The Rock
11 Like Water
I AWOKE a couple of times in the night as girls shifted positions and someone else curled up next to me on one side or the other. Each time, I’d just give her a hug and go back to sleep, usually aware that my hand was gently cupping a breast, ass, or pussy. About five-thirty, I woke up to the delightful sensation of my left nipple being nibbled, sucked, and licked. My cock was being lightly stroked. I raised a hand to the unmistakable tangle of red hair just below my chin.
“Elaine?” I whispered.
“Oh good. You’re awake.” She wiggled around and ripped open a condom package, rolling on my cock quickly. Then she straddled me and sank onto my cock with a sigh. “Another couple of seconds and I’d have done that whether you woke up or not,” she whispered. I glanced to my right and Sora was grinning at me, lightly stroking my chest with one hand and guiding my hand to her pussy with the other.
“What is going on with all the exhibitionism?” I asked.
“I’m not exhibiting to anyone,” Elaine said. “I just needed to feel you one more time before I go back to school.”
“Me, too,” Sora said. “But it’s okay to use your fingers. They feel so good right now.” She raised up enough to kiss me. I just let it go and enjoyed the moment. Elaine and Sora were each in their own world, not paying attention to each other, but both wholly focused on me. I did very little but let them enjoy themselves as I lost my senses to the awareness of their pussies and my impending explosion. It was a ragged come. First Sora, then me. Finally, Elaine pressed down firmly as my last shot fired and sighed out a gentle orgasm.
“Mmm. That was a bonus to get a climax. All I wanted was to feel you come in me. Thank you, lover. Let’s go make breakfast for our casa.”
Before she took off in the evening, I managed to corner Rose again and drag her back to my bed. We were alone this time and I was aggressive with her, licking her first to an orgasm and then crawling between her legs to bury my naked cock in her grasping pussy.
“Oh, Brian! What got into you? I love you! Come in me. Come in me, lover.” I had come enough times this weekend that I could keep going for a while and I stroked her to another orgasm. “I love you. Oh, darling, what have I done to deserve such a wonderful extra from you?” Just after she had her next orgasm, I slowed my pace and pressed my body down onto her.
“I want to know what’s going on and the only way I could think to get an answer was to fuck you into submission. What’s with suddenly everyone wanting to make love in the room with everyone else, Rose? I’m worried about the message that we’re sending to those who aren’t wanting to have sex. Cassie, Nikki, Mary. I know you’ve got some plan. What is it?”
“Oh, my love. My sweet, sweet lover. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to keep you in the dark. We didn’t mean to. Can you keep fucking me like that until I finish telling you? I think I’ll come again if you do.”
“As long as I can stay hard I’ll stay in you, sweetheart. Now tell me the story.”
“We talk. It was during our… um… indoctrination of Mary that the subject came up. Believe it or not, it was Cassie who asked if we were still going to be a nude casa. I hadn’t realized it, but every time it is just our casa, we end up taking our clothes off. It turned out that we all really like it. We like feeling our skin touching when we hug each other and when we hug you. And it’s not like we’re all asking to be fucked by you when we’re naked, but we like seeing your appreciation of us.”
“It was a lot more than appreciation I was showing last night,” I chuckled.
“Yes. It was a little weird, wasn’t it? What did you think of having nine teenaged beauties sitting in a semicircle around us fingering their pussies for you while we made love?”
“Think? I wanted to concentrate on you, but every time I close my eyes I’m going to see that sight. It was incredibly hot.”
“I know. I don’t think I’ve ever felt you come so much in me. But it wasn’t really intended to be an exhibition for either us or them. It was more an affirmation. What it amounts to is that seven of the thirteen of us girls in the casa have committed to be your cónyuge. You are lovers with two more. We talked about intimacy and spontaneity, and how easy it is to forget there are others around. So, we decided this weekend that we would just let ourselves go and when desire and opportunity arose for one of us to be with you, we would, whether there were others around or not. When we all live together, we don’t want to have a problem if we walk in on another pair or more making love. Whether it’s with you or with each other. We are going to discuss it informally this week to see if it made anyone uncomfortable.”
“And why didn’t you think to tell me about all this?” I asked, picking up my speed a little and pushing deeper into Rose.
“Oh! Yes. Forgive me, cónyuge, but sometimes you try to talk an idea to death before we get to try it out. I didn’t mean to hurt you, lover. Please forgive me.” I picked up the pace a little more. I could feel my come rising in my balls.
“I love you, my darling Rose. I forgive you, but let’s try at least letting me know what’s happening sometimes so I don’t put my foot in my mouth or my cock where it doesn’t belong.”
“You’ve got it where it belongs now. Are you ready, Brian? I’m so close. Just come with me, baby. Come with me.”
I did.
We were still carrying an undefeated record into the holiday tournament. The whole state was trying to put together what it meant to have four classes of schools in various tournaments and whether there should be interclass games in non-statewide tournaments. Plymouth had grabbed the bull by the horns and scheduled what they considered the top 3A team from each of four counties, St. Joseph, Elkhart, Kosciusko, and Marshall. We’d been selected as the St. Joe County team. It wasn’t until the week of the tourney, though, that Coach realized who was in it. Plymouth and us, obviously. Concord had been the 3A champion last year, taking us out in the semi-state. And Warsaw.
We’d had a pretty nasty showdown with Warsaw in the Regionals last spring and I wore the bruises all week. Nobody assumed they’d changed their style of play, even though they had a new coach. Well, we had a new coach, too. Oh, well. We were paired up against the Concord Minutemen for the first game, so there was a good chance we’d never meet Warsaw in the tourney.
Scratch that.
Concord was still good, but nearly half their team had graduated this year. They still had a couple of last year’s starters, but they were simply nowhere near the level they’d played at in the semi-state. It was a closer game than we’d had so far this season, but we still had them by ten points. Coach hustled us out of the arena and off to a restaurant for food while the second game was being played. Coach Washburn, our assistant coach, Geoff, our manager, and Ms. Hammer and our five cheerleaders all joined us. It was only four o’clock and we figured we’d need to be back at the gym to watch the consolation game, but Coach surprised us all by having the bus deliver us to the local bowling alley. All thirteen of us guys, plus Geoff, the coaches, and the cheerleaders got shoes and went about the process of selecting bowling balls and spreading out along six lanes. There was a cheerleader on each of the player lanes and the three coaches played the sixth lane. Isn’t it amazing how that worked out? Some of the guys were pretty good, and we discovered that Anne Ploughman, a junior cheerleader, was some kind of a league bowler. She was really good. Doug, Lionel, and I managed to grab the lane with Rose. Next to us, Carl and Geoff were on the lane with Brenda. George and Lexi had managed to get on the same lane. Wow! Ten of our clan on the squad of twenty-two.
We had a great time. I have no idea who did well and who did poorly. We just took our turns and at six-thirty, Coach blew a whistle and told us it was time to go play basketball. We were ready. And we didn’t even know who we were playing yet.
Well, we had a pretty good idea when we saw six State Troopers and as many Marshall County Sheriff’s Deputies when we walked in. The organizers at Plymouth had apparently done their research and were prepared. We went straight to our locker room and dressed for the game. Coach opened the door and called the cheerleaders in with Ms. Hammer when we were ready.
“Ladies, I want you to hear the instructions that I’m giving the guys you are cheering for tonight,” Coach said to the cheerleaders. “You have an important job to do. You are in charge of our fans. That’s not fair, I know. But never underestimate the way that our fans follow you and your example. Lead them in cheering for your boys. Don’t let them get involved in booing the other team. Keep them positive. Can you do that?”
“We can do it, Coach,” Brenda said immediately. She turned to the cheerleaders and even Ms. Hammer was nodding her head. I had a feeling she and Coach had already talked about this.
“Now, gentlemen. We had a rough time with Warsaw at Regionals. They are tough. They are physical. It’s the way they play ball. We will NOT have any rocks on our court during this game. Is that clear, Frost?”
“Yes, Coach.” I said softly. He didn’t ask me to speak up, he just nodded.
“It wasn’t a bad idea,” Coach said. “It was just the wrong idea. We got caught up in playing their game instead of making them play ours.” It was kind of cool that Coach was talking about last year’s game as if he’d been our coach. “Our game isn’t brutal. Our game is elegant. Our game is fast. Our game is… like water. We flow around the obstacles. We find the open spaces. We conform to the shape of the shore, but we rush past it. I want water on that court tonight. I don’t want you to foul anyone tonight. I don’t want you to get fouled by anyone tonight. You are going to not be where the rocks are. And that light little ball, like a twig tossed in the stream is going to go with the flow—where the water goes.”
It was an elegant speech. I sure didn’t expect it from Coach. Barry was scratching his head a little, but he’d integrated into the team well enough that he understood Coach’s style and even he could get that he wasn’t supposed to foul or get fouled.
We played our game. There was a substitution at every buzzer. We went from standard court positions to three guards and no center to four forwards and no guards, flowing in and out of the positions as smoothly as we fed the ball through our opponents. We’d move into positions where a player would expect a pick and when he charged into it, he’d find nothing there. They were so off-balance by not having anything to bounce into that they lost the ball more than they shot.
Of course, it left us all in different positions, too. Usually, you claim your space on the court and you defend it. But we’d find ourselves way out of position. I sank a three-pointer from the corner where Whitney always scored. Couldn’t believe I’d made it. I’d followed my guy to the basket on a layup but realized I couldn’t be in a position to block him without making contact. I stepped aside two steps from the basket and he was so off-balance as a result that the shot he put up bounced off the rim and I grabbed it, shoveling it out to Carl and spinning the other direction before my guy recovered from his missed shot. By then, Josh had the ball down-court and passed it off to Barry who managed to get his heavy feet off the floor for a slam-dunk.
I won’t say there weren’t any fouls, but it might go down as the cleanest game in IHSAA history. The cheerleaders did a great job, but there really wasn’t anything for anyone to get upset about. We won by twelve points. It wasn’t a really high-scoring game, but it was all about ball-handling and shooting. The guys from Warsaw came by and congratulated us on a good game. It was like last year’s regional had never been played.
“You know, Frank, I’m going to study the tape of tonight’s game every night over the holiday break,” the Warsaw coach said as he shook Coach Hancock’s hand. “In fact, I wouldn’t be surprised if that tape doesn’t get passed around to every 3A coach in the state. This whole game was how basketball was meant to be played.”
“Your guys did a great job,” Coach replied. “You’ve had a big job to do this year rebuilding your team. You’re really getting them to focus on the game.” We headed for the locker room and for home, a jubilant crew.
Parents and fans met the team bus when we got back to school about ten-thirty. The JV was waiting for us, too. They’d placed second in their tourney at PHS.
“I loved that style,” Whitney said as she embraced me. “We are definitely going to try it. And I’m going to talk to Master Cho about how to integrate water style with rock style. He will know.” When I got home, all my local girls were there—well, Whitney and Rose rode with me. The moms had pizza for us and we sat around eating and drinking pop.
“Can you do without sex tonight?” Cassie asked me when we all headed upstairs.
“Honey, of course I can. What’s up?”
“Mary and I want to cuddle,” she said and then dropped her voice to a whisper. “Mary’s never slept with a boy at all.”
“I’ll keep my pants on,” I whispered, giving her a kiss on the cheek.
“You’d better not. That would spoil it all.” Well, I guess I had my orders. When we were all settled down, I lay naked in my bed with an equally naked Cassie on one shoulder and Mary on the other. “Goodnight, my compañera,” Cassie whispered.
“Goodnight, hearthmate,” Mary said from the other side. “Thank you for being our patrón.”
There was a little noise from the other side of the room and a couple of gasps. All three of us pushed ourselves up on an elbow to see Samantha being double teamed by Jennifer and Courtney. She gasped and grabbed a pillow to muffle her orgasm and then all three settled down to sleep. The girls giggled a little as we settled back down. Mary rolled toward me in a position favored by most of my girlfriends, her arm across my chest and one leg on my thigh, almost touching my cock. She might have found that a little startling.
“Bet you wish that was you,” she whispered.
“Which one?” I asked.
“Any of the three,” Cassie laughed, giving me a kiss. She faced away from me with her back and butt against me and my right arm pulled around under her neck. She pressed my hand against her breast and kissed my arm. Before long we were all asleep.
When I woke in the morning, we were three spoons. I was on my right side facing Cassie’s back and Mary was pressed against my back. I was so close to coming between those soft sweet cheeks that were clenching and unclenching as they moved against my cock. I thrust against them.
Holy shit! I was masturbating against Cassie’s butt! I tried to roll away, pinned between the two girls.
“Please, Brian,” Cassie pled. “Don’t stop. I’m almost there. I want to feel you. Please go ahead and come on me.”
Oh, man! I still had one of her breasts in each hand and I twirled my fingers around her nipples. I could feel more distinctly the movement of her own hand in her pussy. I went ahead and rubbed against her butt. So beautiful. So exquisite. I was confident that I couldn’t get her pregnant with my cockhead sticking out of her crack at her tailbone, so I just went ahead. I heard Cassie mounting with little gasps and pinched her nipples slightly. That set her off and the sudden vibration of her ass against me set me off as well. I splattered come between the two of us against her back and my stomach. Behind me, Mary moaned. When our breathing calmed a little, Cassie crawled out of bed and led me to the bathroom to shower.
“Cassie, you know I love you,” I said. “What am I going to do when you really leave me to join Josh? I know it’s going to happen.”
“You should ask yourself what you are going to do when Josh joins our Casa,” Cassie said as she soaped me up and turned her back so I could wash the semen off of her. That was a really good question.
IU classes were out and the semester was over on Friday before the tournament, but of course our high school classes continued on Monday through Wednesday. It was hard for any of us to concentrate on classes. Jen, Court, and I were joined by Elaine and Sora whose classes were also out. Sarah waited until Monday to come in. I had all five of my college girlfriends together.
“How are your parents taking you spending part of your break with me?” I asked Sarah.
“Mmm,” she said as she lay beneath me on Monday afternoon, positioning me to slide into her. “I’m nineteen—almost twenty—and on a full-ride scholarship. I have an internship lined up for the summer already and money I saved up from working last summer. My parents are being especially nice to me because they think they’ve lost one daughter and even though I’m independent I still love them.”
“Please don’t tell me she doesn’t love her parents.”
“It’s hard, Brian. Hannah is in this dark place that no one can reach. The only person she’ll talk to is her boyfriend… and I’m not sure they talk much.” I didn’t want to hear that and I didn’t want to hear any more. I slid into Sarah and wiped away all the bad images in my mind by losing myself in her pussy.
“Sarah, lover,” I whispered. “Always remember that I love you. I love the shape of your face and the color of your eyes. Not because they are like Hannah’s, but because they are you.” I moved in and out slowly, looking down at her as she smiled up at me.
I’d noticed that many of my lovers liked being in dominant positions when we made love. They liked to ride me, sit on my face, push me down on my back. For an eighteen-year-old guy, that’s not a bad thing. Girls mounting me because they wanted sex with me? Shit, yes! But Sarah seemed to really like the good old missionary position and we seldom parted from it. She usually kept her legs spread wide to give me lots of room between them and I did my best to stimulate all her sensitive spots as I sank into her depths. So exquisite.
This time Sarah had something else in mind. Her legs squeezed in against mine.
“Put your legs on the outside of mine, sweetheart,” she whispered. I did, not sure what we were accomplishing. Her thighs closed against me and she gently reached between us and lifted my balls so they weren’t trapped. It was suddenly like fucking a different girl.
Her passage tightened on me and my cock slid along her upper legs as I pulled back and pushed forward. She was producing ample lubrication to make sure there was no drag, even against her legs and light hair. I couldn’t get as deep, but the angle of entry was different and I pressed directly against her clit as I pushed into her again and again. She arched her back, rising to meet my thrusts.
“Oh, lover,” I moaned. “So nice.”
“So close,” she whispered, barely having enough breath to emit sound. “So… Oh!” I pushed and held, just moving my hips side to side a little to increase the pressure on her clit. She went rigid and inhaled a long whine as she shook beneath me. I wasn’t quite there and as she began to relax, I began to thrust into her wet, welcoming pussy again. This time she rose rapidly to meet my impending orgasm and we crashed together with both of us crying out our passion.
I tried to move off of her, but Sarah clutched me to her tightly. There were tears leaking from her eyes and sweat dripping off both of us as we kissed and held each other. Finally, we were able to roll to our sides without losing our connection.
“I love you, Sarah,” I repeated as I kissed her again.
“I love you, Brian. When I am away at school, I dream about making love with you. When I am with you, I can’t imagine another life. What will I do? What will I do when I graduate and go off to study different cultures for months at a time? How will I survive without you to love?”
“You will always have me to love, Sarah. And somewhere out there is your one true love and you will find your happiness.”
“I used to believe that. I used to believe you were not my true love and he was waiting for me somewhere else. I don’t know anymore.”
We lay there hugging and kissing, gradually becoming aware of the movement around us as our hearthmates went about preparing for the day. We’d been so involved that we’d been unaware of Sora and Elaine, Jennifer and Courtney. They’d been sleeping in the same room overnight but, of course, I had to get up and go to school.
“That was a really intense position,” I murmured as I pulled out and stripped off the condom. “Really intense.”
“I bought a copy of The Joy of Sex,” she giggled. I raised an eyebrow. “I had to have something for light reading!” We laughed and headed for the shower.
It was like having five insanely busy girls in the house. Of course, Elaine and Sora each spent at least one night at their own homes, but then they left and promised their parents they would come back on Thursday to spend the holiday. The solstice, however, was ours.
Mom and Dad and Anna were going crazy, too. Samantha’s parents and Rose’s parents were helping them and surprisingly, Nikki’s parents came to their aid as well. We simply couldn’t invite all the parents to our celebration. There were going to be over forty of us crammed in our family room as it was. George came to me on Tuesday and practically begged for me to let his parents come. They were so interested in our clan from a psychological and sociological perspective that they couldn’t stand not to watch.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if they are collecting data for a paper that they’ll co-author,” George confided. “God knows, maybe a book.” I laughed but invited them. They showed up on Wednesday afternoon to help with the final preparations.
I was all but banned from the kitchen as the Moms and Dads had it under control. Doreen, Lamar, and Renee showed up early as well to help with decorations. We stripped the family room bare to the walls with furniture jammed into the living room. We put in pillows raided from everyone’s home. We had the sofa cushions scattered with everything else and a small card table next to the fireplace. The card table was draped with a custom cloth that the girls had sewn. It had a center square of white, bordered on the four sides by strips of red, yellow, green, and blue—the colors of the clan (white) and the four casas. We all dressed in our gis with the house colors on our belts. By eight o’clock, we all had plates of food and were sitting or standing around the family room and kitchen. The adults were in the dining room, but they were kind of huddled next to the door.
Rose nudged me. I guessed it was my turn to be on the hot seat.
“Hi, cousins,” I said. “Thank you to our tribe, parents of our clan, for feeding us this evening. This is really good stuff.” Everybody laughed and clapped for our parents. “I wish that all our parents were here to witness this tonight. We’re growing up, but we are still your children and we love you.” I’d thought a lot about what I wanted to say, but still felt like I was winging it. Extemporaneous, Ms. Streeter had said. Every member of our clan was present. All except Hannah. I still wouldn’t give up. “This time of life often creates tensions between parents and children—or so I’m told. Actually, we’ve seen it. Not all of us in this room are at peace with our parents. And that conflict has prevented one of us from being here. We are so glad you are standing with us and that you support us. We know you represent the majority of our parents.” I looked at the cousins gathered on the floor. I loved each and every one of them.
“When I was a freshman, I was asked by the friends who had been closest to me for the previous four years, to set up rules so that we could all safely date each other and explore our burgeoning sexuality without going too far or getting hurt. We were scared. Some of us had already had experiences that pushed us past where we wanted to go. Many of us had had boyfriends and girlfriends. Many of those had had spectacular breakups.” I looked over at Brenda and Carl and they both innocently pointed at each other.
“We came up with a dating agreement. It only has eight points that we all agreed to and the first version was signed by twelve girls and four boys. It’s grown since then and on October 28th, we welcomed thirteen more, mostly sophomores with a couple juniors and a senior, into our group to bring the total to thirty-nine. We mourned the death of our sweetheart Denise, so there are only thirty-eight left. Denise’s father passed away this summer. I believe he died of a broken heart. This is a happy occasion for us, but let’s take a moment in silence to remember our beautiful girlfriend and her father.”
There were more than a few sniffles as we paused and bowed our heads. Poor Denise. Poor Mr. Raymond. I’d been to visit him once over the summer and was surprised to find that he looked… old. Really old. He told me then that he’d had prostate cancer and had kept it from his daughter and everyone else but he just didn’t feel like fighting it any more. He passed away a month later. He was buried next to Denise. I could barely stand to attend the service. Every time I looked at Denise’s grave I saw Lester Hawkins and what I’d done to him.
It took me a minute to compose myself so I could continue.
“Thirty-seven of us are here tonight. One of our number, Hannah, is estranged from us at the moment, but we will not abandon the hope for her return. No matter what…”
“We still love you,” the group responded all at once. I’d invited Hannah. I actually sent her a letter and asked her to come and told her she could bring her boyfriend if she wanted to and we’d consider him for membership, but she hadn’t responded.
“This summer and fall, we realized that we had more than a dating agreement. We had love and respect for each other. We had lovers. We had clustered together in distinct groups but were all part of one whole. It was when we looked around at the colors of the various casa and the belts and started looking at the terms we’d started using, that we realized we needed to define ourselves a little more clearly. Some of us have had rituals to commemorate relationships within our groups. But we didn’t have anything written down—like our agreement—that said who or what we are. The ladies of our group decided to start defining things. It started with terms like compañera and cónyuge. Casa and hearthmate. It got kind of complex. Especially for those of us who never took Spanish.” Everybody laughed and I felt a sense of relief that we were past the sorrowful part of the evening and into something exciting and new.
“Some of us have fathers who are lawyers, and I’d like to thank Mr. Duval and Mr. Davis for helping us. I understand that George’s parents, Dr. and Dr. McCall, also had a hand in clarifying this. So tonight, we have a document. It sounds so… legal.” Everyone laughed again.
“You’ve each received a copy over the weekend so you’ve had a chance to read and approve it. Tonight, the thirty-seven of us present are gathered to celebrate the formation of the Clan of the Heart. Mr. Duval and Mr. Davis sat with representatives of each casa and explained that this is a document that contains ‘articles of formation.’ It does not carry the legal implications of Articles of Incorporation or a partnership agreement, therefore is still not a legally binding agreement among us. Therefore, those who are under the age of eighteen can still sign the agreement. Like the original dating agreement, it’s really a declaration of our trust and love for each other. It is why we call ourselves the Clan of the Heart. We are cousins because of our love for each other. Mr. Davis? Would you explain a little more about what we’re about to sign?” Rose’s dad spoke from the doorway to the dining room. There really wasn’t room for him to fit in the family room.
“First, Brian. And Rose. And Ross. Let me tell you that this is really hard on your parents. Oh, we’re happy for you all. We’re proud of each and every one of you. But even this simple document that you are preparing to sign tells us that you are no longer our babies. You’re adults. Even those of you who are not eighteen yet. When your parents grew up, we had nowhere near the life experience that you have had already. In a way, that makes us sad. We worry that you didn’t have enough childhood. But we look around at our world and realize that perhaps the very essence of the agreement you started with preserved some of your childhood that others of your peers have had ripped away from them. We are so proud of you!”
Rose and Ross interrupted things by rushing to their dad, almost falling over a couple outstretched legs, to hug him. Their mother was right there with him and they made quite a scene. At that moment, I think every one of us present wanted to hug our parents. Finally, Mr. Davis wiped his eyes and continued.
“The document you have here sets down the slightly modified rules of your initial agreement,” he said. “The modifications are to allow your transition into a single legal entity. As they stand in this document, it is little more than the formation of a club—what you have decided to call a clan—The Clan of the Heart. It is a personal commitment to each other. And it is the basis for forming a legal entity when it is deemed appropriate. Frankly, we—meaning Mr. Duval and I—are exploring new areas of law that are not part of real estate and corporate law that we are supposedly experts in. We’ve had Jennifer’s father and stepmother review the document as well from a litigation perspective, but this is really outside their field of expertise as well. So, we are bearing the expense of having a family law attorney work with us. We believe we will be able to create a legal structure for the Clan of the Heart that will both define your organization—such as it is—your responsibilities, liabilities, benefits, and protection. Believe me, you will all be given an opportunity to review that when it is time. As parents first and as lawyers second, we want to provide for and protect you.”
Mr. Davis gave Rose and Ross another squeeze and then stepped back a step into the doorway where the parents were gathered to watch. Rose and Ross returned to their casa.
I turned to the table and picked up the pen lying beside our new document. We’d considered all kinds of things and there was a strong enough push that we selected a good fountain pen and had it filled with black ink for the signing. There was a scratchpad on the table, too, and I tested the pen on it before I reached over and scrawled my name at the bottom of the agreement. I turned to the rest of the group. Everybody clapped. I looked at them.
“Well, as John Hancock purportedly said, ‘So far, ladies and gentlemen, I’m the only one who will hang.’ I propose that the cousins without casa come forward to be the first to sign, for we are first and foremost a clan and you are our clan cousins.” Josh, Geoff, Robyn, Leonard, Pam, and Nancy came up and signed. Next, I called for Casa de la Tierra. Then Casa del Agua. It happened to be the order they were sitting around the room. We’d each clustered around our Casas. Casa del Sol. Finally, Casa del Fuego.
“There is one space remaining for a charter signature. It is reserved for Hannah. From this point forward, we will admit new members to the clan who are dating or declared by a current clan member and are approved by the remaining members. Declared is defined as engaged or in a committed relationship. Welcome, cousins, hearthmates, compañera, and cónyuge.”
It was pretty much just a party after that. We had more food. We went around the room and all greeted each other with some form of kiss. Most of them were just cheek kisses. There were a few friendly kisses, and within the casa there were more than a few kisses with intent. I was happy to see that pretty much everyone made it to into the parental area to hug the McCalls, the Davises, the Duvals, Anna, and Mom and Dad. We had some music on and the gas fireplace going and all the windows open because it was so hot with all of us crammed in one room.
It was about ten-thirty when I heard the phone ring. I didn’t think anything about it. I didn’t notice anyone leave the room, but apparently Mom had answered it and got whoever was necessary to go to the phone. Probably for or from a parent. This was our big party of the season. We would have a casa party on New Year’s Eve, but this was the clan holiday party. I wondered how on earth we could ever keep this going once the next group moved off to different colleges. It was so cool to all be together.
“Brian!” The agonized call from the kitchen had me up and running before it even registered who was screaming.
Sarah was wrapped in Mom’s arms but as soon as she saw me, she rushed to me. God no! Please God, no! It was all I could think.
“Hannah is in the hospital,” Sarah sobbed as she looked up at me. “He beat her, Brian. You have to help. Please help!”
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