Page 1 of Keeper
“ARE YOU TWO GOING TOhelp me unpack, or are you just here for wanker-colour commentary?” I drop a huge box of pots and pans on the French oak flooring in the kitchen of my new flat. It’s not the biggest flat in the neighbourhood, but it’s situated in the heart of Shoreditch Triangle, London, which is a great spot to be. Plus, it’s been completely renovated and updated with modern finishings, so I really like it.
My brother Camden drops down off the counter he was perched upon. “Booker! Did you see your kitchen has two ovens?”
“Not that the prat can actually cook.” My other brother, Tanner, adds as he opens and closes the oven doors like they’re objects from outer space. “Living with Dad for twenty-five years has spoiled the child.”
“You guys lived with him just as long as I did!” I argue.
Camden ignores my completely valid point as he hitches his voice to do his imitation of the Queen that he thinks is so hilarious. “My Baby Booker gets a cook and a housekeeper for as long as he likes.”
“And Baby Book will never touch a dirty laundry item. We have people for that!” Tanner chirps, mimicking the same pitch.
Camden shakes his finger. “Baby Book shan’t drive himself to practice.”
“Or wipe his own arse after a code brown round.” Tanner’s last jab sends Cam into a fit of laughter, and the two high five like the tossers they are.
I roll my eyes and ignore them like I have for most of my life. There’s no use fighting with these two. Firstly, they are twins, so they willalwaysgang up on me. Secondly, my brothers and I know that living at home with Dad had major perks.
Our family home is on the outskirts of London in Chigwell. It’s a large, brown brick mansion that was quite sparse most of our lives. But when our dad, Vaughn Harris, took the managing job with Bethnal Green F.C. and my three brothers and I started playing for him, he did some renovations. Now it’s kitted out like a footballer’s dream come true, complete with an in-home gym and stationary goals outside. Our sister had no interest in playing, so she got her restaurant-quality kitchen, where she was happy to work her way through our mum’s old cookbooks and support all our football endeavours.
Growing up was all about hat-tricks, penalties, and the full-time whistle. We were a football family. End of.
As adults, we’re more the same. Camden plays for Arsenal while Tanner and I continue to bleed green and white for our dad’s team. Our older brother, Gareth, is a defender for Man U, and Vi is currently enjoying the life of being a new mummy to her six-month-old surprise baby she had last year.
However, being surrounded by footy fanatics isn’t easy. I have to work harder than all of them to keep from embarrassing the Harris name. My whole life, my brothers have seemed bigger and stronger than me, drilling balls at me between the posts at superhuman speeds. But, despite my meek size as a child, I learned to appear larger than life in front of the net. It was survival.
Over the last few years, my body has finally caught up with my mind. At six-foot-one, I may still sit an inch or two shorter than my twin brothers, but I’m more than equipped for the position of goalkeeper now that I’m nearing thirteen stone.
“All right, where do you want me?” Camden groans amongst the sea of boxes.
I do a rapid survey of the space. Vi found me a fully furnished flat, which is nice because we didn’t have to haul a ton of items up two floors. It also meant I didn’t have to go shopping. “If we can get the kitchen sorted, that would be grand.”
Tanner rips into a box and starts dropping spoons into a cutlery sorter. “I’ll gladly get your kitchen sorted, broseph. Anything to get you to stop sofa-surfing at my place.”
“I hardly sofa-surf,” I argue half-heartedly. “I merely crash there on nights I don’t feel like driving twenty minutes back to Dad’s. And excuse me for wanting to spend some time with you guys.”
“You cock-block, baby bro,” Tanner retorts. “Morning sex with Belle is a lot harder when I can hear you through the walls taking a leak.”
Camden flings a kitchen towel at my scowling face, but I catch it easily before it hits me. “Specs and I are actually trying to work our way through every room in the new house, and you are hindering that epic goal.”
I shake my head. “It’s still mind-boggling that you two managed to land girlfriends at all. The fact that they are both doctors makes me feel like at any minute, someone is going to come out and tell me I’ve been punk’d.”
“Specs isveryreal.” The lewd smirk on Camden’s face forces me to look away.
Indie—or “Specs” as Cam calls her because of her love for funky eyewear—was a surgical resident at the Royal London Hospital when Camden tore his ACL last year. They fell hard and fast. Then somehow, Tanner ended up with Indie’s best friend, whom is also a surgeon. Now, Indie is the Bethnal Green assistant team doctor, and Belle is working under some famous feotal surgeon and preparing to wed herself to Tanner Sleazeball Harris. How these two knobheads ended up dating best friends who are as close as sisters is disturbing. These days, so much is changing in our family.
So yeah, I guess the sofa-surfing is a bit intentional. I don’t want the fact that they’re all starting families to change what makes the Harris family, the Harris family. We’re Harrises. We’re close. End of. I refuse to lose them.
Tanner drops a box by Camden and adds, “He’ll stop inserting himself in our love lives now that he’s going to be living with his girlfriend.”
“Poppy is not my girlfriend,” I deny as anxiety creeps up my shoulders over his words. “She’s just…Poppy.”
Getting her to agree to stay with me took some major convincing, but I’m nothing if not persistent. And selfishly, her living with me will help me worry about her a lot less.
“Your childhood best friend whom you’ve slept in the same bed with, created a secret love shack in the woods with, and still claim to have never shagged?” Tanner pins me with a look that says he wasn’t born yesterday.
“It was a fort,” I defend. “And she’s only staying here until her lease opens up.”
“Famous last words, baby bro,” Tanner says. “Things can change quickly with girls. Look at me and Belle. I wanted to marry her after one month of being with her. She’s the one who made us wait.” He crosses his arms and leans back against the counter. “You’d be surprised how much fun sex with the right person can be.”
