(As a follow up to "When They Became Roommates", this story should stand on its own, but you might want to read the original to better understand why they do the things they do. In either case, enjoy! mrjones)
Around them, the chaos of graduation filled every conceivable crack in the universe. Freshly degreed students in purple and white robes mixed on the sculpted lawn with parents dressed in casual chic. Small children bored to distraction cried and struggled to break free of the sweaty adult hands that enslaved them. Camera flashes went off like lightning bugs somehow confused into firing in broad daylight. Multicolored balloons trailed from skinny ribbons singly and in clusters, whimsically trapped in the vagaries of the afternoon breeze.
"Congratulations," Toni said. "You made it."
Mike was all grin from the chin up.
"And in three years, I'll be saying the same to you."
Toni was two years older than Mike, but she'd married right out of high school and never went to college. Not until this past fall, when she began at the very same school her brother had just graduated from.
"Yeah, we'll see about that," she said. "It's no picnic, taking courses and working to support yourself at the same time." Especially not alone.
Her marriage to Steve had lasted about four years. Shortly after she and Mike's parents were taken from them in a car wreck, Steve announced he was leaving her. Crushed and alone for the first time in her life, Toni had moved to the town where Mike went to school, and the two of them shared a small apartment, both working part time while Mike continued his studies.
And they'd shared a lot more than that.
But, Mike had been gone, on his own for almost a year, and Toni had been left once again.
The cause of that abandonment came bouncing up to them out of the crowd of perspiring celebrants. Her name was Patti, and she was a junior. Short, petite, cute, with blonde hair cut short and big green eyes, she was the essence of enthusiasm. In a perky sun dress and white sandals, she ran up and hugged Mike hard, squealing with excitement. Mike lifted her off the ground, and as they pivoted in place, trying very hard not to fall down and make complete asses of themselves, Patti noticed Toni standing there with a somewhat nauseated look on her face.
"You must be his sister," she said, and she extended a hand in greeting, which Toni hesitantly took. "He never shuts up about you! I've wanted to meet this superwoman he keeps talking about for so long! How are you?"
"Warm," Toni said.
Mid-May had turned unnaturally hot, perhaps in compensation for the late winter storm that had dominated April. The sun hung like a yellow ball in a crystal-blue sky, making it feel like late July, just before the Dog Days of August set in. The mere act of breathing was enough to make people perspire.
"Tell me about it," Mike said, tugging on the front of his gown. "Try wearing this goddamn thing in this heat!"
Patti unclenched herself from him. "Where's your hat?" she asked.
The mortarboard had been snatched off his head shortly after the tassels had been turned. Whoever had taken it flung it into the air where it joined another hundred of its brethren in a tall arc, falling into the anonymous crowd.
"Lost it," he said.
"What are you wearing underneath?" she asked.
"Not a damn thing," he said.
Patti squealed again. Toni got the impression she did that often.
"I was gonna suggest you take it off," Patti said. "I guess that's out."
"Why not?" Toni said. "Maybe it would give some of these people something else to think about besides how badly they want some shade."
Patti made a face, and mimicking dire weightiness she said, "I don't think the world is ready to see Mike naked."
Toni raised an eyebrow. From what she remembered, he looked pretty damned fine naked. He couldn't have changed that much in a year. Maybe she was just prejudiced.
"So, what now?" Mike asked shortly thereafter, realizing that an uncomfortable silence had grown over their small triangular crowd. "Anybody hungry?"
"Too hot to eat," Patti said, and she mimed vomiting.
"Maybe we can just go inside somewhere and get out of the sun," Toni suggested. "How about your place? That way you can change."
No one objected. Toni followed Mike and Patti in her own car to the apartment they shared on a quiet, tree-lined street. Patti jumped out practically before Mike had the car stopped completely, declaring that she had dibs on the bathroom. She ran to the front door and vanished inside.
"You okay with this?" Mike asked Toni when they met on the sidewalk
Toni smiled wryly. "Kinda late in the game to ask that, isn't it?"
"Well, I mean..."
"I'm fine," Toni said, sounding one-hundred percent confident. They headed for the house. "Just two questions," she added as they reached the wide front porch steps.
"Shoot."
"Is she always this...?" Not normally at a loss for words, Toni found herself incapable of saying what she really wanted to ask without sounding catty and jealous.
Mike understood precisely, however. "You overlook it after a while," he said. "Really, she grows on you."
Like shelf fungus on the side of a dead tree, Toni reckoned.
"So, what's the other question?"
Toni looked at him naughtily. "Are you really naked under that thing?"
Mike smiled back. "Wanna see?"
They had just gone inside and were still in the foyer leading to the other four apartments.
"Right here?" Toni asked.
"If you want," Mike said. "I was thinking of someplace a bit more private, but..."
He started up the stairs ahead of her, and lifted the bottom of his gown, way up farther than he had to so as not to trip on it. Toni, being below him, got a great view of the backs of his legs, and the round white globes of his ass.
Mike dropped the gown.
"Satisfied?" he asked her.
Not in the least, she thought inside her head.
"For now," she said.
Mike and Patti's apartment was on the second floor, in the back of an old house that at one time was a single-family home to some very affluent people. The grandchildren who inherited the place chopped it up into four apartments, because it had far more commercial potential than sentimental value.
Mike and Patti had four rooms, and from the way things were stacked all over the place could have used at least two more. When Toni and Mike had lived together in her little three-room efficiency it had seemed plenty big for them, especially when Mike stopped sleeping on the couch and began sharing his sister's big bed. Now it was all hers again, and some days it felt to her like a cavern and other days it felt like a straightjacket.
"Nice place," Toni said.
Mike knew bullshit when he heard it. The walls needed paint, the ceilings showed stains where the roof leaked, and the window in the kitchen had a jagged diagonal crack right through the bottom pane.
"We're practically never here," he said. "We're either in class, at the library, or at work. It costs almost twice what our place did."
'Does', Toni wanted to correct him. But, it hadn't been 'their place' for quite a while.
On a cold and stormy autumn evening a few months after Mike had moved in with his sister, and by no design on the part of either of them, they became lovers. For six months they lived more like man and wife than brother and sister, and both couldn't have been any happier.
Then Mike met Patti, and everything changed.
At first it was just study dates and lunches on campus, but Toni knew something was up by the way Mike had become less attentive. A short while later, Mike and Patti started formally dating, and not long after that Mike moved back to sleeping on the couch in the living room. A few months later, he moved out, taking this apartment with Patti, and Toni found herself alone again.
Patti came out of the bathroom like a leaf being blown by a hurricane. The toilet flushed noisily behind her.
"I wouldn't go in there for a while," she said, and headed for the kitchen. "Who wants a beer?"
They both said they'd take one.
"She's cute," Toni said while Patti retrieved the beers.
Mike thought for a second before he said, "She's okay."
Toni wanted to ask him if he was seriously in love with this...child...but she was afraid of the answer. That Mike and Patti had been together almost a year said a lot, but then again, if they were really all that busy all the time like Mike had said, maybe the newness just hadn't worn off yet. When it did she was sure that Mike would find some excuse to get away. Blonde hair, green eyes, and perky little tits can only take you so far, and are poor compensation for a lack of intellect. In a battle of wits, Patti was unarmed.
Toni and Mike had been so much more than just lovers, and so much more than just brother and sister. They'd become each other's lives, each one half of a much greater whole. She still couldn't accept that this lemon-topped tart had come between them.
Maybe it had something to do with her, with Toni. Steve had left her for another woman. Mike had, too. Maybe some women were just born to be left behind.
"You seeing anyone?"
The question caught Toni off guard.
"Yes," she said at first, then changed it to, "No, not really. I mean, I'm dating, but nobody in particular."
"Good for you," he said, trying his best to sound sincere without being condescending.
Patti came out with the beers. "Why don't you take that off?" she asked Mike. "Get comfortable."
Mike downed half his beer, placed it on the nearest flat surface (which happened to be the stereo turntable) and said, "Sounds like a deal."
He undid the three buttons at the collar and whipped the gown off over his head. In sneakers and white socks alone, he carried the gown to the bedroom and closed the door.
