Exotic

~ coming clean ~

"Stay on the line," I told Lauren. If I was about to be violently dismembered, I wanted there to be a witness. Hopefully, her guilt over the mistake which had landed me in my current situation would outweigh her family loyalties, and her testimony would at least see justice served.

The closed door had given me some relief by muffling the alarm. It meant I could fully process what Jake had just said and formulate a coherent reply despite my peaking distress.

"Was that... did you just make a Vampire Diaries reference?"

Jake looked immediately self-conscious, which lessened him somewhat as an intimidating presence. "Yeah? And? It's not exactly a commonplace thing, sibling sliding. I didn't have a lot of options."

"Then why make the reference at all?" I backed up against the door, sliding my hand around for the handle, before remembering it was an emergency door and didn't have one. I dropped my arm, with the sinking realisation that I was trapped.

Jake threw up his hands, and the gesture made me flinch back. But he looked more exasperated than anything. "I don't know. You might have guessed I'm a little thrown on what exactly has been going on between you and my sister. And my brother."

He waved his phone at me accusingly. I wished I could retract into myself, and leave only a thick shell of impenetrable, featureless armour behind. Exposed, I could only stand as still as I possibly could, and hope that, like a crocodile, Jake's attacks were based on sudden movement.

"What's going on?" my phone called from my hand. "Miles, are you okay? Please talk to me."

Jake's attention shifted. He looked down at the phone in my hand, face contorting in confusion. "Laur?"

"Jake? What are you do..." Lauren began, trailing off before long. After a revelatory pause, she growled, "Put me on speaker."

I obliged, just happy to put someone between myself and Jake. Even if it was just over the phone. The way Jake slouched like a lectured tween when her voice rang out, loud and severe, told me that it didn't make much of a difference when it came to Lauren. She could be just as menacing in audio format.

"Jacob Linus Proust, you better quit your macho posturing and leave him the fuck alone," she seethed. "I don't know what you heard, or what you're thinking but you're wrong and you better well believe that if you make one accusation against my friend Miles without proof, one catty remark that makes him feel worse than he already does, I will tell every senior at Tranquillity that you are taking time off dating to rediscover your faith."

Lauren was breathing hard over the line, daring a retort. I remained fixed in place, with the phone between us acting as a barrier. Jake looked queasy, toeing the unkempt grass with the toes of his sneakers.

"Jesus, Laur, I just want to know what's going on," he finally stammered. "I think that's fair. Caleb comes out and a few hours later I'm getting messages for your ex-boyfriend, intended for him, implying..."

"Implication is not admissible in a court of law," Lauren cut him off harshly. "Try again."

"God, I don't know, Lauren," Jake retorted. "Maybe if Miles actually explained what was going on, I wouldn't have to come to conclusions on my own."

"Maybe if you let him talk, he will," Lauren fired back.

"Uhm," I said weakly, nervous to get between their bout of sibling warfare. "Sorry, but... did you say Caleb came out?"

"Yeah. This morning," Jake replied, as nonchalantly as if he'd been talking about Caleb making toast. If anything, he looked irritated about the derailment of the conversation. "Are you going to tell me or..."