8
1773 Words
The next morning sunlight poured through the windows, turning the kitchen into a bright, normal scene. Jake was flipping pancakes at the stove while Sarah sipped coffee and scrolled on her phone.
Ethan sat at the island, nursing a mug, eyes flicking toward the stairs every few minutes. Mia still hadn’t come down. The memory of her tears on the porch yesterday sat heavy in his chest like a stone he couldn’t swallow.
The doorbell rang. Ethan stood before anyone else could move. “I’ll get it.”
He opened the front door and found a guy standing there — nineteen at most, tall and lean with messy brown hair, wearing a simple t-shirt and jeans, holding a backpack. The kid looked friendly enough, but Ethan’s frown came instantly.
“Who are you looking for?”
The guy smiled easily. “Mia. She invited me over to study.”
Before Ethan could respond, soft footsteps came down the stairs. Mia appeared in loose shorts and a cropped tank top that showed a strip of her stomach and the faint freckles across her chest. She didn’t even glance at Ethan as she passed him, walked straight to Tyler, and wrapped her arms around him in a quick, warm hug.
“Hey, you made it,” she said softly, voice lighter than it had been all yesterday.
Tyler hugged her back. “Wouldn’t miss it.”
Mia took his hand and tugged him toward the stairs without another word to Ethan. “Come on, my room’s upstairs. We can spread out on the desk.”
They disappeared up the steps, her door clicking shut a moment later.
Ethan stood frozen in the entryway, jaw tight, staring at the empty staircase. Confusion and something sharper twisted in his gut.
Back in the kitchen, Jake slid a stack of pancakes onto plates. “Who was that?”
“Some guy named Tyler,” Ethan muttered, sitting back down. “Said Mia invited him to study.”
Sarah laughed lightly. “Good for her. She’s been so quiet since yesterday. Maybe she just needed a friend her own age.”
Jake shrugged, pouring syrup. “Tyler’s cool. He’s in her bio class. I’ve met him a couple times at campus events. Harmless kid. I trust my baby sis not to do anything stupid right under my nose.”
Ethan’s grip on his mug tightened. “You sure about that? They’re up there alone. Door closed.”
Sarah nudged him playfully with her elbow. “Relax, Ethan. She’s eighteen. She’s allowed to hang out with a guy. You sound like her dad.”
Jake chuckled around a bite of pancake. “Exactly. I can’t even imagine Mia getting f****d right under my nose. That’s disgusting. I’d lose my mind.”
Sarah burst out laughing. “But you can screw a girl in the next room and that’s fine?”
Jake grinned. “Totally different. She’s my little sister.”
Ethan pushed his plate away, appetite gone. The sounds from yesterday — Mia’s soft moans against his mouth, the way she had trembled when he ground against her — kept flashing through his head. Now some other guy was up there with her. Alone. In her room.
“I’m gonna… check on them,” he muttered, standing.
He headed upstairs, footsteps quiet on the carpet. Outside Mia’s door he paused, fist raised to knock.
Voices drifted through the wood — low, intimate, unmistakably flirty to anyone listening from the outside.
Tyler’s voice first: “God, this is so hard… I keep getting it wrong. Can you show me again how you make it swell like that?”
Mia laughed softly, the sound warm and teasing. “It’s all about the right stimulation. See? You have to rub it gently at first, then build the pressure. Feel how it gets bigger and harder when you do it right?”
Tyler groaned low. “f**k, yeah… that feels intense. Keep going. I love when you explain it like this.”
Mia’s voice dropped, almost breathless. “Mmm, you’re getting so worked up. Look how wet it’s making everything… just from a little touch. If you keep stroking it that way, you’re definitely going to make it explode soon.”
Ethan’s blood roared in his ears. His hand slammed against the door and shoved it open without knocking.
Mia sat cross-legged on her bed in her cropped tank and shorts, biology textbook open on her lap. Tyler sat beside her, leaning close, both of them pointing at a detailed diagram of the male reproductive system — arrows labeled “vasodilation,” “erection,” “ejaculation.”
They both jumped at the sudden bang of the door.
Mia’s eyes widened. “Ethan?”
Tyler blinked, startled. “Uh… hey, man.”
Ethan stood in the doorway, chest heaving, fists clenched at his sides. The relief that they were actually studying warred with the raw, possessive heat still burning in his veins from everything he had just imagined.
Mia tilted her head slightly, that small, knowing smile still playing on her lips. “Need something, Ethan?”
Ethan’s jaw flexed hard. His eyes flicked from Mia’s calm face to Tyler sitting too close on the bed, then back again. The image of her soft moans from the porch yesterday mixed with every flirty word he had just overheard through the door, even if it had turned out to be nothing more than biology diagrams.
“Yeah,” he said, voice low and flat. “Tyler needs to go.”
Mia blinked, confusion flashing across her face. She sat up straighter. “Why?”
Ethan didn’t answer right away. He simply stepped fully into the room, his broad frame filling the doorway. “No reason.”
Tyler looked between them, eyebrows raised. “Uh… okay? I can just—”
Before he could finish, Ethan crossed the room in two strides. His hand closed around Tyler’s upper arm — not rough enough to hurt, but firm enough that there was no argument. He practically dragged the younger guy off the bed and toward the door.
“Hey, man—” Tyler started, stumbling a little as he grabbed his backpack.
Ethan didn’t let go until they were both in the hallway. He released Tyler’s arm and gave him a tight nod toward the stairs. “You can head out now.”
Tyler glanced back at Mia once, confused, then shrugged and started down the steps. “Text me later, Mia. We can finish the chapter another time.”
The front door clicked shut downstairs a minute later.
Mia stood up from the bed, arms crossed over her chest, confusion turning into irritation. “What the hell was that? He was just helping me study.”
Ethan turned back to her, closing the bedroom door behind him with a quiet click. The room suddenly felt much smaller. He leaned against the door, arms folded, trying to look casual even though his pulse was hammering.
“You don’t need him to study bio,” he said evenly. “I can teach you. I already took the advanced version last year, remember? No reason to call some random ‘friend’ over when I’m right here.”
Mia stared at him for a long moment. The hurt from yesterday still lingered in her eyes, but now it mixed with something sharper — frustration, challenge, and that same quiet determination that had been building for days. She took one slow step closer, then another, until only a couple of feet separated them.
“So now you want to teach me?” Her voice was soft, almost too calm. “After yesterday on the porch you told me we had to stop. That I’m just your little sister. That you have a girlfriend and can’t ruin everything.” She gestured vaguely toward the bed where Tyler had been sitting. “But the second another guy comes over to help with homework, suddenly you’re the only one allowed to be alone with me in my room?”
Ethan’s jaw tightened again. He uncrossed his arms, one hand rubbing the back of his neck. “It’s not like that.”
“Then what is it like?” Mia took another step, close enough now that he could smell the faint vanilla on her skin. “You push me away, tell me we can’t, then you storm in here and drag my study partner out like he was doing something wrong. Make it make sense, Ethan.”
He looked down at her — at the crop top that showed the smooth strip of her stomach, the way her shorts sat low on her hips, the freckles he had touched yesterday. His fingers itched with the memory of gripping her ass, palming her breast, grinding against her until she was trembling.
“I just…” He exhaled sharply. “I don’t like the idea of some guy in your room when Jake’s not around. That’s all.”
Mia’s eyes searched his face. For a second her expression softened, the hurt flickering again, but she quickly masked it. Instead she gave a small, almost sad smile.
“So you get to kiss me until I’m shaking, touch me everywhere, then tell me it was a mistake… but no one else is allowed to even sit next to me on the bed and look at a textbook?” She shook her head slowly. “That doesn’t sound fair, Ethan.”
She stepped even closer, until the toes of her bare feet touched his. Her voice dropped to a whisper.
“You can’t have it both ways.”
Ethan’s breathing had grown heavier. His hands stayed at his sides, but they curled into fists like he was fighting the urge to reach for her again. The air between them crackled with the same thick tension from the porch — only now it was laced with jealousy and unresolved need.
Mia held his gaze for another long beat, then turned away toward her desk, picking up the biology textbook like the conversation was over.
“Since you’re offering to teach me now…” She flipped it open to the same page she and Tyler had been on, the detailed diagram of male arousal and erection still visible. “Maybe you can explain this part better than he could.”
She glanced back over her shoulder at him, eyes steady but with that spark of challenge still burning.
“Or are you going to push me away again?”
The question hung in the quiet room, daring him to answer.
- Writer
