Michael Smith - Siblings

She shifted to a kneeling position, which – even naked – seemed somehow more formal. Her expression became serious. "It all comes down to one question, Michael: Do you love me?"

I just looked at her for a moment, then sat up facing her. This didn't sound like a rhetorical question; did she really need an answer?

"You know how I feel about you, Alex."

She folded her hands together and tucked them between her knees, and studied them. "Maybe I do, but I have to hear it. Please."

I leaned forward and covered her hands with mine. I looked into her eyes and said slowly and clearly, "Alex, I love you with all my heart." She blushed a little but her smile seemed relieved. She caught my hand and squeezed.

"Michael, I love you more than anything. Anything. We*are* in love, for real, and it's not fair that we can't share it physically, like any other couple."

I guess that's what made up my mind. I was still nervous about taking the final step, taking my sister's virginity, even though she was actively pressing it on me.

"Incest," I decided at that moment, was just a word. An outmoded concept that had no relevance to us. I'd had one semester of psychology, though I was actually very widely read in that field already, and I suspected Freud and his crowd would have all sorts of significant things to say about us, but that simply didn't interest me. It didn't mean anything.

My sister and I might be unusual in our relationship, but that was all it was – "unusual." If we had had two different sets of parents, we would have been just like any other teenage couple, and no one would care. So what was so perverted? What was so degenerate about us?

I realized that my conclusions had been coalescing for months. I knew I loved a girl named Alexandra. And that it wasn't a crush, or puppy love, or anything so trivial. Those things were all we were*supposed* to be capable of feeling at our age, but I was convinced that our feelings for each other were much, much deeper. Perhaps we were simply more mature in certain ways than most of our peers… or maybe it was our slowly developing love and resulting closeness that had matured us. However cause and effect worked, the result was the same.

These thoughts rushed in and piled atop one another in my mind as we sat there in bed holding hands and gazing longingly at each other. It was almost an epiphany. My nervousness about the resolution of our sexual involvement was still there, of course, but now it was the natural nervousness of any young male contemplating sex with a girl he cares for deeply. That "I-word," the one we never used aloud, no longer entered into it.

The few seconds' pause in our conversation seemed like an hour. I had to think back to recall the last thing Alex had said. Ah. Yes.

"You're right," I replied. "It's not fair. And I think we've just decided to do something about it, haven't we?" Alex looked faintly surprised at the sudden resolution in my voice.

"But I think we should treat this as a special occasion – special for both of us. Why don't we give each other a very special, very private birthday gift?" Her eyes were bright, now.

"I also think we should give up all this foreplay with no 'last act' until then. Sweets taste a lot nicer when you haven't had any for awhile."

"Yeah," she said with a smile. "I think you're right. Looking without being able to touch will make us anticipate the Big Day all the more." She hesitated. "We don't have to avoid each other, do we?"

"Alex, we're still brother and sister; what else have we been agonizing about? We just won't be lovers for a week, not actively anyway. But I still get a kiss in the morning, okay?"

My sister looked and seemed happier than she had in months. This was a deep river for us to cross, but I thought things would be all right, now that we had decided to blow up the log jam.

It was a long week… like trudging across a desert, even though you know when and where the waterhole is going to be. We continued the same friendly affection we had developed over the years, and we still exchanged quick kisses of greeting and departure. We held hands when we went shopping out of our neighborhood.

But each of us adopted a careful modesty around the other. Clothing changes were made with bedroom doors shut, and we knocked on the bathroom door, just like other people. All showers were solo. We stopped our intimate but casual sex play. In some ways, of course, it was godawful frustrating, but it also heightened the sexual tension, like tightening a guitar string. For some years, I had had regular dreams about Alex -always very nice ones, too – but now the dreams came every night.

She was still doing most of her studying on my bed, though she was wearing more than just underwear these days. But neither of us was getting a lot of studying done; we spent much of our time looking at each other and smiling. The mounting anticipation became almost overwhelming.

The morning of January 6th, my – our – birthday, as I was putting my keys and coins in my pockets, I discovered a neatly sealed square envelope propped on top of my chest of drawers.

On the front was "An Invitation," lettered in my sister's precise script. Inside was a folded sheet of her monogrammed notepaper which read:

"The Joy of Your Presence Is Requested at a

Grand Opening to Be Entered Into at

Approximately 9:00 p.m. on the Evening of

January 6th and Ending Whenever the Revelers

Are Exhausted. No R.S.V.P. Required, No

Excuses Accepted. Dress: Optional."

I had a great deal of difficulty concentrating on school that Friday.

We had a leisurely supper with Mother and Dad, who wished us both Happy Birthday and gave us our presents. Our family had never made a big deal of birthdays, especially after we each passed the plastic toy stage.

That suited us, too. Each January, Alex and I gave each other small, highly personalized gifts carefully selected or handmade. The more unusual and unexpected, the better; no unimaginative boxes of candy or bottles of cologne between us!

This year, our folks gave us each very nice new wristwatches in matching style, relatively modest in price but a lot better than the old Timexes we both were wearing. Our gifts to each other would come later.

Dad was working on weekends at least half the time these days, in addition to his frequent business trips, but I was concerned that he might be inconveniently present that night. Not*that* night, of all nights, please!

As it turned out, he was taking Mother for a rare night out: They were going to a show and then to visit some friends across town who had recently returned from a winter vacation in the Caribbean. Mother absolutely hated lugging her wheelchair to other people's homes, but these friends had known her a very long time, long before her arthritis became crippling. Anyway, they didn't expect to be home until well after Midnight, which was fine with us.

We each took an hour in the bathroom, trying to make ourselves perfect for the occasion. I had problems deciding what to wear. Or should I just show up naked, wearing a bow tie? I finally settled on a pair of slacks and a reasonably new dress shirt with the top few buttons undone. Then I slipped on my loafers without socks. This was almost formal attire by Upstairs standards, but it was nothing I couldn't get out of in a hurry. As I was brushing my hair and wondering how to approach our rendezvous, the question was answered by Alex's soft knock at my door.

"Michael? Don't open the door yet – but it's ten to nine, and I'd like you to come and open MY door at exactly nine o'clock. All right?" I agreed and heard her bare feet hurry back down the hall. Whatever she was preparing, it was going to be interesting.

At ten seconds before 9:00 by my new watch, I stepped across the hall. Alex had taped a big red satin bow to the middle of her door, with a printed note just above it: "ENTER WITHOUT KNOCKING."