Page 49 of Stepbrothers with Benefits
Arlo grunted, finally smiling. “Now that you put things into perspective, I feel a little arrogant for pushing.”
“I know a thing or two about siblings, and that includes knowing that sometimes you have to speak up because either they won’t, or they don’t see things the way you do,” Marshall told him, picking up his beer bottle. “Milo here seems to be surrounded by nothing but people who love and care about him, but still let him be himself. That combination is pretty rare; all of you are lucky to have each other.”
“I suppose we are,” Arlo said calmly, but I could tell he was pleased by what Marshall said. Whether it was because of the whole thing or just the tail end was anyone’s guess. Arlo appreciated a nice, wrapped-up explanation so long as it made sense to whatever logic went through his head. Then again, even with his logical approach, he was still a sucker for a good, emotionally impactful statement, and Marshall had covered that nicely, talking about how luckywewere to have the family we did. Arlo wasn’t the most expressive of people, but I doubted a day went by that he wasn’t grateful for the family he’d been given.
“Have you two finished having your little heart-to-heart?” I grumbled, not quite feeling excluded but still on the outside enough to feel irritated. That was my brother, but also my dad, whom I was supposed to be connecting with. Was that petty? Probably, but I was still irritated.
“I was just getting to know him a little better,” Arlo said with that private, secret smile he was so good at before taking a drink. “Where’s your better half by the way?”
I scowled at him. “Don’t you start.”
“I wasn’t starting anything,” Arlo said, but his soft squint told me he was enjoying himself. “Better half can mean a lot of things.”
“Only when it suits you,” I told him, narrowing my eyes. “But we both know you’re jumping on the train of giving us hell over....well, you know.”
Arlo chuckled, setting his glass down and staring up at the sky. “There are worse things in this world than being teased by your family because you’re close to...someone.”
“Mystepbrother,you mean,” I said, hissing the emphasis. The subject felt more sensitive than usual, which made sense considering a couple of weeks ago, I got an eyeful of Eli in a way I never had before. Even then, I still felt more sensitive about itthan usual, even with...well, seeing Eli hard right in front of me. Which was strange, I generally figured out what was going on in my head enough to know what was bothering me if I dug hard enough, but every time I’d tried lately, I ran into a mental...well, it wasn’t a brick wall, it was a fog. I was being kept from understanding something about myself, but I couldn’t get close enough to figure out what it was, let alone how to deal with it.
Annoying is what it was.
One thing stuck out. It was a dream from that night when I came home and just... lay down with Eli. Of course, if it were that simple, then it wouldn’t matter, but that dream had much more weight. Like I lay with him, and there had been so much more that I didn’t know what to do with it.
Not that significant dreams about him weren’t something I hadn’t dealt with, because fuck knew I had. I’d had several dreams about him, mostly about sucking and fucking. But what stuck with me was somehow more significant and yet...less.
“If that makes it better, sure,” Arlo said with a grunt as he took a drink.
I knew he meant something, sure, it was something innocent, but I still?—
What?
I remembered Eli.
Warm and available.
Present and there and?—
And?
Hard?
Oh God, he was hard?
“Whatever makes you feel better,” I offered limply.
Hard?
Why would he be hard?
The fuck kind of dream did I have?
Eli hard from...my touch. Yeah, that made sense. That was just the kind of dream I would have about him. He was, after all, the epitome of my fantasies, and just...no, it made sense. Well, no...it didn’t make sense. Not exactly. First of all, I didn’t have sex dreams; when I remembered my dreams. I’d only had a dream about Eli like that once, and it was...different than the dream I swore I had had about him that night.
The memory of the dream was off in a way that was hard to put into words. It wasn’t hazy in that I could barely remember the details because while the whole dream didn’t stick out, there were more details than I usually had. Yes...that was it. Remembering my dreams was based on the feeling the dream left me with, not necessarily the details. But I could remember details more than emotions. I remembered how good it had felt to lie against him, talk to him, and be honest about...things. How I had felt him grow hard and then felt him touching me like I’d always wanted him to?—
My fingers fumbled around my beer, pushing it forward when my grip missed as my fingers clenched, knocking it over with a harsh crack as the glass split and sent beer splattering everywhere. I barely noticed the sounds of disgust and surprise from Arlo and Marshall as the fleeing beer hit them. Because… I fully understood that what I had in my head wasn’t the memory of a dream. It was just a plain, old-fashioned memory that had sunk below the surface of my thoughts.
A memory that was fuzzy because I’d been drunk. A memory that probably should have been lost to the universe because I’d been drinking, and I rarely remembered what happened the half hour leading up to falling asleep with booze in my veins. A memory that, even fragmented and hard to piece together, was still strong enough for my addled mind to hold on to those scattered, glittering pieces.
