My Brother's Keeper Ch. 01

Suddenly everybody was laughing, laughing and I didn't know why. Of course, it wasn't long before I looked down to where everyone was pointing, to my feet. To where Jean Marie lay passed out and content—or at least as content as the unconscious could be. I didn't know what to do at that, all I could do was to look at her, to watch her as she slept, if sleep is what you could call it. I could feel the heat in my face grow hotter with every passing second, my heart swelling in my chest and rising as a hearty lump in my throat as I felt her shift and move. Her arms were around my ankle, hugging my leg tight as she could as she cuddled up to it in sleep. "What—what do I--?"

"Take 'er home!" laughed the girl at Candie's feet, shaking her head as she reached back for another beer.

The boy at Jean Marie's side chuckled some as he gave a nudge to her thigh, as if to test the depth of her unconsciousness. "Never could hold her liquor..."

"Never could catch up, either," laughed the thick guy as he guzzled the last half of what he had and belched loud and clear, tossing the empty bottle back and over his shoulder.

"Hey now!" It was the voice of my sister, drunk as she was herself, she still managed a rational thought or two. "Give her some credit 'cuz she can hang!" She hiccuped, grinning. "It's been a while since she's made it this far--,"

"Which is to say, 'at least she's not flung over the tub like before'!" laughed the guy at the other girl's side.

Frowning, Candie kicked him from behind, making him wince, while the other girl pinched his arm and made him yelp. The poor bastard, he deserved it.

"Jack ass," Candie scoffed, smiling only lightly as she lift her eyes to me. "Sucks that you came out here," she began. She shrugged. "But I guess it's all good, 'cuz she needs to be taken' back to the house."

"I'll take her," said the boy at Jean Marie's side with a smirk, his hand already on her bare thigh, giving it a pat as he talked.

He couldn't see me, but I scowled at him, hoping with every passing minute that he would turn around and would see just how much I hated him. It wasn't right, the way he touched her. But then, who was I to say, really, if it was right or wrong? I mean, these were the people that she was always with, the people that she trusted—that my sister trusted. And if they trusted these guys... Besides, they were older, all of them. And who was an eighteen-year-old to tell the legal adults what they could and couldn't do?

"Fuck that!" my sister blurted, shaking her head and frowning. "I trust you drunkards with her about as far as I could throw you!" She shook her head again, looking up to me. "Besides, we're staying at my mom's, and I'll be damned if I get kicked out for the night because I let one of you jerk-offs take advantage of my best friend in my mother's house!"

"I thought I was your best friend!?" joked the guy at my sister's feet, only to get kicked again. "Ow!"

With her chin, Candie gestured back to me. "Sean'll take her home. Him I can trust with Jean Marie."

Around the fire everyone fell silent, and they all looked back to me for a second time. I was feeling that heat again, even more as it raced through my heart and coursed through my veins. It was like wildfire in the way that it spread. And I liked it. "Take her home?" I asked, shifting my jaw and gnashing my teeth, anything in the hopes of hiding from everyone's eyes the feeling—whatever it was—that I felt.

Candie nodded. "You can do that, can't you?" she asked me, her voice sober. Though, really, it was more of a challenger or demand.

"Y—yeah..." I stammered. "Yeah, I guess so."

"Fuck that!" the thick guy yelled as he jumped to his feet. "I don't want his juvenile hands all over my girl!"

"Fuck you!" Candie barked back. "First off, pencil-dick, she isn't your girl. She's mine!"

Looking at my sister, I smiled, doing all that I could not to laugh. I couldn't help it. I'd never heard her outright lay claim to Jean Marie in any way, shape, or form. So this, to me, was amusing. But then, my sister always was the amusing type. She nodded to me then, gesturing for me to pick up Jean Marie.

"Secondly," Candie went on. "You're a drunk, sick, fuck who doesn't know one head from the other, and I won't let you fuck me over by trying to fuck Jean Marie once the two of you are out of earshot!"

The guy at Jean Marie's side helped me to lift her onto her feet, though that didn't last long in the least. He caught her as she stumbled back, holding her as I turned my back to the both of them. Looking back, I nodded for him to lift her onto my back, and he did. They all might have laughed as I did it, but I had my reasons. Anyone who had ever walked a path through any woods that weren't part of a public park knows that the paths are none to wide, more often than not just barely wide enough for one, much less one carrying another, in their arms.