Tom didn't move fast enough for Charlie. Charlie reached over Tom and undid Tom's seatbelt then he leaned back outside the car and calmly said, "Get out." Tom turned to me with a worried look on his face and Charlie grabbed his arm and pulled him out of the car. I heard Charlie ask "What's my brother doing here?"
My clothes began to tighten against my skin and I was fighting to breathe. Charlie and Tom were busy yelling at each other. The car started to cave in on me and some unseen source sucked the air out completely. I could feel myself suffocating. I closed my eyes to try to focus on breathing then some where in the distance, Charlie said, "Sam get out the car. You're coming with me." I undid my seatbelt and ordered myself to move but I couldn't find the energy to make it happen. "Sam, get out of the car." Charlie's voice vibrated in my head and made my ears start ringing. I covered my ears and pleaded for silence then I leaned forward and accidentally hit my head on the dashboard.
"Sam." Tom's voice was so soft. I opened my eyes slightly and saw that my door was wide open and Tom was kneeling next to me. I closed my eyes again and suddenly I was floating on a hard cloud. I heard Tom say, "I'm going to put him on the bed." Charlie was saying they should take me to the hospital but Tom said I would be fine. Tom laid me on the bed and I felt him climb up next to me. He draped his arm over my chest and whispered, "Calm down, Sam, you're fine. Things are fine."
He kissed me on my ear and I felt him near me and I smelled him but I couldn't open my mouth and say something. He held me and kept whispering that I would be fine and that he loved me then suddenly I could breathe again and the world seemed normal. I opened my eyes and looked at him. He smiled and kissed me.
Charlie cleared his throat and Tom pulled away. We both turned to Charlie. Charlie moved closer to the bed and put his hand on my forehead. "Are you okay?" he asked.
"He's okay now. He just had another panic attack," Tom said. "The doctor should have given him something stronger for it."
Charlie gave Tom a look of irritation. "I was asking Sam, not you."
"Sorry."
Charlie rubbed some of the sweat off my forehead and asked his question again, "Are you okay?"
"I think so."
"What happened?"
"I don't know. I started feeling like I was suffocating."
"Should we take you to the hospital?"
"No."
"Why not? You practically passed out."
"I'm fine."
"Well I'm taking you home. We can deal with the rest of this later."
Neither Tom nor I protested. Tom planted a tender kiss on my lips. "I'll walk you to the door," he said.
Tom held my hand as we walked, but he didn't stop at the door. Tom walked me all the way to Charlie's car and helped me get situated then he kissed me on my cheek and said goodbye. He closed my door and walked back to his house.
Charlie drove down the street. I made the mistake of moving my injured hand. Charlie noticed it. "What happened to your hand?" he asked.
"I had an accident."
"What kind of accident?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
Charlie pulled over to the side of the road. "What do you mean you don't want to talk about it? Did you do it to yourself?" I couldn't look at him. "Why did you do it?"
"I was being stupid. I didn't mean to do it. Tom has already made me feel bad enough about it so can we just leave it alone?"
"I can't leave it alone if you're hurting yourself."
"I'm not hurting myself."
Charlie sighed then merged back in to traffic and drove home. He followed me to my room. I lied across my bed and I felt Charlie sit next to me. He sat there for a while without saying anything then he got up and left. I managed to doze off and when I woke up, Charlie was still gone.
I wanted to find him and try to talk because I knew he was upset with me. I walked to the hallway and called his name, "Charlie."
"I'm in here."
His voice was coming from his room. I went to his room and opened the door. He was sitting on his bed reading a textbook. He didn't look up when I entered the room. I sat on the foot of his bed. He didn't say anything. I bounced a little to get his attention but he remained quiet. I exhaled loudly and he continued to pretend I wasn't there.
"Are you going to say something?" I asked.
"I called your school and told them you weren't feeling well and you wouldn't be back today."
He still didn't look at me. "Why won't you look at me? Are you mad because I went over Tom's house?" He turned the page in his book and kept reading. "Charlie come on, say something."
"Did you hurt your hand before or after you went to Tom's?"
"I thought we were done with that."
"No, you were done with it. I want to know what happened."
"It's embarrassing."
Charlie looked up from the book. "I don't care if it's embarrassing. This morning we were on the same page then you went to school, snuck off with Tom and hurt yourself and now you don't want to tell me why your hand is wrapped in a freaking bandage. I don't get it. Are we moving forward or are we still stuck where we were before?"
"We're moving forward."
"Then prove it."
"Okay." I took a few moments to put a story together in my mind that omitted graphic details. "Tom was doing something to me that really excited me and I didn't know what to do with the way I was feeling so I bit down on my hand but I bit harder than I intended and I pierced my skin a little."
Charlie smiled then started laughing. "Was it your first time doing something like that with him?"
"Yes."
He sat down his book. "Really? I thought you two had already done everything together."
"Why would you think that?"
"Well you're always together. It just, hmm, how could you be with him so much and not have anything really happen?"
"I'm 16."
"I know that's what's so shocking about it. You're sixteen and before the past couple of weeks you spent most of your free time alone with your boyfriend but you guys didn't do things you should have done by now. What are the two of you waiting for?"
"I think he's waiting for me."
"Well what are you waiting for?"
"I thought you didn't like Tom?"
"Nice deflection, but let's try to stay on topic. Why aren't you having sex with Tom?"
I realized I had made a gross miscalculation when I relayed how I injured myself. I shouldn't have insinuated that Tom was doing something sexual to me even though that was the truth. "I think that's a private issue."
"I'll respect that but let me give you a piece of advice: Don't let how you feel about your body get in the way of expressing how you feel about Tom."
"So you want me to be with Tom?"
"No, but after seeing how he was with you today, I may have to rethink my position on him. He was wrong for taking you away from school without permission but maybe that was for the best. He obviously knows how to take care of you and he understands your needs better than I do." Charlie wiped his face with his hand. "I shouldn't have been so violent when I confronted him. I was just so upset because of the phone call."
"What phone call?"
"Mark's little brother Billy called me and said, `Your brother left with Tom about fifty minutes ago. I think they went to Tom's place,' and then he told me I should go get you."
"Billy called you!"
"Yeah. I didn't know you guys knew each other. Billy gave me directions to Tom's house then I had to drop Janet off and come find you guys."
Charlie coming to Tom's house hadn't seemed odd to me but I realized that it should have. My mind hadn't even thought to ask how Charlie knew I was with Tom. In my head I created a story that Charlie was following me around all day and that he had waited down the street while Tom and I went in the house and he decided to confront us when we came back outside. My story seemed completely plausible to me but it was far from the truth. Charlie's version was something I never would have guessed. Why would Billy call and tell on us? Was it because Billy hated me or because James put him up to it so that he could ruin Tom's plans?
I was busy trying to go over different reasons in my head when Charlie said something else. "I still don't like Tom."
"Maybe you aren't meant to like him."
"Maybe. I'm happy that you're making friends with Matt though because I like Matt and you need to be friends with someone other than Tom."
"Tom isn't my whole life," I stated. Charlie looked at me in disbelief. I quickly added, "anymore." Tom wasn't my whole life; he was most of it and definitely the best part of it but he wasn't all of it. It actually hurt a little to admit that because even though the words were true, I didn't want them to be true. In my heart, Tom was still my everything. He was all that mattered to me but I understood that he wasn't the only person in the world.
As much as Charlie bothered me, he had also grown on me. I was the one who reached out to him when I realized I had done something to push him away. The old me wouldn't have gone to his room and tried to patch things up because the old me would have dismissed his departure as him finally realizing how horrible of a person I was and him trying to get away from me before I brought him down too.
I surprised myself with how much my relationship with Charlie meant to me. I didn't want Charlie to be upset with me and I didn't want to take steps backwards. I wanted us to keep moving towards one day having a typical brotherly relationship. I wasn't disillusioning myself with thoughts of us being best friends, but I was able to see a future in which we were friends. I wanted to be able to talk to him about anything and it was strange to want that with him. I never thought Charlie and I would reach a place where we were not only talking to each other, but also listening to each other. I knew we were moving in the right direction and I was going to do everything I could to make sure we kept moving in that direction even if it meant stepping out of my comfort zone for a few minutes and initiating communication with him.
"Do you want to go to the store?" he asked.
"Sure."
"Good. We can pick up the ingredients for my sandwich."
"What sandwich?"
"The one that you're making me this evening."
"Oh. Okay."
"Do you still want to go for a run?"
"Yeah, I need to, I'm getting fat." I wanted to lasso the words and reel them back in but they were too far gone for me to reach so I waited for Charlie to say something about me not being fat and give me a short lecture on why I shouldn't think that way about myself.
Charlie stood up and walked towards his dresser. "I have to change my clothes," he said. I stared at his back as he pulled out some clothes to wear and I waited for him to turn around and confront me because I knew that's what he wanted to do. He turned around. "Don't you need to change, too?" he asked.
"Yeah."
"Alright well get moving. We can stop by the park before we go to the store."
"Did you hear what I said before?"
"Yes."
"Aren't you going to comment on it?"
"Would you like me to comment?"
"Not really, I just thought you would."
"Well you thought wrong. I'm not going to say anything about it."
"Why not? I shouldn't have said it in the first place, don't you want to tell me that?"
"If you know you shouldn't have said it, do I need to make it worse by making an issue of it?"
"I guess not."
"Okay, and you shouldn't make an issue of it either, so stop talking about it."
I picked up the psychology book he had been reading and opened to where the bookmark was placed and glanced at the chapter. "Is this some kind of new psychology technique you read about in your book?"
Charlie smiled then quickly took the book out of my hands. "No, it's me deciding to choose my battles wisely. You slipped up and said something you wish you hadn't but it's out there now and all we can do is move on. I'm not going to make you afraid to speak around me. I want you to be able to just say whatever you're thinking, whether I'll approve or not. If you say anything that I think I need to address, I will, but we went over this whole weight thing last night and there's no reason to go over it again. Nothing I say is going to change what you think even if what you think is so far from the truth that you can't even see the truth with a telescope."
Charlie was saying that he didn't have anything to say to me about my slip of the tongue but his last few words made it apparent that he had a lot to say on the subject. Charlie didn't think I was fat. I decided to give him a simple test. His reaction would tell me all I needed to know. "Tom thinks I'm too skinny," I said.
"Maybe you should listen to your boyfriend."
"Maybe you both love me too much to be honest."
"Okay we are not going down this path. Go change your clothes and meet me in the kitchen."
He said it nicely so I complied. I left his room and went to my room to put on my workout gear. I knew better than to wear one of my black shirts so I left on the blue shirt and pulled out some black jogging pants. I slipped on my running shoes and ran downstairs to the kitchen. I thought I would beat Charlie, but he was sitting at the table waiting for me. He gave me a once over and his eyes kind of stopped when they reached my black jogging pants.
"I'm wearing a blue shirt," I pointed out.
"I didn't say anything." He stood. "So how far do you want to run?"
"I don't know."
"Do you think you can do three miles? That's what I usually do."
"I can handle that."
"Okay. Do you want to run a mile and a half in one direction and then run back or run three miles then walk back?"
"Which do you do?"
"Depends on the day. When I want to think, I walk."
"Do you want to think today?"
"I'd rather talk, if you'd like."
"That's fine."
Charlie reached in the refrigerator and grabbed two bottles of water then we left and he drove me to the park. We talked about different songs on the radio while he drove and when we reached the park, we got out and did a few stretches.
We were done stretching when Charlie asked, "Hey, want to make a bet?"
"Depends on what it is."
"Fair enough. I say we race the three miles and if I win, you have to let me get you something to eat before we go pick up Matt."
"Okay. If you win, you can feed me, and if I win, you let me invite Tom over to hang out with all of us."
"You sure you want me and Tom to be that close?"
"He's growing on you, remember?"
"I don't recall saying that."
"Those may not have been your exact words, but it was what you meant."
He held out his hand. "Yes to the bet, no to Tom growing on me. Now let's shake on it." We shook and the bet was made. Charlie pointed out the marker on the side of the path and told me when I saw three on the marker that would mean that I had run three miles.
I laughed at him. "I'm not slow. I know how to read the markers."
"Okay, let's go then."
We lined up at our imaginary starting line and Charlie counted to three then we were both started running. I thought I was fast, but I guess running around the track for fun didn't exactly make me quick. Charlie had a huge lead on me and I shouted, "You can't keep up that pace for three miles. Slow and steady wins the race. I'll see you at the finish line."
He turned around and ran backwards for a second as he shouted back, "I'll be waiting."
I did my best to keep him in my sights but I quickly gave up and focused on finishing the race. Soon it was me, the woods, the path and my thoughts. I replayed my morning with Tom over and over in my mind as I jogged at a steady pace. I had a huge smile on my face when I reached the three mile marker. Charlie was leaning against a tree looking at his watch.
I stopped in front of him and caught my breath. "Tired?" he asked.
"My lungs hurt."
He laughed. "You'll live."
"How do you run so fast?"
"Don't be fooled. I was fast for about the first mile, then I jogged the next mile and a half and gave the final half a mile all I had left in me. You weren't that far behind me."
"I couldn't see you."
"The path curves in and out a lot and the trees don't help, but trust me, I was only here for about three minutes before you got here."
"That's a big lead. We only ran three miles."
He grinned. "Yeah you're right. I guess I did mop the floor with you. So what do you want for lunch?"
"Right now I just want some water."
He put his arm around my shoulder. "Let's walk back to the car." I decided to play a joke on him. I grabbed on to him like I was about to fall down. "What's wrong?"
"I don't think I should have gone running after I almost passed out this morning."
"Oh God, you're right! I wasn't thinking."
I meant to keep pretending I was seconds away from passing out but I had to laugh. "That was too easy," I teased.
Charlie pushed me away, "That wasn't funny you little shit!" I looked at him and saw that he wasn't upset so I smiled and kept walking. Charlie caught up with me and put his arm back around my shoulder. "We have to work on your jokes," he said. "You know I have a sensitive heart and then you go and try to scare me to death with a false alarm. I was really afraid for a second there."
"It was supposed to be funny."
"I'm sure I'll laugh when my heart gets out of my stomach."
"Did I really scare you?"
"Yeah."
"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to."
"I know you didn't."
Charlie and I talked and joked all the way back to the car then we got in and Charlie forced me to make a decision about what I wanted to eat. I picked a fast food restaurant and ordered a side salad with a fat free dressing. Charlie had his lips perched to say something but he didn't and I was grateful for that. I ate the salad on the way to school and I was done with it by the time we reached the parking lot.
I was afraid one of my teachers would see me and report that I wasn't really sick so I made a suggestion, "Why don't we park by Matt's house? That way he'll see us and the teachers won't see me."
"You're not the first person to cut class and show up later that day."
"I know, but it doesn't feel right." I could have added in that I didn't want to deal with strange looks from my classmates either but I didn't want him to know that school was getting to me so I left that part out and tried to convince him that the teachers would get me in trouble. "Some of my teachers already don't like me," I said.
"You don't have to make up things. I'm moving." Charlie moved the car and we waited for Matt. We were listening to music when Charlie said, "Man he has some balls!"
"Huh?"
"Your boyfriend is walking over here. You've got to be kidding me. Is he really not afraid of me?"
Tom walked around to my side of the car and motioned for me to let down my window, but I opened my door instead. Tom kissed me on my cheek and asked, "Are you okay?"
"I'm fine."
"Why didn't you come back to school?"
"I didn't feel like it."
"Oh." Tom was looking at my lips like he wanted to kiss me.
"I will turn my head for three seconds," Charlie warned.
Tom's loving expression turned to anger. "What's that supposed to mean? You're only giving me three seconds to talk to Sam?"
"No it means I'm giving you three seconds to kiss him."
Tom smirked. "Really?" he asked in disbelief.
Charlie smiled at him, "Yes, really. Now you have three seconds. That's it." Charlie turned his head. Tom raised his eyebrows then leaned in and kissed me on my lips. "Time's up," Charlie announced.
Charlie and Tom looked at each other. Tom said, "Thanks Charlie."
"Don't thank me."
"Sorry."
"Why did you come over here anyway?"
"I wanted to make sure Sam was still doing okay."
"Alright well you've seen that, you can be on your way now."
"Are you okay because you were nice to me a minute ago and now you're in full blown jackass mode again?"
"I can only be nice to you for so long."
"Whatever, I'm leaving." Tom leaned in and kissed me on my lips one last time. He whispered in my ear, "I'll try to call you."
The word call jogged my memory and I blurted out, "Billy called Charlie and told him we were at your house."
Tom stopped for second before he slammed the door and stormed off towards the school. Charlie told me, "I'm not sure if you should have said that."
"It slipped out."
Charlie sighed then opened his door. "Against my better judgment, I'm going after him to make sure your boyfriend doesn't do anything stupid on school property."
Charlie was gone a few minutes when Matt came to the car and opened the door and sat in the driver's seat. "Guess what Tom and Charlie are doing!"
"What?" I asked, afraid that the answer was going to be something I didn't want to hear.
"Tom is trying to kill some kid and Charlie is holding him back. You would think the kid would have enough sense to run while he still has the chance but instead he's saying all this crap about you." Matt tossed his bag over the seats. "Does Tom always fight to defend your honor?"
"It's not like that."
Matt rolled his eyes. "I bet everything Tom does has something to do with you."
"Nope, you're wrong. Not everything Tom does involves me."
"Well it should." There was an awkward moment of silence and Matt looked at me like he was going to lean in and kiss me. "It's so romantic having a boyfriend who will fight for you. You don't know how lucky you are. I've always had to fight my own battles." Matt reached out and caressed my cheek. "I guess Tom is lucky too because he gets to be with you." Matt quickly moved his hand. "Are you going to go check on Tom or are you going to stay here?"
I was still worried that one of my teachers might see me but I wanted to know what was going on with Tom and I wanted to get out of the car because Matt was looking at me in an odd way, so I said, "I think I should check on Tom."
c Lustyville 2009 Please send comments to lustyville@yahoo.com and check out more of this story and my other stories at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/lustyville and my website at www.lustyville.com