For the third time in a week, I spotted a stream of clothes fall steadily out the second story window of the house across the street. The window belonged to my best friend, John, and the culprit throwing his clothes was no doubt his twin brother, Danny. All week, from my own second story window, I watched John run outside, collect his scattered clothes, and return inside.
The Collins boys, meaning the twins and their older brother, Andy, moved into that house when they were only a bunch of toddlers. Their younger sister came along a few months later, about the time I showed up in the neighborhood, right before kindergarten. Despite all of our trials and tribulations and butting heads, John and I have been more or less best friends since.
Danny recently returned from I don't know where and since then the warring brothers had been at it. John never told me what he did to warrant Danny throwing his clothes out the window. Although John claimed he was innocent, I doubted that was the case.
Back when we were in elementary school, all playing football, Danny and John were always at each other. Danny was bigger than John back then and they'd tackle each other even when they weren't meant to be tackling. And then, during tackling drills, they'd always choose to tackle each other. Danny always won.
But how things changed over the years. Danny stopped playing football many years ago and I was sure John was much bigger than him now.
This last time John didn't emerge from the house. Instead, I saw a dark-haired teen boy, wearing a black hoodie with no shoes and socks run through the snow to collect the clothes. Even from this distance, I noticed a purple hue to his hair, hair that flopped over his face and ears. I wondered what he looked like up close.
As if to sense my stares, the boy shot me the middle finger. I decided to close my blinds so I didn't look like a creepy peeping Tom.
"Hey, you in there?" a familiar voice asked behind my door. While I was busy staring at the boy I presumed to be Danny, I hadn't noticed John walk across the street to my house. Getting off my bed, I opened my door to let in my best friend. "Can you believe what that punk did again?"
"Uh...throw your clothes out the window?" I replied.
"Yeah, third time this week," he said. "He's washing them this time. He just better not bleach them or I'll kill him."
"What'd you do to him, anyway?" I asked.
"What do you mean what I'd do to him? Nothing. Nothing at all."
"Yeah, right," I said doubtfully. He was always doing something to someone, but only in fun. He wasn't mean-spirited like some of his friends. Deep down, John and Danny really loved each other, that's partly why they always chose to tackle each other during tackling drills back in elementary school.
As twins, though, they looked nothing alike, definitely not identical. I always thought Danny was the cuter brother although I'd never say that out loud or admit it to anyone but myself; I was straight until proven otherwise.
In fact, John and Danny couldn't have been more different. John was Mr. Athletic—strong, built, tall, a perfect all-round athlete while Danny, from what I could see, was on the skinny side, dark and emo, the kid who always wore black. I could barely believe he once played football.
"Okay okay, so I reversed his doorknob of his room so the lock was on the outside," John confessed. "So I locked him in his room."
I had to admit that was kind of funny.
"And why'd you do that?" I asked.
"Because he deflated the tires to my bike," he replied.
"And why did he deflate your tires?" I asked.
"Because I flunked my driver's license test," he said. Since he failed his driver's license test, I thought he most definitely deserved to have his tires deflated. He only flunked his driver's test because he failed to look over his shoulder while backing up. We must have practiced backing up a million times, but he still messed up. He deserved what he got.
"You shouldn't have flunked it," I said.
"So I messed up," he said. "Give me a break. Anyway, I'm having a party tonight. My parents are going to New York for the weekend. Andy's hooking me up. You coming or what?"
In this case, "hooking me up" meant John's twenty-one year old brother, Andy, was coming home for the weekend to supply the alcohol. The Collins brothers (i.e. John and Andy) would most likely charge a small fee for admittance to the party. Danny was often invisible at these parties, hiding somewhere in the house. As his best friend and neighbor, John would never let me miss an infamous Collins' party. I never knew what to expect at these parties.
Even though John and I were best friends, I wasn't even close to the type of athlete he and his brother, Andy, were. After a couple of concussions my freshman year of high school, my parents forbid me to play football again, leaving me only with soccer and baseball. I was mediocre at both, but good enough to make the teams. John played everything except soccer.
John only stayed a few minutes, mostly to complain about Danny. Luckily I didn't have to listen to him go on and on about his ex-girlfriend and how she moved on and he didn't. His girlfriend, Kayleigh, broke up with him three weeks ago to go out with some other boy on the football team. She pretty much tore out his heart and stomped on it a hundred times. They had been going out for close to a year, too.
I hated to be the first one at a party, so I waited until nine o'clock to head over. Fortunately, I didn't have to drive.
"No drinking," my hypocritical mother said to me on my way out the front door. She typically drank half a bottle of wine a day. She no doubt would be passed out drunk by the time I got home at midnight. At nine o'clock, my father was already in bed as he was most nights.
"Yeah, alright," I called back to her.
By the time I got to the party, John had already had a few beers and was feeling pretty good. Twenty or so people swarmed around the living room, a mixture of girls and boys, mostly from high school, in addition to a few of Andy's friends.
Andy's hair was light like John's. From the back, they could pass as twins. I spotted him in a corner, facing a girl whom I recognized from high school.
A pretty brown-haired girl handed me a bottle of Bud, not my preferred brand of beer, but I took it, anyway. This girl, who seemed to aspire to be Ariana Grande with her long brown hair tied up in a pony tail on the top of her head like the pop star/actress, seemed to know me, but I didn't know her or at least I couldn't remember her. A lot of girls seemed to know me and I never really paid much attention.
"Hi, Ari," she said to me, smiling widely. She was pretty so I wondered if John would be interested. He really needed to move on.
"Hi...uh...um...I..." I wreaked my brain, trying to recall her name.
"It's Anna," she said.
"Thanks," I said, smiling in return. "Anna." Her smile faded as I walked away from her.
John's fifteen year old sister, Caitlyn, wearing black leggings and an oversized black sweater, stood in the back of the room by herself, holding a red cup. I doubted she was drinking plain soda. Her short dark hair stuck out messily along the brim of her maroon beanie hat. Smiling at me, she took a sip of her drink, waving to me as I roamed around the semi-crowded living room.
Caitlyn resembled Danny more than his twin, John, did. For the past year or so, Caitlyn developed this school girl crush on me. John found pleasure in teasing me about this. At eighteen, I'd never ever consider dating a fifteen year old, whether a girl or a boy.
As Caitlyn smiled at me, sipping her drink, I wondered where Danny was. We'd known each other for years, but rarely said a word to each other. I wanted to praise him for deflating John's tires although I did feel kind of bad because his bike was his most prized possession. Maybe he learned a lesson this time and wouldn't flunk his driver's test again.
Another girl approached me, her long blond hair hanging over her bare shoulders. Again, this girl knew my name, but I had no idea what her name was.
"Wanna dance?" the girl asked.
"Um...uh...well..." I stammered.
Fortunately, John saved me by tossing me another beer even though I had barely finished the first one. I really wasn't much of a drinker. Usually I'd succumb to peer pressure and have a couple of beers. John was the one who'd get drunk and so hung over he'd swear he'd never drink again after a puke-filled morning.
Somehow I got suckered into playing a juvenile game of Truth or Dare, as if we were all still in middle school. It wasn't John's idea, at least, but he went along with it because he went along with anything when he was drunk.
Whenever I played this stupid game, I most always inevitably chose "dare."
"Okay," John said, relishing this moment as a bunch of us sat in a circle like some cheesy teen movie. "I dare you to go upstairs and kiss my sister," he said as if he had been dying to dare me to do this for months. Caitlyn had said goodnight to me about an hour ago, probably passed out by now.
"What if she's asleep?" I asked, not too keen on the idea of kissing a girl.
"Wake her up," John said. "She won't mind. She'll do anything for you."
"Shut up, John," I said. "I feel like we're twelve years old."
"Are you going or not?" John asked, laughing.
"I'm going," I said, staggering to my feet, tipsy but not drunk. The entire room went quiet as spectators watched me tiptoe up the stairs.
The entire hallway was eerily dark. I had been upstairs a million times, usually to go to John's room. I was fairly certain I knew where I was going. Opening her door, I stumbled over a few things on the floor, giggling on my way to the bed.
"Caitlyn," I whispered. "Hey, sweetheart, I have a present for you." Drunker than I thought, I plopped down on the bed. The room was very dark, a moonless January night.
This is stupid, I thought. No one would even know if I didn't go through with it. But I was sure John would find out and I wasn't one to back out of a dare. Besides, if I didn't carry through with it, John would never let me live it down or trust me again with anything.
Just do it, my mind told me.
Except for a dark head of hair on a pillow, I really couldn't see anything. Holding my breath, I bent down and kissed a pair of lips.
Surprisingly, the chapped lips were nice, far nicer than I ever expected. There was some movement in the bed, some ruffling and then the bedside light abruptly turned on. The pair of lips I kissed were not Caitlyn's but Danny's.
Oh boy...
His white cheeks were a light shade of pink. My cheeks, too, were warm. He sat up, staring into my eyes. As he sat up, I noticed a purple tint to his pretty blue eyes.
"I...uh...was looking for Caitlyn," I said.
Despite the initial shock, I had this strong desire to kiss him again. He was definitely cute. As we looked at each other, I sensed he wanted to kiss me again, too. His eyes were bluer than John's, his skin fairer and far smoother. I bet he only shaved once a month.
When I kissed him, he definitely kissed me back. It was nice.
Continuing to sit on his bed, I admired his eyes. Likewise, he gazed dreamily into my own green eyes.
His hand poked out of the blanket, reaching for the back of my neck.
As he went to kiss me again, I abruptly stood up. Backing out of his room, our eyes remained fixed on each other.
"Ari," he said. I wanted to say something, but I was suddenly speechless, my voice gone. The hair on the back of my neck stood up.
Closing his door, I bolted down the stairs and to the front door, totally freaked out, afraid Danny would let everyone know about this mishap. Not only that, I enjoyed the kiss and wished it were under different circumstances.
"Hey, what's with you?" John asked. "Hey, how'd it go? I bet she loved it. Hey, come on, man, what was it like? What'd she say?"
"I never kiss and tell," I said and left the house. I had to get out of there.