I shrugged and shut the dryer, not turning it on yet, waiting for the rest of her wet clothing.
In the bag I also found a small makeup bag and a paperback book. I checked the book over and saw that it was not too water damaged. The pages were curled a bit at the edges, that was all.
I looked at the cover and could not help but smile. It was an old copy of On The Road by Jack Kerouac. I remembered reading that book when I was around her age and the sense of longing for adventure it had instilled in me, like it had for so many young people.
I heard the kettle whistle in the kitchen and I headed that way, dropping the book on the counter before making a strong pot of coffee in the French press.
I had just poured two cups when I heard Bailey on the stairs. I looked up to see her coming down towards me and I couldn’t help but lick my lips.
She looked like a different person to the wet girl who had rung my doorbell.
She had dried her hair and must have run my comb through it. It was still damp, but under control. She had washed her face so her makeup was not running any more. She was wearing a blue plaid button up flannel shirt she would have pulled out of my closet and nothing else.
Her bare feet padded down the steps, and I noticed that her toenails nails were painted green. My eyes ran up her bare smooth legs. She was so pale that they almost shone white in the light of the stairway.
The shirt was obviously too big for her, hanging down to her upper thighs. She had buttoned it most of the way up, but it hung open at the top, showing off the space between her breasts and her collarbone. Her breasts were impressive before, under her wet top, but the way they bounced as she defended I could see that she had abandoned the bra. They swung free, but youth kept them firm and pert, despite their obvious fullness.
I shook my head and looked away, groaning silently at myself for looking at my sister in that way. What was wrong with me? She was family and she needed help. The last thing I should be doing was turning into a sudden pervert.
“I made you some coffee,” I said when she entered the kitchen. “How do you take it?”
“Milk and very sweet,” she said. “Thank you so much! For everything!”
“No worries,” I said, trying to reassure her. “You found everything ok?”
“Of course! I hope you don’t mind that I took your shirt?”
“Of course not,” I said. “Did you need some sweats or something?” I did not mind her having her legs bare, but that was, I supposed, the problem. I liked the look of it too much.
“Oh,” she said, looking down and tugging at the bottom of the shirt. This managed to cover slightly more of her thighs but opened the top up a bit wider. “I actually tried a pair on but they were way too big. Is that ok?”
“Of course. Never mind. Here. Have some coffee.”
She took the offered cup and wrapped both of her hands around it, pulling it to her lips and inhaling the steam, seeming to be drawing warmth from it.
“Oh god,” she said, smiling. “You have no idea how badly I needed this!”
I sat on one of the counter stools at the island in my kitchen and gestured for her to sit on the other. She hopped up and turned to face me.
“Ok,” I said. “Let’s get it all out there. What are you doing here, Bailey? What is going on?”
She took a deep breath and launched into her story. I asked a couple of questions along the way, but mostly it was her delivering a monologue. It seemed like she was unburdening herself of something she had been holding onto for a while. Her story meandered as she told it but this is the basic structure.
My father, it seemed, had done a much better job with Bailey than he had done with me. He worked a lot but had been there for her growing up. Providing for her, but also being there for her important moments like dance recitals and student teacher days.
Her mother had been more difficult. She had always been erratic and manic. Some of the time she was the perfect version of a suburban mother, other times she was unreliable. Angry and cruel sometimes, depressed and useless at others. Bailey told me that several times a year her mother would crawl into bed and stay there for weeks at a time.
Still, Bailey managed to have a pretty normal childhood. Of course as she became a teen she acted out and rebelled. She went out with friends. Drank, tried drugs, but, according to her, all within acceptable levels. She never let her schoolwork suffer and was on track to get into a decent school.
She had some boyfriends but even those relationships were pretty tame. She stressed that she was just a normal teen doing normal teen things. This, however, seemed to drive her mother crazy.
It seemed like a couple of years before, when Bailey was around 17, her mother had found Jesus and joined a Born Again church. It had been jarring for Bailey since they had raised her in a relatively non-religious household. Once her mother had converted she had gone all in, convincing my father to join the same church.
He always went along with his wife, Bailey said, blindly agreeing with anything she decided. So when she went religious he did too.
Suddenly everything in Bailey’s life was turned upside down. The rules all changed and her freedom became non-existent. Of course she rebelled against it, which led to many fights, screaming, and, suddenly corporal punishment from both her mom and my dad.
“Wait,” I said, interrupting her, my voice angry. “They were hitting you?”
“Well,” she said, looking down, “mom was. She is a slapper. Dad … well, he never wanted to but Mom would make him spank me while she watched.”
“Jesus Christ,” I said, disgusted. “And you were seventeen? I’m sorry you went through that.”
“It’s ok,” she said. “Just something that happened I guess.”
This went on while Bailey finished high school. Her grades plummeted and she did not get into the schools she wanted. She would push the boundaries and her parents would punish her. With no school she did not leave home. Her mother would not let her get a job so she was trapped in the house.
Of course she would sneak out and see her friends and they would hang out and sometimes party. If she got caught she would get punished. She did not see a way out.
“And then,” she said, “about six months ago I met Kevin. He’s a pretty nice guy and he seemed to like me a lot. So we started dating. I was sneaking out to see him, or sneaking him into my room almost every night. Then, last week Mom caught him in my room.”
She took the last sip from her coffee and placed the cup on the counter and looked down at her knees, ashamed.
“We were fucking,” she said. “I thought mom and dad were at a night service but I guess she wasn’t feeling well so they came home early.”
“That must have been embarrassing,” I said, doing my best to avoid imagining Bailey having sex.
“I guess,” she said. “But what was really embarrassing was the way she reacted. She was screeching like a fucking cat or something. She dragged him off of me, we were naked and she was slapping me. He grabbed his clothes and ran.”
Bailey was tearing up again.
“She called me a slut and a whore, and wouldn’t listen to me. He was my first! And I’m nineteen fucking years old! She acted like she caught me in the middle of some kind of gang bang or something!”
This went on for days, she told me, until Bailey had had enough. She decided she needed to leave. She asked Kevin if he would take her in for a bit but he actually broke up with her instead. My sister was going to run away anyway, just try to make it on her own, maybe sleep at a shelter, when she remembered me.
She stole a couple of hundred dollars from her parents and bought a bus ticket and came here. She didn’t call me, scared I would turn her away.
“And so now I’m here and you know all about it. Will you help me, Brent? I know you barely know me but I promise I’ll be good! I’ll do whatever you want. I’ll clean and cook and … please don’t send me back!”
She broke down in tears again and I pulled her to me in a hug. She melted against me and sobbed against my chest. I held her there for a good five minutes before she caught her breath.
“Ok,” I said, finally after she had calmed down. “I will help you.”
Her eyes lit up and she smiled at me.
“Oh my god!!! Thank you!! You won’t regret this!” She almost shouted. “I promise!”
I had to smile at her sudden turn around in mood.
“You don’t have to cook and clean for me,” I said. “I’ve been doing just fine at that for myself for a long time. If you want to help out that is fine. I can also give you a job, working for me, if you want one. That way you can make some money, save up for your own place, or school if you want.”
“Speaking of money,” I said, remembering something she had just told me, “how much money did you take from your parents? I’m going to send it back to them.”
“Why?” She sneered. “Why should they get any?”
“Because you don’t want them to have anything over you. If you want to be free you can’t give them any leverage. I’ll pay them back and you can pay me back. I’ll take it off your paycheck.”
She nodded.
“It was three hundred and sixty dollars. What dad had in his wallet.”
“Ok,” I said. “Why don’t you head on up to bed. The spare bedroom is the one beside one upstairs. That can be yours while you are here. I’m going to call Dad and let him know you are here and are going to stay for a bit. Tomorrow I have a full day of meetings and site visits, but I can get free the day after and we can hang out. Maybe go to the mall and go shopping for some clothes for you. You didn’t bring much.”
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