Chapter 2: An Old Wound

The week progressed and the three teens worked Rebecca's schedule out the best they could. Once Tony got Rebecca back up the stairs after her history class he turned her over to Tina. After that he didn't have to worry about her until going back down to the lower building for her Spanish class. Dropping her by the gym for the final period was right on his way to class as well. What, exactly, Rebecca was going to do in P.E. during that period was still a mystery.

On Friday the girls were heading to fourth period when Rebecca finally got the nerve to ask, "Is your brother really as nice as he seems?"

Tina laughed. "Oh I've been waiting for that one. Got the hots for my big brother do you?"

"I, I, oh come on, it's not like he could like me like that. I've seen several girls who get all goo-goo eyed when he's around. All of them are a lot prettier than me."

"Only several? He must be slipping. It's been a week, I would think there would be a couple of dozen by now," Tina replied.

"Oh he's like that. I've seen guys like that before."

"Absolutely not," snapped Tina. "He doesn't even realize it. Well he may realize it, but he doesn't know that he's doing it. He's just being Tony that's all."

"OK, now I'm completely confused," Rebecca said

"Look Rebecca we need to talk. I mean really talk. There are some things, one thing in particular, you need to know about Tony, about us actually. What are you doing tomorrow?"

"I don't know. I didn't have anything planned."

"How about we go to the mall, I'll get Tony to drive us. We'll do some shopping and talk."

"Oh shopping, and without my mom! OK, I'll talk to my mom this afternoon and give you a call."

The directions looked familiar and as Tony turned onto the final street he was sure and started laughing out loud. He handed the directions to Tina and asked "next to the last house on the right huh?" Tina broke out laughing then and they were still at it when they walked up to the house and rang the bell. Marj answered and looked on at them bemusedly.

"Well you two look awfully chipper this morning."

"I'm sorry Mrs. Harris its just we didn't realize from the directions at first. Apparently my folks are your landlords. We used to live in this house," replied Tony.

"Oh that's right! Your sister put me in touch with your parents, Jim and Carol, a few weeks ago when I mentioned we were still looking for a place to live."

"Yep, we were living on the other side of town and my folks acquired the property we live on now. They wanted to have a house custom built. They put the house we were living in on the market and it sold in like a week and they hadn't even cleared the land for the new one yet. We bought this house just to have a place to live while it was being built."

Tony and Tina met Mr. Harris. He seemed nice enough though a bit wary about his fourteen year-old daughter going out in a car with a 16 year-old boy even if his sister was present. Tony assured him he was just going to drop them off at the mall then head out to run some errands both for himself and his parents. "As a matter of fact I think I've just added another errand. Do you have a tape measure and a pad to jot some figures down on?"

"Sure Tony, what are we measuring?" Mr. Harris asked.

"The porch" Tony replied.

Tina went to check on Rebecca while Tony and Mr. Harris took some measurements on the porch. When they were done Rebecca was ready to leave.

The girls had mined the mall for all they were worth and were sitting in the food court over pizza slices and cokes when Tina began the discussion.

"OK, so you want to know about Tony." Tina smiled at Rebecca and continued. "To answer your question, yes, my brother really is that nice a guy. He is, quite probably, the nicest boy I know." She paused for a second and continued, "So there you are, yes he is nice and he is that nice to everyone especially the girls, all girls. I know it's supposed to be against some code for brothers and sisters our age to actually admit we can even stand each other but I love my brother very much. He treats me like absolute gold."

"So it's not just me," Rebecca replied, a little dejectedly.

"Nope, you are a special case. You are definitely a special case." Tina went on, "Like you said, he has girls falling all over him. He's smart, a certifiable hunk, a musician, an athlete and the nicest guy on the planet. If the girl-network is any indication he's quite the stud as well."

Rebecca quite literally shot soda out of her nose. When she recovered she stuttered, "I think we may just be bordering on too much information here!"

Tina continued with a smile, "Well store that last little bit for future reference then. Rebecca, do you really like my brother?"

"Well of course I do," she replied.