Chapter 42: Chapter Twenty-1

Chapter Twenty It’s warm. For chilly mornings of spring, it sure is hot. But it’s a nice kind of hot. Not humid or burning hot, but cool hot. I feel warmth and comfortable. I curl my body into a smaller ball and enjoy this strange once-in-a-lifetime sensation. I flip over to my right side to get to the good side of the pillow. My hand brushes against a cold solid. Did I hit the nightstand? I reach for my phone. Why hasn’t my alarm woken me up yet? Where is Mom? All I get in return is something hard. It’s smooth. When was my table so smooth? I slap my hand around for some sort of recognition of my nightstand while my eyes remain closed. “Stop it.” Who’s that? I open my eyes slowly. Did my nightstand just talk to me? I need some more sleep before I think my pillow’s talking to me. But I should find my phone to see what time it is. I don’t want to be late for school. “Can you please stop?” There it is again. I must be in the half-dream-half-awake state. Or drunk. But I don’t recall drinking anything last night so I go with the other choice. I ignore my nightstand’s complaints and spread my fingers over, knowing my phone’s here somewhere. If I open my eyes, it’ll ruin my chance of sleep again. “Okay, this is just absurd, Miss Ivory. Please stop.” Miss Ivory? What? Is my nightstand taking over Lee’s voice or…. My eyes snap open and right into Lee’s forearm—his muscular forearm. And then my eyes travel to his tired face…and down to his naked torso. I scream. Lee jolts up, covering his ears. “Will you stop that noise, please?” I jolt up too and yell, “What are you doing here?” My eyes travel to his abs on my own. I blush. “And why aren’t you wearing a shirt?” I’ve never seen him so naked and exposed before. I look away. “Put on a shirt!” Suddenly, I feel a hand on my wrist. I scream again. It’s Mark, his eyes half-open and his hair messy as can be. “Why are you screaming so early in the morning?” he mumbles before falling back onto his pillow. His torso is naked as well. My eyes linger on his hard eight-pack before looking at the quilt. “Why is everyone naked?” I yell. And since when did businessmen work out? Did they even have time? Why do they all have abs? It must be because they’re billionaires. “Can you all put on a shirt?” I hear Mark softly snoring back into his slumber and Lee just staring at me with blank eyes. What the hell happened? The sunlight is shining through the windows. Why am I in my mother’s room? And then I remember last night. Wait, but why are there— Ding-dong! Who would be at the door? Mom’s in the hospital and our family doesn’t really visit. They usually just send a handful of cash with a card reading ‘Happy Birthday!’ and that’s it. Mailmen usually just leave the mail in the mailbox since we almost never order packages. “Get the door,” I tell Lee. “Me?” he says, pointing to himself like I accused him of great crime. “No,” I say, “I’m talking to the freaking lamp.” Lee looks over to the lamp on the nightstand next to him. It’s a floral patterned lamp—one of Mom’s favorites. He turns his gaze back to me, his eyebrow arched. “Why would you talk to a lamp? That’s simply—” “I’m being sarcastic, genius!” His eyebrows knit even more. “Oh,” he says. He crosses his arms. “I knew that.” His muscles flex and I have to pry my own eyes away before he catches me staring. “Why should I get the door anyways? It’s your house. Why don’t you go open it?” “Just do it!” I demand, crossing my own arms. It seems that I’m the only sane person in the bed—also the only dressed one for that matter. My thoughts travel back to Lee’s abs but I catch and turn them around before they can get further. “Go open the door.” “No, why don’t you.” “Open the fucking door, Lee.” “Don’t curse at me, you little woman with—” I seemed to be so busy arguing with the stupid and arrogant Lee that I didn’t realize that the doorbell had stopped. I also didn’t realize someone was standing at the door. Someone I hadn’t seen for a long while. My eyes widen. “Brent?!” I jump out of the bed, a grin etched onto my face. “Brent, it really is you!” I run and jump on him into a big bear hug. My brother is here. I haven’t seen him ever since he left for college this year. He could be a real jackass but he really isn’t so bad. He’s actually quite okay. “What are you doing here?!” I feel Brent hugging me back. He pulls me away. His face is blank—not a trace of a smile or even any emotion. “What are you doing, Ivory?” My eyebrows press together in confusion. “What do you mean?” Brent’s eyes wander behind me where the two (naked) men are, still inside the bed. Mark is rubbing his eyes open as Lee stares at Brent. Now that I think about it, it must’ve looked really awkward in Brent’s eyes. “Oh! Them. Oh, this is not how it looks! I wasn’t doing anything, I swear!” Brent’s face questions me. “How about you head down to the kitchen? I’ll fix you up a coffee. I’ll explain. I promise.” Brent stares for a few minutes at everything before nodding. “Fine.” He readjusts his duffel bag on his arm before lugging away to the kitchen downstairs. When I hear him step off the stairs, I close the door. “You two need to go!” I tell Lee and Mark. I pick up their clothes, which they rudely decided to throw on the floor. Throwing their clothes at their faces, I start fixing the bed. “Get up, get up!” Mark sluggishly gets out of bed. Lee is already on his toes, putting his pants and shirt on. He throws on his watch on his wrist and does his tie—looking sophisticated and calm. Mark on the other hand is still trying to stand up. They were so contradicting to each other. While Mark finally gets his ass moving, Lee pulls me to the corner of the room, holding my elbow in a death grip. “Who was he?” “Who was who?” “That guy.” “Oh,” I say. “That’s Brent.” Lee’s eyes darken and his grip tightens but it doesn’t hurt. His voice is barely a whisper before he says, “Brent who?” Why did he sound so angry? And demanding? I don’t have to tell him anything. Because after all, none of this is his business. He’s just a stalker and a weird rich man that uses girls for his lonely stupid life. “None of your business.” I snag my arm away and go pull the covers up on Mom’s bed. I don’t need Lee telling me what I should tell him and what I shouldn’t. I run my life. I’m an independent woman who does just fine. Mark finally finishes putting on his clothes. “Let’s go, Mark,” I say, gesturing to the door. When I reach the bottom of the stairs, I hear Brent making clank noises. As sexist as it is, Brent was never meant for the kitchen and still isn’t. I remember one time he had decided to make Mom a cake for Mother’s Day. He nearly burned down our house, along with Mom and I in it. In the end, Mom had to pay extra for damages and we ended up spending the day in a motel while workers got our kitchen renovated. “Where is the goddamn coffee?” Brent asks me when he sees me. He closes the current cabinet he’s opened. “What the hell, man. It’s like the coffee is frickin’ gold.” He opens up another cabinet and only groans. “Just sit down,” I say, shaking my head. Brent walks around and sits at the island. He looks over to Mark, standing shyly behind me. Before he can say anything, I say, “This is Mark. Don’t touch him. I’ll explain everything in a minute.”