Body and Soul by Erica Storm

Chapter 1: Robin
    M y brother Wayne had the bright idea to take me with him and his white girlfriend to a ski resort owned by her brother Edward Wentworth, in Colorado. Wayne met Alexis in college and they hit it off, and after that, I couldn’t use my key in his apartment anymore.
    The reason is when he fell in love, everything changed, and I couldn’t open the door to his apartment without knocking. It was Sunday, my day to cook for him, he liked a home cooked meal especially on Sundays. When mama was alive she would indulge his spoiled ass by cooking his favorite, a pork roast with carrots and potatoes and green vegetables. He would ask for two meats and three vegetables and banana pudding. After she died, that chore went to me.
    I cut out the two meats, cooked one meat and two vegetables, and received an angry phone call. “Baby sister, what’s up with my food? Don’t you know I need my home cooked meal on Sundays? A man can’t function without his food. I need to keep up my strength.”
    “You mean a man doesn’t have the energy to do what you do with Alexis if he’s eating out all the time. Those burgers and fries must take a toll on your erections.”
    “You shouldn’t know about those things.”
    “Why shouldn’t I know about those things? I’m nineteen and a woman.”
    “You’re nineteen and my baby sister. I’ll tell you when you’re grown,” Wayne says to me. I take offence with his words.
    “Who has been taking care of your ass? Washing your clothes, cooking, cleaning up after you, keeping those black girlfriends of yours from beating down Alexis, and keeping you in line so you can meet that rich woman. Who has been giving you advice because you act like you’re sixteen playing with toy soldiers and cars when you should have been out learning about girls and life? Me. Now leave me alone and talk to Alexis like that. She’s your woman, I’m not.”
    There was a long silence and he said, “Never mind that shit, what about my food?”
    Men and their food. All they ever need is a home cooked meal, a little release, desert, and they are as tame as poodles, but even a poodle gets riled when they don’t get what they want.
    I shot back at him, “Let that white woman you’re so fond of cook you a meal if you don’t like what I’m doing.”
    “You know Alexis Wentworth can’t cook. She comes from a prominent family in Seattle. She had a maid and butler all her life.”
    “There are no prominent families in Seattle. Her family is probably one of those poor ass pioneers who stumble on something by mistake. They were lucky and she’s lucky. Just like she stumbled over your poor ass and thought it was gold.”
    “I’m gold to her baby girl, ever loving black gold, and she can’t get enough of me. She bathes in me night and day.” Now the conversation had taken a turn south, and I didn’t want to hear my brother tell me on one hand that he’s taking her white ass night and day, and I have to remain a virgin until he says I can be a woman. That just will not happen. I spend all my leisure time doing things for him and that’s why I can’t have a decent relationship.
    If I had a date or had planned on going out with a friend I would drop what I’m doing and drive across town to do him a favor. Every time I would run into Alexis and she was always trotting around the house naked.
    She likes prancing around with not a stitch on, and Wayne would be jumping her in front of me at every occasion. It became embarrassing just being around them. He would spend all day in bed with her, and they would rush off to class, when they were in college, and expect me to cook and clean for them.
    After college they bought a house with her money she received on her twenty first birthday from her grandparents. Alexis had her college tuition paid along with everything else. Wayne and I had to work for what we got.
    Alexis was Wayne’s gold and he knew it, but he was full of himself after she became his