"Dammit, Chris, I don't have time for this today!" James ended the call and tossed his phone onto the passenger seat next to him, scanning the road ahead for somewhere to flip a U-turn. He was late for work and was only going to be later now because of his brother's fuck up. "Why can't you ever remember your shit?" He mumbled aloud to no one. Normally picking something up for his brother wouldn't be a big deal - they lived close to one another and if he was being honest with himself, Chris was James' best friend. But today he didn't feel like seeing Olivia, didn't feel like enduring that specific brand of torture at 8:15 A.M. on a random Tuesday.
He found a spot to turn around and began driving the familiar route to his brother's apartment, muscle memory taking over, allowing his mind to wander. Images of Olivia swam in his vision, unbidden and (mostly) unwanted.
Olivia in a bikini by the pool last summer when they had all gone on a family vacation to Mexico - her tits straining against the thin fabric of her woefully inadequate top. Olivia bending over to get something out of the oven on Christmas
(James had needed to excuse himself to the bathroom after that particular sight).
Olivia stepping out of the shower, every inch of her soft, supple body covered in tiny beads of water, steam rising from her golden skin...
ok, that one was fabricated by his brain, he hadn't actually seen it with his own eyes, but his dick didn't know that.
"Fuck, James,
stop it,
" he chided himself. "This has got to stop. Now. Obsessing over your brother's fianceé cannot possibly end well, for any of us. She's not interested, and even if she were, it's too late." Saying it to himself, out loud, felt like a promise. Maybe he could finally put this stupid crush behind him.
+++
Olivia was late. Again. "Shit, shit, shit! Where did I put my earrings?" she muttered under her breath, running frantically from room to room, glancing at every surface trying to spot a glint of gold. She finally spied them on the kitchen counter and ran across the apartment in her underwear to grab them.
She had just closed her hand over the delicate jewelry when she heard a key in the lock just a few feet away from where she was standing. "Chris? Is that -" her voice died in her throat as the door opened, revealing not her fiancé Chris, but instead, his brother James.
"What the fuck are you doing?" she cried out, hugging her arms across her naked chest as James entered the kitchen/dining room/living room of the apartment she shared with his brother.
To his credit, James did look genuinely shocked and apologetic. He rushed to cover his eyes, but not before Olivia noticed a look of appreciation in them. "I'm sorry!" He shouted hastily (and way too loudly, she thought). "Chris didn't tell me you'd be home, I promise! I'm just here to grab his laptop!" he said, and his voice sounded so panicked that Olivia softened. She still kept her arms over her breasts, but she was nicer when she spoke again.
"Sorry, you just scared the shit out of me. Turn around, I'm going to run to the bedroom." she said, making sure he followed orders before walking back down the hallway. "I shouldn't be here, actually, I'm running late," she called behind her.
"Ah," said James. It was all he could force out, as the agony of being in the same room as she was while almost naked seemed to have robbed him of all saliva. Or coherent thought. His brain was a buzzing, pulsing, useless mass of goo in his skull. He desperately tried to think about his grandma, or baseball, or what he had once learned SOHCAHTOA stood for in trigonometry class in high school.
James was still standing with his back turned and his hand over his eyes when Olivia emerged from the bedroom, Chris' laptop and charger tucked under her arm. "Here ya go," she said. "I'm decent now, you can turn around," she added when James didn't budge from his spot.
When he turned around and uncovered his eyes, his brain once again went into overdrive.
