20. And Another Thing
Chapter twenty
And Another Thing
S urprisingly, there were only two things I regretted about JP.
It wasn’t that I hadn’t made a ton of mistakes with him. I had. Getting distracted by an inappropriately emotional conversation with JP was a mistake.
Fucking in his room instead of meeting in our usual hookup spot was a mistake.
Hell, it could be argued that everything I’d done with, for, and about Jean-Paul bloody Marchand from the moment I’d entered his bedroom three years earlier was one big goddamn mess of a mistake.
But mistakes didn’t have to be regrets . I didn’t regret losing my virginity to JP. I didn’t regret the orgasms he’d given me. Even being there that night, Anne-Marie pounding on the door as I leapt bare-ass-naked off JP’s bed, wasn’t something I regretted.
What I did regret was, firstly, the whole part where I dove off his bed bare-ass-naked. The second I hit the floor, I realized I could’ve just thrown his bedspread over me and pretended I was some random other girl who was going to stay hidden until his sister left.
That realization came at the same moment I realized there was no way in hell I was going to fit beneath JP’s bed, which had apparently been my instinctive hiding spot instead of some place smart, like his closet. There was no more than six inches of space between the base of his bed and the floor. All I could do was press my body as tightly as I could to the frame and hope against hope that Anne-Marie would stay on the other side of the room so she couldn’t see this side of his bed.
The second regret I had was telling JP he was mine.
Mainly because after about ten seconds of lying there, my heart racing fast enough to leave me light-headed, I got cum on the floor. And sure, it wasn’t my floor—or my cum, obviously—but in order for it to get on the floor, it had to drip out of me and onto my leg and I couldn’t even reach down to wipe it up, which meant all I could focus on was the annoying sensation of it sliding from my leg to the floor.
And that sensation cemented the moment in my memory, making it a stark snapshot. A freeze-frame where I stared at the wall and wondered what was wrong with me.
How, exactly, I’d gotten here and what, in the fuck, I was doing with my life.
But by the end of it all, I would’ve given almost anything to go back and erase the memory of his chin in my hand. To forget the resistance of his neck as I turned his head to me and the echo of the rasp in my voice as I stared him dead in the eye and told him the opposite of what he thought he wanted to hear.
JP barely got the bedspread over his lap and yanked his book off the nightstand before his bedroom door banged open. I sucked in a breath, holding it so my heart would stop vibrating in my chest before letting it out as soundlessly as I could. On the wall across from me, abstract shadows cast by the mix of light between JP’s window, the hallway, and the lamp beside his bed shifted into the indistinct form of my best friend, who took two harrowing steps into the room before pausing.
“You’re home early,” JP said, his voice unnervingly casual and unbothered.
“It is not that early, dear brother,” Anne-Marie said. Her shadow-form shifted like she’d folded her arms and leaned against the wall next to the door. I jammed my fingernail against my thumb, praying to any deity who might take pity on a joyfully promiscuous girl that Anne-Marie would stay there the entire time. Dionysus, maybe. Or Aphrodite, or literally any of the Erotes, or Bacchus and Venus if the Romans had been right instead of the Greeks. Or there was Freyja, who was Norse. The Hindu goddess Rati. Tlazolteotl from the Aztecs. And a bunch more that I’d learned about because besides the typical Greek mythology phase I’d had as a teenager, I’d spent a couple of weeks nerding out over every god or goddess that represented sex or lust or vice after embracing my slutty side in the first year of university.
“I thought you’d be staying at Remy’s,” JP said. “Or is he waiting in your bedroom because Mom and Dad got a hotel tonight?”
“No, Remy is volunteering in the morning,” Anne-Marie said, her voice almost wistful. “Plus I already tired him out tonight, so—”
“Jesus Christ, Anne-Marie,” JP muttered.
Anne-Marie snorted on a laugh. “Since when are you such a prude, Jean-Paul?”
“I’m not.” I could almost hear him rolling his eyes. “I’m just not in the mood for an AMNN broadcast tonight.”
“What is an AMNN broadcast?”
“Oh. The Anne-Marie News Network. Because your, uh, updates are like a news broadcast.”
There was a moment of silence. On the wall across from me, a shadow shifted, and in my mind I imagined Anne-Marie had tilted her head thoughtfully. “You know, I would make a wonderful news anchor.”
“As your only current viewer, I’ll be a reference for you,” JP said. “Now, if that’s it?” Apparently I could also see the aura of JP’s movements because the shadows shifted again as if he’d held up his book. “I was in the middle of a good part.”
“That is not it and you know it,” Anne-Marie said.
“Do I?” JP asked, his voice tired.
“What are you doing home?”
“What do you mean, what am I doi—”
“Jean-Paul. Do you take me for stupid?” she interrupted.
“Only most of the time,” he replied.
She ignored the jab. “You were supposed to go out with Michele tonight.”
“It sounds like you have your nights mixed up.”
“Oh, do I?” Anne-Marie asked. “Did Michele also have her nights mixed up? Because she mentioned when I saw her at the funeral this afternoon how much she was looking forward to your date, and then halfway through the wake, she pulled me aside to complain that you cancelled on her, and for what? To… read?”
My lips parted, but not even a breath came out.
“It’s a good book,” JP said.
“It must be to be better than Michele. As much as I do not want to know a single thing about your sex life”—I almost snorted at the disgust in her voice. Anne-Marie was way too comfortable knowing about JP’s sex life—“she has repeatedly told me she would do anything with you.”
“I mean, Michele’s hot, but… like, not to be a dick, but it’s a really good book,” JP said.
“Funny. I do not believe you, for some reason.”
Neither did I. Because I’d seen Michele and she was hot, and no book was better than hooking up with a hot redhead, and also I was lying—still bare-ass naked—on JP’s bedroom floor because he’d…
He’d picked me.
The same sensation of ringing curled up my spine, warning signals making my palms sweat as my heart rate picked up again, pattering out a beat that sounded something like oh-god-no-please-no-not-this-not-him-he-promised.
JP let out an exasperated sigh. “What does it even matter to you if I cancel a date?”
“Because it is not like you to cancel a sure thing.”
“Maybe I wasn’t feeling it.”
“And maybe I am being a concerned sister.” Something in her voice softened. “Is it because of the funeral?”
“Don’t,” he said.
“I know things like this are—”
“Seriously,” he said, his voice stony. “Stop.”
“JP, please.” I almost sat up in surprise. I didn’t think I’d ever heard Anne-Marie call her brother JP instead of Jean-Paul. “I want to make sure you are alright.”
“So you came home to check on me?” he asked.
“Yes,” she said plainly. The shadows moved on the wall and I figured Anne-Marie had lifted her hands in surrender. “But I will stop, if you tell me you are really okay.”
“I am fine,” JP said. “Seriously. I am.”
It looked like Anne-Marie nodded. “Okay. Well, Michele told Sonique LaPlante that she is not going to give you another chance, so you know.”
“I’m positively devastated,” JP said.
“Don’t be,” she replied, ignoring his obvious sarcasm. “We all know she is lying. Michele will drop her panties the second you look in her direction. But then again, she would probably—”
Her voice dropped mid-sentence. Silence filled the room and my heart seemed to climb my ribcage so it could settle itself in the base of my throat.
“Speaking of panties,” Anne-Marie said, her voice pitching up. The shadows slid forward as she took a step forward and floated up as she lifted something. “What… are these?”
Oh no.
Oh.
Fucking.
No .
“I’ve started an online business,” JP said smoothly. “Figured I’d earn a little extra on the side.”
Anne-Marie shrieked and the shadows on the wall jerked wildly. A second later, I nearly let out a shriek of my own as something pink and silky and literally my fucking panties pitched over the side of the bed and landed on my forehead. Slamming my teeth together, I held it in, but couldn’t bring myself to move and take my thong off my face.
“You are disgusting ,” she spat.
JP was laughing, somehow. “You asked.”
“You are not selling used panties online, Jean-Paul. Or worse—oh, crisse d’ostie , you are not selling, ah, photos of yourself or something, are you?!”
“For fuck’s sake, Anne-Marie,” JP said. “Of course not.”
“So you are a liar.”
“And you’re the one asking questions you clearly know the answer to.”
Fuck. Did she? Had she spotted me or—
“I do not know shit, Jean-Paul. That is why I want you to explain to me what these panties are doing here,” Anne-Marie said.
“What do you think they’re doing here?”
“I think you have been collecting souvenirs from your conquests,” she sniffed.
“Bingo,” JP said.
Anne-Marie let out an offended scoff. “That is disgustingly misogynistic, Jean-Paul! And rude, besides. Do you even know how expensive panties are?!”
“It’s not like I’m stealing them," JP said defensively. “They’re giving them to me."
“And what are you even going to do with them?!” she demanded.
JP’s shadow shrugged. “Make a quilt, probably.”
“And you had these out because you were taking measurements?” Anne-Marie asked sarcastically.
JP was silent. A long beat went by, neither of them speaking, their shadows still on the wall across from me. Then:
“Oh, ewwww !” Anne-Marie squealed, and JP started laughing. “You are disgusting , Jean-Paul!”
“I didn’t say anything!” he said through his laughter.
“Ugh,” she grumbled. “Whatever. I came to make sure my brother was okay since he was acting unusual and I was trying to be a thoughtful sister given the circumstances, but clearly you are fine if you’ve had time to blow your own horn while sniffing panties.”
“No one said I was sniffing them,” JP said.
“I should tell Michele you would rather sit at home and play with your own ding-a-ling than have sex with her. It would serve you right to miss out on that.”
JP laughed. “ Ding-a-ling ?! Are you seven?”
“Whatever!” Anne-Marie said again. There were three loud stomps accompanied by a shadow moving across the wall and then JP’s bedroom door slammed closed.
Beautiful silence filled the room, pouring around us like refreshing water, muffling even the way my heart was still drumming in my ears. I counted one moment, then two, then twenty before the shadows on the wall shifted and JP’s face appeared over the edge of the bed, his eyebrows raised.
“Nice hat,” he said.
“Thanks.”
He reached down and gently took my panties off my forehead. “She’s gone, you know.”
“I was making sure she wasn’t going to do that whole ‘And another thing’ thing where she bursts back in the second I sit up,” I said.
JP chuckled. “I think we’re in the clear.”
I forced a laugh as I shifted from my half-twisted position and sat up. “I thought she’d never leave.”
“I’m surprised she did, honestly,” he said, sighing. “Normally, she—”
The door flew open again.
I hit the ground hard so hard I nearly gave myself whiplash.
“One more thing,” Anne-Marie said, her tone so bright you would’ve never known she’d just stormed out. “Do you know who was at the funeral today?”
“Who?” JP asked, and I was stunned again by how casual he was able to sound.
“Nellie,” Anne-Marie said.
My throat went dry.
“Okay,” JP said.
“And do you know, she still has not found herself a date for the Diamond Gala,” Anne-Marie said.
I stiffened slightly. Of course I was putting off telling her, and of course she’d heard me tell Clinton I didn’t know who I was going with yet earlier that day. I knew I’d have to tell her at some point, but I kept telling myself it was a bridge I’d cross when I came to it.
“Okay,” JP said.
“Well, I just thought it was interesting, since if she does not find a date before this weekend, her father will make her go with Clinton Thibault. And you know what he was saying about her before.”
“Why don’t you help her find a date, then?” JP asked.
“You know how Nellie is.”
“No, I don’t,” JP said.
“You do.” Anne-Marie’s shadow moved as she leaned against JP’s wall again. “She ignores things until she can’t ignore it anymore and is left scrambling. Then she panics and wonders why she gets into these impossible situations like they are not entirely avoidable. I love ma chérie to pieces, but she is so lazy sometimes.”
I blinked as the watery sensation of time slowing settled around me.
“That doesn’t seem very nice,” JP said.
Anne-Marie sighed. “I know, but it is like she doesn’t even try. I have stepped in to help her so many times and I cannot keep fixing all her problems simply because she does not want to.”
I blinked again, another watery sensation beginning to prickle in my eyes. Staring at the wall, I watched the stillness of the shadows, an oddly blank feeling in my mind.
“So if you don’t want to help her, why are you here telling me about this?” JP asked.
“Oh, because she nearly punched Clinton today and it was amazing ,” she gushed, then told him an embellished version of Clinton approaching me at the funeral. JP’s shadow moved as he nodded along, interjecting occasionally like he hadn’t already heard the story.
“Wow,” he said when she finished. “Well, good for her.”
“I know.” She sighed again. “I sure hope she finds someone else to go to the Diamond Gala with. We would never allow Clinton to harm her, of course, but it would be much easier if she did not have to spend the evening with him next weekend.”
“I bet,” JP said.
There was a moment of loaded silence and despite everything, I had to fight not to laugh. Anne-Marie was clearly hinting that he should offer to take me. And maybe that would’ve worked out. JP could offer to take me, then we could tell her we were going to the gala together and I wouldn’t have to figure out how to actually tell her.
Then again, I guess that was just another example of me being lazy and letting other people solve my problems.
Finally, Anne-Marie let out another noise of annoyance. “God, I wish you two stubborn shits would get some sense knocked into you.”
JP laughed, startled by her sudden change of tone. “What?!”
“ What ?!” Anne-Marie mocked sarcastically as her shadow on the wall moved.
“Good night, Anne-Marie,” JP called out as his bedroom door closed for the second time.
“Good night, dickhead,” Anne-Marie replied, her voice muffled through the door.
And again, silence filled the room.
It was less beautiful that time. Less refreshing. I didn’t count moments or heartbeats or breaths. I just stayed there until JP leaned over the edge of the bed again.
“As much as I wouldn’t complain about having you permanently naked on my bedroom floor, I think the housekeeper may have some questions,” he said.
“I’m not moving until I know she’s not coming back,” I said.
“I heard her bedroom door close,” he said.
“And which side of it was she on?”
“Presumably the one in her bedroom.”
“You don’t know that, though.”
The mattress shifted as he stood up and I listened to his footsteps as he padded to his door. It opened and he walked into the hall, returning a moment later and closing the door.
“Her shower is running,” he said. “So you’ve got at least an hour, depending on how hot she’s got the water.”
I swallowed hard, then slowly sat up. My face was burning and heated even more when I glanced at JP, who was standing near the door in his boxers. “Where, um, are my clothes?”
“Right.” He stepped forward and pulled the bedspread back, revealing where he’d hidden my shorts and tank top and bra. “Sorry I, uh, missed your panties.”
I forced a laugh as I grabbed my things. Neither of us said anything as JP pulled on a T-shirt and a pair of shorts and I dressed quickly, running a hand through my hair to smooth it down.
And fuck, it was awkward.
“Alright,” I said when I finished. “So, I’m gonna head out. I’ll see you next weekend?”
“Yeah, for sure,” he said, then cleared his throat. “Uh, about tonight—”
“It’s fine.”
“Sorry.” He half-laughed. “Things got, uh, unexpectedly deep.”
“You mean your dick?” I asked, trying to laugh.
“Are you implying my dick’s gotten bigger since the last time we fucked?” he asked.
I shrugged. “Maybe.”
A smile flickered on his face, then faded. “And um, what she said—”
“It’s fine,” I said again.
“Nellie—”
“She didn’t know I was here.” I shrugged. “She's not wrong. I am lazy.”
He sighed. “You know how Anne-Marie is.”
I shrugged. “She says things behind everyone’s back. It was just my turn. Whatever. It’s fine.”
“If you say so. And, uh, about the whole… date thing. I didn’t feel like going out tonight. Michele can be a lot to handle and I…”
“Of course,” I said. “Like you said, it was a hard day.”
“Right. And it doesn’t mean anything.”
“Yes it does.” I ran my hand through my hair again as JP looked up with wide, startled eyes. “It means I’ve got a great pussy.”
He laughed, the sound relieved. “Yeah. Exactly.”
“Cool. Okay. I’m gonna, um, head out.”
“Yeah, for sure,” he said. “Bye, Nell.”
I nodded, then went to JP’s door. After opening it carefully and listening, I left, closing it behind me without looking at him before creeping down the hall and disappearing down the stairs so I could sneak out using the route my best friend and I had discovered years earlier.