The Twins & Me

Sorry

"Cherry!" comes a voice from inside the house, and Mrs. Camden turns.

"Coming!" Then, smiling at me and giving my arm a final squeeze, she says, "I'll leave you kids to it! Enjoy yourselves."

And she teeters on her high heels back inside.

I'm rooted to the spot, but Arlo takes a step forward. "Wren?"

I give a little shrug. My face gets hot under their stares.

Then, the mystery boy turns—

It's the guy from the Halloween bar. The devil on the pedestal that grinded up against me. He's lost his eyebrow piercing and his clothing covers his body tonight. Expensive, conservative clothing. His hair is parted and styled intentionally, completely different than the first time I saw him—but his eyes are the same. In a flash he's up out of the chair and extending a hand to me.

"Wren, so nice to see you again." His movements are just as fluid as before when he was pushing me up against the stripper pole. He's even got that devilish grin on his face.

"Y-you?!" I can't contain the exclamation in my voice. "Who are you—what are you doing here?"

His hand falls because there's no way in Hell I'm going to shake it.

"I fucking knew it," Ollie suddenly says, rising from his seat. "It was you at the Devil's Lair. Does Daddy know you strip on the weekends, little Bastian?"

My head spins. Daddy? As in Dr. Camden?

Bastian laughs—it's a light, hollow sound. He doesn't take his eyes off me. "Of course not. To think I'm wasting my fifteen years of ballet swinging my cock around for bachelorettes...it would drive him to drugs, wouldn't it?"

That's a nerve. Ollie comes forward but Arlo stops him.

"You're brothers?" I say, looking between them.

"Half-brothers," Bastian answers, cocking his head at me.

I ignore his penetrating glare and step around him to face the twins better. "You never talked about him." At least, present-Bastian. I do remember, when the twins told me about their family for the first time while we laid in their bed and Arlo held me, that after Felix left their mother he went and started a family of his own—and he that he got in a car crash with his child. I guess it never occurred to me that they would be related, or that the child would be around their age.

Ollie's still seething at Bastian, so Arlo answers. "Clearly, we try to avoid him."

I turn partly back to Bastian, who's moved closer to me. He peers down at me just like he did the night we first met—there's a darkness in his light eyes, a familiar glint that reminds me of Ollie. "Just as wide-eyed as I remember you," he says softly. "But not as innocent?"

"Enough," Ollie cuts in. His hand grasps my arm and he pulls me toward him, away from Bastian. My shoulder comes in contact with his chest and I feel like melting. "Run along, little Bastian, before I tell Felix about your extra-curriculars."

Bastian bites the inside of his cheek, giving us a little flash of his tongue, before winking at me. "Catch up with you all later, then. Bye, Wren."

Ollie releases his hold on me once the doors close behind Bastian. I wish he wouldn't.

"If you came just to please Felix, I think you're good," Ollie says, putting distance between us by sitting back on the couch. Arlo follows suit, avoiding my eyes.

Even with the warmth from the firepit, I shiver. I clench my hands and take a towards them. "I came for you."

At these words, they both look at me.

"I—I'm sorry."

Arlo's mouth opens and Ollie's jaw clenches tightly.

I grip onto the hem of my dress. "I don't want to come between you. I don't. I couldn't live with myself. Ollie, you really fucked up by ignoring the safeword. Arlo told you the truth about that night. He loves me, and I love him. And, honestly, the truth is..."

Here my words get cut off. Tears well up in my eyes and I can't stop them. But I push on. If I don't tell them how I feel now then I never will.

"The truth is that I like you—I—I even love you. I don't know what your deal is, how you feel about me, if you just see me as a toy, it doesn't even fucking matter. Just know that I do care for you, no matter that I can't stand you. You've always looked out for me in your own sick way and you're number one in Arlo's life so that means you're pretty high on my list, too."

And I start sobbing. I cover my mouth with my hand as my vision blurs. I squeeze my eyes shut. "I don't want to live without you—either of you. So I'm sorry for hurting you. If you don't want me then I understand. I deserve it—"

Two sets of arms engulf me from either side. All at once I'm filled with the comforting and secure scent of the Levitt twins. I can feel a hand in my hair, a mouth against my ear.

"Since you haven't figured it out, yet, Little Wren, I love you, too."

My heart expands at Ollie's words.

"I fucking love you," he repeats, just to let it sink in. "Thinking you didn't want me—that you didn't care—it made me crazy. I was jealous of Arlo. I've never felt like that towards him before, and I didn't know what it was until you told me you loved him and I could see it in your fucking eyes. I'm sorry I ignored the safeword. Baby Brother, I'm sorry."

Ollie has never apologized, to me, or probably in his entire life.

"And I'm sorry I'm making you cry."

I grip their sweaters in my hands, put my arms around the both of them.

We stay like that, a minute, two, three. It feels like I could stay in their embrace forever.

But then Ollie takes a step back. He runs his sleeve across his face, and I see the trace of tears. "Now, sit the fuck down, both of you. We need a drink."

Arlo squeezes me tighter, lifts me up. "Never thought I'd get to smell you again," he says, inhaling my hair.

I laugh, wrap my legs around him.

After Ollie brings us drinks, we lounge around outside. I drape myself over them on the couch—I can't get enough contact. Their bodies are warm and their hands are comforting. Four hands. The firelight becomes fuzzy and I find myself content enough to gaze into it, legs across Ollie's lap and head in Arlo's.

"That's quite the dress, Little Wren," Ollie suddenly says in the comfortable silence.

I glance up to find him staring at me, eyes sliding up and down my body. My gaze snaps to Arlo, and he's doing the exact same thing. His fingers curl in my hair.

I feel a tingle, stretch myself out a little more, sigh for them. "You like it?"

Ollie bites his lip. A hand trails up my leg, rests on my thigh, under the dress. "It was pretty naughty of you to wear that here."

"Teasing us," Arlo says, trailing a fingertip on my cheek.

I give them a small laugh. As my body shifts, they tense under me. An unmistakable hardness develops underneath me.

Ollie grunts. "Come on."

He pulls me up with him by the hand and leads us back inside the house. Things inside have gotten louder and more rambunctious, so no one notices us slide through the rooms to the staircase. Ollie takes us up to the second landing, then again to the third. All of the lights are off on this floor. It's quieter up here, the only sounds are the echoes of the music below and some boisterous laughing that makes its way through the floorboards.

"Ollie," I hiss, as he takes us down the hall to the final door. "You can't be serious—not here!"

But he's already pulling me inside.