Chapter Text
Under any normal circumstance, Kiara would find it all very peaceful. Lying under the stars curled up in the sand. A dying fire crackling slowly as the last of the embers glow against the night sky. Her, surrounded by her sleeping friends and the sound of the waves as they wash up against the shore before retreating back out into the ocean. The buzz of cicadas, the chirping of insects, the muffled snores emanating from John B where he lay curled against Sarah. It’s the set up for a perfect evening. A movie scene depicting best friends and the conclusion to their wild adventure. Where all that adventure had really been was a day spent surfing and fishing and laughing and—
If Kie’s honest, all she really feels is… itchy. Restless. She’s got sand in places no girl should ever have sand, her clothes are dried stiff from saltwater and sweat. It’s hot, the night breeze doing absolutely nothing but moving around warm air and god knows what to her frizzy and tangled curls.
She wants to go home.
She wants to hug her dad. Her mom. To erase the past few months from existence and go back to how it was before. Before the Royal Merchant. Before the golden cross. Before Ward Cameron and Limbrey and that psychotic captain who tried to kill her, who nearly killed JJ. Before her parents had gotten it in their heads that she was some broken kid, a kid who needed fixed, who needed to be shipped off to some crazy reform prison in the middle of the goddamn woods.
She sits up. Pope is sprawled half on top of some driftwood a few feet from her, mouth open in his sleep. John B lies on the other side of the makeshift campfire, shirt off so that his girlfriend beside him can use it as a pillow. Sarah is the little spoon, back pressed to JB’s chest, their hands clutched together in front of them as though scared they’ll lose each other in their sleep. It’d be cute if Kie’s chest didn’t clench so tight at the sight of it. If a little part of her wasn’t terrified for them, for what they’d gone through.
Motion catches in the corner of her vision and she notices Cleo slumped against a palm tree. Her hand moves restlessly in front of her, knife flipping between her fingers over and over and over, the moonlight glinting on the metal. The girl doesn’t outright acknowledge Kiara where she’s just sat up, but she nods her head once. Kie gulps, hasn’t decided how she feels about the new addition to her little group, but guesses if John B and Sarah like her, she must be good people.
Kiara lifts her hand in a small wave, swivels her head in an attempt to locate the most unpredictable variable in their group. Her heart kicks up slightly in her chest when she notices JJ’s gone, slows back to normal when she sees his silhouette slumped in front of the ocean a few paces down the beach.
I thought I lost him today, she thinks. And something inside her shudders. She’d thought she lost John B and Sarah a few short weeks ago. Thought she was going to lose Pope when he had his allergic reaction to the wasps. And those moments were horrifying, yes. Gut wrenching. They’re feelings she never wants to experience again in her life, but—
JJ, stay with me! Jaje, please! Please!
She shuts her eyes against the image of his body flopping lifeless over the side of the boat. Against the memory of that—feeling—she had in her chest. Like—like if JJ was gone, she wanted to go with him. If his weight dragged her beneath the waves as she struggled to keep him up, then so be it. Because a life without his sideways smile, a life without his constant quips and idiotic one-liners… well, it’s just unimaginable to her.
It’s entirely disorienting to swallow—the notion that maybe out of all of her friends, JJ’s death would affect her the most. Because it’s unfair, really. To John B, to Pope. God, she doesn’t even want to begin to get into how unfair it is. Not to mention crazy. Ridiculous.
JJ was never the one she was closest to before everything had gone down but… something’s changed. It’s as if a slot has opened up in her heart, a slot in this complicated geometric shape, a slot that only JJ himself has the ability to fit.
And it’s strange. The possibility that JJ can mean something different to her than he had before. Unsettling and confusing and—if she’s actually, truly, honest with herself, she doesn’t think she’s brave enough to fully comprehend the meaning of it.
The sand sifts through Kie’s fingers as she moves them against the grain, relieves a harsh sigh. Before she can think much of it, she’s up from her spot, maneuvering carefully over the forms of her sleeping friends as she makes her way down to the edge of the beach where JJ sits.
He doesn’t seem surprised when she sidles beside him. When she sits down and pulls her knees to her chest, the tips of her toes just barely grazed by the ocean waves as they wash in. JJ doesn’t do anything at all, really. Just stares out into the endless ocean, out to where the inky depths meet the dark night sky and blur into one black canvas.
“Can’t sleep?” she asks as way of greeting.
He turns his head toward her, eyes dark in the shadows and blond hair flip flopped onto his forehead. Like he’s been running his hands through it manically—the way he does when he’s thinking, Kiara’s learned over the years. When he’s been forced to sit still but still needs something to do with his hands.
“Ya know?” he starts, “I could really use a blunt right now.”
She exhales a laugh, watches as he moves his gaze back out to the nonexistent horizon.
“Make that two of us.”
JJ takes a breath. “So much for Poguelandia. Shit’s busted now that I’m not in immediate vicinity of my grinder.”
She knocks his shoulder with hers. “Or a twelve pack of PBRs?”
His nose scrunches. “Fuck PBR. I need a manly drink. Like Coors or Bud.”
Kiara rolls her eyes at him, snorts. “Alright, Joe Dirt,” she says. Contemplates for a moment. “I don’t care what kind of beer it is, as long as I can shotgun it.”
A grin splits his face, the shadows turning his single dimple into a chasm on his cheek. “Atta girl.”
Kiara wraps her arms around her legs and places her chin on her knees, watches as the water washes in and tickles the tips of her toes. JJ’s legs are stretched in front of him, arms back to support his weight in the sand. He looks up at the sky.
There’s a beat of silence between them before he says, “I wonder what they’re doing right now.”
She doesn’t have to guess who he’s referring to. She already knows: his dad. Her parents. They’re miles and miles away. Luke, most likely getting in trouble somewhere off the coast of Florida. And her mom and dad? Well, it hurts too much to truly think about.
But she humors him anyway, snorts in derision. “Probably cozying up by the fireplace and basking in the fact that they’re finally rid of their delinquent teenage daughter.”
He lulls his head toward her, gives her a look. “You don’t actually believe that, do you?”
She doesn’t know. But the vision of them sitting at the kitchen table, happy and smiling and flirting as though she no longer existed, as though her mom hadn’t just thrown her out and told her not to come back—it’s a shard of glass caught beneath her ribcage. A pain that lances through her if she dares breathe too hard.
Kie scowls. “They want to send me to boarding school, JJ, I’m sure they don’t give a shit about me. Or where I am.”
For a moment, his gaze sharpens, jaw tenses minutely, and Kiara knows what she said isn’t fair. That he just helped his own father up and leave the country. A man who didn’t give his boy a second glance, didn’t even think to ask him along. Not that JJ would have gone. Luke Maybank is a piece of shit if there ever was one but… Kie knows he’d have liked the invitation. That he’d have appreciated the possibility that maybe… maybe his father does care about him.
“How are you doing, J? You know, with your dad.”
He shakes his head, jaw working. “I’d say about as good as you.”
She swallows, about to open her mouth in some sorry excuse of an apology, but in the next moment JJ relaxes.
“Man,” he says, “they really fucked us up, didn’t they?”
She feels guilty. It’s brewing in the pit of her stomach. She wants to reach out and hug him, comfort him in any way that she can. But JJ’s never been one for coddling, especially when it comes to his dad, so she clenches her hands together. Locks them in the grip she has around her legs.
But then he sighs, gives her this exasperated look like… like she’s killing him somehow, and the next thing she knows, he’s scooting closer to her. His arm is a comforting weight as it settles on her shoulders. As he tugs her against his side and she finds her head nestled into the crook of his neck.
It feels kinda… monumental, somehow. Because in all the years of their friendship, she doesn’t think he’s ever done something like this. And she decides right then that, yeah, she sort of really likes it. Likes how her side fits against his, how his arm curves around her shoulders and nearly dwarfs them, how she can feel his steady heartbeat through her limbs.
It’s jarring, actually, just how natural it feels to be held in his arms.
“JJ,” she says.
“Kie?” he replies into her curls. His face is turned into her hair, lips nearly pressed against the crown of her head in the semblance of a kiss.
But… surely not.
“You smell really bad.”
“Yeah?” he replies idly, “You don’t smell too great yourself.”
Kie holds back her wince, but only barely. “I guess we could both really use a shower.”
“Is that an invitation?”
She elbows him in his ribs. “Shut up.”
“What? Save water, shower together, Kie, c’mon, you’re the one into all that environmental shit.”
“JJ—do you want me to drown you in the ocean?”
He squints out into the water, tightens his hold around her shoulders. “I think that would be a little counter-productive, considering today’s events.”
“I’m sorry, do you not remember that I’m the one that saved your dumbass today?”
“Would you have preferred me to let the crazy captain maul you in the back of the head with a machete?”
Kiara blinks.
“Didn’t think so. You’re welcome.”
“I can’t stand you,” she says.
“You’re sitting down.”
It’s not a funny joke. It’s not. She refuses to laugh at him. Bites her lip in a tragic attempt not to.
But then she sees his face, proud expression prominent even in the dark, and it’s like that damn dimple causes something in her to give. He thinks he’s fucking hilarious.
Some odd mixture of a snort and a laugh bubbles from her mouth as she lifts her arm once again to jab her elbow into his ribs. When his arm releases her as he maneuvers away, the loss is unmistakable. But his grin is enough to make up for it.
+
It doesn’t take long before they realize their little deserted island isn’t actually as deserted as they first thought.
It happens the day after they dock. John B’s got the whole group corralled around their fire. He’s giving this big speech about how they’ve gotta stick together, gotta find fresh water, gotta forage the jungle for supplies to build shelter, when Pope gets this look on his face. Nobody else notices it, but because Kiara’s facing him she watches as he squints his eyes toward the beach, as they grow wider and his mouth opens up in surprise.
He lifts his hand to point. “Uh, guys?”
Kie whips her head around to where his index finger is aimed as John B cuts himself off.
“Not now, man, this is serious.”
She lifts her arm to smack John B lightly with the back of her hand where he stands beside her. “Shhhh, shut up, John B. Just look.”
JJ leaps to his feet from beside Pope. “No fucking way, bro.”
“Alright that’s it,” Cleo cuts in. She looks to Sarah, who’s got this silly shocked expression on her face, lips pursed and cheeks blown slightly with air. “You guys are tellin’ me we spent the whole night camped out on a beach in the sand, uncomfortable and gross, just ta’ find out we’re not alone?”
John B seems to finally spot the couple walking hand in hand along the beach, too far away to notice where they’ve got themselves camped out between rocks.
“They could… be lost… too?” he bargains.
“Dude,” Pope chides, “He’s wearing khakis and a pink hawaiian shirt and she’s got on a white dress. You think they’re lost?”
JJ says, “Bro, is he carrying Sperry’s in his hand? Nah, that’s a kook right there.”
Kie squints her eyes at JJ in annoyance before swiveling her head around at her friends. “Look, are we just gonna stand here like idiots or are we gonna get their attention?”
“Right.” Pope nods, and then he’s up and running frantically down the beach, feet kicking up sand and arm raised comically as he waves to get the couple’s attention.
JJ is the first to shake his stupor and follow after him, and then they’re all yelling like deranged maniacs as they run down the beach. Looking like the sea swallowed them up, took them for a spin in Davy Jones’ Locker, and then spit them back out.
As it turns out, the island they landed on is one just off the coast of Great Abaco in the Bahamas. The couple, after being very obviously shocked to find a gaggle of ship-wrecked teenagers on their morning beach stroll, takes them to the private resort just on the opposite side of the jungle. Authorities are contacted, parents are called, and by the next morning, they’re set up in the worker’s quarters as they await their flight home later that afternoon.
Kie’s sitting on the patio, looking out through the palm trees, blue waves crashing against the shore as patrons mill around on their vacations. Happy rich families having no idea the shit life has to offer, no idea what she and her friends have lived through the past few months, no idea that as soon as she returns to the Outer Banks, she’s going to be shipped directly to Blue Ridge. “Wildlife therapy.”
Fuck that.
“Man, I swear to god kooks are the same everywhere, bro,” she hears JJ saying to John B through the sliding door. “They have all that room in the resort and they stick us out here with the help?”
Sarah’s reasoning with him. “These living quarters aren’t bad, JJ. I mean, look at the view.”
“You would say that, Princess,” JJ replies sardonically. “The fact of the matter is that they just don’t want trash like us dirtying up their white sheets.”
“JJ, man, don’t talk to her like that,” John B defends.
JJ only grumbles something in reply, something Kie doesn’t quite catch from where she’s sat outside the door, before pushing the glass open and stepping out into the heat with her. He pulls out the other plastic chair where it sits pushed into the small patio table. It scrapes along the cement as he turns it around and plants himself on it so that his chest is pressed against its back and his legs are spread either side.
Kie looks over at him. He scowls at the families as they lay out beneath umbrellas, cook on portable grills, build small sculptures out of sand. She wants to reprimand him, tell him he’s being ridiculous, dramatic, because he is and that’s always the role she plays for him. But if she’s honest? She doesn’t have it in her.
She’s tired of defending people against him. She’s tired of the kooks getting their way. She’s tired and annoyed and fed-up and she doesn’t want to be sent away as soon as they get home, she doesn’t ever want to be separated from her best friends again, and at this point… yeah, she gets it. She understands why JJ is so upset, why the little things piss him off.
She wants to put her arm around him the way he had to her the other night. Wants to feel his side pressed against her again, wonders if it felt just as disorientingly right to him as it had to her. But she doesn’t, she can’t, because she’s scared. Because… it’s not them. It never has been.
“So much for that surf trip,” she says instead. And he turns his head toward her finally, mild surprise shown in the widening of his eyes. Like he didn’t expect her to remember, didn’t expect her to be serious about a plan that had been the only thing in a long time to give her actual hope.
He releases a short sarcastic laugh, deflects immediately. “What, no scolding? No ‘You should be more nice to Sarah, JJ. She’s one of us now, JJ.’”
Kiara watches as his fingers tap restlessly at his knees, wishes that she had a joint on her just so that he can relax a bit. So that he can stop acting like he’s about to come out of his skin.
She rolls her eyes. “Get over yourself, Maybank. I promise I don’t care about the shit you do nearly as much as you think.”
JJ cocks his head at her slightly, self-assured grin lifting a corner of his mouth.
“Save it,” she says, before he can spew his normal bullshit.
He lifts his hands in defense. “Wasn’t gonna say a word.”
Kiara snorts.
“Really, scouts honor.”
“You were never a scout.”
“I could’ve been.”
She gives him a look but doesn’t reply, doesn’t have her usual fervor for their bantering wordplay in her at the moment. Every time she closes her eyes, all she sees is that damn packet. “Blue Ridge, Wilderness Therapy.” That’s her future. That’s where she’ll be.
No bamboo hut. No cookin’ a fish on a fire. No riding wherever the waves take them. Just endless trees and dirt and stuffy log cabins, mess halls and chores and strict teachers.
She feels JJ’s elbow knock against her’s.
“Hey,” he says, “What’s eating you?”
There’s a lump in her throat as she speaks. “Out of everything that’s happened recently? Pick one.”
JJ shakes his head, “Seriously,” he says, uncharacteristically soft. “Look, I know I’m not your first choice of confidante, but I got ears. I’ll listen.”
When Kie glances over at him, he crosses his arms atop the back of his chair, settles his chin there and gives her an expectant look.
“It’s just…” She sighs, gives a single shake of her head. “I can’t help but feel like we’d have been better off if there wasn’t actually a way off of this island. If there wasn’t this massive resort and a plane to fly us all the way back home.”
“As much a fan as I am of freedom,” JJ says, “I think we both know Poguelandia was never gonna work out. I mean, shit, unless we found a weed plant and started growing our own bud, God knows I’d have gone off the deep end.”
Kiara laughs despite herself. “Of course you’d think of bud instead of the likelihood of finding a sustainable source of food and water.”
He’s got a goofy smile on his face. “Hey, I’m just giving the facts to you straight.”
Kiara looks down. “JJ, they’re not gonna let me see you guys once we get back.”
“You’re parents? Like hell—“
“No, JJ, I’m serious. I know I only kinda mentioned boarding school to you before but… They’re going to send me away. For real this time. They’ve got a pamphlet and everything.”
“Oh no, a pamphlet. I’m shakin’ in my boots, Kie.”
“You’re such an ass,” she says, and reaches over to shove at his head playfully. There’s a smile on his face as he ducks out of the way, tries to hide it from her. The slight indent on his left cheek causes an inexplicable notch to form in her heart.
It’s silent between them for a moment as their gazes fall forward again. As they watch the waves, trace the horizon where it blends with the blue of the sky. A big part of her wishes she was out there. Wishes that instead of feeling confined and suffocated by the inevitability of her future, she was drowning out her thoughts with salt and ocean spray. That she felt nothing but her wet hair plastered to her cheeks, the scrape of the velcro tied around her ankle as it anchored her to her board.
“Hey,” a curl, loose from her ponytail, is caught between fingers. Tugged. Kie pulls her bottom lip between her teeth as she glances JJ’s way. “We’ll figure something out, okay?”
She nods once. Realizes after a moment that his hand is still held aloft next to her face. The warmth of his skin grazes her cheek, lingers a second longer than it needs to until he drops the strand of hair and pulls back.
When she lifts her gaze to meet JJ’s, her breath catches in her throat. There’s a lift to the corner of his mouth as he watches her. Not his usual suggestive smirk or that stupid grin he gets when he thinks he’s being funny, but something soft. Something contemplative. It almost makes her feel like she’s being viewed beneath a microscope.
“Hey, guys—“
They’re interrupted by the sliding screen door as Sarah’s head pops out, mouth frozen mid-sentence and honey blonde hair swinging around her shoulders. Kie jumps back slightly, only just realizing how close she and JJ had leaned into one another as they spoke. Something twists oddly in her chest when JJ’s gaze shutters and swings back out toward the beach.
Sarah’s eyes are flicking between her and JJ suspiciously when Kie finally turns. She can tell her friend is on the verge of saying something—she’s got that curious twist of her mouth she always gets before she blurts something benign and insensitive—but when Kie shoots her a look, her eyebrows scrunch together momentarily, relax in the next second.
“Uh.” She clears her throat. “Pope just got back from talking with the people at the front desk. Says we’ve got an hour before a boat takes us to the mainland.”
There’s a muffled exclamation from the room behind her, one that sounds a lot like an exasperated Pope. Kie lifts a brow at Sarah’s nervous nibble of her lip and JJ’s attention is finally caught. He twists in his chair, craning to see what he’s missed.
“Also,” Sarah continues innocently, “Me and John B might have accidentally knocked over the lamp that was on the side table.”
Kie blinks. “The glass one?”
“That’s the one.”
“You weren’t even alone in there for ten minutes, what the hell were you—oh gross, Sarah, really?”
Sarah has the decency to attempt to hide her face, cheeks pinkening.
JJ snorts as he clambers to his booted feet. “My man,” he says. Kie takes his hand when he extends it toward her to help her up, tries to ignore the spark of heat that travels up her arm.
A second head pushes out through the doorway, a perturbed Pope giving Kie his squinty eyes from just slightly above Sarah. “I was gone for five seconds, Kie, five seconds, I thought you’d be able to keep these heathens in order.”
“Natural urges, Pope! Natural!” comes John B’s protest. Kie can see through the glass door that he’s crouched on the ground trying to gather the shards of glass into a pile.
She lifts an accusing finger. “I am not a babysitter.”
“Well that’s good, because you’ve done a horrible job.” Pope states, backing away so that JJ and Kiara can walk back into the cool air of the room. Sarah’s scurried over to help John B sweep together the mess with their hands.
Pope pauses when he sees this, purses his lips. “That,” he points out sagely, “is a catastrophically bad idea.”
John B ignores him.
“Enough with the fuckin’ SAT words, Pope. We’re on a tropical island,” says JJ. He seats himself in the stiff armchair, props a foot on the coffee table across from it. Kie knocks it off as she walks past and toward the puny en-suite kitchen.
Pope glowers. “Not seeing how those two variables cancel each other out,” he argues, hands on his hips. “Also, we were shipwrecked here.”
Kie can’t help the annoyed scrunch of her brows as they continue to bicker back and forth. She finds a small handheld broom and dustpan beneath the kitchen sink, has to reach her hand through a cobweb in order to grab it.
She’s standing back up when she hears an exclaimed “Fuck! Ouch, piece of shit, goddamn—“.
It’s John B, he’s holding his hand in front of his face and looking at the bead of blood on his palm as though it’s thoroughly offended him. Sarah grabs his wrist, clucking affectionately as she observes his wound.
There’s an aggrieved sigh from Pope. “I told you.” He turns to JJ, who’s foot is propped back up on the coffee table again. “Did I not tell him? I told him, right?”
JJ shrugs, completely uninterested as he picks at the calluses on his hands.
“Oh for fuck’s—“ Kiara heaves an irritated sigh, drops the dustpan and brush beside the two love-birds still crouched on the floor. Walks over to where JJ is slouched in the chair and shoves his leg back onto the ground. He merely raises his eyebrows at her grouchy look.
“See?” Pope says, unhelpful. “Babysitter.” And then, when he turns away from her glare, “Anyone know where the hell Cleo went?”
Sarah says something to him in reply, an explanation, Kie’s sure. But she doesn’t really pay attention as they talk back and forth. Ignores JJ’s watchful eye as she sits on the couch and slumps back against the cushions, leans her head back to look up at the white ceiling.
For a moment she listens as the chatter dissolves into another bout of bickering. As JJ, of course, makes a dig at John B that has Sarah snorting with laughter. There’s the shuffling of bodies, the sound of playful wrestling as JB retaliates, Pope scolding them when they nearly knock into the coffee table. She can’t help the sullen curve of her mouth as it continues, chest feeling slightly hollowed.
And after a moment she thinks, fuck. Thinks, what the hell am I gonna do without these idiots?
+
A week passes before she gets to see them again.
There’s a faint glow coming from the back of the Chateau when she pulls into its drive. Laughter and disembodied yells filter through her open windows, sticky air pushed around by the weak breeze. She can hear splashing, beer cans being popped open, a low whistle that sounds a lot like John B. Her cellphone is lit up in the passenger seat next to her, message thread open and bright against the dark of the night.
JJ (9:34 pm): got an extra j here with your name on it
JJ (9:34 pm): whenever it is you decide to finally turn up again
JJ (10:01 pm): we miss you
Kie sighs, gathers her things before finally pushing open her door and hopping out. Dirt and sand crunch beneath her yellow sneakers as she makes her way up the familiar worn path, but just as she’s about to enter the clearing where her friends would see her, she hesitates, loses her nerve. Swivels on her heel and begins to head back toward the front.
She doesn’t think she has it in her to face them all yet, she realizes. Isn’t ready to see the inevitable disappointment that’ll mar her friends’ faces when she drops the news.
Blue Ridge, wildlife therapy—that’s her future. Because despite the countless tearful arguments, despite the begging and pleading, she’s still set to attend it. And it’s not just a far-off possibility anymore, it’s a reality, a set date, a count-down.
Three months. Three fucking months.
That’s all the time she has left until she’s torn from her life and shipped to the mainland. Until she’s unable to see her friends or ride the ocean waves or sit on the dock and strum on her uke as her boys bicker around her. There’ll be no late night bonfires or impromptu fishing trips on the HMS, no smoke seshes laid out on the screened porch as she attempts to read the boys’ tarots. No more of John B’s finger guns or Pope’s conspiratorial smiles. No more of JJ’s wild unreadable grins.
No more Pogues.
The thought is like a bruise blossoming beneath her ribcage, growing bigger every day, making it harder and harder to breathe. They’re this very large chunk of her heart, she realizes—has probably always realized. Their souls are tethered together, futures intertwined, and though they all give her shit for her spiritual beliefs, they know just as well as she does that parting from one another would be like losing a limb.
She’s met with the faint smell of rotted wood when she pushes open the front door to the Chateau—a smell that’s entwined with countless memories. It’s dark inside, the only sound being the muffled laughter of her friends as they fuck around in the side yard. She’s been there enough times to know exactly where to step despite the lack of light, where floorboards are loose and where clothes are thrown haphazardly in piles on the ground. John B swears he knows exactly which ones are clean and which ones are dirty. Says there’s an organization to his piles and that if she ever tries to clean them up, he’ll never speak to her again.
The thought sticks in her heart, a needle in a pincushion, serving as a reminder of what exactly it is she’ll be losing. Because yeah, they all exasperate her to no end, can definitely do with better hygiene practices and maybe lay back on the amount of axe body spray they use, but she’d trade nothing in the world for ‘em.
God, she can really go for a beer, a joint. A warm shower too, if she’s honest. Wants to wash away this horrible dread in her gut, the sick feeling threatening to rise in her throat. Watch as it washes down the rusted drain and then let the cathartics carry her away on a wave, silencing the cacophony of thoughts that’ve been threatening to spill over the surface ever since she climbed into her jeep.
She’d left her parents abruptly after another pointless fight—this time about whether or not seeing her friends before she’s sent away would be a good idea.
“What is it about these boys, Kiara?” Her mom spat the word boys as if they were a disease, a parasite. Something she needed to be rid of.
“They’re my best friends! I have a right to say goodbye!” she yelled back, stubbornly holding back the tears that welled in her eyes.
Her dad tried to intervene but Anna only placed her hand on his chest. “Did the time away from here teach you nothing?”
“I’m a pogue, mom. You can’t change that about me.”
The unanswered text she got from JJ, the one that had pushed her to fight her parents one last time about seeing the boys—her boys—burned a hole in her jean pocket until she climbed into her beaten car, ignoring her father’s yells for her to come back. Her anger, thick and alive, had felt like this physical thing in her chest. Like she needed to yell and scream and cry in order to get it out.
But she doesn’t really feel angry anymore as she makes her way through the dark. It’s like all the fight, all the defiance, has left her body and what’s left is just this… bone-deep fatigue.
She wants to relax, smoke that fuckin’ joint JJ mentioned. She wants to forget.
Forget, forget, forget.
Forget that there’s news she has to drop, a truth that has to be told. A rift that’ll be torn between her and her friends as soon as she makes that trip to the woods.
Three months.
The lightbulb in the bathroom buzzes quietly when she flicks it on, and for some reason it brings this odd sort of comfort to her chest. She’s got a love/hate relationship with the room—the lock on the door is flimsy at best, water pressure definitely on the low side, and if someone happens to turn on the hose from the outside while the shower is running it immediately turns ice cold, but Kiara doesn’t mind at all. Honestly prefers the familiarity of the old shack, the chaos of sharing a living space with three teenage boys, over the boundless and empty luxuries her family’s house has to offer.
She didn’t bring any fresh clothes from home and she’s pretty sure all the ones she has stocked up in the Chateau are dirty, so she has no choice but to grab the bikini that she’d left to dry on the towel knob. It was used just once, and only in the hot tub, so it’s basically clean anyway.
The water is flaccid but warm as Kiara steps beneath the spray. She washes quickly, thankful that the boys hadn’t touched her organic bar soap she likes to keep on the ledge for herself. It’s a little misshapen, divetted in the middle from use she’s sure wasn’t her, but it smells of cocoa butter and shea, leaves her skin feeling soft and fresh.
When she shuts off the tap, water runs in rivulets from the ends of her hair and she shivers from the sudden cold. As she pulls the shower curtain back, she realizes the only available towel in the bathroom is one thrown into a heap on the floor. She picks it up idly, sniffs it. It smells faintly of saltwater, but her only other option is to wrangle herself into her bikini while completely soaked, so she wraps it around her shoulders before she can think much of it.
Steam billows out of the bathroom when Kiara opens the door. She’s simultaneously finger-combing and towel-drying her hair, her bracelets wet and sticking to her skin, when she approaches a clothing pile that she’s ninety six percent sure is clean. She picks a white shirt at random, gives a sigh of relief when it smells like laundry detergent. There are holes in it and the lettering is so faded she can barely make out the words “kildare island” on the back, but the material is worn and soft when she slips it on over her bathing suit, falling to the tops of her thighs, and she decides that it might be her favorite article of clothing she’s ever snagged from the boys.
When Kie pulls the fridge open, creaking on its hinges, jaundiced in color, she finds an unopened pack of PBRs. She smiles quietly to herself and grabs a can, affection growing in her chest. She knows none of the boys really like PBR, like to talk shit about her taste in beer most of the time, but the assholes still stocked up on them for her even though she hasn’t been around.
She’s taken, suddenly, by a bout of premature sadness. Because fuck if she doesn’t know she’ll miss the shit out of the boys when she’s gone—surfing with John B, complaining to Pope about the detriment microplastic is to the environment while he tries to keep up with the conversation, sneaking beer at stores with JJ because they’re both easily the best bullshitters of the group. All the little memories slice into her, scattered papercuts infinite in their presence.
The crack of the beer can when Kie snaps the tab open makes her flinch but she brings it to her mouth anyway, takes a large gulp. Sucks in an unsteady breath before finally pushing open the screen door.
She goes unnoticed at first, John B and Pope floating in the Cat’s Ass, arms propped on its ledge as they attempt what appears to be a very intense arm wrestling match. Sarah’s sat in the water next to them, Cleo an exasperated presence next to her, watching with an amused expression until the muffled slam of the screen door behind Kiara causes her to look up. A smile breaks across her face when she sees Kie, but the boys are so enraptured by their stupid display of masculinity that they don’t notice. The bruise beneath her heart pulses as she watches on at their antics. At the way a vein pops from John B’s forehead, Pope giving a good go at the match for somebody as academic and spindly as him.
Kiara glances around the rest of the yard, discarded beer cans scattered randomly in the patchy grass, isn’t even aware she’s looking around for JJ until Sarah’s smile softens in this annoyingly knowing way when Kie meets her eyes again. She lifts her hand and points across the yard to where the hammock is strung up between two trees. It’s shadowed, a little distant from the string lights that illuminate where the rest of her friends sit in the hot tub, so Kie can’t quite make out JJ’s slumped form. But she does notice the occasional glint, light refracting off the metal of his ever-present zippo lighter as he flips it open and closed.
As long as she’s known him, he’s always been that way. Messing around with whatever was in his hands, never able to sit still completely unless he was ridiculously high. She remembers one Christmas, Pope had gotten JJ a fidget toy—one of those cubes that have a different mechanism on each side: switches and buttons and levers. And while JJ outwardly expressed his offence at feeling patronized, Kie would catch him sometimes pulling it from his pocket when he thought nobody saw.
She lifts a hand in a weak wave toward Sarah, who’s somehow now been dragged into refereeing the match between Pope and John B and is laughing loudly at something the latter exclaimed, and before she’s even actually decided to, she’s making her way in the direction of the hammock. The sandy grass is rough beneath her bare feet, the longest parts tickling at her ankles after being left unmowed. There’s the constant sound of bugs, the quiet hum of some reggae music being played from somebody’s phone, a pause in laughter as Pope and JB finally realize she’s shown up. She thinks John B tries to call out to her before he’s hushed by Sarah.
She tries not to feel grateful, fails. Knows that she’s not quite ready to face Pope or John B yet… that they’ll ask her about her feelings, about where she’s been, and… it still hurts too much. This rip in her chest—it’s too raw, too fresh.
And if there’s one thing she’s always found comfort in JJ, it’s that he doesn’t ask questions. He doesn’t do emotional talks or heart-to-hearts, he never pries about whatever’s bothering his friends. His support is shown through deflective quips and the extension of his favorite sedative: weed.
Kie thinks it’s just what she needs. Beer, weed, quiet company.
He’s laid out in the hammock when she approaches, a cat stretching as it naps. His eyes are closed, hands still fiddling mindlessly with his silver zippo. Of course, he doesn’t have a shirt on, shark tooth necklace dark against his skin, black rim of his boxer briefs peeking from above his cargo shorts. Kie tells herself she doesn’t notice the indentations on either side of his hips, the slope of his abdomen, the dip of his bare collarbones. She blinks a couple times, sure she’s just looked up at the string lights a little too long.
“Hey, J—“ she starts, guesses she could have eased into it, considering how lost he seems in his own head—whatever it is that goes on in there. But she genuinely doesn’t expect him to startle the way he does.
“Jesus, god—!” JJ exclaims. He jumps about a foot in the air, nearly flips the hammock and topples sideways. When he notices it’s just Kiara, the hands that have raised in fists in front of him instinctively drop back into his lap.
“Swear to god, one of these days you’ll get decked and it’ll be your own fault. Christ, don’t sneak up on a guy like that.”
She can’t help it, she laughs. She’s had the week from hell, and it takes him all of two seconds to make her laugh.
“Well, hello to you too, I guess.”
“Shut up. Shut up. Kie,” he says, “where the hell have you been, loca?”
She gives him an amused look. “Did you just quote Twilight?”
“That’s from Twilight?” He looks genuinely confused for a second. It’s oddly adorable. “I just saw the meme on Reddit.”
“I think you’re on Reddit too much.”
“And I think you’re being a little judgemental for somebody who’s been MIA for a week.”
Kiara snorts. Opens her mouth to say something about the joint he promised her and how it’s the only reason she’s relented, but suddenly he’s frozen. He looks like he’s swallowed his tongue as he takes her in for the first time, eyes somehow darkening even in the shadows.
She feels oddly exposed as JJ’s eyes travel over her, starting at the tips of her bare toes, painted a pale turquoise, traveling to where she has a damp band-aid stuck to her knee from where she accidentally cut herself shaving. She thinks there’s a good chance she’s imagining it, but his pupils dilate when they reach where the oversized shirt brushes against the tops of her thighs. When they skate up her figure, her necklaces hanging over the neckline and wet hair staining the white a darker color as it becomes damp.
In the next moment, it's like all the oxygen has been sucked clear from her lungs and it’s hard to breathe with the way he’s looking at her. Certainly, this outfit she has on is no different than anything he’s ever seen her in before. In fact, in the years of friendship they have between them, there've been several awkward instances of accidentally witnessing the other in varying states of undress—it just happens when you’re around a bunch of teenage boys that have no concept of boundaries or privacy.
His throat works around a swallow, adam’s apple bobbing, and suddenly she has the odd urge to cover herself up. Which is weird because ninety percent of the time she’s around him she’s in a goddamned bikini anyways and never before has his gaze caused an inexplicable bout of goosebumps to form along her skin.
She crosses her arms over her chest, the movement causing JJ’s gaze to flick up and catch on hers. The primal look in his eyes is sort of unsettling. Sort of thrilling.
“Are you done staring like a twelve-year-old boy who’s discovered jerking for the first time? Or are you just gonna make me stand here forever?”
She thinks it’ll pull a laugh from him, or in the very least a smirk, but all he does is blink. Shake his head once as though discarding a weird feeling that’d overcome him.
“Why the hell are you wearing my shirt?”
Oh. Oh.
Well, shit.
She looks down like she’s forgotten what she’s wearing, though she very much has not. It’s obvious now that it’s his, the way it's faded and worn, has a hole in the armpit.
Kie glances back up at him. “This shirt?”
He gives her a look. “No, the other shirt.”
She tries for nonchalance, shrugs. “It’s a good shirt.”
“I know, it’s mine. Why are you wearing it?”
Exasperated, Kiara throws her hands up. “Jesus christ, I don’t have any clean clothes here right now so I just found it in a pile. Do you want it back?”
She reaches for the hem, acts like she’s about to pull it off. If she’s honest, it would be pretty satisfying to lob it at his head. But she genuinely thinks she might’ve grown a small attachment to it, and doesn’t really wanna part with it, like, ever.
“No! Just—“ he clears his throat awkwardly. Which is strange, because JJ’s a lot of things, but hardly is he ever awkward. “Jesus, just keep it.”
She squints her eyes at him. “You’re being weird.”
“You’re being weird.”
“Nice comeback. Where’d you get that one, Reddit again?”
“Haha,” he says, deadpan. “You’re hilarious.”
“Bite me. Now will you scoot the fuck over? I want on.”
JJ huffs a little, scoots over on the hammock to give her room to climb on beside him. She hands him her can of PBR so that she can steady the flimsy material with both hands, hooks her right ankle around the edge in order to lift herself up.
JJ’s actively avoiding looking at her—specifically her exposed legs, she’s noticed. She has half a mind to rib him about it, because it's just a shirt for chrissake, but for some reason he’s acting as though she’s shown up in nothing but a skimpy thong and a pair of pasties, and she thinks even then he wouldn’t act this weird.
It makes her feel more exposed than if he’d make some smarmy comment like he usually does.
Kiara’s so caught up in her own thoughts that as she’s hoisting herself up, she doesn’t notice that she yanks on the edge of the hammock a little more aggressively than necessary.
A yelped “Shit-!” escapes her mouth as it nearly flips toward her, yanking JJ in her direction as he grunts in surprise and attempts to hold her beer aloft in a way that’ll keep it from spilling all over him. In order to counteract the shifted weight, she almost falls backward, nearly splits her head open on the exposed tree root beneath her, but JJ’s hand snakes around her ankle in a tight grip. His other hand grabs at her useless, flailing arm, and then he’s yanking her forward so aggressively that she lands in a gangled heep sprawled half on top of him.
Everything inside her stills for a moment, the hammock jerking around from the shock of the movement. JJ is breathing heavily, one hand still wrapped around her wrist and the other somehow tangled between her legs. The heat from his fingers nearly scorches her thigh, and she can feel the place where their abdomens press flush together as though all her nerve endings have zoned in on it.
“Fucking christ,” JJ hisses. His head is somewhere off to her left, having fallen forward and across his stomach, the same stomach she can feel taut beneath her through the thin material of her shirt— his shirt.
Fucking christ, is right, Kie thinks.
“My beer,” she says, a little forlornly. She can see where it was tossed aside when JJ jumped to help her, contents spilling out into the sandy grass.
“Kie.” JJ sounds a little breathless. “Kie, get off of me.”
“Huh?” She starts. “My entire life just flashed before my eyes, gimme a second will ya?”
He squirms, clears his throat. “Okay, well fair warning, things might get a little awkward if you lay on top of me any longer.”
This causes her to freeze momentarily, scramble backward to the opposite side of the hammock. “Oh for the love of—are you serious?”
JJ sits up, shrugs noncommittally. She doesn’t think she’s ever seen him quite so… uncomfortable. Though his body language doesn’t really express it, lengthy and casual, lean and bored, same as always. But she knows him, can sense the slightest shift in his composure.
He lifts his arm to palm the back of his head and Kiara tries very hard not to notice the way his bicep flexes. “Well shit, Kie, what do you expect? I’m a guy. We tend to have certain bodily reactions when a girl shows up half naked and wearing his shirt. Especially, if that girl ends up sprawled on top of them.”
Kie can’t help it. She makes a face. “Gross.”
JJ’s lips press into a thin line as he watches her for a moment. An indecipherable emotion flickers in his eyes, so quick Kie thinks she might have imagined it. It causes her stomach to dip inexplicably, some form of dread pooling just below her navel.
His gaze follows as she reaches down to fiddle with the edge of her t-shirt nervously, sighs in this very dramatic, very JJ, way.
“Just—you better bring that back to me pressed and ironed, Carrera.”
It’s like all the awkward energy surrounding them suddenly dissipates, and Kie finds the side of her mouth lifting in relief. “Like you even wash your clothes, Maybank.”
He smiles back at her, one corner a little higher than the other, single dimple making an appearance. “Ah, ah! Pressed and ironed, Kie. No excuses.”
She rolls her eyes. “You owe me a beer,” she states, sitting back and stretching her legs out in front of her.
The hammock sways slightly with the movement, JJ’s shin accidentally brushing against hers. It lights a spark that travels all the way up to her heart.
JJ snorts, indignant. “I don’t owe you shit.”
“You spilled it!”
“I saved you!”
She crosses her arms, gives him a look.
“You can give me your angry eyes all you want Kie, it’s not gonna work.” He’s pulling a blunt from behind his ear, lifting it to his mouth. She honestly wasn’t aware that it had been tucked there in the first place, wonders how the actual hell it had stayed in place with all the movement. But JJ’s always got weed somewhere hidden away on him, so honestly, she’s gotten used to the way he always seems to conjure them from thin air.
“I do not have angry eyes,” she argues.
“Do too, giving them to me right now,” he says around the blunt pressed between his lips. His free hand flips open his zippo and brings it up to light, the other one cupping around the flame so it’s not blown out by the ocean breeze.
Kiara sits up as he inhales, watches the light of the flame reflect off of his pinky ring. When he pulls his zippo away, she reaches forward and plucks the lit blunt directly from his lips, brings it to her own and takes a long drag as she lays back once again. She exhales the smoke through her nostrils, can’t help the satisfied curve of her mouth when JJ blinks in surprise.
He purses his lips. “I honestly can’t even be mad at that,” he says. “It was kinda hot.”
Kiara’s too far away to swat at him with her arm, so she lifts her foot to kick his shoulder good-naturedly instead. “You’re so annoying.”
He catches her ankle in his hand, tsks. “Violence is never the answer.”
She pauses, thrown by the sudden heat of his skin against hers. Doesn’t yank her foot away immediately because suddenly JJ’s looking at her legs again and something sparks in his eyes, something she can see even in the faint glow of the distant string lights.
She swallows, hears herself say, “That’s rich coming from you,” but even to her own ears, it sounds strained.
JJ’s eyes travel up her legs, over his t-shirt again, to where the blunt is held between her index finger and thumb. She takes a breath, chest feeling strange as she brings the blunt back to her lips, as JJ follows the movement with his heated gaze. He hasn’t released his grip on her ankle yet, and it’s kinda weird that she hasn’t pulled from his grasp, but the oxygen seems sucked from the air around them and it’s honestly a little hard to breathe at the moment.
Kie takes another puff of the blunt and JJ lowers her foot back down to the hammock, lingering in his contact. She holds her breath, the smoke, in her lungs until finally he pulls his hand away and she releases it.
An easy smile forms on his lips again. The moment passes.
She’s able to breathe.
What the fuck.
What the fuck?
“So,” he moves on, tone far too nonchalant for what has just passed between them. He leans forward and steals the blunt from her grasp. “Are you ready to talk yet?”
She blinks. Opens her mouth, closes it again. Swallows.
“Talk?”
“Yes, talk, Kie. It’s what it’s called when you open your mouth and words com—“
“Shut up, I don’t need the Merriam-Webster definition of what it is to talk, asshole.”
He shrugs, pauses to take an abnormally long drag, crosses his ankles over one another as he lays back and places a hand behind his shaggy blond head. For a moment, the only noise between them is that of their friends laughing distantly, the slosh of the water as it smacks against the marsh just a few yards away.
Kie looks up at the endless night sky above her, begins to count the stars. The blunt is passed between them a few more times, JJ not saying a single thing as he waits quietly. She knows he won’t push her to talk to him. That she can just up and change the subject and he won’t mind in the slightest, just pass the blunt back over to her and allow her to take the conversation wherever she wants.
And she thinks, finally, that it might be this very fact that unlatches her tongue from the roof of her mouth, allows her to say:
“You know it was my parents that got me into astrology?”
He hums in response, his only indication that he’s still present and listening. The hammock swings slowly in the wind as they pass the blunt between them again.
“When I was younger, before The Wreck started picking up speed, they’d take me out on my dad’s old boat at night. Teach me all about the constellations, the mythology behind them.”
“Does this have to do with your zodiac shit?” JJ asks.
“It’s not shit, JJ, and yes, partly.”
“I’m a gemini,” he says, tone inflated with pride.
“I know. I’m the one that told you that.”
“Well, I just wanted—“
“For fuck’s sake, JJ, will you let me finish?”
He seems to contemplate for a moment. “That depends, is there a point?”
Kie knees him in his side, relishes in the soft oomph he releases. “Yes there’s a point, now shut up.” She takes a breath, continues, “My mom was kind of a hippie when she was my age. Weird to think about now, but she knew all there is about astrology and zodiacs. We’d go out at the end of summer and she’d point out all her favorite constellations. Andromeda, Delphinus, Pegasus.”
“Isn’t there one that’s a giant pot?”
“Yeah?”
“Dope.”
She rolls her eyes. “Anyways, she used to talk to me about my star sign.”
“Cancer, right?”
Kie’s surprised that JJ remembers, looks at him maybe a little bit affectionately before nodding.
He lifts a single brow. “What? I pay attention when you talk sometimes.”
She can’t help but snort. “Cute.”
“Glad you’re finally noticing,” he preens.
God, if Kie had a nickel for all the times she’s told JJ Maybank to shut up, she wouldn’t even need the four hundred million in gold.
She decidedly ignores him. “Sometimes I wish I could go back to those times. Back to when my parents and I actually got along.”
It’s a touchy subject to bring up with him, one she knows isn’t very fair, considering. So she tries to meet his gaze across the darkness, moves her leg so that a part of it is touching his in what she hopes is some form of comfort. But when his eyes flick up to meet hers, she doesn’t see anger, which is what she’s used to when home life is mentioned—or, atleast, his. Instead, all she finds in the deep blue of his eyes is a steadfast understanding.
He says, “What happened, Kie? Where’ve you been?”
And the way he says it… it kind of breaks her heart.
She swallows, looks back up into the stars. “They’re sending me away next semester. I’ve got three months.”
He sits up so suddenly that the whole hammock moves in one jerking motion. “Three months?”
“Shh—Shut up. I haven’t told the others yet. I just…” Kie trails off, not really knowing what else to say, not really having it in her to decide.
He scratches at his forehead. “Fuck.”
“Yeah.”
“Fuck.”
“I know.”
JJ stubs the blunt out on the tree behind him, flicks it into the lawn. Pulls his long legs in to cross in front of himself. The low glow from the lights hung through the trees casts shadows on his bare chest, darkness gathering in the dips of his collarbones, his deltoids as he runs both hands through his hair and causes it to flip messily over his forehead.
Kiara swallows, pulls herself into a sitting position across from him and wraps her arms tightly around her knees when she brings them up against her chest. The effect of the weed hits her pretty directly now that she’s in an upright position—head buzzing in that intoxicating way. Limbs loose, lungs feeling so large she thinks they could expand enough to inhale all the world.
It’s silent between both of them for a moment. The breeze is cool against her flushed skin, JJ’s pupils blown wide and stained slightly red. After a moment, he swings a leg over the side of the hammock, pulls himself up to standing and begins to pace slowly in front of her. The sudden loss of his weight nearly causes Kie to tip over, but she reaches a hand out, steadies herself. Turns to face him, legs dangling so that her bare feet brush the sparse grass below.
“Shit, Kie,” he says, runs another hand through his hair. He’s really gotta stop doing it while his arms are on display like that, it’s driving Kiara slightly mad. “Maybe we can talk to them. John B, or Pope, or fuck, even me if I have to—“
She sucks in a breath, grip tightening where her hands clutch to the side of the hammock. “No—“
“I dunno, everybody tends to love JB. He’s got that annoying ass charisma he can work on your parents—“
He’s rambling. She knows he’s rambling, he does it sometimes when he feels trapped and is trying to find a quick escape. “JJ, stop—“
“Or, like, Pope is academic as hell. He’s always trustworthy ya know? He can talk to them—“
“Jaje—“
“And I know I’m not really worth shit, I’m probably the one your parents hate the most, but I can try—“
Something inside Kie snaps. She jerks up from the hammock, head whooshing a little bit from the movement, and takes two large steps in his direction. Places her hands on his solid shoulders.
JJ stops abruptly, mouth snapping shut and eyes zeroing in on hers. She’s not really sure if it’s because she’s a little high or not, but they seem particularly blue as she fixes him with a stern gaze.
“Shut. Up,” she says, tightens her hold on his shoulders. He’s towering over her in this position, all gold skin and muscle and, if Kie’s honest, it’s vaguely distracting in her unsober state.
“For once in your life would you just—stop fucking talking for a moment? God.” JJ’s jaw tightens as she speaks, shoulders tensing beneath her grasp. But there’s this fist of anger tightening around her intestines, this annoyance at how he views himself, and because she just smoked a blunt with him, a severe lack of filter pushes her to continue. “I’m so—tired—of this ‘woe-is-me, I’m so worthless’ narrative you force on yourself. Tired of it, JJ. Do you have any idea how much you mean to me? To all of us?” She swings an arm back to motion at their friends in the hot tub, breathing heavy.
JJ swallows, clenches his jaw again. “This isn’t about—“
“Don’t do that. Don’t tear yourself down while I know, know, your brain is in hyperdrive right now trying to figure out how to help me out of this situation.” Kie takes a deep breath, backs off from him because suddenly he seems to be taking up a little too much space in front of her and it’s slightly overwhelming. “Do you think for one second that any person would do the things that you have for your friends? You’d walk through hell for any one of us.”
He shrugs, a little uncomfortably. “The way I see it, it’s where I’m gonna end up anyway.”
“No.” Kie crosses her arms over her chest, watches JJ shift his weight from foot to foot. “You don’t—“ she sighs, a little frustrated, a little beaten-down. Uncrosses her arms and then carefully sits back down on the edge of the hammock.
JJ’s watching her, he’s got this unreadable expression on his face. His hair’s a mess, blond tresses sticking up in every which direction, and the way the shadows are playing on his skin just… something unravels in her chest.
She tucks her hair behind her ears, says, “Look, there’s no use in trying to talk my parents out of their decision. I’ve tried, okay? They’re not gonna budge.”
JJ lifts his hand to move his thumb over his bottom lip contemplatively. His ring glints in the shadows.
“I told you we’d figure something out, Kie.”
“I know you did,” she returns quietly. “But right now I don’t need solutions. I need weed, beer, and my best fucking friends.”
He lifts a brow, corner of his mouth rising slightly. “Yeah? Then why’d you come over here?”
“I knew you could provide at least one of those things,” Kie jokes.
JJ releases a breathy laugh. “I knew it. I knew you only kept me around for the weed.”
She shrugs. “Where else would I smoke cousin Ricky’s bud for free?”
He clutches his chest as though deeply hurt. “Straight for the balls, Kie, damn.”
Kie laughs, swings back slightly in the hammock and looks up into the stars again—mostly because the quiet smile on JJ’s face as he watches her makes her heart expand and she doesn’t really have it in her to understand what it means. What it is that she thinks is growing between them.
The hammock dips as JJ lowers himself next to her. From the way it hangs, the sides of their bodies come flush together and she can feel tiny sparks of lightning zip all along the places their skin meets.
“JJ?” she says into the night.
“‘Sup.”
“The one thing you could provide? It was actually just… being my best friend.”
She turns her head toward him, watches as his throat works around a swallow. He doesn’t look at her when he responds, “You goin’ soft on me now?”
Kie releases an exasperated breath through her nose, rolls her eyes. Doesn’t dignify his barb with a response.
It’s quiet between them for a few seconds before JJ reaches his hand out and catches an index finger beneath the sleeve of her t-shirt. And then, probably because he’s a little high, he says, “It looks better on you.”
She ignores the way it causes her heart to flip, takes a slow breath.
“Damn right it does.”