Pieces [Wattpad's Editor's Choice]

9: rOsY cHeEkS

"Your brother's a dick."

We walked along a sidewalk between rows of trees, keeping our pace steady to not draw attention. I surveyed the grass beyond the trees, the sidewalk far ahead of us, and the few faces who glanced in our direction, but my lover was nowhere.

"He was worse before he got clean," I said, gripping the strap of my bag. "Life with him was unbearable."

"Before he got clean?"

"Yeah. My parents don't like talking about it, but he dropped out when he was sixteen. When he was just fourteen, he became a slave to drugs and we never saw him sober. Skipped school all the time, always high. He was never home. We still don't know where he went for days on end, but he always came back just to steal money and food. My mom always let him in until one day, she stopped. She called the cops on him, he went to juvie, then when he was sixteen he dropped out and ran away. Heard he was on probation and living with a friend somewhere. Eventually he did get clean, clearly, and Mom invited him back home. But by then, he wanted nothing to do with us."

Sunlight streamed through the trees and some people walked back to their own dorms, their hair disastrous as they still sported their PJ's. I blended in quite nicely.

"He's never mentioned it. I wouldn't have guessed, but I can tell he's got some kind of baggage. He never lets girls come into the dorm if she has plans to get high before doing stuff. He won't take money from her-which you'd be surprised how many girls randomly offer him some-though he works late hours to compensate for his low savings. He drinks eight cups of various teas a day, and I notice it happens anytime he gets anxious or jittery. Never told me why. And he freaks out any time he gets lower than a B on an assignment. I help him study for some of his tougher classes a lot of times."

That surprised me. The Phil that Isaac knew wasn't the same one I grew up with. And part of me felt a pang of sadness for not knowing who my own brother was. "Wow. And you're fine living with him?"

"He's cool. We've been roommate's for two years; he's better than the roommate I had my first year who hogged the TV all the time and was such a neat freak that he designated Friday night as a chore day for us."

"Sounds wonderful."

"It sucked."

"Not much of a neat-freak?"

"I'm more of a dirty-freak." He nudged my arm and smirked, and for the zenith time that morning, my face burned. "Nah, my life's just too busy to allot time to cleaning, you know? School and work during the week, volunteering on weekends, making time for friends at night with a couple beers so I don't go utterly insane. I mean, that time cleaning could be spent doing way more valuable things, like making soulmates in the basement of the science building."

I smiled. "You mean making love in the basement of the science lab."

He glanced over at me. There was a strange look behind his eyes, but it was overshadowed by the amusement lingering there. "Yeah. Exactly."

"God, I can't believe my brother actually thinks we slept together."

"You can't believe it? Even I believe it, and I'm the one who lived the truth." He smirked. "It totally looks like it."

I sighed. "It does. And I have no way of proving otherwise. Oh well. The worst he'll do is bring it up during our next holiday dinner and buy me condoms for Christmas."

"Really?"

"Yup."

"You know, I think I'm starting to see the correlation here. I mean, you both look insanely alike, but you both possess one attribute that makes it easy to tell you're related."

"Really? And what's that?"

"You're both good at walking in at the wrong time."

I stopped walking long enough to punch him in the arm. "I told you, I was sixteen when that happened! You and Luna didn't bother locking the door."

"Yeah, well it was a sexually charged moment. You don't think about those things when it's happening."

"Guess I can't relate. But maybe you're the problem here; I mean, you always get stuck in situations where people walk in at the worst possible time."

He chuckled. "I guess you've got a point."

I watched my slippers as I walked. "I should've guess Phil was your roommate: The handcuffs. The campus security thing. The criminal justice major. Sometimes I forget Phil and I are on the same campus."

"I don't know if I should tell you this, but he never mentioned having a sister. You don't talk a lot?"

"Never, except sometimes holidays. What's he doing with his life? At Christmas, he said he was getting his degree in Criminal Justice to maybe be a probation officer."

"That's still his plan," Isaac confirmed. "He only started as campus security when the semester began. It's for experience."

"Sounds like you guys are actually good friends. I'm glad though; it's good to know-"

"Oh shit!"

"What?" I stopped and looked at Isaac. He put a hand to his forehead like a thought just slammed into the front of his brain. Did he remember something about my lover? I glanced around campus quickly, my hair smacking my cheeks as I looked left, right, and left again.

"The keys. I have to return the keys." I heard a jingle and looked back at him. He pulled out a ring of gold and silver keys with numbers on them. They were the campus security keys; the one from the science building was still missing-thanks to me.

"What, right now?"

"Yeah, otherwise your brother's gonna be in a shit ton of trouble. The only one who approved of me covering for him was Professor Howard. He works at the security office part-time."

I bit my lip. I couldn't ask Isaac to stay and help me look for my lover; I wasn't that selfish. Phillip may have been a-a-well, what Isaac called him-but I still cared about him. I didn't want to interfere with his chances of succeeding on campus.

"Okay," I said. "You have my number. I don't have my phone, but I'll be...somewhere. I don't know, I'll just be around looking. Please, please keep an eye out for my lover, okay?" But even after I said the words, it didn't matter. This wasn't Isaac's problem. I lied to him: our deal was that he'd help me get into the science building, that he'd monitor me in the science lab, and we'd part ways in the morning. And here I was, still asking him for help. He never asked to be a part of this. This was my problem. It was my lover. And if Isaac never spoke to me after we parted ways, then I would have to be okay with it. Because that was our real deal.

"I will," Isaac said, already backing away. "You know what? I might even be able to check the security cameras if Phil lets me. Maybe I'll catch something."

"Okay. But if you can't, don't worry about it. Go home after dropping the keys off, enjoy your Sunday! It's back to work and school tomorrow!" He was already far enough out of hearing range, but he nodded and started jogging in the opposite direction.

I sighed. I was back to being alone.