BRUCIE

FIVE

"If you really like her why don'y you say something?" asked Marcie as she closed her eyes in the cool night breeze; listening to her younger brother talk.

"I would if Kendra hadn't gotten to me first, she's persistent and a bit crazy and I like her but Lameer has always been there for me and she's always been here I mean for Godsakes she lives right down the street. Although we are not together I feel like I am betraying her somehow," Bruicie placed his hands behind his head with a worried face and looked at the moon.

"Are you serious about Kendra?" Marcie sat up on her elbow and looked at him as her long dark hair wiggled in the breeze behind her.

"I don't even know if she is serious about me. I don't know anything about anything. Kendra and I just happened and that's that I guess," there was a slight uncertainty to his voice and he caught a glimpse of his sister's stare and asked her what was wrong.

"Nothing," she replied with a smile and mimicked his lying position "This sounds like a similar situation I had with an old boyfriend when I was your age, he was Mr. Wrong and even though I knew Mr. Right I let him slip through my fingers like a bar of soap," she made an imitation with her left hand and glanced at him.

"What exactly are you saying Marcie?" he asked as if he were completely blank to her response.

"I'm saying," - she interupted herself with a sigh "Don't make the same mistake that I did. You see those two stars almost touching each other under the moon?" she pointed.

"Yeah," he replied; following her index finger.

"That's you and Lameer, or it should be you and Lameer depending on all that stuff you said about her being there for you," she retreated her hand to the space behind her head.

"And where is Kendra?" he asked; slightly annoyed.

"Kendra is the sea of stars you see around you. There will always be another Kendra but there is only one Lameer," Marcie replied and stared at her brother's mesmorized little face.

It had been on that following Monday morning at middleschool when he realized he was going to be stuck with Kendra a little while longer, for Lameer had found someone whom she spoke of greatly. Now he was locked in a house with her screaming profanities at him as he had unloaded a bullet into her left leg.

"You motherfucker!" she cursed as her hands did their best to caress her shin.

Blood squirted from the hole that had burrowed through her leg and Brucie stood by the door with an opened mouth; truly dumbfounded at what he had done. He cautiously entered the livingroom when she had managed to prop herself against one of the couches and barely but took a seat in the caramel coloured couch across from her. He shamefully placed his bald head into his coarse black hands and felt a sharp pain at the back of his eyes that slowly made its way down his throat and into his chest.