I'm Addison and I'm sixteen years old. I live with my mother and big
brother. Jonas is twenty-one, though he still lives at home. He provides
for us. Mom cannot, or will not work. She is depressed. I don't mean
she's just sad. She IS sad, but it is more than that. Mom is a shell.
She eats and sleeps, but that's all she does.
We both take care
of her. Jonas is great. He's not my blood brother, nor is he mom's
child. He is my step brother. His father and my mother were married
since I was ten and Jonas was fifteen. I called him dad because he was
the only father figure I ever knew. Jonas didn't mind sharing. He seemed
to like having a little brother. He spoiled me. He still spoils me. He
buys me all kinds of great things and he spends more time with me than
he spends with his friends.
Though I've began to wonder if he has any friends. He never talks of any.
Since
I've reached the age of consent, I can leave the house any time I want
to and make my own life, get married, even. It might seem like a young
age, but the world has changed a lot. I'm just lucky I'm not a girl or
I'd be forced to leave my home at sixteen and marry.
I do not
want to leave Jonas or mom, even if she is only a shell. I love both of
them too much. I can even remember a time when she was normal. It was
when dad died that she started to change. I guess she was always a
little broken, though I was unaware of this.
----
She
finally succumbed to her illness in year 2120. I cried one tear and then
I locked the pain away. After all, she had been gone for a long time.
Jonas also shed a tear or two, but he tried to hide them from me. We
stood at the park. Her favorite place when she had been normal. We held
the urn that held her ashes. They no longer let anyone be buried in
graveyards. There were too many grave-robbers and people who liked
experimenting with the dead bodies.
We each had a hand on the urn and Jonas had a hand on my shoulder.
I
was eighteen and he twenty-three. We were still unmarried. It was
unheard of for two healthy males to live together and not have a wife to
breed with, but they knew we were brothers, and not one of those
“forbidden” couples.
Couples who couldn't breed, that is. So
they left us alone. Somehow they missed the memo that said we were not
blood related. If they had known that, they would have made a fuss, even
though we are not a couple.
At least not that kind of couple. We
were close and we did love each other, but our affection had never gone
over the forbidden line. Same sex couples and infertile couples were
not allowed to live together if they were over the age of eighteen, let
alone be in a pleasurable relationship. You were only allowed to live
with someone and not be married to them when they were a blood
relative.
Sex was forbidden unless it was to breed. Population
was so low and even with all the advanced technology at the hospitals,
infants and children were dying a lot more often. Our race was dying
out.
We tipped the urn together and let her ashes blow across the park and past her favorite tree.
----
That
night I sat in the same room with Jonas. We sat on his bed. We were
just talking about a lot of random things like we often did whenever we
weren't taking care of mom or working.
“When do you want me to move out?” I asked him. He gave me a startled look.
“What do you mean Addison?” He scooted closer to me and grasped my chin in his slender fingers.
“If they find out we're not blood related, we'll both be punished, Jonas.”
“But they do think we are blood related. We got that letter, remember? The one after mom first went to the hospital.”
I remembered. It hadn't been the most thoughtful of letters. We had been angry after reading it.
Dear Dunner Family,
We
regret to hear of the health of your mother. Now that you are well past
the age of consent and your mother will soon be passing, it is time to
think about doing something for your country. Why not come to the Single
Ball in one months time? Here are your enclosed invitations. If you do
choose to continue to live under the same roof, we can not force you to
do anything, but please consider to take on a wife or two.
Yours truly,
Jennen and Jennen Co.
The
president of Jennen and Jennen Co. owned everything there was to own in
what was left in the world. They had branches all over and controlled
the people in every way possible. Once a month there was a public
execution to remind people who were in charge. The people executed were
mostly innocent people. People like myself and my brother, who are not
blood related, but still living together, or couples who get married,
even though they are forbidden to. The gays and the barren.
There is talk of little places in the world where Jennen and Jennen Co. hasn't reached. I dream of finding a place like that.
“How is it they think we're blood related?”
“I- well mother and father must have done something. They did work where they keep records and birth certificates.”
I
can see it now. Father hacking into the system and filling in the black
spot where the name of my birth father should have been. He had to have
put his name if they think Jonas and I are brothers.
“They had to have wanted to make it so we wouldn't be forced apart when they passed.”
Jonas nodded. “Can we look at our birth certificates without drawing suspicion?”
I
shrugged. “Sure, they're ours, aren't they? If anyone says something,
we can make something up. Like we wanted to know the name of the doctor
who delivered me... cause if have my own children one day, I'd like to
use the same one.”
“If he lives.”
“Yeah.”
So we
looked on the computer. It wasn't hard to find. All you needed was your
full name and the name of your mother and the identification number they
gave you when you were born. Sure enough, looking 100% legit, was the
name of my stepfather. My father. Not my true birth-father, but he was
now according to this document.
I smiled. We plopped back on
Jonas's bed and spent some time staring up at the ceiling, with goofy
looks on our faces. We were free in a way. Didn't have to get married if
we didn't want to and nobody was going to force me to leave Jonas..
Thanks. I hoped if there was a Heaven, my parents could hear our gratitude for their huge and dangerous lie.
“If they had been caught... wow.”
Jonas
flopped around toward me and grabbed me in his arms and started to
tickle me. We hadn't had a tickle fight since the time we first became
brothers. Jonas had always liked to playfully torture me when he was
younger, but it stopped the older he became.
“I-I know,” I gasped as I laughed and tried to push him away. “They would ha-have been executed.”
Not
to mention what would have happened to us. Would we too have been
murdered to set an example for other people thinking to forge legal
papers?
He stopped tickling me and just held me. It was strange.
He has hugged me before, but never held me in such a way before. I was
pulled to his chest and didn't resist. Jonas rubbed my hair and just
held me gently and for a moment, I thought he was trying to comfort me,
but realized maybe he was trying to comfort himself.
When he let go, I could tell he was a little embarrassed. He was blushing. He said “sorry” and then sat up.
“It's fine. I was scared too.”
I
hate this world. Where it forces you to be on your own when you turn
eighteen or it forces you to get married if you are a woman and the men
are strongly encouraged as well. Innocent people die all the time and
that is not counting all the dying babies and children who can't seem to
get over sickness.
They used to kill the elderly when they could
no longer bare children, and they killed barren women for the same
reason. Now they force the barren women into brothels to entertain men
or they turn them into slaves of some sort. Though they forbid sex for
anything but breeding, sex is allowed for pleasure in brothels. There
are even some of the questionable brothels for barren men. Gay brothels.
The government allowed this, as they believed allowing this would
satisfy the curiosity of sinful men.
Elderly are no longer killed
by the hands of the government, but they are dying a lot sooner on
their own. It's usually double suicide.
He hugged me again. When he pulled away, he placed his palms on my face.
“You mean a lot to me. I would break every law to keep us together.”
I
was having a hard time figuring out Jonas's meaning behind his words
and his actions. Being sinful wasn't unheard of even among family
members or in our case, pretend family members.
“What do you mean, Jonas?”
He
leaned his forehead against mine. “I asked father to change your birth
certificate right before he passed. We all knew how sick he was and that
he didn't have much more time on this plane. He didn't question me and
it wasn't hard for him to hack the system and put his name as your
father, because there hadn't been a name listed before.”
Shock. Yes, that's what I felt.
“Why?” I asked.
“I
didn't want us to be pulled apart when they both passed and I knew I
never wanted to become a pawn for Jennen and Jennen Co. and be forced to
marry some poor girl and impregnate her.”
He pulled away from me and held his hands in his lap. I could see they were shaking.
“I
hate what they've turned the world into. It is their fault so many
young are dying. The water, the air, nothing is healthy, especially for a
young immune system and now the fact they force people to marry for
breeding purposes only. I just hate them. It's just lucky your birth
certificate never had a father listed or it wouldn't have been so easy
changing the record.”
I didn't know who my real father was. He
had died before I was born and I guess mom never had the heart to give
me my father's name, so she left that spot blank. She was left alone and
never forced to marry again. Mom just told me she fell through the
cracks or something. Then she met Jonas's father and they got married
and now here we are eight years later.
“Lucky,” I agreed. I tried
to stand up and move away from the bed, but he grabbed my hand and
pulled me back to him suddenly. I was laying on top of him before I
could even make a sound.
I had tripped, but neither of us tried to move.
“You have to know something and you might not like it, Addison.”
I
looked into his gray eyes. They were like mine and we both had dark
hair, so it was no wonder people believed us to be related. “What?”
“When
I first met you, I was fifteen and already quite mature for my age. I
thought a lot. I had the wrong kind of thoughts a lot. Only dad knew
about them, though he insisted there had been a time in the world when
my kind of thoughts had been okay, even allowed.”
Trying to roll off him, I couldn't, because he had wrapped his strong arms around me and held me to him.
“W-what thoughts, Jonas?”
“Sinful thoughts, illegal thoughts.”
He was stalling, but I allowed him to.
“When
I met you, you were ten and so vibrant and smart, and kind. We looked
alike, though we were so different. You were cute, too.”
“You had
those kind of thoughts about me when I was ten and when we were
brothers?” I wasn't upset or anything, or even horrified. Mainly, I was
just confused.
“No, no, not like you are thinking. Not those
kind, especially when you were still a kid. It's true we were now
brothers, but you grew and matured and so did my feelings. Sinful and
wrong and painful. I'm only telling you now since mom and dad are
gone... I'm giving you a chance to choose if you want to stay in the
same house with someone with a sinful mind.”
I'm eighteen, no
longer a child. He hasn't been a child for a long time. I can see that
now. Those feelings of his have been haunting him for who knows how
long, making him grow faster then he should have. I'm just glad dad was
on his side. I doubt mom knew though. According to papers we are
brothers, but we are not. The government does not count us as brothers,
or if they knew about us, they wouldn't.
I couldn't think of
Jonas as sinful. Of course since sex was only allowed for breeding now,
being gay and especially acting on it, was seen as sinful again. There
had been a time when it was allowed and accepted.
“It's not sinful because they say it is. It isn't sinful at all. Okay? Now can I get up, one of us needs to make dinner?”
He looked half relieved and half frustrated.
“I guess you didn't understand I meant I still have feelings for you?”
I
guess I didn't. I thought it had been a phase when he was a teenager or
something. He honestly has feelings for me? I'm not sure how I feel
about it, though I am not scared or disgusted, nor do I feel like
pushing him away. Never wanting to get married and have children with a
girl. I've always felt that way, but could there be a deeper reason?
Could I ever feel for him like a lover and not a brother?
He let
me get up and I stood at the foot of the bed and looked down at him. “I
guess... let us make dinner and then we can think about this and decide
what's to be done.” I started to walk out of the bedroom. At the
doorway, I turned and looked back at him.
“But whatever we decide, I do not want to leave this house or you.”
He smiled at that and I felt a tickle in my stomach. I think I was blushing as I quickly rushed out of the room.
----
We
did make dinner and we did think while we ate, but we didn't speak. We
were both in our own little worlds. I bet he was imagining every type of
rejection I could give him, and even imagining a couple where I throw
myself at him and confess my undying love. I was thinking about pros and
cons. I know it sounds silly. I want to keep my brother. I do not want
to grow away from him because of this.
Can I stop thinking of him
as “brother” and be with him? Or can I be with him and think it okay
even though we are supposed to be brothers, step brothers at any rate?
What will happen if I turn him away and cannot return his special
feelings for me?
Pros:
1. He will not get hurt if we are together.
2. He does love me.
3. He takes care of me by working and providing for me.
4. He makes me laugh.
Cons:
1. Jonas is a man
2.
If
that was the only con, then it was stupid to turn him away. I guess I
could have added that us being together would be illegal and we could
get executed if found out.
-----
“Jonas.” I walked into
his bedroom and looked around for him. I ended up finding him in mom and
dad's room, sitting on the bed, with a torn up book in his hands. These
days books were quite rare, but our parents had a huge collection from
back in the day.
“What are you reading?” I set down next to him
and leaned toward him to take a look at the cover. “Little Women, mom's
favorite. Such an old book, but a classic.”
He set it down, and faced me. I gulped.
Okay,
here comes the 'talk'. I'm prepared for it. I've thought long and hard
about it... I have. Blushing, I leaned my head against his shoulder.
“I don't mind trying to be ex-step-brothers and trying... well, you know?”
Jonas grinned. “So we're going to have a step brother divorce?”
I
chuckled. “Okay, but only in secret, or we'd get in trouble for sure.
Jennen and Jennen have to continue to think we are brothers.”
We shook on it and then he kissed me, and I was okay with that.
THE END
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