work party? That was really going to impress my boss. What if I’d stumbled back into his living room wearing his girlfriend’s bikini, dripping water, and puked on his polished marble floor?
I’d get the pointed finger tomorrow. You’re fired.
Dad would go super crazy if I told him I’d done something so embarrassing. He’d think it would impact on his reputation.
But I wasn’t telling him because I wasn’t going to lose my job, there would be a way to convince Mr. Rees to keep me on, if I had to. I’d worked out a hundred wiles for manipulating people in my years of growing up.
British boarding schools were full of stuck-up––get me I’m rich––bitches. You learned to be loud and stand up for yourself or you ended up the school dupe, laughed at and constantly bullied. I had got loud and I’d learned to win attention. Manipulation was an art I’d learned from my daddy though, not just school. But I wasn’t proud of that.
Well, New Year’s Day or not, it seemed to me the miserable weather, and my hangover, called for a day spent in bed watching any movie that didn’t take much brain power to follow it. I leaned over and picked up my laptop, then lay back down and flipped the lid open.
I went into Netflix, ignoring Twitter and Instagram, and everything else. I didn’t want to face any malicious office party pictures; I’d deal with them tomorrow. Today, I was all for pulling the bed covers over my head and hiding.
I scanned through the lists.
Justin
Fuck. My head felt like someone was banging it against a wall. Fucking free champagne. I wished I hadn’t indulged so aggressively. But then, hey––it was free.
An image of Portia flowed into my head––Portia in an emerald green bikini. All the girls had looked hot, but she’d looked the best, and she’d felt pretty hot in the pool too––when the others had gone.
Shit. My head.
“Justin! Justin!” My eight-year-old kid brother rushed into my room, thrusting the door aside, and then jumped on my bed. My head spun, and my belly did a full roll, as pain pierced through my forehead and out the back of my skull like someone fired a gun through it.
“Go steady––you pain in the butt.”
“It’s New Year’s, Mom’s cooking lunch, it’ll be ready soon. You’re lazy.”
“Cheers bro, but––get off, Dillon.”
He climbed off me with a huge grin and then ran away again.
“You getting up, man?” I looked up. Another of my brothers, Robin, stood in the doorway, his shoulder resting against the doorjamb.
We shared this room, but he looked like he’d been up and dressed for ages.
Robin was seventeen. Then there was Jake who was fourteen.
“You were in late last night.”
“Yeah.” I sat up. My brain rolled around in my head like a pinball. I needed food and coffee. I pulled my T-shirt on.
“Mom’s checked your cell.”
“Great. I’m twenty-two, why the fuck is she checking my cell?”
“For the same reason you check ours. ‘Cause she don’t want you getting into trouble.”
“Like I’d have a chance.”
Robin twisted his lips in a grin that mocked me. I screwed up my face at him, saying whatever, as I stood and pulled my jeans on over my boxers, then ran my fingers over my hair.
“You look fucked.”
“Don’t copy my bad language. Mum ’ll smack you ‘round the ear for it. Do as I say, not as I do…” But I wished I had got fucked last night. Nearly.
I got another twisted smile.
Robin had grown out of idolizing me long ago, but we still got on, and we talked a lot, about everything. He rarely talked to Mom. But I kept him talking to me ‘cause I didn’t want him falling in with any of the gangs in our neighborhood.
I think if he did have any trouble, he’d tell me.
I did look out for them, my brothers. All my brothers.
When I walked into the kitchen, I saw my cell on the counter next to Mom. She was mashing potatoes to go with the chicken that stood on the side. Lunch smelt good, spicy. My belly rolled over––hunger giving it a bite. That was all I needed to cure my hangover––food.
“Justin.” Mom looked up at me turning her cheek.
I leaned down and kissed it. “Morning, Mom.”
“Afternoon,” she corrected, “And where were you, child?”
I rolled my eyes. “At Mr Rees’s party, like I was last New Year’s Eve. I told you where I was going. I told you I’d be late.”
I knew why she was asking––for the same reason I checked up on Robin, Jake, and Dillon. ‘Cause she didn’t want me caught up in trouble––but she ought to know, I looked after myself. I’d got to twenty-two and stayed out of it.
“Mom, give me a little line, I’m not a kid. Trust me why don’t you…”
She smiled, still smashing the potatoes. I caught up my cell and shoved it in my back pocket.
Jake was sitting on the sofa watching Dillon’s cartoons, with his arms crossed over his chest. He was in a bad mood––but then the kid was always in a bad mood. It was a rite of passage for boys his age to be shitheads. A rite I hadn’t had chance to claim. But Robin had gone through it and come out the other side… I had my fingers crossed for Jake.
He didn’t talk to me much, but he talked to Robin. I figured if I kept Robin safe, Robin would do the same for Jake.
I hoped.
Mom started dishing up. “Wash up and sit at the table.”
Dillon ran off to the bathroom to wash his hands, and Robin followed, to check he did it. Jake didn’t move.
“Come on.” Mom urged. She turned with a pile of cutlery in her hand. I took it from her and laid it out on the table. Jake still hadn’t moved as Dillon and Robin came back.
I glanced over my shoulder at him. He was staring at the TV. Dillon sat down and Robin moved to collect the plates, as Mom finished them off with corn. Jake still hadn’t moved. I went over and knocked his leg with mine. He looked up.
With my gaze and a nod of my head I told him to get the fuck up, asshole. Mom worked hard for us. She’d been on her own for years, since before Dillon was born, but we’d never gone hungry or not had clothes. She deserved respect––even
