year. It was on my bucket list.
“Let me run a brush through my hair and we can head out.”
“Awesome. Where’s Sades?” He reached down and picked up one of her pillows, placing it to the side before flopping onto the cushions.
“Babysitting,” I called out over my shoulder as I headed to the bathroom. I grabbed my brush and walked back into the living room. “So did you want to go pick pumpkins tomorrow?”
Josh gave a quick glance in my direction. “Aren’t you too old for that?”
“You’re never too old to pick pumpkins. And besides, we always carve them together. It’s tradition.”
He took his hat off and tossed it on the back of the sofa. “You’re in college now. And traditions are meant to be broken.”
“No they’re not. Come on Josh. It’ll be fun. I’ll even buy you a caramel apple.” I ran the brush over my highlighted strands, pouting my bottom lip.
“With nuts?” he asked.
“Yes, with nuts.”
“Is Joe coming?”
He was supposed to until he made plans without me for the weekend and then didn’t think it was necessary to tell me until the very last minute. I didn’t say that though. I told Josh a lot of things, but I didn’t want him to think poorly of Joe before he got the chance to meet him.
“No, something came up. Family stuff. He’ll be gone for the weekend,” I said instead.
“Too bad, I was looking forward to threatening him.”
I glared at him then waited for him to pity me and give in.
“Okay, fine. You driving?” he asked.
“I guess. I don’t really want to put dirty pumpkins in my car, but why not.” I shrugged.
“So it’s okay to get my truck dirty.”
“Like it’s clean anyway.” I threw one of the decorative pillows at his head, but being an ex-state champion baseball player he caught it before it hit him.
“Good point.” He set the pillow on the couch. “You almost ready? Let’s go before the girls get too drunk to talk to.”
I rolled my eyes and followed him out the door.
You’d think I’d have learned that going out with my brother required a full day of recovery. My bed was so comfortable I wanted to stay beneath my covers as long as I could. But I’d talked Josh into going pumpkin picking, and there was no way I was missing out. Assuming he was functioning after last night’s festivities.
Grudgingly, I dragged myself out of bed and went to the kitchen. I needed caffeine ASAP.
I stepped out of my bedroom expecting to find Josh in a coma. The last thing I expected to see at the crack of dawn was Zach sitting on
Josh leaned back into the beige sofa. “Oh, hey, sis. Look who I bumped into at 7-Eleven this morning.”
This morning. As if it was the middle of the afternoon. I thought for sure after the fifth body shot he did off the bartender, he’d be hurting when he woke up. But there he was, smiling as if he hadn’t played three rounds of beer pong too. And Zach. Ugh!
I glanced at the green numbers on the cable box and was surprised to see it wasn’t actually the ass crack of dawn, but 11:22 a.m.
“’Morning, sunshine,” Zach said, a stupid grin settling on his face, which made me want to smack it off.
“What are you doing here?” I asked, flipping my hair out of my face with my hand.
“Like Josh said, we bumped into each other. He invited me to go pumpkin picking with you guys. I can’t believe you still do that.”
My nails dug into my palms and I could feel the anger widening my eyes. I didn’t know who I wanted to kill more, my stupid brother or Zach.
“Excuse me?” was all I was able to get out.
“I thought it’d get boring just the two of us. Besides, I can’t believe you didn’t tell me Zach was here,” Josh said, effectively passing Zach on my “who I want to kill more” list.
“This is a joke. Right?”
A sick, twisted joke.
“Lizzie, you know I don’t joke.” That damn grin returned. “Now go get ready.” I glared at Zach with every ounce of disgust I could muster. “Oh, and you might want to do something with your hair.”
“Ugh!” I turned so fast I could have given myself whiplash. I stormed out of the living room and straight to the bathroom mirror.
If it was possible to die from embarrassment, I would have dropped right then and there. My hair stood up in all directions like something I’d imagine Medusa sported on a really bad day. I’d forgotten to wash my face before bed and had black mascara smeared under my lids. As if that wasn’t bad enough, I had dried drool on the corner of my lip.
I wasn’t even wearing my cute pajamas. I was too tired to care, so I had just grabbed something out of my dresser. Which just happened to be a crappy pair of sweatpants with paint stains and an oversized t-shirt Josh brought back his first visit from school when I still lived at home.
Wait a minute. Who cared if Zach saw me looking bad? Okay, horrible. But seriously, why did I even care? The only person I needed to look good for was Joe. And he was on the road with the band.
I didn’t get my coffee, but I wasn’t going back out there. I turned the shower on, rid myself of my craptastic pajamas and stepped in. I didn’t need to look good for Zach, but that didn’t mean I wanted him to see me looking horrendous again.
An hour later I evaluated myself in the mirror. Hair straight, but with volume I have no idea how I managed to pull off. A pair of dark-wash denim skinny jeans with a white shirt, a gray three-quarter sleeve grandfather cardigan and a lightweight gray and white scarf. And since the weather was finally cooling down, I was able to wear my gray crocheted slouch boots.
“Much better,” Zach said when I walked into the living room, making me want to dive across the couch and smack him upside his head.
“I’m so happy to have your approval.” I rolled my eyes. “Are we ready or what?” I turned my attention to Josh, who was still playing video games.
“Oh, yeah. I just have to use the bathroom. I’ll be right back.” Josh released the controller from his grasp and left the living room. Since Josh never did anything quickly, I flopped down on the couch in the farthest spot possible from Zach.
I rested my ankle on my knee and leaned back, letting the overstuffed pillows swallow me.
“What the hell are those?” Zach pushed at my foot with his finger.
“My boots.”
“It looks like your foot’s being attacked by a Muppet.” I looked at him and then down at the material wrapped around my leg and laughed. It really did.
“Did I just get a laugh out of Liz Wagner?” His dark eyebrows rose in fake shock.
“It was funny, I’ll give you that, but don’t worry, it won’t happen again.”
With a narcissistic confidence shining in his eyes he flashed a half grin and said, “We’ll see.”
“Get in,” I said to Zach and Josh as I hit the unlock on my keypad ten minutes later.
Zach looked through the passenger side window. “No, I’ll drive. Don’t want the pumpkins to dirty your car and cause you to get your panties in a bunch.”
I rolled my eyes and purposely walked past Zach’s open door and around to Josh’s. I climbed into the Jeep and flopped into the backseat.
Little did Zach know it was hard for a thong to actually bunch. Not that I told him that. As far as I was concerned the less Zach knew about my undergarments the better.
There was a time when I was excited to tell him about my adventures in lingerie shopping. I was young and had a boyfriend I was crazy about and loved nothing more than watching the desire to see said lingerie burn in his
