effervescent romances are my best way of letting out all the stress from work.

And now my mother has gone ahead and fixed this "My getting to know my Brother" shit with this guy, without asking me.

And she did do this very craftily, informing me just before her flight took off to some remote island in the Pacific with my new step-father, leaving me pissed about single-handedly dealing with this new "Step-Brother" of mine.

So here I am, checking myself out in front of my mirror, deciding what to wear.

I decide to go with a simple light pink top and beige slacks, topped up with just a hint of lip gloss. Definitely no mascara or eyeliner.

Only the professional working look for this asshole, work-shy "Step-Brother".

I look and admire myself in the mirror in my bedroom upstairs.

I say to myself "Bonnie, you look good!".

A few months shy of my twenty-eighth birthday and at five feet and nine inches, slim and athletic body toned with regular swimming practice at the university gym, I did look good.

My tear-drop shaped 34B tits are one of my best assets along with a tight but rounded ass.

Men and their attention has never been a problem for me; many times more of a pain in the ass.

All of them, including those that I finally decide to go out for a drink with (and it has never progressed beyond that in a long, loooong time), have always complimented me on my turquoise green eyes.

A pale skin with shoulder-length chestnut brown hair parted in the middle completed my ensemble.

Today I decide to tie the hair in a lazy bun (I did say the professional look).

I may not be a Runway model, but definitely, I am no pushover.

So here I am, waiting in my downstairs TV room, which Mom has always called the living room, just flipping channels randomly on the TV to calm myself down and failing miserably at it.

I just press the mute button and get up, not even bothering to check which channel I am at and just start roaming around the house, touching and feeling various objects around the house and trying to recollect memories and stories associated with them.

This touch-based association has always had a calming effect on me and it didn't fail me now.

After their honeymoon, many of my Mom's customers brought back small trinkets from various exotic locales they had been to, as a token of appreciation.

She always treasured those, more than the money she made by selling those wedding gowns to the brides and the bridesmaids.

So my quaint two-level, turn-of-the-century house in Essex County, New York, a place I had lived in all my life, looked more like a souvenir store than a residential dwelling.

It had a lot of bric-and-brac just thrown around the house and I have seen many a visitor (mostly Mom's clients) cast a troubled look at the ordered tardiness around the rooms.

But Mom wouldn't change anything and now that I am the only one living here, neither would I.

Realizing that I needed to fortify myself for my sure-to-be feisty encounter with my "Step-Brother" (that's how I always thought of him, with quotes and never in the first person, someone always distant and far-far removed from my world), I treated myself to a glass of Chardonnay.

The one Big J had brought me.

Yup, this one tasted good, slightly acidic with a kind of peach flavor. I savored the wine lazily. It calmed me down. Perhaps this was the only good memory I would have of this evening.

I checked my watch, he was already late.

Well, what else could be expected out of these party-hopping, pill-popping types?

He hadn't called me after his flight landed (I had refused to pick him up at the airport and drive back with him. I wouldn't be caught dead with druggie types like him, thank you very much).

I had to call up the airline and confirm with them that yes, Justin Jacques had indeed been a passenger on the London-Boston flight and it had landed at Logan International about five and a half hours ago.

I did have his European contact number, but as he had not bothered to call me up I didn't want to do him any favors by displaying even a hint of concern about him.

Intending to do something to while away the time before he got here (that is, if he did finally get here) I started scrolling through his posts on social media.

And they were all variations of the same image.

Spiked black hair on pale skin with heavily painted over-hanging brows. The most remarkable, or in this case, un-remarkable features were his dull and dead eyes.

A firm chin with promisingly good cheekbones but disfigured with a lip piercing and a scraggly beard.

Dark eye shadow, numerous ear piercings, and a spiked dog-collar with various death-metal tattoos on his bare chest and shoulders along with chain-mail armlets completed his I-want-to-desperately-portray-that-I-am-Goth look.

So help me God!

But giving credit where credit is due, I had to agree though, if it were not him, I could surely see myself admiring his compactly wired musculature.

Scrolling through an online article in Celebrity News

(Gawd! When the fuck did this attention-whore become a celebrity!!)

I always did stop and pause at one of his not-so-recent pics which had always intrigued me.

This particular camera angle was not flattering.

It seemed to have been taken by a telephoto lens from quite a distance and the resolution was not too good (must have been some newbie pap trying to jump ahead of the curve in terms of proving his street creds)

It still captured enough of his desperate goth look though. He still had the spiked hair but the most important difference was the eyes.

The eyes in this pic were different.

While in all of his subsequent pics, he wore a wide range of colored lenses starting from brown and going all shades to finally black, in this one, it was bluish-green, turquoise, almost like mine.

In this pic, his eyes were alive, not dull and dead. And his eyes were angry as if the pap who snapped this had somehow invaded his privacy.

But those eyes showed promise. Those eyes showed a person as yet not committed to the Gothic-grunge lifestyle, as if he was tethering on the balance, before finally taking the plunge.

The doctor in me always exhaled a deep sigh whenever I came across this pic. At the promise of what could have been.

The tinkling of the bell rudely brought me back to the present and incorrectly equating this rather timid sound to the impending doom of my "Step-Brother" arriving, I was more than a little flustered, and in haste, I rushed to the door.

Realizing that my glass of wine was still in my hand I hastily deposited the same on the side table, patted down my hair, took a deep breath, and opened the door.

I opened the door to an unknown face.

"Yes?" I asked rather testily. I was looking over his shoulders, wishing this "Step-Brother" of mine would get here soon.

No reply. Just a warm smile.

"Can I help you?" I was increasingly getting angry.

I caught sight of a seven-year-old model sedan on my sidewalk. Looked like a rental. Why would this guy standing at the door and whom I did not know from Adam, drive a rental to get here?

Still no reply, just a little more turning at the corners of his mouth, maybe a hint of a smirk.

"Listen asshole, I am quite busy right now, so just tell me what is it that you want? I am waiting for someone" I was getting really angry now.

"Me" he replied with a quiet laugh.

"What the hell do you mean? Who the hell are you? I am calling the cops unless you tell....." I directly looked at his face for the first time and the words died in my throat.

The first thing to arrest my attention was his eyes.

Bluish-green, Turquoise.

And if I were a betting woman (which I was not), I could swear that his and my eyes were an exact color match.

Now, where had I seen those eyes before?!! And quite recently, I was sure.

Traveling my gaze downwards, my eyes rested on his jawline, firm cheekbones, and a prominent chin.

A pale face, maybe tanned just a little.

He was about four inches taller than me.

I kept looking closely at his stranger, while in the far reaches of my mind, the cobwebs started untangling.

He was clean-shaven off-course and had neatly combed fair hair.

Looking closely I could see the pricks where all those lip-rings and ear-piercings had been.

My mind had already started cataloging the similarities and differences.

Broad shoulders with none of those ostentatious, bulging biceps (which I hate), just a lithe but robust physique.

A simple light blue button-down shirt with folded sleeves and denim jeans completed the outfit. He was carrying his simple tan jacket folded in his arms.

My jaws reached the floor and my eyes bulged out of their sockets.

"Why... Justin?!" were all the words my lips could whisper.

My ears registered the sounds, but my brain still couldn't process them. For the first time, I had thought of him as Justin and not my Step-Brother.

I still couldn't understand it.

The difference between the man on those social media posts and the man standing in front of me was like the difference between heaven and hell.

As if having a life of their own, my hands drifted to the buttons on his shirt, started making them undone one-by-one. I guess my eyes needed to actually see and confirm those death-metal tattoos were indeed gone.

But there was a part of me, a very tiny part, that hoped those tattoos were still there. That tiny part of my brain wanted me to kiss those tattoos off his chest. I wanted my fingers gouging those tattoos while I rode him like a rodeo steer. Wanted to scratch and leave bleeding wounds on his shoulders.

"Uh... Sis! Can I come inside?" his words brought me up short. Without waiting for my reply he strode inside.

To say that I was embarrassed was the understatement of the decade.

I just couldn't allow myself to turn my body and face him.

My cheeks were aflame and my ears red-hot.

My momentary surrender to my fantasy had my palms madly itching.

I, who was nicknamed 'Queen Mary of Scots' at the hospital where I worked, because I viewed all men with disdain.

I, who had set such high standards when it came to dating men, that it was practically not possible for any man at the hospital to meet them and thus they openly spread rumors about me being a dyke.

I, who had let those rumors be, because that helped me stave off all those lecherous men and their creepy fingers.

That same me was now fantasizing about my step-brother.

That same me had abandoned all reticence like a street whore and a few moments ago was openly pawing the shirt buttons of my step-brother.

That same me now had madly itching palms and an acute tingling in the pit of my stomach, just by the mere thought of wanting to see his tattoos.

I don't know how long I stood rooted to the spot, ashamed to turn around and face him.

I knew I had to, but my burning cheeks and red-hot ears just wouldn't let me.

"Well, well, well... Dad's wine. Now, this is a welcome that I didn't expect!" I heard him say from somewhere behind me.

I finally turned to see him already seated on one of the high-backed chairs around the wood bar-cabinet with a glass of the bubbly already poured out for himself.

Miraculously my half-drunk glass (which till a few moments ago was at my side just near the door) had also appeared there.

I faced him and with a slight scorn replied "You surely must have been expecting the groupie-sluts that I had picked for your welcome."

I decided that a sharp biting comeback was the best way out for me from this embarrassing debacle.

Offense was the best defense.

He didn't flinch.

No constriction around his eyes or tightening of his cheekbones or his mouth.

He took the pointed jab like a pro.

Like a man who was sure of his situation and not easily fazed by whatever life threw at him.

The 'Queen Mary of Scots' in me, was thrilled to take on the impending battle of wits.

I was going to get him to a situation as embarrassing as he had put me through, if that was the last thing I did.

I knew that I had to up my game with this one. I was just looking forward to the challenge.

He just indicated with an inclination of his head that I was welcome to sit down. His look showed that he was a man habituated to people obeying his command.

Though that look instantly got my back up, I decided to let that slide.

I took my glass and pulled up another high-backed chair to the bar cabinet.

He raised a toast "To Life! May it always surprise us!"

Before I could formulate a scathing repartee he cut in

"Sis! One request! Can we give this back-and-forth verbal dueling a rest for today?"

"I will be out of your hair in no time. Can we not spend this time, which if I am not wrong, you would like it to be our last, in plain civilized conversation?"

"Ask me whatever you wish, and I will answer. I know you won't afford me the same privileges. That's ok. I will take what I can get!"

He surely could not have failed to see the disappointment writ large on my face when he indicated this meeting to be our last.

Now that I had seen this side of him, I didn't want it to be the last.

Also, I was not going to let him off so easily after embarrassing me so squarely.

I wanted and needed a chance to cause him emotional pain, physical pain if necessary, but pain nonetheless before he could get out of my hair.

At least that is what I told myself.

But, I had to give it to him, he was smart and astute.

In a few minutes, he had summed me up nice and square.

So I repeated what was foremost in my mind and what I had uttered a few minutes ago "Why... Justin?"

Even saying his name aloud was doing things to me deep down. I had never felt anything like this before.

"You mean why the wannabe-Goth in the social media handles and why me here?" he had judged correctly. I just nodded my head.

"For reasons that I cannot go into now, I need to lay low. And as you so profoundly demonstrated, offense is the best form of defense."

The burning of my cheeks and red-hot ears told me he had intuitively divined the reason behind my opening verbal gambit.

"And being the son of a well-known Winemaker is not exactly conducive to laying low" he would have continued further but I steam-rolled in with a half-smirk "You can use the term Vintner with me! We of the colonies are no dumb idiots, you know."

"Hmm... the English-only movement seems to have done wonders here!" he admitted with a smile. And that smile lit up his face. I just couldn't take my eyes off him.

"I can speak French quite fluently. I am passable in German. If English is difficult for you we could try some of the languages of mainland Europe?" I baited him as I wanted to just hear him talk.

Anything to just hear him talk.

"Togda nam sleduyet govorit' po-russki"(We should speak Russian then) he countered.

If he thought he could throw me off-balance, by showing off in Russian then he had underestimated me very much.

"Perestan' khvastat'sya po-russki... eto ne pomozhet"

(Stop bragging in Russian... it won't help) I responded.

He couldn't have known that I had spent a whole summer in St. Petersburg not so many summers ago, and I was rather good at picking up languages.

"Ya podchinyayus"(I surrender) he surrendered with open palms and a wry but disarming smile.

We both were enjoying this back-and-forth light-hearted verbal sparring.

"But why lay low Justin?"

I still couldn't believe that I was saying his name aloud.

"All in Good Time, Sis!" He replied with again a radiant smile. But the same effect as earlier was not there. Something was different.

And then I realized that this time the smile did not reach his eyes. I could read the wariness in his eyes when he said this.

I couldn't understand him, but I let it rest, for now.

Finally, surrendering to the mad itching of my palms, I got up, walked around the table, and stood in front of him in a gesture of supplication.

My thoughts were going into overdrive. I just had to know about those tattoos.

"This time I am asking permission... Please... I just have to know!"

I couldn't bring myself to say the exact words that I needed to say, but he guessed my intentions correctly.

He stood up in front of me, unfazed.

He just stared me down and without taking his eyes off me he started to unbutton his shirt once again.

I caught both of his wrists with my hands and stopped him.

The electric jolt that stung me when I caught his wrists was quite unexpected.

Shit! Holy Deep Shit!

The pit of my stomach had never actually recovered from earlier and now my intestines felt like they were doing the St. Vitus's dance.

How in the name of hell could I ever have a chance at getting back at him, if I was going to feel and behave like a naïve love-struck teenager?

I just could not hold his stare anymore and cast down my eyes.

Ok, time to get my act together and stop this silly nonsense.

He was just a party-hopping and pill-popping druggie.

I kept repeating this like a mantra in my mind over and over again.

The lowest of the low scum on earth.

I meet this kind of human refuse day in and day out at the hospital.

I just prescribe some pills and forget their name by the time the next patient comes in.

That's it! I had to imagine this guy as a patient.

That was the best way to pull up my defenses.

So after having repeated the mantra what seemed like a hundred times I gathered up my courage and again looked up into his eyes.

Somehow his stare had mellowed down now and I found an unexpected encouragement in his look.

There was frank curiosity in his eyes now.

This look provided me with the requisite courage and surprised at my forwardness, slowly, with infinite care and loving caress, I started unbuttoning his shirt one button at a time.

Don't get me wrong, this was not the caress and concern of a lover, but the caution of an artist and connoisseur. Of course, that's what it was, what else could it be?

One of the few closely guarded secrets of our home is that among the various bric-and-brac that are thrown around the house, there are a few sculptures done by me.

I call them sculptures, while Mom always called them Dead-body art.

These sculptures started during my medical school as an attempt for me to understand anatomy. And then I became addicted to that stuff.

Initially, I took some classes off-course but left off halfway, partly because of the enormous workload at medical school and partly because the teachers in those classes only ever wanted me to depict emotions through the montage of anatomy.

Whereas I just wanted to represent what I felt about the person through my hands and fingertips in a bare-boned muscled structure.

So you see, many of those sculptures that I sculpted were quite gruesome to look at, all wiry peeled muscle just dripping or hanging from bone, very much like dead body art.

We could not, of course, tell anybody else that these were my creations because then the cops would lock me up in a padded cell.

So we let the story run that these were among the gifts given to Mom.

And that is what I was doing.

I was memorizing his muscle and bone structure.

Of course, this thought was also added to the earlier mantra that I had been chanting in my head all this while.

I was sure it was these mantras that would keep me safe from doing any harm to my ego, and self-esteem and also control my wanton lust which was just about brimming to the surface.

Well, that is what a mantra is supposed to do, isn't it?

Closing my eyes and just with the touch of my fingers I began memorizing his pectoral muscles, the shape, and sinew of the muscles on his upper arms.

His neck muscles, his face, the jawline, the cheekbones, the eye-sockets. And then I opened my eyes and finally like a magician opening his box of tricks I parted his shirt to look at his chest.

His wired muscular chest.

His was more Jean-Claude Van Damme than Dwayne Johnson.

Yes, the tattoos were there, but not all of them as present in his social-media posts, but they did cover a large part of his chest and abdomen.

Of particular interest to me was that of a praying mantis.

This particular tattoo seemed like a combination of Eastern and Western art.

The mantis was both peaceful as well as fierce in the depiction.

The detail on it was unlike anything I had seen anywhere before.

"How can you hide this one, when you click for your social media posts?" I enquired.

I realized that I had already memorized all his tattoos from his posts and this one was never in any one of them.

"This one is just a fake job. You know.... Just to impress girls!" I could hear the laughter in his voice.

I looked up into his mirthful eyes and replied with a smile "You forget, I am a doctor! I can tell the difference between a fake tattoo and a real one."

I was tracing out the intricate design of the tibial spines of the mantis with my fingers and nails as I said that.

Also, the realization was slowly growing on me that I had been checking out the muscles on that particular part a tad too long.

The contact of my fingers had turned to a caress and a slow burn was starting to build upon my lips.

I realized with growing horror that the slow burn was a precursor to my lips wanting to kiss that Praying Mantis.

To avoid any untoward incident that would haunt me forever and also to hide myself from looking into his face and his turquoise eyes, in desperation, I turned him around to hide my eyes while facing his back.

Which was really a very bad mistake as his entire back was covered with a single large, whole back tattoo.

That of Michelangelo's Creation of Adam.

And the tattoo artist had embellished somewhat on his portrayal of Adam's scrotum and phallus.

In this one, Adam was hung almost like a porn star.

Nothing could describe my situation better than that from the frying pan into the fire.

"Justin.... when?" a thin long-drawn-out cry stole out of my lips.

It was partly a question and partly an accusation.

This particular tattoo, I was dead sure was never displayed or talked about on any of his social media handles or in Celebrity news.

I so fervently wished that I had chosen just about any other profession than that of a doctor.

Then at least I could kid myself that this tattoo was just a fake.

As he had said before. To impress girls.

Because now, being a doctor I was almost salivating at this very fine piece of work which must surely have taken multiple sittings.

How had he hidden this piece of wanton lust and beauty from the paps, God only knew.

It was almost like he had thrown me a curveball when all I was ready for was a bunt.

To date, I had never known that I was such a tattoo freak.

It was like I had jumped into the Moose Creek in the dead of winter with all my clothes on and now after I had climbed out, these clothes were drying on me and turning into icicles.

I was shivering from head to toe like I was suffering from acute hypothermia.

I had a foreboding that my fingers would get scalded if at all I touched any part of this Creation of Adam.

So to prevent myself from doing so, I grabbed his elbows from behind with both of my hands.

And just to stop myself looking at the piece of meat on his back and to calm myself, I rested my forehead on his shoulders and closed my eyes.

The slow burn in my lips had already intensified into blazing embers and I had trouble keeping them closed. I honestly couldn't run a prognosis on where the current turn of events would have taken me if my house phone hadn't rung just then.

Saved by the bell.

Offering heartfelt thanks to whoever was my guardian angel, who had quite literally saved me from drowning in a sea of guilt and sin (how medieval did that sound!), I physically pushed Justin's arms away and ran to the ringing phone.

(Thinking his name aloud was still doing that weird thing in the pit of my stomach)

I had already decided to take this call, whoever it was, even a dammed tele-caller would do.

I was ready to buy any and every single product that he or she sold.

Just about anything to put on some distance between me and my brother.

Just near the phone, I ground to a halt.

I had thought of him aloud as a brother.

For the first time, as a Brother.

A real flesh and blood Brother and not just a Step-Brother.

What was happening to me?

My emotions were playing havoc with my senses.

Within half an hour of his getting here, I had already re-christened him from my "Step-Brother" in quotes to my brother.

What the hell was wrong with me?

I was still staring at the phone when I realized that it was still ringing and the caller id said "Cassie".

It meant it was my BFF who was a resident nurse. It also meant that this call was both a blessing and a curse.

It was a blessing because I knew I couldn't cancel the call or say that I would call back.

Saying I would call back was the surefire way of getting Cassie to ring up incessantly and if I turned off the ringer, she would call in the cops.

So I had to take the call and speak to her for some time at least, thus mandatorily putting distance from my brother, which I had been so desperate for just a few moments ago.

It was also a curse because Cassie was an inveterate gossip.

She could concoct wild theories and conjectures from someone's tone of voice.

But the most startling part was that more often than not, her arrows shot home.

So, I had to be careful about what I said to her and how I said it.

And in my present condition, I was apprehensive if I could pull it off.

So taking a couple of deep calming breaths, I picked up the phone.

"What took you so long? Are you busy? Why were you busy? I checked your roster, you have nothing showing today! Is that Step-brother of yours gone? How was he like? Is he coming back....??"

I was sure that if I had let her, she could speak non-stop for a whole five minutes without any interruption, but I managed to barge in with a "Cassie.... Stop!"

And to my surprise, she stopped.

"Yes, my brother is here, and we were both talking. Ok! And he is not that bad..." I had to make an effort to make the tone of my voice neutral in that last sentence.

I sensed a movement out of the corner of my eyes and turned to face my brother.

(This new word in my life was starting to sound really something great and was becoming quite endearing).

I was shocked and disappointed to see that he was already buttoned up

No! I desperately wanted another look at those tattoos. With a nod of his head, he indicated to me that I had better cut the call.

Not actually understanding, what was going on with my brother, I hurriedly spoke on the phone, "Cassie, let me call you back. And don't keep ringing up or else I will throw the phone on the floor and break it" and cut the connection.

With two quick military strides, my brother was beside me.

He took both of my hands in his and he looked into my eyes.

For the first time since he had come in through the doors, his eyes were sad.

With infinite tenderness, rubbing his thumbs over my fingers which he was holding in his hands he spoke softly

"Bonnie, I wish things could have been different, but I am sorry this visit has to end now".

I couldn't believe what I had just heard. It was like someone had delivered a knock-out punch to my gut.

'End'! Had I heard this word right?

"Yes Bonnie, I know how you feel. If it's any consolation, I too feel the same. At long last I get my sister back, but what can you do? Duty calls!"

He wasn't making much sense and anyways I was too stunned to take notice of the words he spoke.

I however was able to see that he had taken a business card out of his pockets, which he handed over to me.

"And sis, just one request. Pls remember you have only seen me as the grunge-rock wannabe-goth. This avatar of me you do not know. Get it? And you still hate me!"

"NO!" I shouted. I had nodded my head mechanically to all those instructions that he was giving me, but I would not, could not, agree to his last one.

Hate him?! I hadn't sorted out my feelings for him, but sure as hell, Hate wasn't any part of it. This part of his request I was not going to keep. To hell with whatever he says.

He had grasped the rebellion in my voice. And his astute nature told him that he would not be able to change my mind on this last part.

"Ok. Let's compromise. If you cannot hate or despise me, then at least show to others that you remain indifferent to me."

He was back to his entreating voice and pitiful eyes.

It was quite late in the day for me to realize that this brother of mine was an accomplished seducer of women.

(Shouldn't I have realized that from the girls' gallery on his social media posts?!)

I mean, which bimbette would be able to resist his kind eyes and those lustful tattoos?

"Yes! That's right. Just think of me and those galleries of women around me and you will do just fine" he said with a quiet smile.

Holy Crap! My brother was now divining my thoughts!

How could he make out my thoughts by just looking at my face?

Was I that transparent? I wouldn't have liked to think so!

And then he did something that stole my breath away.

He stepped closer to me. Our toes were almost touching.

He took my face in both of his hands and with smoldering eyes and an earnest face, he whispered to me, "Whatever I am to those girls, to you, I shall always be your brother. Never Doubt that!"

And bending down, he kissed me on the cheek.

(I later measured the point of impact. It was dangerously close, almost at the corners of my lips)

And then he was gone.

I don't know how long I was rooted on the spot, but a ding on my cellphone alerted me that I had received a text.

Mechanically and without having any awareness of what I was doing,

I picked up my phone to read the text from Cassie.

'Wht th hll d y mn y wr tlkng t yr "brthr"? Whtvr hppnd t th "stp-brthr"? Cll m bck NW r I m rlly cllng n th cps!!'

Oh Shit!