Boy/Boy Problems

One Tequila

It began, like most good decisions do, with a bottle of tequila.

There were other beginnings, of course. Origins can often be traced back further and further until everything becomes murky mess of lineages and evolution. But there are moments, choices, decisions, that are so clear, so important, so unavoidable that they feel like a beginning even in the moment. For Teddy King, that bottle of tequila was one of those moments.

The bottle taunted Teddy. Sitting starkly against his pale kitchen bench promising the kind of temporary relief that causes more problems later. Teddy wanted temporary relief, he needed it. But he knew he had to put up some semblance of protest or his sister would take the bottle away to be contrary, she was like that.

"I'm fine," said Teddy for the hundredth time that day. He'd said it so much it almost felt real.

"That's a lie," said Lily as she searched the kitchen cabinets for something for them to drink out of. "Nobody ever says they're fine when they're actually fine. They say they're good, or great, or okay. Never fine. When someone says they're fine it means they are definitely not fine."

"I really am fine," insisted Teddy with a hint of the petulance that was almost entirely reserved for conversations with his sister.

Lily placed two metal mugs proudly on the breakfast bar in front of Teddy, "sure you are little brother."

Teddy had never seen these mugs before in his life, if he had he would have sent them directly to goodwill or more likely regifted them to one of the pretentious people that populates his life. Unfortunately he had not encountered them before, and as such they were a stark reminder that while his name was on the deed, this apartment had never truly been his. Someone else had stocked the kitchen, someone else had picked the furniture. This wasn't his home, it was never meant to be.

"Those are not glasses," said Teddy pointing to the hideous, fake industrial mugs Lily had discovered in his all too trendy kitchen.

"Well they are all I could find 'Mr I'm so rich I've never used my kitchen'," said Lily with a hint of humor that suggested she knew perfectly well where the glasses were but had chosen the mugs anyway.

Lily poured more tequila than anyone should into both cups, and if she gave Teddy a more generous share he wasn't about to protest. As much as he was standing by saying he was fine until he felt it, there was only so much he could take sober. It had been a long stressful day of questions he did not have the answer to, he needed a drink.

They maintained eye contact, throwing the tequila down their throats as though they were in an old western drink off. Neither of them were cowboys and they did not keep their cool for long. Teddy broke first, he threw his head onto the hard cool granite of the breakfast bar, swallowing his breath, willing the tequila to stay down. Lily wasn't far behind she doubled over, resting her hands on her knees, breathing heavily.

"We can never enter any kind of drinking contest okay, we are not cool enough," said Lily through harsh breaths, still doubled over her hands raised above her head as if reaching to the heavens for help through the burn.

"It would help if we weren't drinking lighter fluid," said Teddy.

"Shut it you. Not everyone can afford to drink champagne like it's water."

"I can buy us champagne," suggested Teddy. "Please let me buy as champagne. I can get Rah to go buy us champagne right now."

"You are absolutely not calling Rah right now."

"She won't mind."

"She's your assistant not your slave little brother, besides she has more important things to worry about at the moment," said Lily suddenly serious in way that cut through the humour that had been holding the evening together until that point.