by Siera Maley
“So she likes you more than you like her,” I realized. “That’s not the worst problem in the world to have.”
“Yeah, I guess not, but…” She picked up the glass again, took a drink, and then set it back down on the bathroom counter. “She got all of the shallow stuff out back in high school, so now she wants to get serious with someone. I didn’t get the opportunity to have a few shallow relationships back then, so I’d like to have some fun first. Maybe in a couple of years I’ll date.” She paused, then laughed again. “I can’t believe I’m having this conversation with Nicole’s kid sister.”
“I’m not a kid,” I repeated. “I’ve dated around more than you have, probably.”
“Ouch,” she laughed. “But you kind of have the advantage of liking guys. I saw you eyeing Michael, by the way. He has a girlfriend.”
“I wasn’t eyeing him,” I denied. “And even if I had been, I wouldn’t want to date him.”
“Sure,” she said in a way that told me she didn’t believe me. I grit my teeth, frustrated.
“I’m serious. I broke up with my boyfriend in March. I just want something with no pressure and no feelings. That way I won’t get hurt again.”
“That’s… kind of sad,” Grace replied, folding her arms across her chest. She looked like she felt sorry for me for a moment, but then that disappeared and she let out a dramatic sigh. “Well, if only you were about two years older, were into girls, and weren’t my roommate’s little sister. Maybe in another life, huh?”
She straightened up, like she was about to leave, and I blurted out, unthinkingly, “I could like girls. You don’t know.”
She arched an eyebrow at me. “You? Uh huh, sure. Look, there’s a baby lesbian at this party, but it isn’t you, honey.”
“I’m serious,” I pressed, only half-registering what she’d said. I wasn’t even sure why I was arguing with her; the goal had been to find a guy to help distract myself with. Not a girl who’d just exacerbate the problem. But being brushed off wasn’t something I handled well, and not being taken seriously was something I handled even worse. “I’ve thought about kissing girls before.”
She raised a hand to smother a laugh. “Oh… I don’t even know what to say to that, honestly. Um. Are you propositioning me?”
“No. I don’t know.” I bit my lip and blinked until my vision was clearer.
“I’ve got a feeling there’s a lot of stuff you don’t know.” She sighed and moved to leave the bathroom. “Anyway, this has definitely been the highlight of my night, but for both of our sakes, I promise I won’t tell Nicole about this. Talk to you later?”
She paused, and it seemed to dawn on her that I was a little intoxicated and that she was supposed to be watching me for my sister. She turned to me, waiting for confirmation, and I glanced away from her, blinking back tears as I leaned against the wall and stared at my feet. I felt humiliated, and I couldn’t even pinpoint why.
“Whoa, hey,” said Grace, rejoining me. “Don’t cry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I thought you were kidding. If you’re having serious feelings about girls, we can… I don’t know, talk about it? If you wanted.” She glanced down the hallway, presumably to make sure no one else was around, and then seemed frustrated when I didn’t say anything to her. “Is there something I can do…?”
I glanced to her, too confused about what I actually wanted to even begin to answer her question. She wasn’t much taller than me already, and she was leaning over, her hand pressed to the wall at my head, so we were at each other’s eye level. She took one look at me and practically groaned. “You look like a lost puppy. There’s no way you’re guilting me into this, you know.”
“Into what?” I mumbled, but I knew that she’d noticed how close we were right around the same time that I had. She shot me an exasperated look, and I felt the corners of my lips turn upwards against my will. Mostly because of the look on her face: like someone had just told her an injured animal had been left on her doorstep and needed to be taken care of and she really didn’t want to do it even though deep down she knew she was going to.
She visibly bit back a smile of her own, shook her head one short time, and then told me, “Once, and you never tell your sister, alright?”
I swallowed hard and hid my surprise, though I imagined it wasn’t well, given that my brain still wasn’t functioning at one hundred percent. Still, Grace was pretty, and I was a little curious, and I knew it wouldn’t mean anything, so I nodded at her and then waited, resting the back of my head against the wall.
She glanced down the hallway again, and when she didn’t see or hear anyone coming, she moved in closer to me and then paused, like she was collecting herself. I watched her with a lump in my throat and my heart pounding in my chest. Some parts of me felt like they were trembling and others felt like they were made of jelly. I’d worked myself up into a panic in a matter of seconds and I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. I thought briefly about stopping her before I decided against it.
Grace rested one hand on my neck and moved in toward me. I felt her chest and stomach against mine and didn’t dare move an inch, and when her nose brushed mine, I closed my eyes and held my breath, determined to stay completely still for a reason I didn’t really understand. I pressed both of my palms to the wall behind me.
Her lips were soft and gentle and she kissed slowly, like she knew – and she did know – that I’d never kissed a girl before. She tasted like strawberries, kind of, and I knew that was from the fruity mixed drinks some of the older kids had been drinking earlier. I decided I’d try one when I got back outside. It tasted good.
When she kissed me harder, my hands came off the wall, and I moved them to her hips, resting them there with a very light, uncertain touch. I felt her smile when I did that, and she mumbled something into my mouth that sounded kind of like “cute” right before she nipped at my lip and then used her free hand to press one of my hands down harder against her hip. I found one of the belt loops of her jeans with my other hand and used it to gently tug her closer.
Kissing Grace was kind of like kissing a guy, in that she led the whole thing and I kind of just went along with it, partially because I was frozen with anxiety and also because I was worried I was somehow bad at it given my inexperience with kissing girls. But it was also different in a lot of ways. I noticed that she kissed softer than any guy I’d ever been with and that she smelled nicer. So with her leading our kiss, it was kind of like being pressed to the wall by a sweet-smelling pillow as opposed to feeling stuck between a hard wall I was attracted to and a hard wall that was actually just a wall.
She also didn’t shove her tongue down my throat, which was nice. That part – the tongue part – was my favorite difference.
Right around the time I was able to draw that comparison – when it was just starting to get really good, in other words – was when Evan squeaked out, “Kayla?” from down the hallway. Grace detached herself from me before he could even get my full name out, and I turned my head so quickly my neck gave a painful throb.
He blinked at us, wide-eyed, and then glanced back the way he’d just come, like he couldn’t process the series of events that had led to him standing right where he was at that very moment. “What are you doing?” he asked me once he’d picked his jaw up off of the floor.
It was apparent that Grace was going to let me handle this, so I fumbled my words for a moment before I finally got out, “Really drunk.” It seemed like the best excuse to go with given the circumstances, and, in all fairness, it was about half-true. I was drunk enough to do something I’d have never done sober, but sober enough that I’d been able to not do if I really hadn’t wanted to.
“What the hell is wrong with you?”
I opened my mouth to respond, but then I realized that this question had been directed to Grace.
“Me? It’s a party; lighten up.” Grace rolled her eyes at him even as she walked down the hallway and brushed by him. “Everyone does stupid stuff when
they’re drunk. Get used to it.”
She disappeared outside, and I let out a small sigh of relief, satisfied with her answer. “You okay?” Evan asked me, suddenly beside me, and I nodded at him, unable to look him directly in the eyes. I was worried he’d somehow realize how heavy my eyelids felt as an after-effect of a very good make out session with Grace, or that he’d see something else in my expression that gave away how I really felt about what I’d just done.
“Please don’t tell Riley,” I murmured to him, and though he seemed hesitant at first, he nodded and took my hand to help walk me back outside.
“I won’t. But you should seriously tell your sister her friend’s a creep.”
“Maybe,” I said, and then, a beat later, added, “Thanks for saving me.” I felt something sink in my chest and regretted saying it.
“Any time,” he replied, tightening his grip on me as we descended down the front porch steps, and my guilt only worsened from there.
***
The rest of that night was a massive blur of not being able to look anyone in the eyes. Not Grace, who seemed just as content with ignoring me as I was to ignore her. Not Nicole, who wouldn’t have known whether to kill me or Grace first if she’d found out what we’d done. Not Evan, who very quickly got nearly as drunk as I was and then turned red any time we made eye contact. And certainly not Riley, who I was paranoid would notice I was acting weirdly and confront me at any moment.
But that didn’t happen. Riley was kind of sullen and withdrawn for the remainder of the party. Had I not had my own issues to deal with, I’d probably have asked her if something had happened to upset her. But as it was, I was a little distracted.
I passed out quickly in my bed once the party was over, and woke up in the afternoon to the sound of my phone buzzing. Someone was calling me.
In the ten seconds or so it took me to roll over and retrieve my phone from my nightstand, I relived the events of the previous night and was struck with mild horror. When I saw that the person calling me was Evan, the horror turned to panic. I immediately rejected the call. I wasn’t ready to defend myself to him.
And what could I say, other than “I was just drunk”? I couldn’t tell him that I’d been the one to come on to Grace. I couldn’t tell him that I’d only come on to Grace in the first place because I’d come to the realization that I was a little bicurious. Because if I told him those things, he’d wonder how I’d come to that realization, and I’d have to tell him that it’d involved Riley cuddling with me in my bed like we had hundreds of other times and probably would hundreds of more times provided I kept my mouth shut.
I sucked in another sharp breath as my phone rang again. It was Evan. He really wasn’t going to let this go.
I pressed the green button and raised the phone to my ear to croak out, “Hello?”
“Kayla.” He seemed relieved, not confrontational, which was a pleasant surprise. “You’re alive.”
“You woke me up,” I told him, unamused.
“Oh. I’m sorry. It’s two o’clock. I thought you were just avoiding me.” I didn’t answer him, and after a pause, he asked me, “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I said. “Just kind of have a hangover.”
“Yeah. Last night got kind of… weird.”
“I guess.” I tried to sound casual. “It wasn’t that weird.”
“I’d say it was pretty strange. You, uh… you do remember what happened, right?”
“Yes, Evan.” I heaved an audible sigh. I knew how I needed to play this. He was the weird one for making it into a big deal. Obviously it hadn’t meant anything. Girls kissed at parties all the time. Throw in a little “I drank a lot” and I was in the clear. “It’s not a big deal,” I told him.
“I-” he started, and then paused, sounding confused. “It wasn’t a peck, Kayla, c’mon.”
“I had a lot to drink,” I argued. “I guess I get kind of promiscuous when I drink too much. At least now I know. I have this theory that Riley’s a sad drunk. That would explain last night, anyway. What was up with her?”
“What was up with you?” Evan countered, refusing to change the subject. I held back another sigh. “That wasn’t a cute party kiss, Kayla. She might’ve started it, and you’ve might’ve been drunk, but you guys were really going at it. She had her tongue in your mouth.”
“Why do you care so much about who I kiss?” I snapped.
“Because I’m your friend!” he shot back. “You’ve been going through some stuff, and I know I haven’t been the best friend to you these past couple of months, but I want to be. You lost Josh, and I guess maybe it feels like you’ve lost a part of Riley and me, too. But you don’t have to do stuff like this; this self-destructive crap reads like a massive cry for help. You don’t get to do this stuff and then ignore the people answering the cry.”
“You’re so smart, Evan,” I sighed out. “Is that what you want me to tell you? That you’ve got me all figured out? Maybe I’m allowed to have fun with people that aren’t you or Riley. Wasn’t that what you said? That I deserve to have a little fun?”
“You know what I meant by that. I thought you were going to go flirt with that guy. Maybe get his number. Not french some chick you just met! And you thanked me last night. You said I saved you from her. I know you regretted kissing her, so you don’t get to act like it was some casual fun thing you wanted to do. You lost control.”
“Well, it’s time for me to take some of it back, then,” I said. “Why I don’t I start with ending this phone call?”
“Don’t-” he began, but I ended the call with a jab from my thumb and then turned my phone off.
I wondered, for a moment, if he was going to tell Riley what had happened. Then I decided I didn’t care.
If she found out, I’d lie to her, same as I’d lied to him. I’d lie to everyone, if that was what it took to avoid making this into a big deal.
I’d even lie to myself.
Chapter Six
It became clear the next time I finally got around to spending time with Riley and Evan again that Evan and I had a silent understanding: if I didn’t mention the night of Nicole’s party, he wouldn’t mention it, either. Riley remained clueless, and it made it easier for us to keep hanging out like nothing had changed.
I noticed that the party had, in fact, affected our group when we all went swimming at the pool again. This time, we went at night, when it was deserted and the water was warm. I laid down in one of the recliners to relax while Riley stripped down to her bikini beside me, and I glanced first to her, very determined to keep it to just a glance, and then to Evan, who was a few feet away, watching the both of us carefully as he took his shoes off.
When she was finished, Riley turned to me and sat down on the end of my recliner. “You should get in,” she told me, placing a hand on my thigh. “I’m gonna need the extra firepower on my side if Evan and I get into a splash-off.”
My face warmed as she leaned toward me slightly, increasing the weight on her hand. “Go without me,” I told her. “I’ll get in later.”
“You sure?”
Evan joined us before I could reply. “Riley, c’mon. The water’s warm; it’s nice.” He pulled her to her feet and I watched him steer her away, a possessive arm around her waist. My eyebrows furrowed.
“Hey! Actually, I think I will get in,” I decided, and got to my feet. Riley beamed at me and rushed from Evan to grab at my hand. I noticed Evan watching us with a frustrated look on his face, but I dismissed him to grin back at Riley as she tugged me to the water’s edge. Together, we leapt in.
Evan joined us once we’d resurfaced, and we all treaded water for a moment, adjusting to the temperature.
“I’m glad we can all still hang out and it’s not weird,” Riley admitted. “It was touch and go for a while there.”
“I don’t know; it’s not totally the same.” Evan looked over at me and his eyes narrowed slightly. “There have definitely been some weird changes.”
Riley looked back and forth between us for a moment, clearly confused. “Okay… anyway, I was thinking we could play Sharks and Minnows. You guys up for it?”
“Maybe,” Evan said non-committedly. “I might just swim around for a little bit. And I really have to pee.”
“Then why’d you get in?” Riley asked him. “Go to the bathroom.”
“You guys were getting in; I wanted to get in, too,” he argued, embarrassed. “What are you going to do while I’m gone?”
“Uh… wait for you to get back?” asked Riley. “Can you please just go before you pee in the pool?” She shot him a strange look and then turned to look at me as though to ask, “What’s up with him?” Evan noticed and went red.
“Okay, fine. I’ll be right back.” He lifted himself out of the pool and then walked away, but not before glancing over his shoulder at us just before he rounded the corner to head into the men’s room.
“What was that?” Riley asked me almost instantly, drifting toward the wall and then pressing her back against it. Her arms came up out of the water and she gripped at the edge of the pool with both hands.
I shrugged my shoulders, more than willing to ignore whatever was up with Evan for as long as I could. If he wanted to be weird about what’d happened at Nicole’s party, then that was fine with me. I’d just refuse to acknowledge his weirdness – and the oddly possessive behavior that had seemed to come with it – until he finally got over it.
“I feel like you two are exchanging looks every time you think I’m not paying attention,” Riley told me, arching an eyebrow. “For like the past few days, anyway. You two aren’t into each other, too, are you?” She grinned to let me know she was joking, but I knew without asking that she was still curious about what was up with us.
“You caught us,” I deflected, giving an overdramatic sigh.
