I picked my head up and fixed my 16-year-old little sister with an inquisitive gaze. “When the hell did you get so mature?”
Brooke grinned at me. “Ever since you started fucking me and I had to grow up to deal with the rioting emotions inside. And it’s different for a girl; if we just let stuff happen TO us, we can end up in deep shit real quick.”
She sat back and I let myself stew on that. What was wrong with the way my life had gone? Yeah, there had been complications, but it had been a VERY enjoyable life. Adrienne talked about putting herself in my hands, trusting that I would never hurt her. That may have been true, but the fact was I put myself in her hands. Quite frequently it seemed she had a plan up her sleeve, a plan that always seemed to be in my benefit. It was how I knew she loved me so much, and I trusted in her instincts. Wasn’t that what every guy dreamed of: A woman who would take care of them?
I had two such women. I had every confidence that if I left every single decision of my life to Dawn and Adrienne, I would live a very, very happy life. What was wrong with that?
What did I want in life? What did I want to be when I grew up? I was eighteen now, and I didn’t have that much longer before I was supposed to BE grown up. Hell, I didn’t even know what I wanted to do for a career. I’d just picked a major based on something I could admitted for because of my grades.
Career? I didn’t know yet. But I had four more years of college to help figure that out. How could I make a right decision without even knowing what my options were and what a job would really be like?
But relationships? Brooke was right. I’d totally lucked into having Dawn and Adrienne solve their little rift on their own. If they hadn’t done something, I might’ve fucked things up and lost the both of them. Like it or not, I’d had a very close call that could’ve completely changed my life.
So here I was, eighteen and about to leave home for the first time. College promised to be a whole new world, a world I barely understood, if at all. I’d meet new people, and I’d have to deal with the relationships of the people already coming with me.
How were Dawn and I going to be when we got to school? Would her relationship with Ryan even survive this? And if they broke up, what kind of pressure would Dawn’s single-status put on mine and Adrienne’s relationship? And what would happen to mine and Adrienne’s relationship when we got to school? Once we were living away from our parents, living TOGETHER, how would that complicate things? I’d never lived with a girlfriend before. Hell, would Adrienne feel more like a sister than anything? In a way, she already did. She was my girlfriend and yet my sister and there was Dawn who was neither girlfriend NOR sister but felt like… Oh, this was sooo complicated.
“You’re thinking too hard, Ben,” Brooke announced while I was staring off into space. I turned my head to find her just sunning herself, her sunglasses obscuring the entire upper half of her face.
“What?”
“Relax. I didn’t mean you had to figure it all out NOW. I mean, come on. You’re going to be living in a house with Brandi, Dayna, Dawn, and Adrienne in two months. Besides getting your brains royally fucked out every night, you’ve got four girls who know what they’re doing and who care a great deal about you. They won’t LET you fuck it up.”
“Really?”
Brooke turned and smiled reassuringly. She lifted her sunglasses up and winked at me. “Really.”
I nodded and was about to say something when suddenly Brooke’s gaze drifted behind me. Her eyes popped open wide and a big smile spread across her face. “Andrew!!!” she screamed and scrambled out of her chair.
I turned as my sister sprinted off, skipping happily like a 16-year-old schoolgirl instead of the wise older sage she’d appeared to be just second before. And with the back of her bikini bottoms getting wedged into her buttcrack as she sprinted along, I watched my little sister running up to Andrew Hemingway: the cute, nice guy she’d met and briefly ‘dated’ last summer.
And that reminded me of another thing. Soon, I wouldn’t have Brooke around anymore. I loved and adored my little sister. In the past year or so she’d been the one constant presence in my life, loving me unconditionally no matter what other drama I went through with all the girls around me. In a way, I felt closer to Brooke than Dawn OR Adrienne.
But we were soon to be parted. And as I watched Brooke wrap her arms around Andrew’s neck and plant a kiss on his surprised lips, I sighed, knowing that the end was beginning right now.
The knowledge that I was soon leaving the nest to go to college was the first reminder that I would soon be separated from much of my family. Brooke growing up and spending more ‘adult’ time with boys like Kenta, and now Andrew, instead of being ‘my little sister’ was the second reminder. But at least I was mentally prepared for those two.
The third reminder came on Wednesday and hit me like a ton of bricks.
I returned to the cabin after lunch, planning to change into my board shorts to go by the lake. Upon arrival, I found Eden and Emma lacing up their hiking boots and going around prepping their backpacks for more than just the daily run around camp. I scratched my head as I looked at the twins and asked, “Going somewhere today?”
Eden flashed me a smile. “Yep. Going up to the Garden of Me this afternoon.” Emma nodded in confirmation.
“Oh, okay,” I nodded. “Gary going with you guys?” Gary Wong was the older brother of Jenny Wong, the twins’ best friend at camp, and he or I usually chaperoned the girls on the long hikes, at least when he wasn’t busy following Dawn around like a lost puppy.
Emma smiled. “No, he’s hanging out with his friends.”
I frowned. “Is someone else already taking you guys up?”
Eden shook her head. “Nooo…”
A light bulb went off in my head: the girls were angling ME to take them up. In typical twin manipulation, they were getting themselves all ready to go and if I refused, they could pout, ‘But we’re already READY!’
I nodded. “Ah, okay. Lemme talk to Dawn and Adrienne. They’ll probably OK us going up.”
“Bennn!” Eden laughed, waving me of. “We don’t NEED you to take us up anymore.”
“Huh?”
“We’re twelve now, remember?” Emma pointed out. “Mom and Dad said we could hike there on our own when we turned twelve. We know the way like the backs of our hands and it’s not THAT far.”
I frowned, alarm rising into my eyes. “But, what if someone has an accident? What if the weather turns bad? What if—”
“Ben, we got it,” Eden interrupted. “We’re big girls now. We can handle it.”
“Well, maybe you can handle it. But, you know, maybe Adrienne and Dawn would like to go. Like I said, we haven’t been all summer and Adrienne’s never been to the Garden—”
“Ben!” Emma cut me off this time. “We’re going ourselves, okay?”
“But—”
“No ‘buts’. We don’t need you anymore,” Eden sighed in frustration. “Get it?”
Don’t need me anymore? My baby sisters didn’t need me anymore? Here’s where the ton of bricks came in, knocking me upside the head. Or was it a dagger through the heart? Either way, my lower lip quivered and I sat down heavily on my bunk.
“Oh, Ben…” Emma sighed, clearly recognizing the pain on my face. “It’s not that we don’t love you. You’ll always be our big brother. But… we’re grown-up now.”