This has been my longest break between chapters. I've been getting a huge amount of messages about when this would finally update, and I haven't been able to reply to any of them because honestly I didn't know when I'd be able to finish this chapter. I won't bore you with the details, but I've been going through some personal, real-life stuff that's made it difficult for me to write at the same pace I usually do, and I'm not the fastest writer at the best of times.
I'm trying to be better with it, but even if my updates take a long time I want to make it clear that it's unlikely I'll stop updating altogether, and if I'm ever considering ending the series I'll definitely let you all know, so don't worry.
As always, all characters involved are over 18 and fictional, and I'd very much like to hear what you think of this chapter. The comments of all the readers of this series, those that love it, hate it, and those who don't really care, are all very helpful to me. I'm always trying to improve how I write, and feedback from readers is a huge part of that.
Thanks for reading.
*
I was sitting at the desk in my room with a picture of Jessica on my laptop screen.
It was from her page on the school's news site. It had her listed as the founder, and the editor-in-chief. It went on to list about a dozen other groups she belonged to, including two book clubs, a chess club, and the Student's Political Union, whatever that was. It was no wonder she was stressed all the damn time.
I'd decided to check out the site and a few of the articles she'd written. She was surprisingly eloquent, and her intelligence really showed in her writing style. I suppose you don't get to know that sort of thing about a person when the only communication you have for a decade is in the form of insults and threats.
But I didn't like this picture of her.
I looked at it for a while, trying to decide why it bugged me. She looked as beautiful as always, smiling at the camera, her bright green eyes staring in to mine.
The smile, I realised. It was a fake smile. A common, plastered on, professional looking little smile. Believable, but fake. It wasn't her irritating smirk, or her wide, bright look of joy. It wasn't the sudden smile that comes from a surprise, that almost always starts a laugh. Her eyes weren't shining.
I closed the page and started to idly wonder if she'd been in a bad mood the day it was taken. Or maybe she just couldn't smile easily. I know for me, I always needed to remember something funny to put me in the mood for a family picture, so it would look real.
If I was taking her picture, I probably would have made her laugh right before taking it.
Then, suddenly, I remembered the pictures I
had
taken of her.
I pulled out my desk drawer and took out my camera, right where I'd left it after snapping some shots of her.
I quickly found the right cable for it in the tangled ball of wires in my other drawer and hooked it up to my laptop, opening the images in a folder.
The first one was of my family by the mantel. I shifted through a few more from that day, us laughing and smiling and playing around. Next were a few shots I took outside, to see how the pictures would look with more exposure. There a few more random pictures until I saw the first one of Jessica.
Naked, blindfolded, and tied to my bed. It was quite an incredible picture, the lamp providing enough light to make out most of the detail of her body, but leaving enough darkness and shadow to leave some mystery.
I made the image full screen, and stroked my growing cock in my jeans. I kept moving through the pictures, seeing the close-ups I'd taken on her face, on her pussy. She was incredible, so unbelievably beautiful. The camera really was great quality, and the pictures were of amazing definition.
The last picture actually made me gasp. I'd forgotten about this one. It turns out I
did
try to get her to smile, except I just ordered her to.
She looked panicked, afraid, yet she was blushing with clear arousal. A nice, big, fake smile on her lips, but terror in her eyes.
For some reason, it didn't bother me in this picture like it did with the other one.
Just as I was enjoying my masterpiece, Rose flung open my door and stomped into my room. Luckily my screen wasn't facing the door, so I quickly clicked away from the pictures and brought up something innocuous.
"Hey little brother." she said.
"Hey little sister." I answered trying not to sound guilty. "Ever heard of knocking?"
"Sorry." she said absently, walking over and leaning on the edge of my desk. She glanced around my room, probably realising she hadn't been inside it for years. She looked at the books on my shelf, reading the spines.
"Uh... not that I don't love you visiting but... what's up?" I asked.
"Oh, yeah." she said, remembering why she came in, "We're going to Jessica's for lunch."
"Really?" I asked.
It wasn't totally unusual, but we hardly ever went to Jessica's place, she always came here. And it
was
a Friday, which were usually nights she took for free time, but I hadn't talked to Jessica much since she got back from Paris, after that night. She'd spent every day studying her ass off for our January exams. But now we were finished with them, and just had this last weekend before school started again.
"Yep." she said, "Aunt Alice and Uncle Bob are both out of the house, for work or something, so I invited us over."
"
Aunt
Alice doesn't have a job, so it's probably not for work..." I said.
We weren't related to them, but Jessica's parents had been such a big part of our lives growing up that we always just referred to them as our aunt and uncle. I'd grown out of it at some point, preferring to just call them by their names, but Rose kept it up.
She knew I thought it was a little childish, so to prove me wrong she stuck out her tongue.
I laughed at her, and she grinned.
Things had never been better between me and Rose. To an outside observer, it would have been impossible to guess at the years of tension and difficulty between us that preceded these few months; things were now as simple and easy as when we were kids.
"Ok, so get ready." she said, standing up, "We're leaving in like twenty minutes. Oh, and we'll probably be staying over. It's going to be
so
much fun, trust me."
She walked out, and I breathed a sigh of relief. It was unlikely she'd have seen them, but even having the photos open on my computer was making me tense.
I copied the images off the camera's memory card and deleted the originals. I saved them in a well hidden, innocuously named folder, the same one I kept my porn in.
After a second thought, I created a new folder and hid it even better.
After a third thought, I used an old program to password protect and encrypt the folder.
I used to be really interested in to computers; the security on my little laptop could probably rival that on whatever computers the FBI were using. I knew it was far more than I would ever realistically need, but for some reason it made me feel better. Apart from porn, these pictures were the only thing on it that I would even
want
to hide.
I unplugged the camera, feeling better about having the photos secure.
So... I'd be spending the night at Jessica's, it seemed. I was a little annoyed at suddenly being forced in to this, but it occurred to me that Rose probably didn't even see it that way. She didn't ask me if I wanted to go, but at the same time she didn't really
tell
me to go either, not directly. She just let me know what was going to happen; that I was going to have lunch at Jessica's house, then sleep there. As simple as that.
My twin sister had a very strong personality. I smiled, wondering if she was even knew how controlling she was being.
==
We took the short walk over to Jessica's, and made some sandwiches for lunch.
We watched TV and talked about nothing important for hours. Jessica seemed a lot more relaxed now that she'd allowed herself a whole weekend away from her textbooks, and unlike Rose and I, she didn't seem at all concerned about what the results of the tests would be. She'd ace every single one, as always.
Around five we ordered ourselves a huge pizza, and Jessica brought in a bottle of beer for each of us that her dad had left. In all, it was a very enjoyable day.
"Well, this has been fun." said Rose suddenly, after wolfing down her last slice.
"Are we leaving?" I asked as she stood up.
"Well
I'm
leaving." she answered, "I've got plans. You know, things to do, people to see."
"Wait... are you serious?" I asked, "You were so excited for this, and now you're leaving?"
"Oh relax!" Rose said cheerfully, "You'll have plenty of fun here with just the two of you, I'm sure."
I was actually expecting something like this. I guessed she'd taken at least an hour to work up the courage to propose this to me. When I saw her hesitating about something, I thought that whatever she was going to be say would be a big ask, and I'd assumed I was wrong. After all, being here instead of our place was no problem at all. Now I saw her real plan. She wanted to leave the two of us together.
As far as she knew, Jessica and I had barely been in the same room together without her for more than a few minutes at a time. Of course, she didn't know what we'd normally be planning for a Friday night.
"When are you coming back?" Jessica asked.
"Not sure." said Rose, putting her coat on, "Just hang out here... I'll call you and let you know what's happening."
"Um, bye I guess." said Jessica.
"Have fun you two." said Rose, leaving the room.
Jessica and I sat in silence as we heard her leave the house, then she giggled nervously as we heard the car start up and drive away. Rose wouldn't be coming back.
I sighed and stretched out along the couch. Rose's sudden departure had left a somewhat awkward atmosphere. Jessica was smiling at me.
Anticipation, happiness, excitement. Nothing fake about
this
smile.
"So... I guess it's just the two of us." she said.
I didn't answer her. I just sighed again and found the remote, then flicked on the TV. It was already dark outside, and we hadn't turned any lights on yet. Jessica stood up and started cleaning around us, lifting the empty pizza box and beer bottles.
I was weirdly pissed off with Rose.
She wasn't even trying to be subtle anymore; she was trying to force Jessica and I to be friends by making us spend time alone. I smirked to myself at what she'd think about how we usually spent our alone time together. It was funny in an ironic kind of way, but Rose's attitude still made me angry.
She didn't even seem to care why things had changed between me and Jessica. She didn't ask me about it, or seem to want to know at all. She just went along with things, hoping that nothing would happen to shake it all up again. I could see it when the three of us were together, the way her eyes would dart between us, the way she'd try to fill the lulls and silences in our conversations. I ignored it, but there were all these little signs that she was still so nervous about us, even though it had been months since all this had started.
I frowned, trying to ignore the anger rising in my chest. Jessica had bullied me for years, both openly and in private. Rose didn't know half the things that had been done to me by her best friend, and she didn't want to know. She stopped trying to comfort me or take my side some time around our 14
th
birthday, and now she was just clumsily and opportunistically trying to force a deeper relationship.
Jessica finished cleaning up pizza box and empty bottles and walked back into the living room. She flounced down beside me and smiled. There she was. My worst nightmare. My new best friend.
"So what do you wanna do,
Sir
?" she said seductively.
"I wanna watch TV." I answered coldly.
