Sisters

I went out for a beer with my younger sis tonight. We both had a hard day and needed to blow off some steam. We got to the bar and ordered our overpriced microbrews, listened to the shitty cover band do Piano Man and Brown Eyed Girl, and we talked about another one of our sisters.

She is fourteen, a freshman in high school, and she is into older guys. At her age, neither of us had been kissed; she has made out with many boys, mostly seniors. She could pass for a college student. She wears a lot of revealing clothes and seems to bring home a new boy every week, always telling our parents that they're just friends and then later telling me that they made out. She seems to meet these guys, kiss them, then kick them to the curb.

I'm concerned that she's going to have a reputation within a year. I don't want anyone calling my little sister a slut.

This last guy, she met him and within a few days they were making out on the couch. When she told me, I said "Boy, you're sure a fast mover." She glibly said that yes, she was, and I told her that's not exactly a good thing. She said I'm one to talk.

Well, I didn't have my first kiss until I was sixteen, I didn't lose my virginity until I was eighteen, and even now, looking back, there weren't many guys I've even kissed who I wasn't dating at the time. I don't move fast at all. I like to savor things, go slowly, enjoy the anticipation of the first kiss, continue slowly from there until sex is something you've looked forward to for a while. And honestly, I think it IS better that way. It feels better. And I don't have self-esteem issues stemming from giving it up too quickly.

I'm not judging her, I understand that she's going to do things her own way. I just get scared for when she loses her virginity or progresses from making out with guys to blowing them, that she'll move just as quickly and end up racking up a body count to rival mine before she graduates high school.

I don't have any idea how to approach the problem. It's not really mine to approach except that I AM her big sister and I'm supposed to protect her. Do I sit her down and talk to her about what a dangerous situation she's putting herself in? Do I go to my dad and tell him to keep her on a tighter leash? Or do I just let things play out like they're going to play out?

My other sister, the one I went out drinking with tonight, has started to open up to me for the first time in our entire relationship. It's only been in the last couple years that we've really become friends as well as sisters; she is much more closed off than I am, and even though we're close in age, we've never talked about her life much. She has things pretty well together, working two jobs, one of which is the field I think she'll ultimately end up going into. She has a boyfriend who she's discussing marriage with and lives on her own with her best friend in a tiny apartment with a snuggly cat. I envy her.

We left the bar and walked back to her car, the beer starting to hit me in my favorite way, that heavy buzz where cigarettes feel amazing and everything sparkles just a little bit. We went over to the pool hall and as we drove, I admitted the secret I haven't told anyone. It's nothing major, just something I want to keep to myself for the moment. But I told her. And she understood. We chalked our cues at the pool hall and played a couple games of cutthroat with one of J's friends who's always there. He smiled a lot. He used to hate me for what I did to J. Tonight he was all high spirits, and I felt like dancing, slightly drunk, leaning against the wall in my heels, smoking a cigarette, and just feeling life wash over me.

I feel dead so often. There's a Drive-By Truckers song that says "some people stop living long before they die." I've tried so hard to avoid that, and here I am, feeling like I've hit a cul-de-sac and need to turn around and figure out some other way to go. With the exception of that manic night on Prednisone, the last time I felt alive like this was when J kissed me.

I miss feeling alive like that. Maybe that's why my little sister kisses so many boys. Maybe she just wants to feel a little bit of sparkle.

Is there a better way?