Chapter 3

Emily couldn’t sleep. His uncle’s words kept haunting her: “failed the one member who needed it the most”.

She was supposed to be in a sleepover with one of her fellow cheerleaders, but a sudden bout of high fever caused her friend’s mom to take her to the ER and she returning home, where she arrived on time to overhear the last part of the meeting. She had used the back door so nobody knew she was already home.

She heard the words of her uncle, and suddenly felt sick. A sob escaped her lips, but no one seemed to hear it. She listened until the end, then tiptoed to her room and fell on her bed. Her mind was awash with images of Paul, of some of the pranks she and her friends played on him, of Shirley Blake’s laugh when he asked her out. Actually it was also her doing, he would have never dared to do it if Emily hadn’t fibbed him that Shirley had a secret crush on him. “Needed it the most” she thought again. Certainly Emily and Mike didn’t need the circle, with her great body and his hunky good looks they had no problem to attract partners. In fact, Mike was in his third girlfriend since last year. And Paul was ... just Paul.

“Safe place ... accepted and loved...” Certainly Paul had not gotten much of those. Why didn’t she defend her little brother when their cousin Lisa made that “Tubby” comment? Why didn’t she mention all his good traits, his intelligence, his good heart, and instead joined the nobody-likes-Paul fest?

She liked to think of herself as a good person. Now her actions belied that belief. “I failed him,” she repeated to herself. “I failed my little brother”. Silent tears ran down her cheeks.

With her eyes closed she heard her door opening, and felt Mike entering her room. “Hi”.

She opened her eyes and looked at him in silence.

“Em ... wanna fuck?”

“Sorry, not in the mood,” she answered.

“Come on Em, just a quickie” -he insisted- “Mom isn’t in the mood either”

“She’s upset and worried about Paul. What about you, aren’t you at least a bit worried?”

“Who cares? Come on, it’s been what, two days? let’s fuck” and started to caress her breast.

“I said no!” she sat and looked at him, furious. “You are complaining because of two days without sex, and Paul has been going without, what, years?”

“Emily, what...”

“He’s our brother, dammit! We were supposed to be there for him, to be his safe place, but instead we made him a pariah! He’s been a pariah in this house, a pariah at school and now we turned him into a pariah with the whole family!” She started to cry. “Please leave.”

“But...”

“I said LEAVE!” He ran out of the room.

Among tears, she kept thinking. Something else came to her mind. All her cousins had started to have sex long before their official induction into the circle. Lisa and Jack had been having sex for more than one year before Lisa’s 18th birthday. Herself and Mike had started when they were both sixteen. But for Paul she was happy to wait. She knew Paul was impatient and eager, but for once she stuck to the rules. Paul had simply accepted it and waited for his 18th birthday. And just before it, his hopes were shattered.

“Oh, Paul...” she cried. “What have we done?”

After one more night of sleep and self-pity, Paul went to the bathroom and looked at him in the mirror. His reflect showed him a round face with a bit of a jowl, unruly curly hair and a general air of neglect.

“Enough!” he thought. “I have to think about the future. My future.” After showering and shaving, he went to the small desk next to his bed and started to make a list. First order of business was to check school. He thought he had enough credits to graduate early, therefore negating the need for a GED. Then contact his clients and inform that he was again available. He saw more messages in his inbox, this time not only from his mom and uncle but also from his sister. Curious, he opened the latter.

Dear Paul

First of all I want to tell you I’m sorry for everything. Sorry for the way I treated you, sorry for not being a good sister, sorry for all the things I did, or that I allowed others to do, that caused you pain.

Finally I want to ask you to forgive me for failing you at the circle. As your sister I should have been the first one to welcome you but instead joined the others when they decided not to have sex with you.

“WHAT?” said Paul. So that’s why I wasn’t to be inducted ... all that “normal life” bullshit was just that, bullshit. Fuck, fuck fuck!”

“The others...” Although Emily had meant only their cousins and her, the unintended vagueness of the expression caused Paul to understand it in the widest sense of the word which, ironically, was also the truest. “So nobody wanted to have sex with me. Nor Emily, nor my aunts, nor my cousins ... not even Mom.”