Orien finished tidying up her room. In the background she could hear Aryan's music through his closed door across the hallway. She didn't mind his music, well not that much anyway. What bothered her was the volume in which he played it. She wondered why he couldn't just listen to his music through his earbuds like every other normal human being.
Car doors slammed shut outside. She ran to her window and looked down on the driveway. To her delight, she saw her cousins walking toward the front door. If she had come to the window a few seconds earlier, she would have been able to catch more than a momentary glance of her cousin Nathan. Though she only caught a glimpse, she liked what she has seen so far.
It has been four years since she had last seen her cousins from the South. The cold weather didn't bother her much, that is what layers of clothes were for. Her cousins from the South apparently had a different opinion, which is why they didn't come up North for the winter holidays very often.
Hearing the doorbell, she ran out of her bedroom and saw Aryan exiting his bedroom at the same time. While he was heading down the hallway, she jumped out in front of him and blocked his path as she ran down the steps, him chasing just a step behind. She held onto the railing just in case he attempted to shove her out of the way or down the steps.
Like two little children, they pushed and shoved each other, fighting over who could open the door. Aryan finally won, shoving his sister to the side. He opened the door to find his aunt Mary, uncle Jim, and two cousins waiting in the door way. He smiled and welcomed them all into the home. As they were passing, he focused his attention on Betty. Her big breasts looked like they were begging to burst out of the black sports bra he could see underneath her dark blue spaghetti strapped shirt. He noticed her hips, waist, and thighs were proportionate to her breasts, though she didn't look heavyset at all. Her bouncing butt cheeks caught his attention as she walked down the hallway heading for the kitchen.
After shutting the front door, he turned around and saw Nathan being dragged up the stairs by his sister. He rolled his eyes and shook his head. Nathan looked like a typical athletic college student. His sandy brown hair did not fit into the family heritage of dark black hair shared by everyone else. Following the rest of his family through the kitchen, he took a seat in the family room next to Betty.
She was leaning forward, warming her hands in front of the fireplace. Aryan watched her face as she turned in his direction. He fought his instinct to glance down at her breasts once more, fighting to keep his eyes up looking at her eyes.
"How was the drive Betty?" he asked.
She exhaled hard. "It took forever." Speaking loud enough that her parents seated across the room could hear her, she continued. "I don't know why we couldn't have flown. The eighteen hour drive in the car is ridiculous."
Aunt Mary turned to her daughter. "This is the last year we had to spend time with you, Bet. Next year you will be off to college and God knows we will never see you then."
Picking up that she went by a shortened version of her name, most likely to sound tougher, Aryan changed the subject. "Bet, you want me to show you where you will be sleeping for the next couple of nights?"
She grabbed her black wallet and stood up without saying a word. He stood up and showed her to the basement his dad had just finished fully furnishing with an extra living room, a bedroom, and a room for his tools. Passing the bedroom, he escorted her to the living room which had a love seat and bean bag facing the TV console.
The silence felt awkward to him so he asked the first question that came to his mind. "Are you still dating the girl from your school?"
"You heard I see" she quipped. "Well kinda. We are off and on. What about you?"
Aryan felt really little and insignificant at the moment. Besides her abrupt reply, the answer to her question wasn't going to make him feel any better. "No one. Haven't found a girl yet that will date me."
She turned toward him and half chuckled. "Really? That's a shame. Say, you turn eighteen tomorrow don't you?"
"Yeah" he replied, looking down at the floor. "Just another day."
After a moment of silence, she said, "I am going to take a nap on the couch for a bit."
Looking up at his cousin, Aryan replied before heading back toward the staircase. "Okay, there are two sleeping bags if you want to cover up. Dad said they were for whomever decided to sleep on the floor. That will probably be me since I am giving my room up to your parents."
"So how do you like college? Orien asked Nathan as they sat on the corner of her bed. Staring at the wide open yard covered in snow, Nathan placed his hand on his cousin's leg. "It is awesome. It is so much more fun than I could have ever imagined, and the amount of hot girls is amazing!"
"I bet so" she replied. "I wish I was going to college down in Georgia where it is warm."
He chuckled. "I bet. It must be horrible to go to school where it is freezing cold for six or more months out of the year. Especially with you women all covered up in layers of clothing."
"Yeah" she replied. "Oh well. So tell me, what have you been up to? You dating any women? Or are you just being a man whore? I mean, I am sure you are being a man whore. With your good looks it has to be a bitch fighting off all the women."
"Whoa. Slow down with the questions." They both chuckled before he continued. "I have just been working out at the college gym, going to class, and enjoying the parties. No, I don't have a girlfriend, and no I am not a man whore, as you call it. I do have fun with a few women though."
"I bet" she replied as she heard footsteps coming up the stairways. She stood up and made her way to her bedroom door. Aryan turned the corner. He glanced up at her, then made his way into his bedroom.
As she turned around, she heard their mom yelling up the stairs. "Who's going to go to the corner store to get eggs, bacon, and bread?"
Before giving her brother a chance to answer, Orien shouted, "I will." It would be nice to get out of the house. She was starting to get cabin fever with all the falling snow the past 24 hours. "Want to go with me Nathan?"
He stood up and turned toward her. "I suppose so. We are driving right?"
"Nah, I thought we would walk and spend time catching up. I haven't seen you since we were both pimple faced teenagers."
"I will freeze though. I don't have warm clothes like you guys up North."
"That is okay. I will get Aryan's winter coat for you. It will probably be a little big on you, but it should fit."
Aryan was lying on the bed when his sister entered the room. She grabbed his coat off his chair in the corner next to his room. "Nathan's going to borrow this. Be right back."
He didn't bother to look up from his book as he lay on his bed with his feet crossed. He wished he had a connection with Bet or any of his other female cousins the way Nathan and Orien had always shared with each other. Bet didn't used to be standoffish in her younger years. He wondered if dealing with the backlash of coming out caused her to build up walls of defense.
Orien playfully flirted with her cousin as they trounced through the fluffy snow on the way to CornerMart. A few spaced street lights provided the only light through the darkness to the big ball of light, signalling their destination in the distance. He was holding the winter coat close to his body and shivering as they walked. She stopped, picked up a handful of snow and tossed it at him, missing wildly.
He turned toward her and grabbed a handful of snow himself. While packing it in his hand, she ran toward him. "Don't throw it at me, please." He threw it at her anyway, when she was just a couple steps away from him.
"Ouch, that was my boob you hit." she exclaimed before bursting out in laughter.
"Do you want me to rub it and make it feel better?"
"I wish. Don't tease me like that."
He laughed and pulled the coat close to his body again. "It is frickin' cold out here. I don't know how y'all deal with this weather."
"Same way you deal with the heat down there I guess. Your body adjusts to it's surroundings. Do you want me to warm you up when we get back to the house?"
"Now who's teasing who?" he quipped as he reached forward to open the CornerMart door.
Letting her enter first, he patted her on the ass then reveled in the warmer weather inside the store. She gave him a condescending look over her shoulder then headed toward the coolers in the back of the store. Pulling open one of the large glass doors, she grabbed two stacks of wrapped bacon, two dozen eggs.
He grabbed two loaves of bread off the shelf as she closed the cooler door. She passed by him and stopped in front of the row of candy bars. When he approached her, she reached down and picked up a candy bar. "I could use a big Whatchamacallit."
Nathan chuckled at her insinuation. "I bet" he replied as he reached for a snickers.