Dexter: Dexter/Deb (Sister, Not Sister, Pt. 1)

sister, not sister, i loved you with skinned knees and sloppy ponytails in training bras, face freckling in the sun, crying when you bled because you knew your days as one of the boys were ending and you'd have to find a new way to keep them, fumbling through puberty, stumbling in the dark, i watched you claim your new power awkwardly at first then as carelessly as the rest.

i watched you crying in corners, scared of your changing body in your soccer uniform growing too small in all the wrong places. i watched you try to be me and i watched you fail. i wanted to tell you it was a blessing but we never talked that way. but you shot your guns with precision and you learned about control and you taught them to want you, to need you like a fix and the other girls were only jealous and no one else saw you crying at their words but i knew you would come to this. i knew someone would break you one day. but i couldn't give you what you needed. that's not who i am.

it was a clumsy kiss, it was too wrong to resist. you were drunk and i was intrigued. your lips crushed against mine and i felt a flicker of something that scared me, a slow fever in icy blood. you tasted like something strong and stinging with a hint of sweet and your tongue eased into my mouth so quickly i could only feel it exploring my teeth, the roof of my mouth.

"you're different," you slurred and our eyes met and i felt the weight of your knowing underneath it all. "but you're mine," you added, reaching out a hand to clutch at my own, lying limp on my thigh. your hand reached up to brush the hair from my face and you said, "i could know you." you searched my face for some response. you thought i didn't understand.

"i could KNOW you," you repeated, sliding your hand into previously unexplored terrain. were you trying to conquer me like the other boys? were you reaching out for some kind of connection? did you really think i could be controlled so easily? was it the challenge of it all? yes, tired of trifling with the easy boys and their easy hearts, you wanted something new. you wanted to steal the heart of the one boy who didn't have one.

Dexter: Dexter/Deb (Sister, Not Sister, Pt. 2)

for a minute, you almost had me. because i looked into your eyes and i saw...well...you. and these strange feelings, that i should be having them with you, made sense for all the reasons they shouldn't. i was feeling things a normal boy should but this was not normal at all.

but then something in me snapped back into place and all i could see was the lipstick, smeared blood red, the fucked up frosted blue eye shadow, the tightness of denim shorts hiked up too high and a halter top clinging too tightly and i was filled with this sudden rage. manipulated by a girl who had your eyes but was not you. i pushed your hand away from where it never should have been and i rubbed the back of my hand hard against your lips, smearing the remaining lipstick onto the back of my hand, leaving me marked. your lower lip trembled but you did not cry.

"jeez, sis, you look like a clown with all this crap on your face. what's wrong with you? don't you respect yourself anymore?"
i watched the words sink in and waited.
your eyes watered but you only glared.

"you're better than this, you know."
your face reddened but you would not break.

"who the fuck do you think you are?"
you picked up your crumpled pack of cigarettes from the floor and slammed the door behind you.

i stared at the back of my hand and felt marked. i had done right. it was what he would have wanted. but something felt off. for no reason i could think of, i pressed my lips into the back of my hand and tasted the overly perfumed scent of your dimestore lipstick.