Naughty Empires
No, this was something darker, hotter, the kind that left me aching and furious every time he sauntered through the door like he owned the world.
He’s twenty-four now. I’m nineteen. He dropped out of trade school after one semester, claiming he was “building his empire” by flipping houses and working odd construction gigs. He’d come home covered in dust and grime, muscles carved from real labor, smelling like hard work and trouble. Our parents ate it up—their reliable, charming son back under their roof. Me? I was the rebellious one who’d just started community college classes online while bartending nights, scraping together cash to escape this suffocating suburban prison.