Jamie awoke to a scent that hadn't penetrated his senses for so long that it was almost foreign: bacon. Bacon, and... pancakes? Christ, it had been so long since he'd even tasted anything remotely close to bacon and pancakes. He pulled his blanket over his head, but the smell of a home cooked breakfast lingered in his nose, in his mind.
No, he told himself. He had to be strong, resilient. He had to gather what little possessions he had and get the hell out of the Noble household.
Right after he got himself some breakfast.
Sighing, he pulled the covers away and sat up. Rubbing his eyes, he averted a stuporous gaze to the alarm clock sitting atop the cherry wood bedside table. 8:30 A.M., the clock read. Huh, Jamie had gotten himself a good night's rest, something he couldn't remember ever experiencing before, even when he had a place to call home. A warm bed and a full stomach will do that, he figured. Too bad he had to leave it all behind...
Images of Don and Olivia and Nina flashed in his mind, imprints of mother and daughter doing things... nasty, despicable things. He could see Don's shoot lacerated streaks of white cum against his daughter's creamy skin. He could see Olivia, gorgeous Olivia, drag her long tongue along Nina's supple, wanting flesh. So wrong...
So hot, a foreign voice noted in his mind. Jamie shook his head, as if to didder away the impure thoughts that had invaded his mind.
Jamie decided to drown his grogginess, along with his thoughts, with a hot shower before bothering to head downstairs to satiate his desire for a real breakfast. He brushed his teeth with a brand new toothbrush someone had left on the bathroom counter for him labeled "JAMIE!" (Nina, he'd guessed). Afterward he slipped back into the tee shirt and sweatpants Ryan had given him, and stepped his clean, white-socked feet into his old, worn out sneakers. All set. His big brown eyes observed the bedroom, the bedroom that he could have called his own. It was well furnished, but lacked personality—a soul. It was a guest room, after all. It could have been Jamie's, he could have made this room his own. He could have become a Noble. Too bad. Too fucking bad. He shook his head, and exited the room, flipping the light-switch off as he left.
Through the living room and into the kitchen, he found Ryan sitting alone at the breakfast table, digging into a plate of bacon, pancakes, and eggs. Across from him was a steaming plate of the same thing, untouched—Jamie's plate. Strangely, the rest of the family was nowhere to be found. "Probably out being...nasty," Jamie thought aloud.
"Say somethin', bro?" Ryan garbled, his cheeks full of food.
"Oh, no..." Jamie lied.
Ryan managed to swallow a bit of the food he'd stuffed into his face. "Sit down, have some breakfast, dude!"
"Sure! Uh... where's the rest of the family?" Jamie slid in the chair across from Ryan and snagged the bottle of maple syrup from the center of the table, drowning his pancakes.
"Ah, well, dad left for work a couple of hours ago, and Nina's spending her first day of Christmas break at her friend's house." Ryan lifted a strip of bacon with his hand and devoured it before continuing, "Mom had to make a quick run to the store while you were in the shower."
"Oh..." Jamie swallowed a bit of pancake, and just stared at his food, trying to muster up the courage to tell Ryan what was on his mind.
Ryan looked up from his plate, fixing a quizzical gaze upon Jamie's awkward expression. "Somethin' botherin' you, dude?"
"Ryan," Jamie said, sighing, "I have to tell you something..."
One of Ryan's brows shot up, and he gently lay his fork on his plate. "What's on your mind?"
God, he's just like his dad... Jamie, thought, and suddenly felt uneasy about telling him about the things he'd seen last night. But the young man steeled his resolve, took a deep breath, and decided to just come out with it.
"I saw your parents...and Nina, last night...doing... Wait, what is it?" Jamie was thrown off completely by Ryan's smile, and even more so once he'd begun snickering.
"So, you saw them playing together, huh?" Ryan said. There wasn't a tinge of surprise or anger or...anything in his voice. He was so casual about it. Too casual.
Jamie stopped eating, scooting back in his chair a bit. "You mean... you know what they do?"
"Of course I do," Ryan said, lifting his fork and getting back to his breakfast. "I would have joined in the festivities last night, but I was dead tired from... heh, well, that's not important."
"D-Disgusting!" Jamie exclaimed as he shot to his feet. The backs of his knees pushed his chair back a foot or so against the smooth, tiled floor.
Ryan didn't so much as look up, or stop eating for that matter. "Dude," he said through a mouthful of pancakes, "calm down. It's not that serious—"
"Not that serious? Not that serious?! Your family is a bunch of disgusting white people that screw each other like...like animals!" Jamie's heart pounded, and his ire burned even more at Ryan's aloofness, as if Jamie had been upset at him for riding a bike or shaking hands with someone. Why was he so reserved?
"OK," Ryan said after finishing the last bit of his food, "how long did you watch?"
"What?"
"How long did you watch them? My parents and Nina."
"Uh... I..."
"Did you reel in disgust and immediately run back to your room? Or did you sit and watch them play with each other 'till they finished?"
"I... I...saw—"
"Until they finished, right?"
