I followed a trail of oil drippings down the street. I tried not to stare at the jalopy that had collapsed in our driveway, but it was like a Salvador Dali painting. Strike that, not even Dali could have conceived anything as surreal as the slapped together AMC Gremlin.
The car itself wasn't too much of a problem, the real problem was it's owner, Erin. Ever since my family moved to Saratoga Spring she had been a fixture around the house. She and my little sister Julie were inseparable. They had been best friends since the day they first met, Julie cried for days after Erin's family moved to the next town. It was just six miles away but to an eleven year old kid, five years away from sitting behind the wheel, another suburb might as well be on another planet.
They found a way around it, by spending the weekends at one or the other's house and spending the rest of the week on the telephone.
Once Erin got her hands on what passed for a car they were reunited. Which isn't bad in and of itself, I'm happy that my little sister is happy, but having Erin around the house so frequently became hazardous. She had a serious crush on me. What started out as an innocent schoolgirl crush on a college boy changed when she turned eighteen. Fawning turned to flirting, her clothes shrank and when we were alone she seized every opportunity to touch and tease.
That was the start of my problems, what normal twenty-four year old guy wouldn't want a hot, blonde, eighteen year old girl lusting after him. I shouldn't have minded at all, but a relationship with Erin never felt right.
I hadn't surrendered to her flirtations and was glad, giving in would have been a betrayal of my sister's trust.
I trudged across the driveway. My day at the Video Hut had been cut short by a little squirrel's unfortunate run-in with a power transformer. No power meant no computers, and that meant no more work for this exhausted part-timer. I was anxious to get upstairs to soak in the shower with minimal teenaged interference. I tried to enter the house as quietly as possible, slipping in through the kitchen door. My steps slowed as my shoes thumped on the hard linoleum floor.
I heard a whimper in the family room. It was probably nothing, just the girls doing God knows what. I heard the whimper again, it was Julie. Ignoring the risk of near molestation by my sister's best friend I decided to investigate.
I peeked around the corner and saw my sister. She was sitting close to Sam, Erin's brother. He was a mechanic in town. He was also twenty-six, far too old to be alone on the couch with my little sister.
The creep had one arm wrapped around her waist, the other was underneath her lilac tank top. Julie wriggled beside him. Her lips were moving but I couldn't hear what she was saying. My ears weren't functioning at that point. Sam released her waist and snaked his other hand beneath her top. He cupped both of Julie's breasts, they appeared to be too large for his hands to accommodate.
I felt very envious of Sam at that moment, a revelation that caused me to look away in embarrassment. My eyes fixed firmly on the hardwood floor, without the distraction of Julie's body I heard what she whimpered. "Stop, Sam. Please." I tore my eyes from the floor and looked at her face. Her eyes were red, this was happening against her will.
I had planned to throw Sam out for trying to make it with my sister all along, but now he would be lucky if I didn't crack his shaved head open like a piñata. I tore into the room and grabbed Julie's arm, tearing her free from her molester.
"Shit, Rick!" Sam seemed amazed to see me. His tiny eyes darted between me and my sister. He jumped off the couch and scrambled to the door.
"Get back here, Sam." Did he think I would let him run off after what he tried to do to my little sister? I was on him in a second. I grabbed the back of his t-shirt, tearing a jagged clump of the black material. He threw an elbow that caught me squarely in the gut. As I doubled over he grabbed me in a headlock. His wiry arms tightened around my neck, cutting my air supply.
Julie bounded off the sofa and delivered open handed blows to Sam's head and arms. She screeched at him, demanding he let me go. He unwrapped one hand from my throat and shoved my sister back against the sofa. Sam isn't a big man, puberty only seemed to have had minimal effects on his growth, but Julie was a tiny thing. Watching her barely five-foot tall frame bounce on the sofa cushions boiled my blood.
Sam was older than me by two years and had been a decent wrestler in high school. Those types of credentials are of little use against a pissed off big brother, I supposed my nine inch height and fifty pound weight advantage also worked in my favor. Sam never even realized his headlock had been broken until he found himself cart-wheeling over the couch. He crashed into a table, knocking over a crystal vase full of peach roses.
After a few more moments Sam was nothing more than a battered heap in the driveway.
When I got back to the family room Julie was on her knees gathering the spilled roses. Tears streamed down her pretty face. I looked at the mess. Mom's anniversary roses, reduced to trampled petals and a puddle of water.
Her tank top was torn, exposing too much of her chest. She tried to cover herself with her arms, but she was too well developed. I unbuttoned the dumb blue vest that was part of my work uniform and covered my little sister. I took her hand and lifted her from the floor. I almost led her to the couch but thought better of it, instead we sat together on the loveseat. Julie leaned close to my side and I put an arm around her.
"I didn't think you'd be home." Her tears soaked through my shirt. Her makeup would stain the white material but I didn't care. She held me close, her breath came in ragged gasps. I stroked her hair as gently as I could. "I trusted him," she said between sobs. "He said he only wanted to kiss."
She explained that Sam had been paying a lot more attention to her the last few weeks. The last time my sister had been at Erin's house he asked her out. My sister, being hopelessly romantic, invited the little grease monkey over this afternoon.
Julie relaxed in my arms, it looked like all of her tears had been cried. We straightened the mess made by my tussle with Sam. The vase had survived the fall, good thing too, because explaining the missing flowers would be difficult enough. Julie sopped up the spilled water with a wad of paper towels. She seemed to be in better spirits now, she certainly looked healthy covered in my blue vest.
"What?" she asked, holding the blue polyester close to her chest.
She had caught me staring. "I was just thinking."
"Thinking about what?"
I couldn't tell her what I was actually thinking about. I needed to say something charming. "I was wondering why Lance and I don't look that good in our vests." Apparently, I didn't know the difference between charming and moronic.
She giggled and thumbed one of the oversized plastic buttons. "Well I can't comment on Lance, but you look pretty cute when you wear yours." She sent a soggy white projectile my way. A mass of wet paper towels splattered my face. She was up the stairs and in her room before I could even think about retaliating.
