Page 60 of Trusting You
I didn’t grow into adulthood as a screwup. But it seems I’m settling into it just fine.
* * *
My head pounds,and I’m not hungover.
Don’t think so, anyway, except my mouth feels like dry cake batter and my bones creak like someone tipped me upside down to drink out of a keg last night.
But nope, it’s just me, excruciatingly sober, sitting up in bed, scratching my morning beard, hiking my boxers down to disguise a morning stiffy, and padding out of my bedroom and into the bathroom to—
Oh, hey.
“Locke!” Carter screeches before slamming the door in my face.
I blink. Rub at my eyes. Remember who’s living with me and that I’m sore because of lifting and carrying my daughter everywhere yesterday.
Still a mind-fuck.
I turn to the kitchen instead and come across Lily, munching on a more expensive veggie version of Cheerios on the floor.
“Speak of the devil,” I say and lift her up, kiss her baby-soft hair, and focus entirely on forgetting what just greeted me in the bathroom two seconds ago.
A naked Carter.
Well, not entirely naked, I muse as I accept some puffed cereal being mashed into my mouth by Lily’s eager hand. Carter was in the midst of folding a towel around that very fine, very toned body of hers, flashing me enough that my morning half-chub turned into a full boner upon my eyes meeting her breasts.
They’d still been wet from the shower, offering a liquid shine, practically a beacon drawing my mouth forward. They were big enough to palm and squeeze—
“Bahbah!” Lily screeches into my ear.
Literally. In my ear.
I mouth CHRIST as exaggeratedly as I can, since I definitely can’t shout it, and find an empty, clean bottle of Lily’s. She decides to help by grabbing for anything I lift up with my free hand.
“You’re only adding time between you and this bottle in your mouth,” I say to no avail.
“Abah.”
“No. Not yours,” I respond and start mixing formula. “Yet, anyway.”
“Sorry I screamed.”
“Oh, it’s okay, I only need one eardrum to function, anyway,” I say to Lily.
“Locke? It’s me talking.”
I look over my shoulder at Carter, her hair damp from a shower, fully clothed in one of those things girls wear that has a shirt attached to the shorts. A green one. I tell myself not to stare at her legs, and my attention strays to her chest before I can stop it. She folds her arms.
“I knew it was you talking,” I say.
I didn’t really. Mornings put me on autopilot, and my sister swears I hallucinate.
“I debated dropping Lily on top of you while I showered, but when I went in, I couldn’t even rouse you,” she said.
I turn to her, shaking the bottle. “Did you tickle my feet?”
She looks at me like it’s a creeptastic fetish I have.
“It’s a trick Astor uses,” I elaborate. “To wake me up.”