Three Brothers (Completed)

The Crazy Girlfriend

Chapter 6

The Crazy Girlfriend

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Hey, I know what you’re thinking. Here I am fighting for Lily’s heart and I go and get myself a girlfriend? I’m a guy, I was lonely, I needed companionship and Helen was HOT, not to mention my age. She and I also worked together, on the same night I worked with Lily.

I had this amazing plan, I’d do my sarcastic flirting thing with Lily to get Helen jealous, and then really flirt with Helen to get Lily jealous. The first part worked, Helen hated watching me sarcastically flirt with Lily. She was a willowy wisp of a girl but she had a temper as fiery as a hair, I should have realized that would be a problem. I was more focused on the bigger problem to worry about Helen’s temperament. Lily wasn’t jealous of Helen, she thought it was cute and was actively trying to get us together.

My plan didn’t back fire until we had our first long weekend party of the spring. Our parents had gone away, Sean was still away at university and that meant party time at the Soran house. Of course Lily was invited, and so was Helen. Lily had already arranged to stay over for the night seeing as she planned to get completely hammered and she almost had a heart attack when I told her that Helen would be staying over as well.

She had asked me where to put her stuff and which room she was going to get. James and I had fought for two days over who got Lily in their room and then Helen decided she was going to sleep over and James automatically won Lily. When I told Lily why she was in James’ room she got that look on her face, like a deer caught in the headlights, wide-eyed morbid shock and I had no idea why. I wouldn’t find out until later, but James found out right away.

James hadn’t even said hello to her before she threw herself into his arms. “She hates me!” Lily cried.

James stood there confused, a bottle of beer in one hand and the other arm around her waist. “Hello to you too. When did you get here?”

“Like twenty minutes ago. That’s not important, why are you drinking at four in the afternoon, the party’s not until nine tonight.”

James shrugged. “It’s never too early to pre-drink. Why are you here so early anyway?”

“I came to put my stuff in the room I’d be staying in tonight. Which is yours by the way,” she grumbled.

“Aw come on, you sound so depressed. What’s the matter? Don’t want to share a bed with me?” James teased. He hadn’t admitted it to anyone but he had been sort of looking forward to having Lily in his bed. Mostly because he wanted to be able to shove that in my face, but partly because he wanted to see if he could actually go all the way with her tonight.

“Oh, no it’s not that, James. It’s Helen. She hates me,” Lily explained. James scoffed at her and took another swig of his beer. “No really she does! I think it’s because of all the sarcastic flirting between me and Royce. I think she may think I’m actually interested in him.”

James laughed at her. “Don’t worry Lily, everyone knows you’re not interested in Royce. It’s totally clear that you have the hots for me instead and I will gladly tell everyone at the party that this is the case!”

Lily playfully punched James’ shoulder. “Very funny!” she said. It wasn’t the first time she had done something like that, brushed off James’ half attempts at flirting like they were sarcastic jokes. In her mind they were, and at that time James had convinced himself that they were. Still he hated it when she brushed off his advances, he was attractive, he was desirable, and she should have thrown herself at him by now.

That night I found out that Lily was the queen of avoiding people. I didn’t see her once that night, and it wasn’t that busy of a party, just a few people from work, a few people from school and a few of their friends. I did know that Lily had a problem with crowds, she had made both me and James promise that we wouldn’t abandon her at the party, but no matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t find Lily and whenever I saw James he said he hadn’t seen her either.

James didn’t find her until the next morning. He wasn’t sure where she had slept last night, he had passed out in his bed and she hadn’t been there, he remembered being drunkenly disappointed. She also wasn’t there when he woke up, so he assumed she hadn’t been in his bed at all. He stepped out of the shower and found her on the bathroom counter, her knees to her chest and her head on her knees. “I’m not looking,” she told him and once again he was plagued with that same confusing anger.

“What are you doing in here anyway?” he asked.

To this day I don’t know if this was true or not, but Lily swears to Johnny Depp that it happened. Apparently Lily had been making breakfast, a meager serving of cereal and she had gone into our fridge to look for milk. When she shut the door she found Helen on the other side.

“Oh god, you scared me,” Lily said with a nervous chuckle.

“Royce is mine you hear?” Helen said. Before Lily could tell her that she knew that, Helen continued “I’m his girlfriend and you’re not going to talk to him anymore. Do you understand?”

Naturally Lily had bolted, straight to the washroom.

“I thought you were Royce,” she whispered finally looking up to him. He had the towel wrapped around his waist as he leaned in towards her.

I had watched him do this particular move. He cornered the girl between his bare chest and something else, and then sweep in for the kiss. Instead Lily stared him right in the eye unwaveringly, uninterested and for the first time James froze, he was unable to move, unable make the move. Instead he said, “And why were you looking for Royce?”

“Well it’s obvious isn’t it?” she asked him, she swung her legs off of the counter and slid off of it. She was up against him now, her hands on his shoulders. “I need to tell Royce that I can’t talk to him anymore.”

I wish I could tell you that that’s what she did, talk to me about it, but James sunk to a new low that morning. A low he had never reached before in his life. “Don’t bother Lily. If he’s going to let that girl talk to you like that then let him have her. I’ll be your distraction Lily, you don’t need Royce.” And she let him talk her into giving me up as a friend as easily as that.