Editor's note: this story contains scenes of incest or incest content.
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Part One: Corruption
Bubba's Point of View:
I was seated at the kitchen table, staring intently at pancakes, my phone blasting away some tunes through my ear buds when she bumped in to me. "Wake up sleepy head," was her endearing way of apologizing as she sat in the chair across from me. "Did you check out the links I sent you?"
We were back to that again, and I hadn't been awake barely thirty minutes. I sighed and pulled the ear phones from my ears, "yes, my dear little sister, but it doesn't matter what conspiracy sites you dig up, it was scientifically proven that subliminal messages don't work. I don't see why you constantly bombard me with this stuff, I promised you I would try to help with what knowledge I have. I don't have time to keep researching this silliness."
Her reply was simply to pour copious amounts of syrup on her pancakes (which always marveled me given how fit she was) and stared at me with her big, doe like eyes. "But the play starts in two weeks. I already have my lines memorized but the thought of getting on stage terrifies me still and you promised you could help."
She never paused once in reminding me of my promises. Ah well, what kind of big brother would I be if I couldn't keep my word? Forget about the fact that when I had begun my intro to psychology classes at college a couple of months ago, I had thought hypnotism would be covered in depth. My fault for offering to help, I suppose, but I had known for years that it was her dream to be an actress but going all the way back to middle school she had suffered one traumatic incident of stage fright and had never fully recovered. Now it was her senior year and she had a role in a play being produced by the school's drama club, but her anxiety had spiked again. If we couldn't find some way to calm her nerves, then she was due for yet more embarrassment. And I couldn't allow that to happen.
"I'll pester my professors, okay? Whatever it takes, you will be ready. Hypnosis can work, I just want to make sure I am doing it right and you just need to make sure you can still fit in to that costume after scarfing down all those pancakes every morning." I smiled at her feigned expression of dismay.
"But bubba, I'm on a seafood diet. See!" She opened her mouth, revealing mushy pancakes inside. "Blargh." What can I say, I had to laugh.
Somehow, I still remembered what I wanted to ask my prof despite the appearance of Stacy Miller's black g-string peeking out above the brim of her jeans when she sat down. I say I remembered; I mean that in the sense of I already had my questions written down before the sight of those scant wisps of fabric erased every other thought from my head.
In all fairness, it wasn't like I hadn't seen them before. Stacy normally favored thongs and g-strings often in darker, solid colors. What recently, ummm, piqued my interest was the notion that she knew her panties were showing and enjoyed the attention, even though she never acknowledged it. This could possibly be this whole 'cusp of adulthood' bullshit my parents warned me of years ago that I somehow missed by virtue of being a studious, shy, overweight kid who had only recently started to come out of his shell. Was Stacy just showing off, or did she want my attention in particular? Or was it entirely on accident, and should I ever get up the nerve to mention it to her would she be mortified? Would she call me a creep for looking? I wanted to say something and, I honestly held this hope deep in my heart, I wanted it to embarrass her. That thought, in particular; gave me the sort of thrill that I had to stay seated at my desk so that the tent I had pitched in my pants could collapse so I could approach my professor.
"Doctor Martin, I have a couple of questions if you don't mind." I had waited for the other students to shuffle out before I made my way towards him. He motioned me over and I read off my list. His answers were unremarkable save one. Apparently subliminal messages were effective in reinforcing suggestions for strengthening behaviors the subject already did or deeply wanted to do. It couldn't change a person's inherent moral outlook or indirect, undecided individual behaviors, but as a tool to build upon pre-existing psychological schemas it had been shown to work. He suggested a book I could find at the school library with more in-depth information. I also wanted to ask about hypnosis, but something stopped me. Slightly perturbed, I left for the library, Stacy Miller forgotten as I considered how to help my sister.
I was more than past perturbed and on to annoyed when I finally made it back to my cramped apartment. As I pulled out my hide-away bed and sat down on the paper- thin mattress I couldn't help but feel upset that my lovely, brilliant, oh-so considerate sister had me running around in circles for half the day, on a Friday no less. Turned out the book my professor suggested; Bobbi had already checked out weeks ago on my student ID!
Given her intellect and personality, she most likely already knew what I was trying to learn and probably was keeping quiet about it just to mock me later. Of course, I didn't want to stay angry at her. She was the reason why I was attending the local junior college despite a scholarship offer at a school out of town. Well that and the idea of dorm life scared me. But, with mom and dad providing money for my own place, no matter how small, came at the price of having to stay nearby them and look after my sister some days, it was worth it, until she did stuff like this. If she didn't have a hard-earned aversion to medication of every type I would tell her to just take some damn pills for her anxiety like millions of people do every day, but I knew she would hate that.
Dealing with her could be frustrating at times. With only 15 months between us, we were always maddeningly close. In fact, mom said I gave my sister the nickname Bobbi because I couldn't pronounce the word "baby" when they first brought her home. Her real name was Ashley but in our family we all called her Bobbi. As kids she'd always follow me around and interject herself in to whatever I was doing. This resulted in making her something of a tomboy, up until five years ago, when she became seriously ill. The kind of illness where the only cure is forced weight loss and baldness, the kind of illness many kids and adults don't make it back from.
She persevered, however, and is now in her senior year in high school and is set to do some great things. When she isn't being goofy or purposefully trying to frustrate me, she will still give me a hug and whisper 'thank you' for all those months spent at her bedside playing with dolls, drinking imaginary tea, reading to her, and making some truly bad jokes. I realized as I wiped some moisture from my eyes that my place was very dusty. It was impossible for me to stay mad at her, which is the mindset I had when she found me just moments later as she walked in. Of course, she would quickly put my mood to the test.
