Chapter 8 Charlie
“Charlie King, get your lazy ass up.”
Groaning, Charlie grabs his pillow and pulls it over his head.
Whoever is yelling needs to shut the fuck up.
He regrets giving all of his brothers a house key, the noisy assholes.
Come to think of it, Jason never uses the key unless it’s a boys’ night, and Andrew is far quieter, leaving only one brother.
His baby brother. The one most likely to come over with food.
“Seriously, I’ve been calling you for ten minutes, what did you—what the fuck,” Alec curses.
Lifting the pillow off his head, Charlie peers at Alec who is standing in the doorway, looking far more put together than any human being has a right to look this early: perfect curls fall into his eyes and his cropped t-shirt and jeans are equally perfect.
He’s come into himself this last year, and while Charlie knows exactly who is to thank for giving Alec a safe place to land when he fell, he doesn’t like to think about that too much or he feels nauseous.
“Hey, Ally.”
“‘Hey Ally,’” Alec mimics, flipping the light on so it’s even brighter than before.
“What the fuck happened to you? You were either mauled by a bear or—no, I got nothing, which is saying something because my imagination is wild. Though judging by the teeth marks on your ass, I’m going to say you’re the one who had a wild night.
Where did you even pick someone up? Andrew said you guys just went to Juanita’s and came home. ”
“That’s a lot of talking for this early in the morning.”
“It’s not early,” Alec scoffs. “It’s almost ten thirty. Now answer the question. I want details.”
“Details like the details you gave me about meeting Emerson during pizza night?” Charlie grumbles, still put out as fuck that Alec held out on him.
Even if they’d already talked about it where Alec admitted he’d opened a text message to Charlie then got distracted and didn’t realize he never sent it.
“You can’t still be mad about that.”
“I can and I am,” Charlie insists, rolling over in bed.
His ass is sore in the most delicious way, and though he can’t see it, when he touches his left ass cheek the soreness confirms what Alec saw—his mystery man definitely left marks.
He can only imagine what the rest of his back must look like if the pleasurable ache in his shoulders is anything to go by.
“So a bear or—”
“Just some guy,” Charlie answers evasively. He’s never been shy sharing his sexual exploits with Alec, so he’s not sure why he’s hesitant to share them now, especially when last night was quite possibly the best fuck of his entire life. Normally he’d be bragging and smug.
“Some guy huh,” Alec says, grabbing a shirt and boxers from Charlie’s dresser and chucking them at his head.
“Why are you and Andrew always trying to dress me?” He asks. “I shouldn’t have to wear clothes in my own house.”
“Because I don’t need to see your dick out while I make you pancakes and because Theo is waiting in the kitchen.”
“You brought Theo.”
Alec’s face falls, his easy expression tightening in a way that fills Charlie with guilt.
He knows he’s being a dick about this, has been since Alec got hurt last year, but forgiving and moving on are apparently two wildly different things in Charlie’s brain.
He hasn’t yet figured out how to move on from the anger he feels toward Theo for hurting his baby brother.
Even if Alec has moved on, even if it’s clear that Alec is happier than Charlie has ever seen him. Even if Theo is perfect for him.
Ugh, Charlie needs coffee to handle this. He doesn’t want to deal with his other brother’s lifelong best friend turned his youngest brother’s fiancé who broke his heart before fixing it. Honestly, there’s not enough coffee in the world to handle this.
“You canceled on us the last two times.” Alec’s frowning, that same sort of unhappy pout he used to do when he was a little kid.
The kind of face that had Charlie sneaking into his room after their parents put him to bed to read him an extra story or slipping him an extra cookie when no one was looking.
Despite their massive age difference, he’s always been incredibly close to Alec, which even he can admit is why he’s struggling to let go of the last of his grudge against Theo.
Theo made a lot of mistakes, but he’s a good man. There’s no question he worships the ground Alec walks on. But Charlie doesn’t have Andrew’s grace or Jason’s happy-go-lucky demeanor or Alec’s too-forgiving heart of gold. He’s a petty fucker who holds a grudge.
“I was busy,” Charlie lies. Unlike his brothers, he has no scruples about lying.
He’s not some kind of pathological liar, but he doesn’t have moral qualms about not sharing truths he isn’t in the mood to hash out.
Like his complicated feelings about the fact that spending time with his brother almost always includes Theo now.
It has occurred to him—possibly because Andrew told him—that he feels like he’s being replaced because Alec always needed Charlie.
Now he has Theo and doesn’t need his big brother as much, and that makes Charlie resent Theo.
But since Charlie didn’t ask Andrew to psychoanalyze him, he takes that with a grain of salt, the kind he’d like to bury in the backyard five feet underground where it belongs.
Honestly, jealous of Theo? What a load of shit.
“I’m making blueberry pancakes.”
“You’re buttering me up for something.”
“I’m making your favorite breakfast because I miss you,” Alec says, crossing the room and wrapping his arms around Charlie. Alec hasn’t grown much since he was a teenager, so much smaller than Charlie but so much braver too. Fuck, Charlie is proud of him.
“I missed you too, Ally.”
“Then you’ll stop canceling when I want you to hang out with me and Theo?” He asks, pulling back to blink those big, puppy dog brown eyes of his at Charlie. “And you’ll come in the kitchen right now and tell Theo you’re so glad he’s here and play nice.”
“Unless you’ve put something that causes a personality transplant in those pancakes, that's unlikely.” Alec’s face falls and Charlie sighs, knowing he’s going to give in. “I will go out and play nice, but I’m not going to be his best friend or anything.”
“I don’t need you two to be best friends. I need my two favorite people to get along so I don’t feel like I’m being used like a ping pong ball in your weird passive-aggressive niceness game.”
“Me and Theo aren’t passive-aggressive,” Charlie balks.
“At the family dinner last month you passed him the mashed potatoes and told him you really hoped he didn’t choke on them.”
“I did hope he didn’t choke,” Charlie points out. “You’d be sad if he died, and I don’t like when you’re sad.”
Alec smacks his arm. “You two are going to get along if it kills me, which for the record, it might. I’m going to give you five minutes to wash off whatever questionable white substance is flaking on your cheek, then you’re going to come out and have Sunday breakfast with us.”
Charlie reaches up to his cheek. Sure enough something flaky is there. He doesn’t remember getting come on his face, but last night was pretty epic, so maybe he did and didn’t notice.
“So, fun question,” Alec says in a tone that suggests whatever he’s about to say will be anything but fun for Charlie. “Has it occurred to you that you’re getting a little old to still be slutting it up with randos? You’re almost forty.”
“Oh fuck off,” Charlie laughs. “I’m thirty-two you pipsqueak. Talk to me when you can reach the top cupboard.”
“Just for that I’m going to hide raisins in your pancakes.”
There isn’t a lot Charlie hates, but raisins are one of them. Vile little chewy things. Thinking about finding one in his blueberry pancakes would be enough for Charlie to revolt.
“Put raisins in my pancakes and they won’t find your body.”
“Theo would avenge me,” Alec grins.
That is entirely debatable since Theo’s brand of anxiety and people-pleasing won’t even allow him to tell the server at a restaurant that his food was made wrong, but Charlie is a good enough brother to not point that out.
“Tell yourself whatever you need, short stack.”
“Your pancakes will be a short stack,” Alec snarks, flipping Charlie two middle fingers as he stalks out of the room. “Five minutes, asshole.”
Five minutes is more than enough for Charlie, who ambles to the bathroom, t-shirt Alec gave him clutched in his hand.
He lays it on the sink before taking a piss then splashing his face with cold water.
Realizing that might not be good enough he grabs the bar of soap and scrubs his face, not in the mood to be caught with come on his face in front of Theo.
When he’s finished, he grabs the hand towel, drying his face and giving himself a once over.
The front of him is fairly unassuming, but based on Alec’s reaction when he first walked in while Charlie was sleeping on his stomach the back isn’t unblemished and curiosity has Charlie reaching for a hand mirror and turning around to look at his reflection.
Sure enough there’s a mark on his shoulder, and when he pushes his boxers down there’s a matching one on his left ass cheek, right where his pretty boy’s mouth was.
If he knew Charlie was thinking about him being pretty, he’d probably punch him.
That thought shouldn’t excite Charlie the way it does.
Pretty hardly covers it. That guy was hands down the most gorgeous person Charlie had ever laid eyes on.
He was also bossy, demanding and so damn easy to rile up.
He was fun as fuck to tease with his grumpy glare and his petulant arm crossing.
Equally enjoyable was the way he took what he wanted from Charlie. Shoving him onto his art desk and taking Charlie apart with every touch had been erotic. More than that, it thrilled some part of Charlie that is usually dormant during sex.