The Arrangement

Tattooed Hearts

I took my coffee out to the porch and David smiled at me. Once again, I wished he was straight.

"So my brother ruined your relationship."

"Yup. I was a fool, because the guy told me when he broke it off it was just sex. Truthfully, it wasn't that good." David laughed. "Why did you even tell him who I was with?"

"I wanted to make sure he was good enough for you. Dan definitely wasn't pleased. I guess Dan knew what he was like."

"Still, your brother is a jerk. Did you know he is still whining I broke his balls?"

"That was a traumatic time for him. You were never a teenage boy." I rolled my eyes. "Our most important body parts were in our pants. Especially when they weren't... in our pants." I rolled my eyes again. "Dan had trouble with his genitals anytime you were around since he was about fourteen."

"What?" I asked incredulously.

"He was always hiding his boner. That last summer, it was him and me. Josh was so hot!"

I laughed. "Stop kidding! First of all Josh was straight and with Molly and second, your brother never liked me."

"That's where you're wrong. He always did especially that last summer. So, for you to have injured that part of him. Then he was convinced it would never work right. He actually made my mother pay to get his sperm tested."

Shocked I said, "Please tell me, I didn't make him infertile!"

"No. My point is it was more than just the humiliation of crying in front of the whole class."

Suddenly, I felt worse than when it happened. I was too young to understand at the time and I was so busy hating him for hating me.

"I still don't believe you that I turned him on."

"Oh you sweet thing, I'm willing to bet you still are. When we go on the boat today, wear your bikini and be your sexy self. I bet my brother will get uncomfortable."

"You think, I'm sexy?" I asked teasing.

"I think you have a body that would turn on any heterosexual male." He winked at me.

David gave me a lot to think about. Teenaged Dan did avoid me a lot. I assumed he was moody, but I may have misread him. I felt a jab in my heart thinking of young Dan liking me.

If I hadn't played baseball that day, would we have gone out? Somehow I think dating at seventeen would have led us to not like each other today.

David and I walked to the beach. When he took his shirt off, he had a tattoo on his upper bicep. Looking at it closer, it was a heart with tears and the word Mom. It was small but well done.

I felt myself get emotional. "When did you get that?"

"Last fall, we both have one. It was Dan's idea."

Dan's idea? I never noticed Dan's, but then again the only time I saw him shirtless, I was looking elsewhere. It was a fitting tribute to their mother's memory.

"The artwork is really well done."

David laughed. "Dan had a thing for a while with the tattoo artist. I think it started from the raw emotion of getting the tat, but he continued it to piss my father off. They had been disagreeing a lot." He laughed again. "He brought her to Christmas and she announced she was vegan. There was nothing she could eat. Even the bread was made with real butter."

"Did your father know what kind of artist she was?" Laughing, he shook his head. "So who is he seeing now if not the artist?"

"No one."

"He's been out a lot. Thursday night, he got a call and ran out the door."

"Are you jealous?" He teased.

"No." I tried not to show any emotion.

"He told me he saw Jake. Something about helping Molly out."

"I was so pissed at him and accused him of getting a booty call." Instead, he was helping the brother and the widow of his friend.

"If you ask me, you two should booty call each other. You're both too damn uptight."

"Not happening." I wasn't sure I convinced either of us.