This is the second chapter of seven in Book 3 of the
Charlie and Mindy
tetralogy, which is a story of forbidden love between a brother and a sister.
This book stands on its own, but it refers to events that took place in Books 1 and 2. You may therefore want to read Book 1 and Book 2 before reading this book.
I value your comments and your feedback. I try to reply to comments.
âCarlusMagnus
+++++++++++++++++++++++++
So Stephanie's twin brother, Steve, was my old friend Buck. The revelation was a shock; Mindy and I had good reason to believe that Steph and Buck were lovers.
Mindy had forewarned me, if only barely, so I didn't just stand there with my jaw hanging down to my belly button. At least, I didn't just stand there that way for as long as I might have without the warning. Mindy stood nearly behind him, near my line of sightâglaring at me and giving me a barely perceptible shake of her head. Evidently, she was worried that I hadn't understood her message and would say something awkward.
But I recovered quickly enough to take his proffered hand and shake it. And I managed to cover the surprise I must have shown by saying, "Hey, Buck! So you're Steph's brother. But how do you get 'Buck' out of 'Steve'?"
The tension went out of Mindy like air out of a punctured tire. She winked at me; then she turned and offered to help Steph baste the turkey. The two of them opened the oven and gave the bird most of their attention.
Steve, meanwhile, replied, "It doesn't come from 'Steve.' My middle name is Rogersâmy dad's mom's maiden name. Steph and I had a sixth-grade teacher who read out everybody's full name when he called the roll. He noticed my middle name and started reading it as 'Steven
Buck Rogers
Young.' Before long, he was just reading 'Buck Rogers Young.' And then everyone started calling me 'Buck.' I've been 'Buck' ever since to everyone but Stephâwho always calls me 'Steve.' Except when she's pissed off at me. Then she calls me 'Steven Rogers Young.'"
"I know how that works," I said. And then I went on, making sure that I said it so that Mindy would hear, "When that little girl you just hugged is going to let me have it, she starts by calling meâ"
Right on cue, Mindy interrupted. "Charles Edward Magness, I am
not
little!"
And then Steph chimed in. "Steven Rogers Young, don't you start a fight between our guests!"
Buck and I looked at each and said, simultaneously, "See?"
Mindy and Steph exchanged looks of their own.
"I think we've been tricked," Mindy said to her.
"Led down the garden path," Steph agreed.
"Bamboozled!" Buck added with a grin.
"Hornswoggled!" I tossed in my opinion, too.
We all laughed, and the party was off to a good start. Buck got things rolling even better by opening a cold bottle of champagne and pouring it out for the four of us. They even had champagne flutesâalbeit mismatchedâto serve it in.
Somehow, I managed to stuff what Mindy and I knew about Buck and Steph into a cupboard in the back of my mind, force the cupboard closed, and latch it firmlyâlocking the information out of the way where it would cause no trouble that afternoon. Mindy seemed to have done the same. We wound up having a great day, and a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner, with the two of them.
They were good company; Mindy and I enjoyed them. Steph had done a great job with the turkey and the trimmingsâthough she consulted with Mindy on the gravy, who showed her how Mom had always minimized lumps by mixing a little flour with water and then slowly pouring the result into the simmering mixture of broth and pan drippings while stirring constantly.
The cranberry sauce from Mom's recipe was a hit. Our salad was a good one. Two hours after we'd finished with the main part of dinnerâand even done the dishesâMindy served her pie with a mountain of hand-whipped cream on top of each slice. It was much more than edible. Buck did agree with me that bringing a pie to dinner at someone else's home when you didn't have experimental evidence that it would be any good was risky business. But Mindy was unmoved. She remained unapologetic about refusing to let me sample the other pie before we'd shared this one with our hosts.
When we'd finished the dessert, two bottles of the pinot grigio remained, and we saw no reason to let them languish, untouched, in the refrigerator. We sat around, stuffed and chatting, polishing off the wine, well into the eveningâeach pair of siblings getting to know and like the other more and more.
It was nearly ten when we all decided to call it an evening. Mindy packed up our traps in the bag I'd used to bring them over, and we put our coats on to leave. Steve and I again shook hands, while the women exchanged a hug. Then Steve hugged Mindy while I squeezed Steph. (And, when I felt those glorious honkers pressing against me through my leather bomber jacket, I regretted putting it on before saying good night.)
Mindy and I hadn't gotten twenty yards from the door when we turned to each other. The latch popped open on that back cupboard, and it sprang open of its own accord. I got there first with the words: "Do you think they'reâŚ"
"âŚscrewing each other?" she finished before I could. "I'm sureâ" She interrupted herself: "Look!"
She pointed toward the house we had just left. The curtains on the front window were discreetly closed, but they weren't as heavy as Buck and Steph seemed to think. With the light from the dining room shining through the front room from beyond them, we could see that two figuresâone female and one maleâhad taken each other into their arms and were sharing a very non-fraternal embrace and kiss. To be sure, they weren't Doing the Dirty Deed before our eyes. On the other hand, the embrace we were witnessing wasn't a siblings' embrace. We couldn't have sworn to the identities of the people whose silhouettes we saw. But we had just been in that house; we knew who was in there.
Mindy prodded me, and I realized that I'd stopped to stare. "Keep moving," she hissed at me. "Don't give them a chance to catch us staring. We aren't ready to let on what we know."
Guiltily, I started moving again. "Hunh? Why not?"
"Use your head, Charlie!" she said. "We got along well this evening, and I think they like us. We could be really close friends with themâespecially given theâŚ
special circumstances
âŚwe share with them. And that could turn out to be really, really good for all of us.
"But getting there is going to be pretty delicate. We want to save our friendship with themâand strengthen it. How do you think we'd react if someone caught on about us and just bluntly confronted us? Especially if all they really knew was that they'd seen us feeling each other up on a park bench?"