Siblings Strip Away Past Notions (Remade)

Running her eyes over her own body, Wendy observed the sea of flesh she had chosen to display. Clothing always looked less substantial when wet. As much as she told herself the swimsuit was a tool in her war of attrition against her brother, she couldn't deny how much of a rush it was to wear it. After being raised in a conservative household, she had felt so liberated freshman year when wearing camisoles to parties. Now she had the confidence to wear a beautiful swimsuit in public and show off her natural form. It was empowering. Even in the morning, when she had been studying by the pool alone, it had felt empowering. The sneaky, lusty glances she was now being bombarded with simply acted as a constant reminder.

And to think James told her to cover up. She was hellbent on mending their relationship, and he was only willing to let that happen at the expense of her dignity — her independence. Were there other ways she could have handled this situation? Ones involving more communication, empathy, and clothes? Almost certainly. But that wasn't what Wendy wanted. She wanted to be angry at James. She wanted to hate him. She hated how he judged her, how he looked at her, how he hurt her in front of his friends, how he ignored her for years... She wanted to hate him because he hated her, and he never told her why.

Just as she looked over at him again, she saw his nostrils flare from a single, exasperated breath. Ugh! I can't believe I was excited to see you! I can't believe I thought you moving in here would be a good idea!

Treading water opposite her was James, who was only visible from his sun-freckled shoulders on up. Under the surface, he was clenched in rage. He still didn't understand his sister's mind game. She knew his friends were infatuated by her, and she was not only tolerating it but encouraging it. She wasn't showing any serious interest in them, but she certainly seemed fine inciting their interest in her. James felt like his brain was about to explode.

His sister had always been beautiful, and after high school, she had become more... developed? It wasn't like James was blind. He, along with every person in sight, could see his sister's features. While James was never thrilled about it, he had spent years shrugging off friends and foes alike as they commented on his "hot" sister, flirted with her in front of him, and sometimes even took her on dates. James's attitude had always been that if Wendy didn't have a problem, he didn't have a problem. And his problem was never with her.

Now, though, with each passing glance by a friend, and with each second of his sister's flirtatious indifference, James grew more livid. In their years apart, his resentment for her had only grown, and their relationship was thoroughly damaged. Why did Wendy believe she could waltz back into his life and immediately become friends again? And why did she feel entitled to his friends, too? She was supposed to be the intelligent and wise one, yet here she was waging psychological warfare against him and destroying his dynamic with his friends, all because he didn't accept her in a little over a week.

"No, some of the dishes had little spots on them." "They did not." "Yeah, they did. You haven't unloaded it yet, so you don't know." "Dude, that's not what causes it, haha! Tell me I'm not wrong, Wendy."

"Mm-hmm."

"See! She knows it's not the..."

Wendy had been amused by three grown men arguing about how to load a dishwasher, but she had since become distracted by her little brother sinking to the bottom of the pool and floating back up again. She lowered her gold sunglasses over her eyes, allowing her to watch the oddity while pretending to listen to his roommates. It's official... he's losing his fucking mind, Wendy thought.

Bubbles popped on the surface and then stopped. James had been submerged for a while now, and a lump grew in Wendy's throat. She started to lean off the wall, her green eyes widened, and her chest rose. Then he popped back up, lackadaisically bobbing in the water while he sucked in air.

You fucking asshole! God!

"Harris, if your offer of a beer still stands, I'm going to go get one," Wendy announced. "James, you look like you need a drink. Does anybody else?" Three hands shot into the air, followed by a fourth from a random passerby. "Hah! I'll see if we have extra," Wendy chuckled at the thirty-something man, but he waved it off as a prank. "Alright, five it is then."

Despite her easygoing front, Wendy needed a moment to herself to slow her thoughts. She whirled around and hoisted herself up with the concrete ledge. Then she planted her knee on the deck and crawled to her feet.

To Wendy, she had simply gotten out of a pool. But to James, standing behind her, she had intentionally flexed her bare yoga butt between Austin and Harris's heads. James had no doubt they were watching how the clear droplets ran down her shiny cheeks and thighs as she walked off.

----

When they were left alone together, the four young men were awkward and quiet. James mentioned the intramural flag football team, knowing it would spark a spirited debate and make his friends feel like his friends again, like normal. But it wasn't long before Wendy returned, impressively holding five cans of beer against her body. James was surprised Luke didn't wistfully whisper, This is like a dream I had!

"...Did you not want a beer?"

James scowled with his peach-colored lips and reluctantly took the cold Bud Light from her extended hand, crinkling the metal as he did so. "That's one way to get a beer..."

Wendy tilted her head, seeing the strained lines in her brother's thick neck. His broad, clean-shaven chest was rising and falling dramatically in the water. Huh? What the fuck did I do...? What are you mad about now? I didn't... Oh... Oh my god, James! I got out of the pool to get you a beer! What did you want me to do, magically fly out? Even when I get you a beer, I'm still doing something wrong? Fuck you!

The fantasy of dumping the beer all over her brother's head and then holding him underwater until his thrashing arms finally fought her off, played in Wendy's mind. If she had wanted to live in an environment where she was judged and questioned for every decision, she would have moved back home with their parents. Cracking her can and swallowing half of it before pulling it from her lips, Wendy shrugged. Fine, keep it up, Jimbo...

"Thanks for the beer, by the way," Harris said. "Yeah, thanks." "Thank you," the others repeated.

"No problem. Thanks for letting me have one." Wendy then smiled brightly, melting the tension with her springy voice. "So, is tomorrow night still video game night? Or was that just a one-time thing?"

"Well..." James began.

"It can be tomorrow! You wanna do it again? We weren't sure if ya had fun or not. Honestly, you were better than we expected," Austin divulged.

"Well, I'm glad I wasn't as terrible as you all thought I'd be," Wendy snarked. The boys' laughter was even more satisfying after watching her brother be cut off by his excited friend. "And, yeah, I had fun. I actually gamed a lot in college... mainly, Call of Duty and Halo... some Grand Theft Auto. I got pretty good at those."

Wait, what? James's dense, brown eyebrow squiggled on his forehead.

"You played COD and Halo?! Jeez, where were you last year? We could never find who wanted to play shooters with us," Austin said.

"Hah! I bet!" Wendy tasted her sweet beer. "You gotta be quick. There aren't too many female gamers. They go fast."

"No doubt. The guys you gamed with were probably happy their game nights weren't always sausage fests."

"Well, again, I wasn't the one. A few girlfriends of mine gamed too. But, yeah, I was fine hanging with just the guys. Me coming over gave them a reason to clean their disgusting rooms, so it was more of a public service than anything." The roommates laughed.

"They were probably thinkin', Man, we finally found a girl who can play on our level, let's not screw this up!"

"Probably," Wendy cocked her tan shoulder. "Once guys find out how talented you are, they never leave you alone."

The sound of his friends' giggles faded, as James let his weightless head drift farther back until he had to close his eyes to the blinding sun. He floated with water covering his ears. The pool trip was supposed to be a dream, but it had turned into a nightmare. The jokes, the ogling, the flirting, the innuendos, the orange, the wetness, the butt, the tits, the tan, the ponytail, the shit-eating grin... everything was absurd, a parody of reality, and it wouldn't end. His sister simply wouldn't quit.

"Hey, Wen? I'm just curious... If you still have all those school friends, why do wanna hang with us by yourself?" James spoke in an off-the-cuff tone, looking casually into her reflective aviators. "Don't think it's a burden to bring your friends over. I'm sure by now you have tons of friends here at the complex too. It'd be sweet if you brought a couple people with you on Sunday to play with us. It'd be fun."

Austin, Luke, and Harris lit up at James's change of heart. He finally wanted his sister there, and to bring friends! Meanwhile, behind her tinted glasses, Wendy felt like she had been punched in the gut. The wind had been taken out of her sails. Her eyes were sober and her tongue was dry. She didn't know how, but her brother had figured her out and called her bluff.

She wasn't the hot commodity she billed herself out to be. She was a twenty-three-year-old workaholic. She had no friends at the complex. She had no social life. Her younger acquaintances on campus had even stopped inviting her to parties because she never showed. She only had former college friends spread across the state, and sometimes they'd visit for a weekend if she had the time. Her little brother and his three naive friends were her best shot as a social life any time soon, and he somehow sensed it. Was it really that obvious?

Fighting back tears and the weakness spreading to her fingertips, Wendy held her composure. "Well, nobody I know here games. I could invite school friends, it's just... eh No offense, but they would never drive out here for a video game night with us. They're kinda superficial when it comes to the guys they party with now. Like, they've been trying to get in with the frats lately, which is dumb. So, they wouldn't appreciate hanging with you guys like I do."

While his oblivious friends nodded as if they were watching a healthy sibling conversation, James couldn't help but smile. He was almost impressed by how she had wiggled out of his trap. "Don't get me wrong, Wen, I'm glad you like hanging with us. I just feel bad keeping you from all your friends on campus, especially on a weekend. You keep talking about how much you loved those theme parties. Wouldn't you rather be partying with that huge group of people than sitting in front of a TV with us?"

Wendy was staving off angry tears and, oddly enough, a grin as well. She bit her cheeks at his faint smirk. He was so pleased with his smart reply. Of course, Wendy still wanted to punch him, but she was almost impressed. Taking another swig of her beer, the can slipped as she pulled it from her lips, causing some to spill on her chest. Frantically, she brushed the suds off her tits with her fingers, making them gently jiggle. Through her golden lenses, she slyly watched her little brother's reaction, knowing his friends would be just as interested in the accident. If James thought he was clever enough to win this battle, he was wrong.

"I do miss those parties," Wendy finally said. "But they're not worth it anymore. Not with me living here, anyway. I'd have to drive over an hour just to get there and back. And for what? All so I can dance with my friends while horny undergrads try to push drinks on us, hoping we'd suddenly decide to let them rub their junk on us? No thank you."

The laughter from the roommates was a bit uneasy, as they were sometimes guilty of being those horny undergrads.

James smugly sipped his beer. "Yeah, I can see how that would be annoying. Some people can't read a room and realize how annoying they're being."

"Oh, absolutely. You would think, at some point, those guys would've realized if they just asked us to dance nicely, we probably would've told 'em to go for it. The whole Let's try to get the girl drunk first! routine was pretty cringe."

A flash of heat burned James's forehead and the tips of his ears. His composure collapsed like the house of cards it was, and he stared at the curves of Wendy's face, trying to see what was left of the sister he used to know. Nearly everything about her, from her work ethic to her speech to her peculiarities and mannerisms, was the same as always. She still tilted her head slightly whenever she smiled. Had she always been this confident and playful, but had just been stifled by their parents?

James surveyed her capable body, letting his pale green eyes fall below the shimmering surface to where the rounded sides of her hips met her thighs. She was suddenly transported to a dark house party, where loud music, flashing lights, and inflatable palm trees filled a furnished basement. Wendy was chatting and laughing with friends as she danced rhythmically in her skimpy, tiger orange swimwear. A horny guy walked up behind her and whispered in her ear, and she suggestively shrugged. The guy pressed his erection into her bare ass without her so much as flinching. James couldn't unsee his vision.

Wendy, meanwhile, was on her toes, surprised by what she had said to her brother's friends in front of her brother. You fucking broke his brain... she thought.

"Wait..." Harris drifted coolly against the wall next to her. "You're sayin', at parties, you just let any random dude walk up and dance with you if he asked?"

Luke followed, "And you'd just let him stay there? When we go out, if a girl's with her friends, she'll usually look at them if a guy starts dancing behind her, and then the friends will shake their heads yes or no. If it's a yes, the guy stays. If it's a no, then obviously, the girl pushes him away. The system makes sense. I'm just wondering if, like, you..." His nasal voice trailed off.

"If I know that move? Hell, yeah, hehe! As a woman, that move's a must-know. You have to remember, though, I mostly partied with my friend group, so things were a little different. There were maybe forty of us who partied together all the time, kinda like our own little frat. So, nobody was a total stranger, and we were pretty chill with each other and didn't like drama. So, yeah, if a guy worked up the courage to ask me to dance, I wasn't gonna turn him down cuz a cuter guy might come along. I could always talk to the cute guy later, hah! I just liked dancing for the fun of it." Wendy noticed James disappear under the water and tousle his hair, so she waited for him to resurface to quip, "I guess you can say, when I'm on the dancefloor, I believe in keeping a first-come-first-served booty."

Austin, Luke, and Harris split open and keeled over with squinting eyes. Wendy's easy and unpretentious laugh encouraged them further. She didn't take herself too seriously around friends, and the three guys seemed to love it. James, not as much.

Happy to leave on a high note, Wendy announced she had to go home to study. Looking at her defeated brother, she issued a satisfied smirk. You dummy... It didn't have to be this way.

Once she was sure all four sets of eyes were on her, Wendy grabbed the ledge of the pool and hoisted herself up slowly. Her knee touched the concrete, only for her to stop and glance back aloofly as she flicked a non-existent piece of debris from her left butt cheek. Then, with a flex of her glutes, she rose seductively to her feet, taking a moment to tug at and adjust the orange polyester around her hips, tailbone, and breasts. She then strutted away, leaving a trail of dripping water in her path.

----

The moment his sister reached her chaise lounge, James barged his way through the packed pool. He climbed over the edge and made a beeline for her, not even taking a second to appreciate the first breeze of the afternoon.

"That was quite a show."

Wendy said nothing.

"Hey, just a thought, maybe you can not flirt with my friends nonstop like a weirdo? Maybe you can find your own friends your own age to hang out with?"

He dripped quietly onto his sister's dove gray towel, hands on his hips. The nearby boombox was loud, but she could hear him. Still, she packed her tote in silence. When she finally moved in his direction and leaned down to take her towel from the chair, James stepped back to prepare for her to make another statement with her ass. But she merely began drying herself.

It was to the disappointment of many onlooking men that Wendy slid her jean shorts over her butt. "You're a slow learner."

"What?" That insult was a trigger for James, especially coming from her. "Me? I am?! Ahhh! Wen, do you not think I know exactly what you're doing? Ohhh, Harris, my one-square-inch swimsuit is a little loose, can you please make sure my boobs don't fall out? Hehe!" He growled. "You're trying to steal my friends and ruin my life!"

Wendy spun around. She was ready to call her brother out for admitting he looked at her boobs, but she stopped. That seemed weird. "Uh... Wait, did you just say I'm trying to 'steal' your friends from you? James, that's insane! I've been trying to spend time with you, it's just that your friends always happen to be there. What do you want me to do, treat them like garbage? Not get along with them? Seriously, things would've been fine if you didn't decide to be such an insecure and overprotective jerk."

"Oh, yeah? You think what you're doing is what getting along with my friends looks like?"

His sister rolled her neck and pinched the bridge of her nose. "You know what, James? You're right. You caught me. I'm doing all of this to ruin your life. No, none of this has anything to do with the fact I wanna be close to my brother again but he wants nothing to do with me. This is all just me trying to make you miserable. I'm nothing but pure evil, just like you've thought I was for a long time now."

He stood still, listening to his huffing and muttering sister. He didn't know she was aware he resented her. He didn't know she had taken it so personally. A sense of guilt overcame him over how he had made her feel. Wen... I don't think you're evil, he thought.

James folded his arms and thought, as he slowly built his way to an apology. Though, his face was still blotchy and twisted from the anger and adrenaline. He heard his sister scoff.

"You know, maybe I will steal your friends from you... I mean, they certainly appear to be far more interested in me than they are in you."

James's eyes went wide and burned. "They're not interested in you! That's just a lie you tell yourself. You're just dressing like a slut. That's why guys talk to you. They don't actually think you're interesting. You're an idiot if you think they do."

"Wow... great comeback." Wendy breezily cocked her eyebrow as she folded her towel. "I hate to break it to ya, James, but unlike you, I'm not insecure. You can't slut-shame me, but nice try, though. And do you not think I own a mirror? Do you not think I know how I look in this?"

Having to look a long way down from his five-eleven frame, James saw the frayed, denim shorts, which covered her butt and not much else. He found himself wondering if it was the last time he'd see the elegant, orange thong strap. Most of the suit was still drying in the sun, though the large, round imprints of her boobs in the fabric were still damp. On the rough cement, James's toes wiggled and scraped. A weightlessness spread from the balls of his feet to his loins, and then up to his shoulders and head. He understood why his friends stared so much.