Love and Lists (Chocoholics) (15 page)

“Since you decided to be a slut for the cause, tell me you at least got some information out of Tyler,” I beg, taking a seat next to her.

“Tyler shouts the names of My Little Ponies when he comes. And he makes horse noises with his lips when he’s going down on me.”

My mouth opens and I gag.

“I know. It’s weird. But it was kind of hot. If you ever tell anyone I said that I will smother you in your sleep,” she warns.

“Can we get back to more pressing matters please? What did he say about Gavin?”

Ava sighs and leans back into the couch. “He didn’t say much. That boy is loyal; I’ll give him that. Every time I asked him about Gavin he would just say, ‘Well, what does Charlotte think?’ It was annoying. I even tried asking him when his penis was in my mouth, figuring it would distract him.”

Eeew, I really don’t want to picture Tyler’s penis in ANYONE’S mouth, especially my sister’s. He’s a good-looking guy I guess. Around six feet tall with surfer blonde hair and blue eyes, but as soon as he opens his mouth it ruins everything.

“How do you talk with a penis in your mouth?” I question.

“It takes some practice. You have to know how to roll your
r
’s and really enunciate. I’m pretty good, but he still thought when I asked if Gavin liked you I said, ‘Muff diving dike harlot.’ He thought I was telling him I’m a slutty lesbian. It took me fifteen minutes to get him to focus after that.”

Fuck! How in the hell am I going to find out how Gavin feels about what happened between us? Tyler was my last hope.

“I have a great idea. How about you find some balls and just tell Gavin how you really feel?” Ava suggests with a glare at me.

“Yeah, because that would go over really well. ‘Oh hey, Gavin. So, I know we grew up together and we’ve been best friends since we were little. We usually tell each other everything but here’s something new. Every time I’m around you I want to climb your face like a tree. Oh and you know how all my friends dared me to kiss you at the bar last week? Yeah, totally false. I just made that up because I’ve been dying to stick my tongue down your throat since I was twelve. No, please, stop laughing so hard. I’m serious.’”

I end my tirade and stare back at Ava.

“Yeah, that’s probably pretty accurate. Okay, so what’s left on Rocco’s list?” she asks.

I heave out a sigh and throw my head back against the couch. “Dress up like a slutty school girl, get a flat tire and call him for help, take him to a sporting event and pretend like I know what’s going on, and take naked pictures of him. But obviously that suggestion was for Rocco’s benefit.”

Ava shakes her head sadly at me. “Rocco isn’t going to be able to keep his gayness contained for much longer. Did you know he called Dad the other day and asked him if he wanted to go to a game? Dad thought maybe he’d misjudged him and felt bad. Then Rocco told him the game was drag queen bingo. I think Dad put a hit out on him.”

I hear the front door open and a few seconds later my mom walks into the living room.

“Why does it smell like sex in here? Ava, shouldn’t you be at work?” she asks with her hands on her hips.

“I’m on my lunch break,” Ava says casually.

Mom looks at her watch. “It’s four o’clock.”

“Snack break?” Ava replies with a shrug.

“AVA!”

“Um, I’m sick,” she says, adding in a cough for good measure.

“I swear to Christ if you left work to come home and have sex in my house, I will stop paying your cell phone bill,” Mom threatens.

“Oooooh, not the cell phone bill!” I reply in mock seriousness. “Careful, Ava. Mom’s got her stern face on.”

Ava and I both giggle while Mom stands there tapping her foot angrily.

“You two are both adults, so I have no problem saying this to you right now. You’re a bunch of dicks.”

“Mom, you said that to us when we were eight,” I remind her.

“Well, now I really mean it. Charlotte, how’s the job search coming along?” she asks as she takes her shoes off and moves into the room to sit in the chair across from us.

“Lousy. No one is hiring,” I complain.

“You know you can always come and work for Seduction and Snacks,” she reminds me.

My mom has been asking me to work for her ever since I was old enough to know what sex toys were. A part of me would love to go into the family business. I love my family and it would be awesome to work with them. The only thing holding me back right now is Gavin. It’s bad enough that our families are close and we see each other a lot. If whatever this is between us completely implodes, not only would I have to see him at family get-togethers, I’d have to work side-by-side with him every day. What if he marries Brooklyn and I have to watch her coming into the office every day for a quickie? I can’t work under those conditions. It would be best if I just find a job elsewhere.

“Mom, I can’t work at Seduction and Snacks,” I tell her.

“Why? What’s so bad about working there? Do you have vibrator anxiety? I thought we went over this on your eighteenth birthday when I bought you that starter kit,” Mom says with concern in her voice.

Both an upside AND a downside to having a mother who owns a sex toy store: she always wants to talk to you about sex and buys you vibrators for every holiday. And usually whips them out at the dinner table when you have guests over.

“Mom, I am not afraid of vibrators. If I’m not mistaken, you used to put a vibrator under my crib mattress to get me to sleep when I was a baby. You’re lucky I don’t turn narcoleptic every time I hear one buzzing.”

“Well, if that’s not the problem, what is? Seduction and Snacks is a very good company to work for. There are so many options for you to choose from with a degree in Communications,” she tells me.

“I think you should be more concerned with the fact that you and Dad forked over ninety-thousand dollars in tuition for this fuckernutter to get a degree in talking when she can’t even manage to say three little words to a certain someone.” Ava crosses her arms over her chest and looks at me smugly.

“AVA!”

“WHAT?!” Mom and I both shout at the same time.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Charlotte. This is getting annoying. Mom, Charlotte is in love with Gavin,” Ava states, crossing her arms in front of her.

“WHAT?!” Mom shouts again, looking back and forth between us with wide eyes.

“I am going to reach down your throat and rip out your ovaries, you fat cow!” I yell at her.

“Oh, I’m sorry, was that a secret?” Ava asks me, batting her eyelashes.

“AVA HAD SEX WITH TYLER!” I scream, pointing my finger at her.

“WHAT?!”

Either Mom’s head is about to explode or she’s having a stroke and can only speak one word. Whatever it is, I’m not about to let Ava win this shit. I’m small, but I’m scrappy. Even when we were little and she would get pissed at me and pull my hair, I always finished the fights and had her screaming for mom within seconds.

“You fucking HAG!” Ava screams at me. “Charlotte tried to give Gavin a pearl necklace!”

“Ava likes it when Tyler shouts My Little Pony names instead of hers!”

Before I can come up with another insult, Ava launches herself at me and grabs onto my hair. She yanks it hard and I scream in pain, reaching my own hand up and clutching onto a chunk of her dark brown locks. We’re smacking, pulling, biting, screaming, and kicking for only a few seconds before Mom dives on top of us, trying to pull us apart.

“GIRLS! That’s enough!” she yells, grabbing onto both of our arms as they flail all around, trying to gain purchase.

“Hey, sweet thing, I think I dropped my wallet under the-”

All three of us immediately stop screaming and fighting and turn our heads to the door as Tyler stands there with his bottom lip quivering.

“Mom AND daughters … I never thought this day would come. God does exist.”

“Seriously, Charlotte. You need to watch this. It’s goats screaming like humans,” Molly tells me in a fit of giggles as she stares at her iPhone.

Molly is nineteen and the youngest out of the three of us girls. Where Ava and I take after our dad with dark hair and dark eyes, Molly is the spitting image of my mom with her long blonde hair and spitfire personality.

“I don’t have time for that shit right now, Molls. I need a sharp object that will poke a hole in a tire,” I tell her distractedly as I look through all of the cupboards in the kitchen.

After our catfight a few days ago, Ava and I called a truce and she suggested I go with the whole flat tire item on the list next. Guys like a damsel in distress. Rocco assured me that it would be a good way to make Gavin feel like a man. He’s under the impression that Gavin is probably more embarrassed about what happened last week than I am. I find that hard to believe, but whatever. He hasn’t called or sent me a text since it happened and it’s freaking me out.

“No, really. Come here and watch this. It’s a Taylor Swift video and during the chorus, goats scream. Oh my God, this is the best thing I’ve ever seen,” Molly says in between hysterical laughter.

Opening the silverware drawer, I pull out the largest butcher knife I can find.

“Jesus, put the knife away. I’ll stop playing goat screaming videos,” Molly says in a panic as she comes up behind me, staring nervously at the knife in my hand.

Rolling my eyes at her, I close the drawer with my hip and grab my purse off of the counter.

“I swear to God you never listen to anything that goes on in this house.”

Molly follows behind me as I make my way to the front door.

“Oh, I heard all about you trying to beat the shit out of Ava. Why do I miss all of the good stuff?” Molly complains.

“Because you’re in school. Or you’re supposed to be. Why aren’t you at school right now?”

Molly is five years younger than me and from an early age, she loved helping Aunt Claire out in the kitchen. Right now she’s in school full-time earning her degree in Culinary Arts so she can be a pastry chef for one of Aunt Claire’s stores.

“It’s midterms week. I only have to go to class for my tests. So, remind me again why you’re taking a knife with you to meet Gavin? I don’t think gutting him like a fish will convince him that he loves you,” Molly says with a laugh.

“No, but hopefully slashing my tires will.”

Molly shakes her head at me. “I still don’t understand how you could possibly be in love with Gavin. I mean, this is GAVIN we’re talking about. He used to take the heads off of all of our Barbie’s and then staple them to the ceiling. And you two used to fight constantly when we were kids. How many times did Mom and Aunt Claire have to break you guys up before you killed each other?”

She’s right. We hated each other as kids. I don’t even know why we didn’t like each other. Every time we were in the same room together, someone wound up crying.

“That dress looks funny on you,” Gavin told me, grabbing my favorite
I can be a teacher
Barbie from my hands and then throwing it across the room.

“You’re a dumb stupid head. Go pick up my Barbie right now,” I said with a stomp of my foot.

“You’re such a baby. I can’t believe you called me a dumb stupid head,” Gavin replied with a laugh.

“I’m not a baby. YOU’RE a baby!” I shouted.

“I’m nine. That’s practically an adult.”

“Fine, then you’re dumb stupid adult!” I yelled angrily.

“You’re a labia,” Gavin replied.

“What’s a labia? That’s dumb.”

Gavin shrugged. “I heard it the other day. My mom said it’s a rare fish that no one ever talks about.”

“I want a labia,” I told him.

“You can’t have a labia. You ARE a labia. Labia face,” he said, turning his back on me and walking away.

I was so angry that I hurtled my six-year-old body at him and wrapped my arms around him from behind, tackling him to the ground.

“GAAAAAAAAAAAAAH MY NUTS!” Gavin screamed in pain as we crashed to the floor and he flung me off of him.

I stood up quickly and stared down at him angrily.

“You’re mean. I don’t like you.”

Gavin scrambled up off of the ground and before I knew it, he charged at me and slammed his head into my hip, knocking us both back on the ground.