Breaking Electricity

After we had gotten all the things for my dad from town, we were trying to decide what to do next. We had eaten dinner, but I was way too tired to go to a movie. All I wanted to do was go home and watch HGTV. "John, I'm just really tired. Maybe we can watch a movie at home or something." I saw him smile softly and start the car. My dad wouldn't be home until late tomorrow night. This couldn't be good. All this would lead to was an awkward night at home with John, being alone with him in my huge house.

"If that's what you want," he smiled over at me and drove onto the highway. Throughout the drive, we kept the music low and I slowly nodded off to sleep in the squeaky pick-up truck. I woke up to John softly singing along to Brad Paisley, which made me smile a little bit. He had a good voice, and I wanted him to keep singing forever, but he saw me smiling and stopped. "Why'd you stop?"

"I didn't know you were listening."

"You have a good voice," I said, and after that I went straight back to sleep. I must have slept the whole way home because the next thing I remembered was hearing the car door open and close. I opened my eyes slowly because the car light was still on and I was not about to be blinded. I could hear John step onto the bed of the truck and pick up the things my father sent us out for. I wait a few minutes until I started to unbuckle my seat belt. Once I got the energy, I opened the door and stepped out of the truck, leaving the cigarettes in there because I was just too lazy to reach over to the side of the driver's door to get - wait. Why were my cigarettes on his side? I glared to no one in particular and walked up to John. "Why were my cigarettes on your side?"

He smiled and started laughing as I stood there and gave him a blank stare while my arms were folded across my chest. "I'm sorry. I wanted a cigarette?"

"You could have asked."

"You were asleep."

"You could have woken me up."

"You looked too cute to wake up."

I furrowed my eyebrows, then shook my head and started to go inside before it got too awkward around him. I could hear his grunts as he tried to carry everything behind me. I heard something drop and crash and I turned around, glaring at him. "Are you trying to be the nosiest person alive?"

"Oh, I'm sorry for waking all of the neighbors up," He smirked and gestured toward the empty field all around me that I called my own land. I sighed and turned away from him, beginning my journey into the house again. "Oh, come on, Anna. I'm only giving you a hard time."

"I can tell," I laughed bitterly and held the door open for him politely, just because I didn't want him to break anything else we'd spent the whole day getting for my dad. "Just put it wherever for now. I usually let him handle it." John set everything down next to the living room in an empty corner. "What do you want to do for the rest of the night?"

He shrugged and then went over to our movie case. He looked intently and purposefully took all the time in the world to scan everything. After about five minutes, he stood up and sighed. "I don't see anything I really want to watch. What's there to do around here?"

"Nothing," I laughed and folded my arms across my chest. "Basically the only things there are to do here is watch movies, cook, work on the farm, sleep and cook."

As I was saying this, I watched him walk into the kitchen and open the wine refrigerator that my dad had just recently bought and stored all of our aged wine in. I bit my lip as he scanned through every row of it as well. "What about drink?"

"My dad would kill us," I rolled my eyes at him. "I would be grounded forever, John."

"Grounded from what?" He laughed. "No offense, but there's not much here to be grounded from, Anna."

"That might be true, but my dad would kick your ass back on the street for drinking his wine. That whole refrigerator of wine probably costs over ten thousand dollars, John."

"I just want to have a little fun," He smiled and batted his eyelashes at me. "Do you know any he'd never touch?"

I contemplated my decisions for a bit, and decided to loosen up for the night. Slowly, I walked over to the refrigerator and looked for it. The one that I know he wouldn't ever want to look at again. And there it was. From June, 1971.

"Here," I handed it to him. "My dad has probably wanted to break this bottle ever since they divorced. He won't care about it." For a moment, even though we didn't want to, both of us thought about putting the bottle back, but decided not to. I mean - we were teenagers. We had little or no conscience whatsoever. So we opened the bottle and poured ourselves a glass of rich white wine.

John raised his glass and smiled at me from across the kitchen table, "To..." He thought for a minute and I could feel him staring at me as I slowly shook the wine in my glass. "Bonding."

I raised an eyebrow at him as he raised his glass, but I did anyway. "To bonding," I laughed slightly and clinked my glass against his. "That's really all you could think of?"

"Fine then," He smiled at me, "Show me what you've got, Anna."

"To that shitty high school that I'll never have to see again." Clink. Drink.

"To my shitty family at home that didn't do shit for me." Clink.

"To that shitty college my brother's going to: fuck you for not letting me see my best friend." Clink.

"To my stupid ex-girlfriend that never gave me that two-hundred-dollar necklace back." Clink.

"To the boys that never gave me the time of day in school." Clink.

"To Anna, who's probably too good for those boys that never gave her the time of day." I looked up at John and smiled, blushing a little bit. I slowly leaned my glass towards his and tapped it, a bigger smile creeping onto my face. Then I took the last sip of my fourth glass. "I'm a bit buzzed."

"Me too," I sighed. "That felt good."

"Don't you just love letting anger out?" He smiled at me. I nodded and poured myself another glass. "Another? Jesus, Anna."

And after that glass, I drank another, and another because it made me feel better. John was talking to me about something, or maybe he wasn't. Either way, I couldn't understand what was going on and the room was spinning because John had decided to get four beers out. Two for me and two for him. That wasn't a good idea, obviously.

"John?" He looked up at me, I think. "I don't feel too good."

"I hate those words," he muttered. Quickly, he carried me upstairs and into our room. I went straight for the bathroom and puked in the toilet as he held my hair back for me. "How are you feeling?"

"Stupid," I sighed. John was becoming more and more attractive to me. I didn't know if that was because I was drunk, or if I had just grown closer to him during this one night. "Toothbrush?" John smiled softly and handed me my toothbrush, already with toothpaste on it. "Thank you."

After I was done brushing my teeth, I laid down on my bed and slid my jeans off, then took my cardigan and bra off, leaving me only in a camisole and underwear. I don't think I knew what I was doing, because John quickly got nervous as he sat on his bed.

"Oh, relax," I sighed. "You've seen girls in bikinis before."

He laughed and walked over to my bed, kneeling down on the side of it. "That's true, but they weren't as pretty as you."

"You're drunk," I smiled softly and rolled over so my back was towards him. I jumped a little when I felt his hand running through my hair. I was too tired to do anything about it, so I just let him do it. And right before I was about to fall asleep, he spoke again.

"The truth comes out when you're drunk, Anna."