35 comments/ 51284 views/ 75 favorites Crazy Together By: TheWorldSpins (Author's note: While I was working on a new chapter for "My Master Down the Hall," I started to wonder what a brother-sister relationship might look like without a strong, loving family. This story is much more somber and, hopefully, realistic than most of what I've written before. There is also quite a lot of build-up before any sex, so you're warned. All characters are over eighteen years of age, etc. –TheWorldSpins) Tammy wished her brother Max would say something to her, anything, even just to yell at her. Sometimes he just tuned people out, as if they weren't there, and it had always infuriated her when she was growing up. He could be almost inhuman at times. Tap tap tap. Throughout the agonizingly slow car ride, her leg had never stopped tapping, her constant motion in marked contrast to Max's stolid exterior as he steered the old Accord. Tammy's left leg, tanned golden and bare to the mid-thigh, bounced up and down, catching Max's eye as he drove. God she's growing up... "Could you stop that?" he asked laconically, his voice betraying only a little annoyance and absolutely no trace of his awkward, unexpected appreciation for his sister's feminine form. Tammy clamped one hand down on her knee, though it only served to transfer her nervous energy to running her fingers through her long, wavy blonde hair. She looked over at Max, whose own hair was, as always, short-cropped and dark. They didn't really look much alike. "That, too," he asked. "It's distracting." As late as it was, there was little traffic on the road. They sped through a series of flashing yellow traffic lights. Tammy always liked it when the lights took the night off. There was something magical late at night, like things were possible then that weren't in the light of day. "Are you mad?" she asked, strangely hoping he was. Max waited so long to respond that Tammy almost thought he didn't hear her. Then, with the faintest of head turns, just barely enough to signal his recognition of her presence, he spoke. "Nope." "Don't have a lecture for me?" "Nope." "Did you miss me?" "Who's to say?" That last one pissed Tammy off. Max could be impossibly cryptic when he didn't want to be honest with her. "Don't care your baby sister almost went to jail tonight?" she asked with growing frustration. They reached an actually functioning red light and stopped. Max turned slightly more towards her. "I came, didn't I?" he said, his voice a little warmer. Tammy felt a little bad. She wanted Max to care about her, even though he never showed it any more. She had to admit, though, that picking her up at 2 AM from Wal-mart after she was caught shoplifting was a pretty decent thing for an older brother to do. "Yeah, you did. Thanks," she said sheepishly. "So, not to be an asshole or anything, but I'm starving. Any chance we could get something to eat?" Tammy was hungry, but most of all, she didn't want to go back home. Anywhere but there. "It's late. I'm sure there's food back home," he said, seemingly oblivious to her ulterior motives. Tammy's voice took on a hopeful lilt. "You mean your house?" If she was lucky, Max might consent to let her crash on his couch. His place was actually pretty nice, if a little spartan. Most of all, Tammy wanted to avoid waking her parents in the middle of the night, even if she could simply lie about where she was. Knowing them, they would assume the worst about her in any event. "Very funny," Max replied. "You're going back to Mom and Dad's." "Please, Max. Just one night. I'll go back tomorrow, promise." Tammy didn't want to interrupt this time: Max had gone into one of his "zones." She knew he was thinking things over, turning over every possible objection, every contingency and possibility. Sometimes, she was in awe of the way her brother could think. Other times, she wished he'd get out of his own head and take notice of other people in the world. "No," he said, with the finality of a judge pronouncing a sentence. "You belong there." "Then let me out here," she said defiantly. "So what? You can get killed on the side of the road?" he asked incredulously. "Not happening." "Who are you to tell me what to do?" "The guy you called to keep from getting arrested," he said. Tammy's anger flared. Why couldn't he talk to her like he used to? "I called my brother. I don't know who the fuck you are," she said with a wounded outrage. With the car moving as slowly as it was, Tammy figured she could get out easily enough. She opened the door, only to realize that the road can be deceptive: the car was moving faster than she had reckoned. The force of opening the door almost knocked her out of the car, and Max slammed on the brakes, grabbing her across the chest to hold her back in. His mask of indifference had shattered, though she couldn't tell if he was pissed at her for opening the door or embarrassed for inadvertently feeling up her tits. "Are you fucking crazy?" he shouted at the top of his lungs. His words hit Tammy like a hammer blow. She had her answer: Max, the person she cared about more than anyone in the whole world, was using the "c" word. She started to cry, tears of sadness and anger. "Fuck. You." She said, punctuating each word with a middle finger. "You're just like them." With the car now stopped in the middle of the road, she dashed out and made a run for it, heading towards the now deserted strip mall she could see up ahead. Max followed after her, heedless of his car now parked in the middle of the street. Tammy had always been more athletic than he was, and Max found it difficult to catch up to her. Though he had every reason to be angry, after giving chase for a minute her found himself in awe of her graceful, muscular body as she ran from him. She had never been a skinny girl, but exercise and sports had turned her body into a lithe, beautifully-proportioned form, which suited her rounded, soft features well. He stopped to admire her, letting her run herself exhausted while he broke into a slower jog. If he couldn't catch her, he might as well just wait for her to come back to him, assuming she would. After Max gave chase for as long as he could, he collapsed in a heap outside a darkened nail salon. He could see Tammy round the corner at the Discount Shoe Warehouse and dart behind the building before disappearing. Sitting on the cold concrete curb, Max felt a strange feeling, one he hadn't felt in a while. Despite his better than average vocabulary, he couldn't put a finger on exactly what the right word for it was. It wasn't fear, or concern, or anger, or anything like what he assumed he should be feeling. He remembered feeling it when Tammy broke her arm in second grade and he rode with her to the hospital from school. A strange smile broke across his face, and he shook his head just a little. He was exhausted enough to easily slip into one of his zones again. He was thinking without thinking; Tammy knew that state better than probably anyone else in the world. After about ten minutes, she returned and wasn't surprised to see him sitting there, patiently waiting for her. "I didn't think you'd chase after me," Tammy said from behind him. Max startled a little bit. She looked at him more closely. "Are you smiling, weirdo?" she said, her voice less harsh than before. Max stroked his chin a little, laughing inside that her breath was still heaving while his had long since calmed. "Christ, you're in good shape," he said. "I feel like I'm a hundred years old now." Tammy smiled too. It felt good for him to actually talk to her at all. It had been so long. "Max, I'm serious," she said, though the stupid grins they shared belied that notion. "I'm fucking starving. Take me to Denny's or I'll make you find me in the woods." Sitting on the curb, Max had already decided that he'd let Tammy crash at his place, so there was little harm acceding to her request now. "Fine, as long as you promise not to steal the tips off the other tables," he said sarcastically. "Very funny," she said. "I'll just steal your wallet instead." They trekked back to the road, both thankful nothing gruesome had befallen the Accord. Once they reached Denny's, a place they both agreed was the worst restaurant at which they would ever voluntarily eat, little remained of the argument before. Tammy felt much more at ease, now that Max had dropped his rigid exterior. He was almost treating her like an equal and not a child. They settled in and ordered, making snarky little comments to each other about the place along the way. It was like they were young again, only to Tammy's joy, their five year age difference didn't mean as much anymore. She had only been thirteen when Max left for college, and seeing him since then was a rare experience. She hadn't even expected him to pick up when she called, desperate and in the hands of the night security guard. "So I'm sure Emily's pissed, right?" she said to Max apologetically. "Tell her I'm sorry." Max dropped his smile. Tammy saw that tense look he got whenever he didn't want to say something: it hadn't changed since he was a boy. "So, Emily doesn't care. Because she's, you know, gone. For good," he stammered. "What!?!" Tammy said, her shock played up just a little bit in light of her own longstanding dislike of Max's girlfriend. "You guys have been together for like three years." "We were together two," he corrected. "We broke up over a year ago." All the playfulness in Tammy's voice evaporated. "Are you kidding me? You fucking bastard." Max was confused. "Wait, I didn't think you liked Emily," he said, trying to recapture the joking mood. "I didn't—don't. But I also don't like you not telling me, like, huge shit in your life. What the fuck is wrong with you, Max? I'm your sister," she said, genuinely hurt. It had been hard being cut out of Max's life, but deep down, Tammy had always believed they shared a special bond. More and more, though, she wondered if she was deluding herself. "It...it never came up," he said, his apology half-hearted even in his own ears. Tammy picked at her food quietly. She had lost much of her appetite. Max tried eating, acting normal, but couldn't ignore the icy silence and disappointment of his baby sister, crossing her arms right below her chest and staring at the plate of food. She looked better when she smiled, and would have given anything to see it light up her face at that moment. Tammy's chubby cheeks, the thing about herself that she most hated, were Max's favorite feature on her, but only when she smiled. Then she practically glowed. Twenty minutes passed. "So...shoplifting, huh?" he asked. Tammy returned only silence. "Take me back to Mom and Dad's," was her only reply. "OK," he said, not contesting her wishes. Max paid the check. They climbed silently into the car, and he started off. He kept watching her out of the corner of his eye, hoping to see some sign she was relaxing and letting go of her anger. He was disappointed, but there was something else: she was...different. She had really grown up while he was gone. He had seen her from time to time, of course, but somehow, he'd missed how she'd flowered into a beautiful, if a little wild, woman. Almost without thinking, he turned left when he should have turned right. "Where are you going?" Tammy asked, in equal parts anger and curiosity. Max was silent for a moment. He felt out of his element, and more than a little scared now. Yet it wasn't all bad; it was strangely exhilarating to throw caution to the wind, to move without thinking, not to plan what he was going to say. "We're going to my house. It's too late to take you to Mom and Dad's—you'll get in big trouble. I don't care if you're nineteen, they're going to treat you like a baby until you get out of there." Tammy was prepared to protest his disregard of her wishes, but secretly, he was doing just what she wanted. She was hurt that he hadn't shared something so big with her, but the solution wasn't for him to abandon and ignore her once again. "Is that OK with you?" he asked. "I mean, it's late anyway. We're just going to go straight to sleep." Tammy decided to put him through the wringer a bit. "Yeah, I guess," she said. "I still think you should apologize, though." She expected some push-back, maybe a reminder that he'd come all the way out to pick her up in the middle of the night. She hadn't even really meant it. Max, though, didn't hesitate. "You're right. I'm sorry. How about this—I'll try to stay in touch with you more. I'll call you...say, twice a week. OK?" Tammy held her happiness in check, not wanting to look pathetic in front of her older brother. A nineteen-year-old girl—no, woman, she told herself—shouldn't get so excited about phone calls from her older brother. "Yeah, I guess that would be cool," she said. "Are you ever going to come over?" Once more, Max paused. "No...It's not you. I just...no." Jeff, Tammy told herself. He'll never get over that. Max pulled into his complex and showed Tammy up to his condo. It was nice: no frills, but clean, comfy, and most importantly, free of parents. That made it perfect. "Am I allowed to smoke?" she asked, expecting an indignant rejection. Tammy didn't actually smoke, at least not cigarettes, and she didn't have any weed on her at the time. Mostly, she just liked to make her brother squirm with questions like that. "If you wouldn't mind, go outside on the balcony. It'd probably be fine, smoking inside I mean, but I'm not in love with the smell, to be honest," he said. Tammy was shocked. He was being really cool. Or did he just not care? "Wow," she said. "No lecture?" "You're a grown-up, now," he said. "You don't need your brother telling you what to do." "You never told me what to do," she replied. "That's why I always liked you. You were a good brother." Max smiled. "Past tense? Ouch. Get some sleep—hell, take the bed. I'm good out here. We'll figure it out in the morning." Tammy wanted to object to Max taking the couch—not to sleep there herself, but to tell him they could share the bed. She realized how strange that would sound, though. She really wasn't a little girl anymore, and Max was a grown man, with his own home. "Max?" she called out. "Yeah?" "I'm sorry about the car thing," she said sincerely. "Just, please don't call me 'crazy.' I don't want to explain it, but I hate that more than anything in the world." "Totally—I can see how'd they'd drive anyone crazy. Then blame you for it," he said with sympathy. Still thinking about Max, Tammy snuggled up against the extra pillow. Before long she was drifting off to sleep. *** Tammy wished she hadn't actually tried. Tried to meet somebody. Tried to look good for him. Tried to ignore all the warning signals. Now she was standing outside a Taco Bell, looking way too dressed up and feeling painfully embarrassed. After an interminable wait, she saw the familiar contours of her brother's car crest the hill and pull into the parking lot. "Thank god," she said. "Let's get the fuck out of here." Unlike the last time he had gotten one of these late night calls, Max was glad to see his sister this time. He had missed her. What was more, she looked amazing: sexy but classy in a leopard print dress with black color block on the side. She'd worn it hoping the black panels would make her look thinner. Like a lot of women her age, she was convinced she was too fat, though Max couldn't imagine someone with a more perfect figure than his sister, a fact that caused him some mental distress. "OK, Tammy, you've got to tell me what happened this time." He was surprised by the chilly reception he received from his sister. "Look," she said, "just take me home." Max was confused and more than a little hurt. "Ummm...mine or yours?" he asked. "Mom and Dad's." Once more, brother and sister sat silently in the car, as Max drove the familiar path back to his childhood home. He made it all the way to their street, before he stopped and pulled over. "What the hell, do I have to walk?" Tammy asked. She was startled to see how sad Max looked, almost wounded. She was still pissed at him: he'd broken his promise to call her regularly, but she still felt a little bad about her treatment of him. It didn't help that he looked so good that night, his green eyes sparkling in the streetlight's glow. She thought for a moment he might have been on a date of his own: he had crisp black slacks and a blue, white, and red plaid button up. She felt a weird pang of jealousy—she'd hated Emily, and she'd hate whoever this new girl was, provided she existed. "Hey, I'm sorry," she said. "It's just that... I mean, you were supposed to call me. After, like, two weeks you forgot all about me again." Max's voice was low, too low and quiet for her to understand. She asked him to repeat himself. "Why do you even want to talk to me?" he asked. She was genuinely surprised at his demeanor. "Because you're my brother, and we used to be close. Shit, we ought to be closer now, since I can actually understand what you're talking about now. I'm not a stupid little kid anymore—I mean, you probably think I'm stupid, but I promise it's just because you're like a genius or something." Max was used to people finding him a bit intimidating. He had a way of projecting this Olympian indifference that immediately betrayed his keen intelligence. Sometimes, being smart was its own kind of handicap, at least socially. "I don't think you're stupid," he said quietly. "Don't lie to me," Tammy said. "I mean, everybody else does. If not stupid, then crazy." "You don't mean that," Max said. "Max—you should see the books Mom and Dad read: 'Coping with Problem Children,' 'Parenting a Bi-polar Child,' 'The Tough Love Approach to Juvenile Rebellion.' They think I'm crazy. Everybody else just thinks I'm stupid because I didn't go to college, or I'm some cheap slut." Tammy hadn't meant to let that last part slip out. She and Max had of course never talked about sex, and he had never been around as she developed, first physically and only later emotionally. She looked at Max, who had an unusually intense expression in his eyes. "Tammy, you're not stupid. You're not crazy. You're not a slut. Just because I'm a shitty brother doesn't mean you did something wrong," he said. "I just...there's just shit you don't know about me. It's really not you—it's me." "That's just it," she said, as if excited to get a chance to prove her point. "I don't know about you because you won't tell me. But I'm your sister. I'm not Mom and Dad—really you should know that. I'm not gonna tell people or laugh at you or anything. You can tell me anything—I want to be a part of your life." They sat there for a moment, Tammy waiting for Max to speak. "I want to go home," he said. "Will you come with me?" She nodded, almost too excited to actually speak. Once they got back to his place, Max absent-mindedly offered her a drink. Tammy giggled. "Getting me drunk, huh?" she asked. "This must be bad." Max shook his head, as if he was waking from a dream. "Sorry—dumb. You can't drink yet." "Who's to say?" she asked coyly. Max thought for a moment. "Good point." He poured her a rum and coke. Tammy had drank before, but usually cheap beer or something awful like Smirnoff Ice. "Damn, Max, this is strong," she said, her face puckering a little. "Sorry, I figured a bad-ass like you would be used to it," he said, not smiling but not frowning either. Tammy furrowed her brow. "What do you mean?" "About the 'bad-ass' thing? You just seem, you know, like a teenage rebel," he said, comically emphasizing that last part. "In a cool way, though—really. At least, that's how it seems on Facebook." Crazy Together Tammy felt a little thrill. Not only did her brother think she was cool, but he was also keeping up with what she was doing online. Why couldn't he just talk to her, though? "So you cyber-stalking me now? I didn't even think you used Facebook." Max looked a little embarrassed, which only pleased Tammy more. "I really don't but...I wanted to see what you were all about. You're really...popular." Tammy frowned. "That's not funny," she said. "Uhhh, it wasn't supposed to be. Did I say something wrong?" She paused. Maybe they could actually have a serious talk without hurting each other or talking past one another. "Dude, high school sucked. Graduating sucked. Living at home, not going to college sucks. Working at stupid TGI Friday's sucks. Going out with assholes like Evan sucks. It seemed like you were, I don't know, fucking with me when you called me 'popular' is all." Max looked apologetic enough, and Tammy was happy to drop it. "I...I mean, you've got like 500 Facebook friends. I have, what, 30?" he said naively. Tammy rarely got the chance to treat her brainiac brother like a naïf. "Dude, seriously? You realize Facebook friends aren't actually friends, right?" Max felt a little embarrassed and more than a little old, though truth be told, he had always been a mental adult, even when he was a child. He wanted to change the subject, and Tammy's rant gave him an out. "So his name was Evan, huh?" he asked. "What went wrong?" Now it was Tammy's turn to feel put on the spot. "Do you really want to know, or do you just feel like you're supposed to ask?" Tammy didn't intend for that to sound harsh, and she cringed a little once it came out. She was all hard elbows around Max for some reason. "I didn't bring you back here to bullshit you," he said, "and I really am sorry about not calling. Tell me why I had to pick you up from another parking lot in the middle of the night." Max too didn't intend to sound like he was annoyed with Tammy calling him, though he could hear it in his own voice. He hated saying things that hurt her. Fortunately, the rum and cokes seemed to have loosened them both up. "So, I guess I should tell you a little background first," she said, clearly not relishing what was about to come. "I lost my virginity when I was fifteen." Tammy saw a look of what she had to imagine was concern on Max's face. "Don't worry—it wasn't, like rape, or anything. It got around school, and for whatever reason I was suddenly, like, the town slut or something. I mean, that's what people said about me—not in real life or anything. I'm not, you know, a slut. It's gotten a little better now, but still, if I go out with a guy who went to Harding, or even, like, had a cousin there or something, they immediately assume I'm just going to fuck them if they smile at me." Tammy sipped the last of her drink, and Max wordlessly poured her another. She continued. "The really fucked up thing is that I can count the number of times I've had sex on one hand—shit, no, that's wrong, but two hands for sure. I should have totally slutted around—at least then maybe I would have found a guy I liked." Max felt sorry for his sister, but most of all he felt guilty for not being around, for letting his own shit keep him from protecting her. "I'm sorry, Tammy," he said, pausing. "I didn't know." Fortunately, he though, she didn't seem too embarrassed by sharing with him, and he wondered if he ought to express any interest in finding Evan and at least taking a stab at kicking his ass. Fighting wasn't really Max's thing—though, when he wanted to hurt people, he usually had words that struck harder than any fist. On the other hand, they were both slowly beginning to feel the soothing effects of their friend Captain Morgan. For her part, Tammy just wanted to change the subject. "OK, new question for you: why don't we have nicknames?" The left-field question threw Max. "You mean for each other?" he asked. "Yeah," she said, running her fingers absent-mindedly through her long, dirty-blonde hair. "You know I hate the name 'Tammy,' always have. You at least got a cool first name. Why didn't you ever give me a cute nickname when I was little, like...ummm...well, something cute, for a beautiful little princess like me?" Tammy had adopted a high-pitched, funny little lilt in her voice for the last part, which made Max smile. "Who's to say?" he said, shrugging. "I hate it when you say that," she said, a little less happy than before. "I could give you a different name now," he offered. "Not a nickname, but, I don't know, a secret name. A different first name, and only I'll use it." It would have been harder for Max to come up with something that gratified Tammy more. "Really? That's awesome! Whaddya got?" Max thought for a moment. "Well, there's...Effie." Tammy looked at him warily. She knew his names would undoubtedly come from one the millions of books Max had shelved around the condo. "What happened to her?" "Bad marriage, infidelity, social ostracism, eventual death: you know, the usual." "Next," she cried loudly. "What about Ophelia?" "Even I know that one. You gotta thing for seeing me die miserable or something?" Max pondered. "OK, so this one isn't too happy either. How about Joelle? Life isn't that great, but in the book, they call her the 'Prettiest Girl of All Time.' She even has to wear a veil, just to keep every man she meets from falling in love with her." Tammy blushed. Was that how Max saw her? "Seems a little...what's the word for, like, cocky, but you're, you know, wrong?" "It's not presumptuous. It's a good secret name," he said, gliding past what he really wanted to tell her, how beautiful he thought she was. Tammy rolled the name over in her mind, moving her lips silently at first before letting a sound escape. "Joelle. I like it. I don't want hear about this 'Tammy' bitch any more," she said with a laugh. "OK Joelle, I hate to kill the mood, so I want to preface this by saying that I'm genuinely not judging, just curious: why shoplifting?" Tammy was glad to have a decent buzz going to answer such a question. "Oh, that. I don't know. It makes me feel...in control. I know you probably think I suck, since I got caught, but I'm actually really good at it." She leaned forward a bit, suddenly conscious that this whole conversation, the whole night, was all taking place in her date night best: her sexy dress, black pumps, and uncomfortable but scorching hot lingerie. She was even all made up, something Max had probably never seen. "Your turn," she said. "What happened with Emily?" It was like all the air came out of the room. Tammy was afraid she'd crossed some invisible line and ruined the night. She fully expected Max to turn back into a stone statue, but he downed the rest of his drink, poured himself another—the coke noticeably absent—and, standing behind his bar counter, leaned in towards her on his elbows. "Well, Joelle, I'm a hard guy to know," he said. "And she got tired of living with a stranger." Tammy felt a sudden wave of sadness overtake her, as if she was reliving someone else's heartbreak. She hated Emily so much in that moment. "Did you love her?" Max thought for a moment, though not about the answer to the question. That he knew easily; rather, he thought about the danger that comes from letting a crack form in an emotional wall, even a small one. "No," he said. "But when she was here I wasn't so alone." Tammy knew she had to be careful. She didn't want Max to shut down on her. "If you want me to back off, tell me to back off," she said, "but I gotta ask. What does that mean, 'hard guy to know?'" Max leaned back, the distance between them now chilly. If anything, it made Tammy realize how close he had just gotten to her, physically as much as emotionally. "You know how you hate it when people call you 'crazy?' Well, I...shit, I kind of am. I saw a guy, a professional, once—for a while. But not anymore. Now I just kind of deal." Tammy knew instantly what he meant. She had always wondered about him, about his "zones." "It's depression, right?" she asked. Max had always been really sweet to her as a kid, but even back then he would go through spells when their parents found it almost impossible to wake him. He seemed only to confide in their brother Jeff, the brother the family couldn't talk about, the brother they had lost. For Max, it had only gotten worse after they lost him. Max took a deep breath and tried to muster a smile. "These are a little too strong, huh?" he said. Tammy knew he was desperate to change the subject, and for once, she figured she would let him. They sat in silence for a minute, before, to Tammy's surprise, Max spoke. "So you know my big secret, now I guess. I mean, you're right...your guess." Tammy wished the bar between them dissolved so she could give her brother a hug. "You wanna know my big secret?" she asked. "Of course," he said, "anything." "So I lied about college, about not getting in. I got into State, same as you, just no scholarship. I just...threw the letter away and lied to Mom and Dad." "Tam—why?" "Because I'm afraid they're right. Like, what if I am crazy? I get these mood swings, and sometimes I feel like I'm out of control. I do things I don't even want to do, just to do it. I mean, that's crazy, right?" Max didn't wait for the bar to dissolve; he came around and embraced his sister. "I don't think you're crazy. Or at least, if you are, we can be crazy buddies together. You know, swap SSRIs, have a party with all the voices in our heads." Tammy laughed, and realized for the first time that she had also started to cry. It felt so good to let go of that fear, to hear it mirrored back to her without judgment or condescension. They both made their way over to the living room seating area, tacitly acknowledging that they had reached their quota of liquor for the evening. Tammy suddenly wished Max was closer to her, but he sat, alone, in his chair while she took the sofa. "I didn't know it was so hard for you," he told her, hoping she'd understand his absence was never about her. "I could say the same thing," she observed. "You know, I always imagined you as this, like, solitary genius. It seemed like you were just too good for anybody, and that's why you were alone all the time." He laughed. "I work in college admissions, I'm not Zarathustra," he said, cringing in the fear she might think he was trying to talk over her head. "Oh yeah," she said, stroking an imaginary beard, "Zarathustra. He's one of my favorites, too." She had a way of putting him at ease when she wanted to. "I like seeing these different layers to you," she said, "but when am I going to see the real you?" He cocked his head to the side. "Maybe it's turtles all the way down." She rolled her eyes. "Now you're doing that on purpose. What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Max grinned. "I'm going to butcher this story. So there were some people, I don't remember who—doesn't matter. Anyway, they thought the whole world was just a flat plate balanced on a turtle's back. And some smart ass—probably a little like me to be honest—thought he would show them how dumb this idea was, so he asked them what the turtle was standing on. They told him it was just another turtle, and the smart-ass, as smart-asses are wont to do, shot back and said then that turtle's got to stand on something—" "Another turtle, right?" she asked. "You're an excellent student, Ta—Joelle," he said, making her secret name sound French. "And the other guy, he tells the smart-ass that, yeah, another turtle. And then what does that turtle stand on?" Tammy gave a smile of recognition: "It's turtles all the way down. I get it." She thought for a second. "You're wrong." "Yeah?" he asked. "It was just a story; not sure how I can be wrong." Tammy started talking a little fast, something she did when she got excited. Figuring out Max's point and realizing he'd made a mistake was just such a time. "Yeah, that's a good story and all, but it doesn't mean what you're saying. Like, I get it—you're saying there's no 'real you' under the layers, only more layers. But that's not what the story means. The people are just nuts. The world isn't balanced on one turtle or infinity turtles. And the smart ass, who thinks there's got to be something real—she's right." Max sat in silence for a moment. "You're smart." She smiled. "I know, right? Who'da thunk it?" Max smirked. "So the smart ass is a girl, too, huh?" Tammy tapped her index finger against her temple. "I'm clever like that..." "Joel—Tammy?" "Yeah?" "Go to bed." Tammy's mind flashed to the last time she slept over at Max's place, when she felt a pang of longing for him to sleep with her side by side. She wished she knew for certain that she could laugh off the request if it made things seem weird. "Hey, Max?" "Yeah?" "You can have the other side of the bed if you want. It's big, and your couch sucks, no offense." Max paused for a moment. Tammy tried to read his face. It was working. "OK," he said. "You can borrow something of mine to sleep in, if you want." He hadn't thought about his words. "If you want?" Of course she wasn't going to sleep in what she was wearing. "If you want?" Was she supposed to sleep naked with her brother? Max cursed his stupidity under his breath, hoping she didn't notice. Tammy felt warm inside. Part of her wanted to strip off her clothes and pretend it was all a joke, teasing Max about the offer of pajamas. So long as she didn't look too long and too deep at her feelings, she could pretend that this was all just totally innocent, just about connecting with her brother after years of absence and neglect. "I'll take a t-shirt and...got any cotton shorts or anything?" Taking some night clothes from Max, she changed hastily in the master bathroom. Part of her wanted to burst into the room, to catch Max in the middle of removing his own clothes...but to do what, she did not know. In bed, she closed her eyes and imagined what it would be like if their bodies touched, but they did not, and the gulf between them felt impassable. Soon she heard the sounds of Max gently sleeping, and she felt better. In the morning they woke, nestled against one another, and spoke not a word of it until she was gone. *** Max almost didn't answer when he saw the call came from his parents, but something told him that it was about Tammy. "Max, honey, it's Mom." No shit, he thought, do you think I can't recognize your voice or something? "I'm going to put you on speaker. Tell Tammy she cannot come to stay with you." "What?" He could hear his mother's exaggerated deep breath. She could be so histrionic some times, and Max was sure their father was lurking somewhere in the background, ready to twist the knife whenever it would hurt Tammy the worst. "Your darling sister has told us in no uncertain terms that she isn't going to follow our rules, and your father and I are sick of it. Now she's all about how wonderful her brother is, and how you're going to let her stay with you now. Tell her it isn't happening so she can calm down about it and listen to your father and I." "Me," Max replied. "What?" "'Father and me.' It's an indirect object, so it's not 'I,' it's 'me.' And she's nineteen, stop trying to control her." "Honey, you know what your sister's like—" Max resented his mother's attempt to pit him against Tammy. "Yeah, I do, do you?" He could tell from the difference in voice that his mother had taken him off speakerphone. What a bitch! he thought. She really thought I was going to shoot Tammy down in front of them, to make her feel like shit so they could control her more. "I don't know what's gotten into you, Max." she spat, the saccharine tones of the beginning of the conversation now vanished. "You can't seriously think she can stay with you, do you?" Max didn't have an answer. "Look," he said, trying to defuse the situation, "I'll come pick her up, so that everyone can cool off. We'll talk about it later." His mother was dissatisfied with the idea; Max suspected his mother liked the situation as it was, where Tammy was so afraid she really was the unstable girl they made her out to be that she'd given up on going to college. No matter, he hadn't taken "no" for an answer, and soon Tammy would be on her way with him. Feeling a sudden shudder when he pulled into the driveway, Max realized it had been over a year since he had come home. Being back at the house reminded him of Jeff, and he had done a lot of work to never be reminded of Jeff. Now he just needed to get in and get out. "Max!" Tammy called from the top of the stairs. "You came!" She looked so thrilled to see him. She was oddly dressed up for the house, wearing a nice black and white striped tank top and a pair of dark blue skinny jeans. Had she dressed up for him? Moreover, Max couldn't remember the last time someone was happy he had arrived somewhere. At the base of the stairs stood both of his parents. "Max, you shouldn't have come," his dad said in a gruff voice. He wasn't a big or particularly physical man, but his father nevertheless had a way of getting what he wanted. He could be ruthless if necessary, though his mother's emotional manipulation was usually enough to accomplish whatever they set out to do. As despicable as he found the two of them, they made an undoubtedly great team, always on the same page when it came to him and his sister. "I'm not afraid of you, Daddy," Tammy said. Max always marveled how they had infantilized her. She acted out in just the way they wanted, played the hyper-emotional child because that's what they expected. He knew how living in that house could make you crazy, even if you weren't before. "Well, hooray for you!" said their father. "I don't care what you say, young lady. There's no excuse for acting like...like such a cunt." Even their mother was taken aback at the vehemence of his words. Max watched his father's angry visage slide into a look of utter shame. "I'm sorry," he stammered. "I didn't mean to say that." Everyone watched in stunned silence as Tammy descended the stairs, snaking through her two parents to Max's side. He leaned in, handing her the keys and whispering for her to go to the car. She complied, leaving Max alone with his parents. "Max, honey, you don't understand," his mother said. "You don't know what it's like here with her. You never come around." Max felt a shudder of anger pass over him, then vanish. This was the house where his brother died. This was the house where he almost died, too. He cracked his knuckles, slowly, and took a deep breath. When he exhaled, he felt himself calming. "I didn't stay here to yell at you. I wanted to say I'm sorry," he said calmly. His parents looked confused, though not displeased. "I don't come here. Ever. You know why. Maybe it didn't really matter to you, but it mattered to me." His mother started to cry, and his father embraced her. "We loved him too, Maxie," his dad said, clearly fighting off tears himself. "We just don't want to lose all of you." Max sensed an opportunity to make things right. "Wait a day or two and apologize to Tammy. I'll talk to you then. I really do think she ought to move out, though. Maybe not move in with me, but something. She's grown-up, now. And she's stronger than you think." Max didn't wait for his parents to suck him in to some interminable debate on his sister's fitness for adult life. When he opened the door, he half-expected to find Tammy glued to the other side, listening in. She had made her way to the car, though, most likely in an effort to get as far away from their parents as possible. Crazy Together "What'd you say to them?" she asked in a soft voice when Max climbed into the driver's seat. "I told them not to talk to you like that and to let you move out," he said. "You're a grown-up now. They shouldn't treat you like a little kid." Warm tears cascaded down her full, smooth cheeks. Her upper lip trembled a bit; Max noticed it was a rich rose color, probably from lip gloss. She looked so beautiful: feminine, soft, yet fierce and alive. She hadn't cried when her parents yelled at her, even when her dad flew off the handle. Hearing Max, though, brought on the waterworks for a totally different reason. "So I can live with you?" she asked, her eyes widening into a look he found hard to resist. "Slow down," he said. "You can crash at my place, and I'll totally help you get on your feet. But you've got to decide if you're going to go to school, or start out on whatever thrilling career path is open to somebody with just a high school diploma these days." It was obvious what he favored. Tammy fell silent. Max guided the car effortlessly back towards his place, giving her the time to process all the big life decisions that she had labored so hard to put off. The reality of being an adult was starting to sink in: living with her parents may have been awful, but it was a safe, predictable kind of awful. They were already at his place when she spoke again. "I'll go to State. I mean, I could still enroll. I think Mom and Dad would even pay, at least tuition. If I could just stay with you—" Max cut her off. "I don't think that's a good idea. Can't you just live in the dorms with everyone else?" Tammy tried not to look hurt, but Max could tell he'd made her feel unwanted. They entered his apartment without speaking, and Tammy fled immediately to his bathroom. Max could hear her sobbing softly from behind the door; the sound was wrenching him inside, and he longed to find some way to stop acting like he always did, and to communicate to her, in a language they both spoke, that he only wanted the best for her, that she would be happier as a normal college student, and not with him, a semi-functional depressive and probable sexual pervert. He knew she could have so much more, and despite his intense desire to have her there with him, to talk to her, to laugh with her, to look at her as she breathed, ate, smiled, cried, thought—he had to do what was right. His feelings for her were wrong—for the first time, he had admitted them to himself. Now there was only the matter of getting her ready for the rest of her life, a life that wouldn't need him at its center. Tammy finally exited the bathroom, looking fairly composed despite the redness of her eyes. "OK, Max," she said with an air of acceptance. "I won't bother you. Let me crash here for a while, and I'll get a job and an apartment or something." Max could have left it at that, but his resolve was much shakier than he knew. She just looked so...wounded. His overriding wish was to scoop her up in his arms and tell her that he loved her, more than she could ever know. Instead, he fell back on something he knew she'd like. "Hey, you want a drink?" Tammy's eyes lit up. "You really are a bad influence," she said impishly. "What's on tap?" "Beer?" he asked, taking her expression literally. "Just a few stouts. But I was thinking maybe a 7 and 7." Tammy decided to bluff, hoping he wasn't going to serve her some foul concoction. "Yeah, that sounds great." She was relived to see the liquor pour out clear, and the drink was refreshing and pretty good. "Do you do this a lot?" she asked. "Get hammered by yourself?" Almost immediately she regretted asking the question. Max looked ashamed. "Maybe. I mean, I don't miss work the next day or anything. It's just...something to do." "No, sorry, it's none of my business," Tammy responded apologetically. Brother and sister sipped their drinks in silence for a few minutes, the alcohol slowly washing over them. Max was the first to break the uneasy silence. "Do you want to talk about tonight at all? Like, tell me what happened?" Tammy frowned and then began to fidget, almost imperceptibly, as if pulled by invisible strings. "Not really. They're talking about fucking Haldol again. That's for, like, actual fucking lunatics," she said, clearly agitated. "And I'm not crazy." Around anyone else, Tammy would be terrified to let herself get so emotional. She was always on guard to avoid acting "crazy," but with Max she knew she could let herself unwind a bit. Constantly repressing anything that might look crazy was enough to drive her crazy in itself. "Christ, Tammy, you were right to get out," he said, sighing heavily. "I know, right? Like, Mom is the one who needs to be doped. I just need to talk to you when I get freaked. You make me feel better," she said, her voice growing calmer as she spoke. "I mean, I'm not seeing imaginary shit, Baxter hasn't told me to kill anybody, and I'm going to do anything stupid like slit my wrists." Time seemed to slow. Tammy saw, with evident horror, how Max's expression transformed, from solicitous and engaged, to vacant and taciturn. She wanted to ask him what was wrong, but some unknown force within held her tongue. Her mouth was suddenly dry, and she felt uncomfortably warm. "Yeah," he said, finally breaking a silence that seemed to have stretched on forever. "That would be stupid." Max downed what remained of his drink but made no effort to refill his glass. He hovered for a moment, torn between saying something, anything, to her and leaving the room, to be alone. In his indecision, he merely froze in place, uncommunicative and immobile, a great figure of stone, while Tammy stared at him with fear and a kind of searching scrutiny. First, her lip began to quiver. Tammy knew she was going to cry only a moment before she began. Fuck being a girl, she thought. I'm so sick of crying. So many anomalous pieces from her past were starting to make sense, though. "Fucking camp," she said between the sobs. Max, normally moved by the sight of his sister in distress, had emotionally locked down. He offered no response to Tammy's cryptic statement. "You were supposed to be in fucking camp. Those goddamn lying...what...how? I mean, why?" Tammy expected no response from Max. She thought he had disappeared, vanished into the walled-off fortress of his mind. But he was still there, hurt, confused, but processing nonetheless. "I took pills," he responded in a voice barely above a whisper. "Enough. Dad found me before it was too late. They took me to the hospital, and then they took me away for a couple of weeks." Tammy thought back to those days, in the immediate aftermath of the death of their brother, Jeff, a year younger than Max and by everyone's agreement the family favorite. She remembered, even at her young age, being immensely confused that Max would go away to camp only weeks after their brother's death. She had been so mad at him; first, he had been distant and withdrawn, then he vanished for weeks when she needed him most. Tammy might have held that abandonment against Max forever, had he not returned in the way he did. Once he had come back from camp, he was a new person. He had always been the raincloud to Jeff's sunshine, a good friend and brother but always perpetually morose. Something about being away changed him, though; he came back so...full of life. He had taken her everywhere, relished in spending time with her. For once, she had someone to share her secrets, take her side in the running war she had fought with her parents for as long as she could remember. Tammy had held on to those six months, their time together before Max left for college, when she was only thirteen, as the greatest time of her life. "Why?" Max paused, his eyes now rimmed with tears of his own. "Because I wanted to go wherever Jeff went," he said, taking a long pause, "and because I've hated being alive for as long as I can remember." Tammy's heart sunk. Max had always been her hero; even his chronic depression had always seemed like a kind of jaded wisdom gleaned from not falling for the bullshit that made up far too much of daily life. She never thought of depression as pain, something so bad that going on living seemed unbearable. "But when you came back—" "I realized that I didn't want to die," he interjected, "but...I needed help. So I latched on to you, because Mom and Dad couldn't stop looking at me like a mental case. They never told you, so I could be around you and not have to feel...ashamed all the time. Then I went to school, met Emily, and she didn't know. And even though I guess I never really loved her, I mean, really, deep down, it was just...better that she was there." Though it had hurt her immeasurably when Max went away to college, holding onto those memories had kept Tammy sane. Now she knew that she didn't need Max to protect her from the world—she needed to protect him, most of all from himself. Given her own experiences, though, she knew instinctively not to make him feel like a freak or a reject because of his struggles. Her brother needed her, and she knew how to help him. "Max, listen to me," she said, her voice ringing with confidence. "I'm going to be your roommate. I need your help, but you need me too. I'll help you forget about Emily, and you'll help me get away from Mom and Dad. Deal?" Tammy expected Max to relent, but he only frowned. "Tammy, you've got to believe me. I really would love for you to live here. But...it's complicated. I've thought a lot about it, and I just don't think it's right for you." Max had shared his old secret, but he wasn't ready to share his new secret. While Tammy had crystalline memories of Max, practically as an adult, to draw from, Max's memories of Tammy were of a young girl, scarcely recognizable as the burgeoning woman sitting before him. In his long semi-absence, Tammy had become more beautiful than he could imagine; he wondered if others saw what he saw. She seemed unlucky in love, which Max could never understand. What he was certain of, though, was that he had fallen hopelessly in love with his sister, and that, consequently, she should stay as far away from him as she could. Living with him would either lead to something very wrong between them or simply cause him unremitting daily torture to watch her without being able to touch her. "Max, I know I don't have the right to tell you this," she said, almost smirking, "but—fuck it, I'm totally claiming the right: you're gonna let me live here. So deal with it, dude." She isn't taking this seriously, he thought, before remembering that she couldn't know what he was feeling. She herself would never have such feelings, he believed. Yet he wanted to say "yes" so badly, even though he couldn't. He searched for excuses. "You won't make friends if you don't live on campus," he said, instantly cognizant of the weakness of his objection. Tammy rolled her eyes, brushing her fingers through her blonde locks. "Number one: yes I will. Number two: don't care anyway. You gotta have something better than that." "OK, well, Mom and Dad won't kick you in rent money if you live here. The last thing they want is for us to team up against them like we did when we were kids. You saw the way they were tonight." Tammy smiled. "I've got months before school. I'll save up my money, and I'll do so much work around here that you'll never want me gone. I'll be like your domestic slave." Max took a deep breath, which Tammy interpreted as incredulity. She couldn't have intended to set his mind racing with her words. "It'll be weird for you trying to date," he said, reaching for what he hoped was his best argument. "I mean, living with your brother." Tammy shot him a shrewd look. "You mean I'll cramp your style. Brother, you can bang all the undergrad sluts you want here. I'll totally cross-stitch you some pillows that say 'Pussy Palace' on them for the couch. Mom taught me how years ago." Max blushed. She had a way of getting under his skin. "No seriously! Don't you want a boyfriend?" he asked. Tammy dropped her smile. She wanted Max to really hear what she was about to say. "To be honest with you, no. I hate it—I mean, you know, sex. It sucks. At least, it does for me. Maybe there's something wrong with me, but it always—hey, this isn't too weird, is it?" Max wanted to scream from the rafters: "Yes! This is too weird! Because I want you!" Instead, he decided it was more important to be a good listener. "No way, Tammy," he reassured her. "You can tell me anything." Tammy paused for a moment, screwing her mouth up to the side as if she was a cartoon character concocting a devious plan. "Let's drop this Tammy shit. You remember my real name, right?" Max didn't miss a beat. "Tell me all about the inadequacy of your lovers, Joelle. I'm practically agog at such incompetent cocksmanship," he said in a faux sophisticated accent. Tammy burst out laughing. "Cocksmanship? That's the worst word of all time," she said giggling. "And why do you assume it was their fault?" Max, for once, could draw on one of the few forms of social superiority he had over his pretty, outgoing (if often misunderstood) sister: actual long-term relationship experience. "Because inexperienced girls hook up with inexperienced boys, who suck in bed, but don't know it, and then girls blame themselves for not liking it. And the only way to actually satisfy a woman—and might I add that this is the weirdest conversation ever—is to learn how her body works and to give a shit about making her...I'm going to go with 'climax,' or this will get too weird to go on." Tammy started to giggle like a schoolgirl hearing dirty words for the first time. She had not expected the conversation to take this turn. "Can I continue?" Max asked with mock petulance. Tammy nodded, afraid to speak for fear of bursting into open laughter. "So, my assumption is that you're not hideously and improbably deformed, incapable of enjoying sex. No, chances are you just hooked up with gawky teenage wannabe Lotharios, who wouldn't know where the clitoris was if you gave them GPS coordinates. I guess I'm saying that the second you have sex with a guy who actually cares about you and knows what he's doing, all this 'down-with-sex' talk will fly right out the window." In the middle of Max's rant, Tammy found herself shifting from nervous tittering to something like awestruck attention. In her heart, she knew he was probably right. She felt a sudden, weird twinge in thinking that Max was, like, some kind of sex expert. Sexpert? He had been in a long relationship, at least long by her standards. He'd undoubtedly had sex way more times than her. Had he been with lots of other women too? Not just Emily? Tammy had a strange thought: she really hated those women. Those hypothetical, possibly non-existent, but probably-in-fact-existent-because-I-mean-come-on-Max-is-a-good-looking-guy-with-a-job-so-he's-probably-totally-boned-some-college-sluts women. And Tammy felt strange for that thought too, but when she looked up at Max again, she felt a little unsure of herself. There they were, both drinking, talking about sex, and suddenly he'd gotten this weird upper-hand. She was jealous of his hypothetical hook-ups, jealous of his certainly real ex-girlfriend. In all fairness, Tammy thought, Emily's way prettier than me in, like, an objective sense. Tammy was also suddenly confronted with the reality that she had, if only for a split second, wondered if her brother could make her come where no other guy had done so. Tammy, not yet consumed by lust, but at least now curious about Max in a whole new way, sat only a foot or so away from her brother, who had come to accept his complete love and devotion to his sister, though that love was doomed and impossible, making it, of course, purer than any real love could be. And that was when Max kissed her. And after that kiss, which wasn't long, but was long enough for both of them to enjoy a moment of pure, irresponsible pleasure and unbridled joy before hurtling at terminal velocity back towards the earth, Tammy realized that something terrible had just happened, and that her dreams were shattered, because she couldn't live with Max, and couldn't make him whole again, because she was crazy, just like her mother said, because only crazy people want to kiss their brother, or take off his clothes, or try to find out if he could be the man that made sex the passionate, magical thing that everyone said it was supposed to be, instead of the embarrassing, awkward, unfulfilling disappointment that it had always been for her. And Max only felt heartbroken when Tammy started blubbering and stammering and making up excuses to leave. And when she left, he thought he would maybe never see her again, and he wondered if he could live with himself. And as she ran, Tammy wondered if she had just made the worst decision of her life, and she felt so ashamed and so guilty that she knew she'd die if she tried to go back to Max's place and talk about what happened. *** Tammy didn't recognize the number on her phone, and usually that meant she wouldn't answer it. This time, though, she answered. She'd started to do that lately. "Is this Tamara Belsham?" asked an annoyed, wheezing voice on the other end of the line. "Yes, can I ask who this is?" "Ma'am, I'm the manager at the Target at Pemberton Ridge Pavilion. I believe we have your brother here, and he's very...agitated. We need to know if you can pick him up, or if we should have the police escort hi—" "I'll be right there," she interjected. "Just give me time, I need to get a cab." On the way over to pick up Max, Tammy felt a crushing sense of guilt. She imagined the horror story awaiting her: rejected by her, Max had slipped into a growing psychosis. Now he was a raving lunatic, unhinged, wandering the strip malls and office parks of their suburban wasteland landscape. She would have to check him into a facility, then check herself in right after. Shit, she thought, this cab ride is going to wipe me out, too. The manager was more concerned than angry. The store security had caught Max shoplifting, only when they stopped him, he seemed, not belligerent or evasive, but utterly confused and uncertain of who or where he was. He only babbled, semi-coherently, her name and number, repeated like the mantra of some madman. Tammy feared the worst. She agreed to take her brother home, and the manager graciously agreed not to press charges. Finally, she got to see Max. He didn't look particularly...unhinged. In fact, he looked pretty hinged. He was running his fingers constantly through his hair—in imitation of her? Once they were outside, Max whispered, out of earshot from any store personnel. "I wasn't sure that was going to work." Tammy had to work hard to suppress a gasp. "Did you fake being crazy to get out a shoplifting arrest?" she said, in a whispered shout. Max shushed her. It wasn't until they were in his car (Thank god no cab fare home, she thought) that he finally answered her. "No faking required," he said in an even tone. "I am crazy, remember?" Tammy felt like her body was plugged into an electrical socket. Max had taken her utterly by surprise. In an instant, she knew just what to say. "Then we can be crazy buddies together." Both of them wanted to pour their hearts out, to apologize to each other. The car, though, just didn't seem like the place. "So you suck at this, huh?" she asked. Max grinned. "You just think that because I got caught. I've gotten pretty good in the last few months." Crazy Together Tammy was surprised. He had started to shoplift, it seemed, soon after she had stormed out of his apartment, scared off by their kiss. "Well, it's juvenile teenage rebellion," she said, imitating their mother. "I've got a few choice books waiting for you at home in my library for parenting shitty kids." Tammy felt strange. She was driving Max's car, back to his place. She hadn't asked, nor was she scared to be alone with him. Max turned the radio to her favorite station, and Tammy allowed herself a brief moment of gazing at his hands, his long, slender fingers, which had once played piano for her as a little girl. His arms had held her when she fell down and skinned her knee trying to climb the old tree behind their grandmother's house. She'd ridden on those shoulders before. What would my ankles look like up there? Tammy realized that Max was the bravest person she'd ever known. He'd kissed her—he'd put himself out there, admitted his feelings and acted on them, when she was too afraid too. She had only run away like a coward. She'd replayed that night in her head every day since she'd left, with different outcomes. Sometimes, she just imagined a soft kiss, a sharing of chaste, tender love. Other times, though, when she was alone at night, she let her mind wander to the other possibilities, and she touched herself the way she wanted her brother to touch her. She never found it easy to climax, even by herself, but those fantasies always put her body in a state of intense arousal. The shame of such feelings was almost absent, though, because she knew she wasn't alone, wasn't crazy: Max felt it too. When they got home—our home? she asked herself—Max was the first to speak. "So...I've got a confession to make," he said. Tammy's whole body tensed with frenetic energy; she had a secret now, and keeping it in was too much. "Spill," she said, her legs tapping like they had that first night, when the shoe had been on the other foot. "I've been doing this for months now," he said, "shoplifting, I mean. And I figured that when I got caught, then that was the time to call you again." "It's a little...poetic, don't you think?" she asked. "It's probably lame," he replied, "but I just wanted to see you again, to tell you I'm sorry." Tammy wished she was bold enough to drop the pretense, to proclaim her love for him, but she wasn't. He looked so handsome tonight, clean-shaven, with his prominent jaw and crisp, dark hair. She couldn't speak unless she was sure of his feelings, so she let him continue. "I...I let things get out of hand. I fucked up bad, and I get why you ran away. I won't do anything like that again. I just don't want you to feel weird around me and stay away." "Like you did before?" she asked. Max felt guilty. "Yeah. Like me. If you want to live here, you totally can. No rent or anything. Just...don't hold one stupid thing against me." Tammy didn't plan to toy with him, at least not directly. But she wanted to press him, because deep down, she knew he wouldn't lie to her. "...because you're never going to do it again?" "Right." "...because you don't really see me that way. I mean, like a girl—a woman?" Max started to sweat a bit. "Yes—I mean, no. What I...I won't do anything, you know, like that, again, because....because I have more self-control than that." Tammy smiled. She had him right where she wanted him. "And what do you need self-control for?" Max realized he'd said too much already. "Because...Tammy—" "Who's Tammy?" she asked playfully. Max searched her eyes, trying to discover the purpose of the game she was playing with him. "My sister," he said. "She looks a lot like you, Joelle." Tammy smiled. He was playing back now. "She must be very beautiful," she said. "What do you like most about her?" Max paused. She was baiting him. What could he say? Something lame and innocuous? Something sexy and wrong? Did he want to wriggle out of this situation, or was something happening here that was out of his control? "I like everything about her," he replied. "Mostly, I like that when I'm with her, I feel more alive than I ever have before." Tammy's eyes widened. "That and her tits," Max said, shocked at his own cheekiness. Tammy had planned to string this game out, to make Max profess his undying love for her in full before she ever let on that she had finally accepted her own feelings for him. Suddenly, the game, designed as it was to allay her fears of rejection, seemed unimportant. "Max," she said, coming in close to him. "I want you. Now." She took his hands in hers and guided them to her breasts. A moment passed, where everything could have been shrugged off as a joke. They looked into each others' eyes, a look of complicity, longing, and lust. While both had come, begrudgingly at first, to accept that they harbored romantic feelings for one another, they now confronted the reality of their desire, physical and emotional at the same time, to have each other, to feel pleasure and to give it, to act on the things they had both only imagined alone in the dark. Max moved to speak, but Tammy touched his lips with her finger. She felt Max's warm tongue reach out, pulling her finger into his mouth. It was such an intimate, erotic act to someone like her, who only knew sex as a joyless, hurried experience. Max pulled her in close, and when she withdrew her finger, she allowed her hand to trace his chest, until she reached his belt. When they kissed, for the second time, she felt her lingering fears and doubts fade away. This was right. This was where she belonged. His tongue explored her mouth, dancing with her own. Her neck burned, ever so slightly, as she had to crane her head upwards to meet his mouth. She suddenly wished they were on a bed, though that could come soon enough. Max turned off that part of his brain that normally held control. It didn't go away though, only became a passenger. It watched and listened, but didn't speak. It raised no objection when his hands cupped his sister's round, toned ass, squeezing her provocatively. It didn't warn him about trying to take off her top, and never told him he was moving too fast, that this was all still just as wrong now as it was before, that this was his sister stroking his cock in his pants. Tammy was glad that Max helped her to slow down. She felt so rushed, as if she would wake up from an impossibly perfect dream, and wanted it reach the good part before her slumber ended. Max, though, never seemed hurried. His touch, the way he carefully removed her bra, letting her heavy, soft breasts hang free before him, the way he kissed down her neck, the way he guided her with a simple hand on her back to the sofa: all of it was cool, tender, as if he was savoring every moment and not simply rushing towards some pre-determined end. Yet he wasn't distant or dispassionate. His eyes burned for her, and she knew she had aroused him fiercely. He was a cold-burning flame, but he burned for her nonetheless. He felt stronger than she had expected, and she felt small and fragile in his arms, even as he reveled in her strong, firm thighs and the ripples of sinewy muscle in her back. She didn't think about the things that had always ruined moments like this in the past, didn't worry about if her neck looked too chunky, or if her ankles were too thick. For his part, Max felt a confidence that normally eluded him: he knew he could make this moment perfect for her. He would make her feel better than she ever had before, and she would love him for it. Tammy gasped when Max took her nipple into his mouth, and her typical nervous energy was amplified immensely. Her body squirmed beneath his, as Max slowly peeled off her last remaining shred of clothing. He thrilled in feeling her pussy already wet for him, and she delighted in the cool air enveloping her sex. Kissing his way down her body, he rose up slightly, so that he could take in the sight of her feminine flower. She was so lovely that he felt a small pang: he didn't deserve her. For only a moment, the conscious, worrying part of his mind wrested control once more. Was he taking advantage of her? Was he ruining her life? For once, pure lust saved him. He dove in between her shapely thighs, his tongue dancing its way across her slit. She shuddered with pleasure, and he returned to his blissful state of sexual trance. The only thing that mattered at that moment was bringing the gorgeous woman laid out before him to a state of ecstatic joy. Even his own throbbing cock ceased to concern him. She had to come first. Tammy had never felt anything like this before. She'd had a guy go down on her, of course, but never had anyone so worshiped her body, made her feel both owner and owned, lover and loved, with no thought of anything else in the world. Max's tongue was working some kind of magic on her, while his hand caressed her hips and stomach. She felt like a woman for the first time, in love with a man. Even if she could speak, words seemed unnecessary. Only sensations mattered. Max had avoided her clit thus far, hoping to gradually build up her arousal to a point of complete abandonment. When he began, teasingly at first and only slowly more insistently, to stroke her engorged bud with his soft, wet tongue, he felt a tension, a good kind of tension, build inside her. Her muscles seemed to contract, and he could tell, without seeing it, that his sister was rolling her head back and forth, her hands stroking her hair as she loved to do. He reached his hands as far as he could and took hold of her nipples, pinching and rolling them firmly with his fingers. This was enough to drive her over the edge. What came out of Tammy's mouth was a sound of pure physical ecstasy, as if she tried to tell him how she felt about him, all at once, words blending incomprehensibly into a cry of absolute bliss and sexual release. Max didn't stop stroking her until he knew her orgasm had subsided; when he looked up at her, his face glistening with her nectar, her eyes looked lost in a sea of lust and devotion. "That was..." the whispered, out of breath, "...crazy. I feel crazy—but...good crazy." Max stroked the inside of her thighs, themselves slick with juices. "Will you kiss me?" he asked, aware some women don't like tasting themselves. Tammy didn't give that a moment's thought. She tugged at him, until he was beside her on the sofa, and she brought him in for a passionate kiss. She didn't recoil, tasting herself for the first time: in fact, she decided it was actually nice to taste what he tasted. Her lust and desire momentarily sated, she felt like it was the time to explain herself, her disappearing act after he had kissed her. "Max?" Max held her close, stroking her back and butt. "Yeah?" "I'm so sorry. About before." "You don't have to apologize. I love you." "No, I do. It's just...guys treat me like a piece of ass. And...I didn't want it to be like that with you." "Like I said, I love you," he replied, with a heavy heart for the pain she had felt before. "Max, are we crazy? Is this crazy?" Max paused for a moment, though his hands never ceased to caress her curves. "Yes," he said in a whisper. "But I don't care." It was exactly what she needed to hear. "OK" Tammy reached down to unbuckle Max's belt. She had almost forgotten that his pants hadn't come off yet. "Don't be disappointed," he said. Tammy stripped him and took hold of his cock. It was the perfect size, she thought, and best of all, it was rock hard for her. She stroked it lightly. "I don't want to give you a blowjob," she said. "I mean, not just that. I want to feel you inside me. So, don't come. Please." It was Tammy's turn to lower herself down off the couch, onto the floor, where she took her position between his long, hairy legs. She stared for a moment at his cock, proudly, almost painfully erect in her soft fingers, and his balls, covered in dark hair. Max had made her feel so good—the least she could do was return the favor. Max was about to tell his sister that she didn't have to do this when she took one of his balls into her mouth, rolling it around with her tongue. Meanwhile, her hands stroked his shaft, and after a minute she shifted her attentions to his other testicle. To see his beautiful sister, lavishing his cock and balls with attention, was like having an unreal sexual fantasy come to life. Wordlessly, she took his ball out of her mouth and plunged her mouth over the head of his cock. Though he knew this was all simply a prelude, he couldn't help but imagine what it would be like to spray his seed into his sister's inviting mouth, to release what would unquestionably be a massive load of cum down her throat. The sensations he felt, combined with the exquisite torture of watching her bob her pretty head up and down at his crotch were all too much. "You gotta stop," he said, "before I come." Tammy smiled up at him. "I'm that good, huh?" Max heard a voice speak; surely it wasn't his own, though he had no idea from where it arose: "Ride my cock, right now!" Tammy was startled to hear her brother take charge like that, though the dripping from her pussy made it clear that she liked it. "Yes, sir!" she purred. It wasn't hard to get him inside her. She only wished she was more flexible, because straddling him on the sofa meant that she couldn't get him all the way inside. Still, the feeling of his cock as it slowly spread her well-lubed pussy and his firm hands squeezing her ass cheeks was an indescribable feeling. She looked down at him, as he stared, seemingly mesmerized, by her full, luscious tits in his face. She watched him, as if from a distance, as he licked and sucked at her breasts like a madman. She had never seen—could never imagine—Max so visceral, so physical and raw. She wanted him to use her, to take her for himself. If she could make him like this, frenzied with lust, then she would always know he'd love her. "Fuck me, Max," she begged. "Fuck me hard!" Tammy wasn't prepared for what happened next, though. With a strength she couldn't believe he possessed, Max lifted her off the sofa, still impaled on his cock and all but threw her down. Without a moment to pause, he dove back on top of her and shoved his cock back into her cunt, pumping away furiously. Then she felt a hand reach across her stomach, until it rested flat along her mons. Though he looked lost in blind, unthinking lust, Max retained his wits enough to know that she would feel things on another level if he stimulated her clit, too. When she felt his thumb began to circle the very top of her clit, then stroke it up and down, she thought she had found heaven on earth. Her low moans suddenly became high pitched cries, and she began to babble, calling out Max's name over and over again. Sweat cascaded off his forehead as he slapped his pelvis hard against hers, a note of pain mingling with the overwhelming pleasure she felt. She'd always been quiet during sex, afraid to say the wrong thing, to kill the mood. Now she wanted to urge Max on. "Don't...stop...fucking me...ever." Max smiled down at her, his facing unclenching to seem almost normal. "Never," he said breathlessly, before bending down to kiss her. Their lips pressed together, mouths open in passionate embrace, Tammy began to rock her hips against his, their animalistic fury giving way as if by mutual desire to a slower, more sensual rhythm. "Come inside me Max," she whispered. "I want to feel it." He redoubled his efforts on her clit, and she found that the slower pace, combined with his expert fingers, was bringing her quickly to the point of ecstasy once more. "I'm...oh god...I'm coming," she cried out. Max felt a swell of pride for bringing her to orgasm again. "Come for me baby. Come on my dick," he urged her. He had only a moment before her clenching, velvet-soft pussy pushed him to his limit as well. He had no time to warn her or call out—suddenly, he was filling her with spurt after spurt of warm cum from his twitching, aching cock. Tammy had never had sex without a condom before, and the feeling of a man coming inside her was thrilling. Knowing that that man loved her intensely, almost dangerously, made it all the more meaningful. She never wanted him to leave. She wanted that cock to belong to her now, to make her feel like this always. She'd have it every way she wanted, and all it would take was to offer her body, mind, and soul to Max. It would be perfect. After a few moments of wordless bliss, though, Max withdrew from her. She felt empty, but fulfilled. He was right, of course: all that anti-sex shit was out the window. "Joelle?" She looked into his eyes. "It's Tammy." "Are you sure?" She paused. No use in holding back. "Max, I'm your sister. You're my brother, and I'm in love with you. We both know this won't be the last time. God, I didn't know the first time would be so good." Max rolled her over, playfully, to her side, to spoon her. She could feel his wet, sticky cock pressed against her backside, as his arms enveloped her across her breasts. "Tammy, I was so scared of this, even though I wanted it so bad. I just...I'm terrified that I'll hurt you." "You will," she said. "I get hurt a lot. But I'll heal. I won't break. I'll hurt you, too, even if you'd rather die than admit it." Max felt a kind of weightless calm, a feeling he knew couldn't last forever. It was strange talking to her like this, her facing away from him, but somehow it made it easier to say what had to be said. "Relationships are hard." "So's your cock," she laughed. "Still." "Yeah," he said dreamily. "But that's your fault." "I won't freak out on you," she said. "I mean, I know what you're like. And I won't let you pull that drifting away shit either. But I get it. I don't want some make-believe version of you. You're enough for me just the way you are." "It's all a little fucked, though, right?" "Totally," she laughed, "a lot fucked." "But that's OK?" "Better than OK," she said thoughtfully. "It's as crazy as we are." Max didn't feel crazy. He didn't feel depressed. In fact, he had only felt like this once before in his life: when he woke up in the hospital, alive, and realized that he was happy to still be there. Then, his joy came from merely continuing to live and breathe; now, it was all because of his sister. "Tammy—this is it." He didn't expect her to understand him; it was all to set-up his next line. She surprised him. "I know," she said with a smile. "I told you I'd find the real you." Whatever was in store for them, Max knew that he'd found something—someone—worth living for. He still harbored doubts and fears, but they were about himself. Could he make her happy? Would he hold her back or lift her up? Somehow, not knowing the answers was itself a kind of pleasure. The future felt so open. "I don't deserve you," he whispered in her ear. "I know," she said jokingly, "but here I am. I'm yours." Unlike Max, Tammy felt no fear or doubt. In time they would return; life couldn't go on as perfect as this. Ugly realities would intrude. They'd fight, second guess themselves, wonder what their lives were supposed to be about. But that was called being human. What mattered to her then was that she'd turned the page on a long, dark chapter of her life. Wrapped in Max's arms and still intoxicated by their lovemaking, Tammy knew, as if she was remembering something she'd forgotten, that life was more than avoiding pain, running away from the bad. She was going to chase her happiness, and she wouldn't have to do it alone. I'm his.