A Place So Wicked by Patrick Reuman (life books to read txt) 📕

they were easier to remove than jeans, and a tight T-shirt, because, she wasn’t really sure. She put on her makeup. Prettied herself up. Even gave herself a brief pep talk about how this was no big deal, how everybody was doing what she was about to do.

Then she turned off her phone, tossed it on the bed, and went to go see if her mom needed help packing up. She never went to see Brent. And when they finally had everything packed into the back of the moving truck and were moving in the opposite direction of Brent, she felt relief instead of sadness. She was happy that she was away from him and his desires that he said were natural for people their age.

It wasn’t until his texts became less and less frequent that she started feeling this sadness, this longing to see him again. She wasn’t even sure why. It was insanity, she thought, to feel happy to be away from a person one day and then complete dread to be away from them the next.

All she wanted was a text from him as she lay there, trying to ignore the moon’s light. Even though she knew it wasn’t coming, not that night at least, and maybe not ever again. His responses to her were already short, and meaningless, just as she knew she had been to him in the end.

She rolled back over and faced the wall, which she knew had her little brother on the other side. She wished she could tell Trevor what was going on. She wanted to get up right then and go over to his room, sit there with him, and talk the night away. But she didn’t want to seem childish, and he was probably sleeping. So she wouldn’t. Instead, she would lay there until her mind caved in and she fell asleep.

5

Robbie awoke early and started moving things around the house. He wanted to get on his brother’s good side and having half the work done by the time Richard woke up seemed like a good place to start.

He yawned aloud as he opened a box, one of many that were stacked all along the far walls in the living room. He hadn’t slept much the night before. He swore this house’s walls were alive. They moaned and groaned like there was a storm raging outside even though the night had been crystal clear from what he could tell. A few times, he was startled awake by what he could swear, at least in the moment when he was still half asleep, were voices speaking long, dreary words that seemed to disappear into the air as he came to.

But if they really were voices, he didn’t think they would suddenly stop talking the moment he was coherent enough to understand them. The reality was, the house, his brother’s new house, was probably old, the walls aged and weak. Even the slightest breeze, one he wouldn’t notice from inside, could probably make the wooden skeleton sway. He bet it was at least a hundred years old and chalked up a reminder to ask Richard about it later.

The first box was mostly small sentimental items like photographs encaged in picture frames and paperwork that he wasn’t going to bother going through. He was sure Lisa would have specific places she wanted these things. If anything, moving them elsewhere may make her mad, and he didn’t want that.

He wasn’t sure which of them had the final say, Richard or Lisa, but his fate was pretty much in their hands. He had nowhere else to go. He and his sort of long-time girlfriend had split, and the place they were staying at was hers. He was a little jealous of his older brother. He had joked about it years ago when Richard had told him that he had proposed to Lisa. Robbie had told Richard that marrying Lisa would ruin his life, or at least suck all the fun out of it.

The joke was on him, though. Robbie was the better looking of the two, and the stronger one. He attracted more women that he could count. They were always so damn beautiful, and downright crazy. And Jasmine was no exception.

Robbie remembered spotting her from across the bar, her long, beautiful black hair resting down her firm shoulders, her dark skin a shade of golden caramel, and the smile she flashed as she talked and joked with the man that sat across from her. He should have been wiser right then. Richard had told him on more than one occasion that no girl he met in a bar was going to make a good wife. But a wife wasn’t what he was looking for, not then at least.

Robbie talked his friends into relocating to the other end of the bar, nearer to where the bathrooms were. He wanted to get this girl alone, or at least away from the guy she was with, and he figured she was bound to have to head toward the bathroom at some point.

He was right, of course. Only fifteen or so minutes later, he watched as she stood from the barstool, said something to the guy, and then started straight for Robbie. She went into the bathroom, and when she came back out, he turned and pretended to bump into her. He flashed his own foolproof smile as he took a step back, laughing and apologizing for nearly walking into her. She didn’t seem to mind.

Brushing her hair back, she introduced herself as Jasmine Ramirez. She was from Syracuse but was in town for her sister’s wedding. Robbie mentioned strategically how his brother was getting married as well. It was a hole-in-one conversation starter. While they spoke, he positioned himself between Jasmine and the man she had been there with, so that neither could see the other.

They talked and