Chapter 7

We left my bedroom at seven-fifteen, making only the potential mistake of leaving at the same time. We were wearing fresh clothing, though neither of us had taken a shower. Had anybody else been up they might have reflected that we both got dressed in the same room at the same time, as opposed to one of us (me) getting up and getting dressed first, and then the other (Hannah) getting dressed while there was some privacy. We had a lot on our minds just then and weren’t thinking about things like that.

But nobody else was up so it didn’t matter.

Hannah mixed up pancake batter while I set the table and got the butter and syrup out and all that. She was frying bacon when Dad came into the kitchen.

“Who says teenagers are thoughtless?” he said. “It was nice of you to make breakfast.”

“We appreciate our parents,” said Hannah, who was desperately worried that every adult in the house was going to take one look at her and say, “Hey! You look very well-fucked this morning, Hannah! Want to explain that?”

“And we appreciate our children,” said Dad.

Mom was only ten minutes behind him and she was just as appreciative. Dad had made coffee and she got a cup and sat down at the table.

“Remind me not to drink while I play bridge,” she said.

She didn’t look hung over. If anything she was bright and beautiful. She had this knack, no doubt a holdover from her modeling days, of always looking fresh and rested. She didn’t wear (or need) a lot of makeup. In the old pictures of her she had long hair like Hannah, but she’d cut it short when we were born and had never let it get below her shoulders since then. She said it was easier to take care of that way.

“Don’t drink when you play bridge,” said Dad, smiling.

She ignored him and looked at me.

“How’d you two sleep?”

“Okay,” I said. Hannah didn’t say anything.

“I know it’s a nuisance, but it won’t be for long.”

“No big deal,” I said. I couldn’t look at her, eye to eye. I thought the same thing Hannah did. They’d know. Somehow they’d know.

“Thank you,” she said. “You’re being very adult about this.”

I was thinking about just how adult we’d been when Aunt June and Uncle Brad arrived together. Uncle Brad commented on how good something smelled and breakfast commenced without further delay.

The rest of that morning and early afternoon was spent in usual Independence Day fashion. Uncle Brad and Aunt June didn’t have any children. I think Uncle Brad compensated for that by adopting us, at least for the day. He offered to buy fireworks and he wasn’t kidding. We went to four different locations and I bet he spent three hundred dollars in all. We had thousands of firecrackers and dozens of specialty fireworks. You know the kind, little tanks that shoot sparks out of the barrel, parachutes, and things with names like Voodoo Balls, Street Fighter, Spider Rockets and so on.

The only thing he didn’t buy were a lot of the night time stuff, because we planned on going to the big fireworks show that night in the city park. So we spent the day blowing things up and generally adding to the smoke in the neighborhood. It sounded like a war zone for most of the day.

There was a parade and then the festivities in the park got going. A traveling carnival was in town and was a big hit. The park was full of people sitting on blankets while their kids ran around and popped firecrackers, which were the only fireworks allowed in the park.

It seemed like a perfectly normal 4th of July except there was one part of “normal” I wasnt too keen on. It involved Hannah and she was doing something completely normal. That was hanging around with her friends and flirting with boys. I’d seen her do that dozens of times in the past. Back then I sort of snorted in my mind and felt sorry for the guys. That part was complicated. I felt sorry for them if she did like them, because I was pretty sure they wouldn’t get very far with her. Not that I wanted them to, mind you. I just knew what it felt like to go out with a tease. I felt sorry for them if she didn’t like them because if a popular girl ignores you, it makes you feel bad.

Anyway, at one point there were five guys all standing around Hannah and her friends, trying to get something going and competing for the girls’ attention. Two guys seemed to be particularly interested in Hannah. She was laughing and smiling a lot.

As I said, in the past I would have reacted to this by mostly ignoring it.

But that was before I knew a load of my sperm was still soaking into her pussy.

Hmmm. Actually I don’t know that for sure. How long does a load of sperm hang around in a girl’s pussy? That’s not the kind of question you ask in health class.

Anyway, that’s how I reacted. I wasn’t happy. It was obvious she was flirting with them and it made me ... I don’t know ... sad? I wasn’t mad, really. I mean we weren’t going out and never would. She couldn’t be my girlfriend. So it wasn’t jealousy, exactly, but it had some of the same taste to it.

At one point whatever it was got to me enough that I went up and told Hannah I needed to talk to her. I made it sound like I was on a mission from Mom.

“You’re flirting with those guys,” I said.

“Of course I am,” she said, smiling. “Three of them asked me out. I can’t wait ‘til Steve hears about that!”

“It makes me feel ... funny ... when I see you flirting,” I said.

Her eyes got big.

“You can’t be jealous, Bobby.”

“I know. It just makes me feel funny.”

“Look,” she said. “If I go out with any of them it won’t be any different than when I was going out with Steve. I’m not going to fool around with them. That’s why I have you.” She grinned at me like she’d made a funny joke. “Besides,” she went on, “I’m supposed to act that way. People would think it was strange if I didn’t.”

“You’re right,” I said. “I know. I just don’t like feeling like this, that’s all.”

“You’re sweet,” she said. She blinked. “I can’t believe I said that. I just told my brother he’s sweet!” Then she grinned at me again and went back to her friends.

I wasn’t the only one who noticed Hannah flirting with the guys. I wouldn’t have even noticed what happened except for my ‘enhanced’ relationship with my sister. It was only because I was paying more attention to her and what she was doing that I noticed Mom walk up to the group and say something. Hannah left with her and they went for a walk around the park.

Baldwin Park is made up of what used to be a big estate owned by Cyrus Baldwin back in the early 1900s. He made a zillion dollars in mining ventures and had a big mansion. The mansion is now the county historical museum and the rest of his estate became Baldwin Park. As the town expanded that made the park a huge green space in the middle of urban development. It was five blocks long and three blocks wide, with tennis courts, an 18 hole Frisbee golf course, basketball courts, and walking paths all over the place. There weren’t all that many trees. It was like having half a dozen football fields of green space right in the middle of town. A visitor to town said it reminded her of Central Park in New York, except it didn’t have as many trees.

My point is that a stroll on the sidewalk that went around the park took a while. They didn’t get back to the family blanket for forty-five minutes or more.

By then Aunt June had unpacked our own family picnic, consisting of fried chicken, potato salad, veggies, deviled eggs, and chips. There were covered pavilions for large gatherings and the charcoal barbeque stands in them were being shared by lots of people. Dad went over to one and cooked some hamburgers and hot dogs.

Basically, we laid around and pigged out until it got dark enough for the fireworks to start.

Hannah kept looking at me strangely, like she was trying to send me a message of some kind, but she didn’t actually say anything to me. Of course with all those adults around, anything she did say would easily be heard by them.

Uncle Brad was telling a war story about his time in Afghanistan when the first big boomer started the show. A bright ball of white streaked crookedly up into the sky, hung there for a second and then became a black ball as thunder rocked the park. Kids yelled and people clapped.

Then the show started and we did nothing but stare up into the sky for twenty minutes.

When we got home that night it was late and we all went to bed. It was strange watching Hannah get ready for bed. She took off her clothes - just like that - as if it were the most normal thing in the world to do with me standing there watching her. Then, naked, she went into the bathroom and brushed her hair. She closed the door, a minute went by, the stool flushed and she came out. I was naked by then, but I still felt strange.

She turned down the covers on the bed and got in, making it clear she was saving room for me. It was like that cot wasn’t even there.

I got in, lying on my back and she snuggled up to me, pressing her hot breasts against my arm.

“I can’t believe you got jealous today,” she said.

The weirdness of the situation let me just say what was on my mind.

“I couldn’t stand the thought of you being with any of those guys like this.”

She kissed my shoulder.

“I wouldn’t even think of being with any of them like this, Bobby.”

“What does that mean?” I asked. It wasn’t a rhetorical question. I really did wonder what all this would mean for our future.

“It means that you’re the only guy who gets to do this,” she said. “At least for now,” she added.

“What does that mean?” I asked. My mind was whirling.

“Mom talked to me today,” said Hannah. “She took me for a long walk.”

“I saw that.”

“She was the one who found the dildo. She basically interrogated me.”

“About the dildo?”

“About what I’m doing with boys.”

“Oh.”

“She said the dildo made it clear I was ... she used the word ‘normal’ but then wanted to know what else I was doing. It was very strange, Bobby. She’s never talked to me like that before.”

“What did she say?”

“Well, for one thing she said that since I’m sleeping in here with you I don’t need it. She said she’d keep it until Uncle Brad and Aunt June leave and then I can have it back. She asked a lot of questions about Steve, too.”

“Like what?”

“Actually, it wasn’t so much that she asked about him. She said she knew we were pretty serious before the breakup and told me all about how she lost her virginity.”