Kennedy sighs, and we stare at my grave, the silence deafening. My arms still hold her, but I can feel the distance growing. I’ve told her as much as I can tell her, bared my soul so that she might understand. Will it be enough?
“When they told me you had died, that you were gone, I wanted to curl up into the earth myself. We had just spent a whole year writing to each other, about everything we wished we could be. The things you wrote to me, they were what I’d always dreamed you’d say. If I had to live in a world where you no longer existed, I wasn’t sure I would be able to do that. Everett, I imagined so many things. I imagined a future where you came home for me.”
Her words slice my heart open and seem to empty all the poison I’ve been holding onto for months.
“And then you came home, and you weren’t you. You weren’t the man from those letters, or the one I’d imagined being with. Do you know how hurtful you’ve been over the last few months?”
Turning to her, pulling her in so that were flush against each other, I try to stare every amount of emotion I feel straight into her chocolate brown eyes.
“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, Kennedy. Some days, I can’t tell which way is up. Don’t you get it? I don’t think I deserve to be here. One day, the enemy all just up and left. I have no idea why they didn’t just off me before they went. Maybe they were in a rush. Maybe they figured I was already on my way to death, the desert would finish me off. With every step I took, every look over my shoulder, I was sure someone was fucking with me. That I’d get a bullet to the back, or some fucking militia fighter would jump out and slit my throat. I still feel like that. Why the fuck am I here, how did I make it home? It doesn’t seem real still. To have you so happy to see me home, to have you still be the same incredible, gorgeous woman you were when I left—I can’t grapple with it sometimes. I don’t deserve you. I’m too tainted, too destroyed.”
“And yet, I still want you.” She shrugs, as if we’re stuck in this impossible situation.
“I’ve never wanted anything as much as I want you.” I breathe, relief flooding through me.
I’ve waited so long to say those words to her in person, and I’m finally releasing myself to do so. I’m tired of fighting it, of trying to predict the future of when I’ll hurt her. My life is fucked up enough already, I’m done with trying to close myself off. If I don’t open up, I’m going to end up in that grave for real, buried beneath the earth. Dr. Liu has told me as much, and Kennedy just laid it on me.
“I don’t want you looking at Logan Myers, or him looking at you. I want you. I want you to be with me. You’re … Christ, Kennedy, you’re so damn perfect it’s intimidating.”
Her long dark locks shake with her head. “I’m not. I have so many flaws, Everett, and a lot of them have to do with wanting you even when you push me away. But, I guess that’s how we got here, huh?”
I just thank the heavens that she doesn’t take no as an answer very easily. For all the shit I’ve thrown her way, before and after returning to Brentwick, she should have kicked my ass to the curb long ago. I have a lot of making up to do. And I plan to start now.
My fingers trace her jaw. “No more games. Let’s do this. I can’t promise I won’t be surly, or closed off, but I want to try.”
Kennedy blinks up at me. “I’ve been waiting a long time to hear you say that.”
“So, say yes.” I breathe, bending until my whisper fans over her lips.
“Ye—”
She can’t get the full syllable out. I don’t let her.
Because when my mouth covers hers, in the first time as two people who have pledged their hearts to one another, it isn’t patient.
There, over the shadow of my gravestone, I give her the kiss I’ve been waiting a decade to give her. And it feels all that much more real because she is finally mine.
26
Kennedy
Two weeks pass before the night of the big barn party on Thanksgiving Eve.
They’re filled with hours of schoolwork, goofing off with Rachel and Bi, EMT shifts, and worrying about my college acceptance letters. Oh, and of course, fitting in every spare second I can with Everett.
Since the night at his headstone, where we agreed to no more games, he’s been … incredible. Everything I envisioned a relationship with Everett would look like, is what we have had these past two weeks. Texting and talking all hours of the day. Sneaking glances at each other across the football field. Hanging out with my friends on weekend nights. He came over for dinner with my parents.
And best of all, we sneak out of our houses most nights to spend them with each other in the tree house. While there has been no sex, or talk of it, we’ve come pretty damn close. I gave my first hand job, and then blow job, this past week. I don’t think I was particularly great, but Everett made it sound like I was and I got the desired end result, so I couldn’t have been that bad.
But tonight, you’d think all of that had never happened.
Thanksgiving Eve is the biggest night of drinking, well, probably everywhere in the United States. Everyone comes home from college, or from out of town if they’ve graduated. Exes meet up, hook up, old friends drift back into town in search of their mom’s turkey and end up doing shots of tequila with the kid they sat next to in ninth grade Spanish. It’s tradition for everyone to venture out to the barn where parties are held, and spend the last hours before sitting down at a table with your family getting absolutely plastered.
So here we are, sitting on Scott’s tailgate that’s parked in front of the enormous bonfire, surrounded by hundreds of people. There are kids six years older than I am here, hitting on the juniors who got invited to this party, which is kind of disgusting, but far be it from me to cock block. Some of my previous cheer captains showed up, and we all played flip cup together. Bianca’s ex-boyfriend is lurking, and Rachel has already threatened to knee him in the family jewels.
But it’s Everett I can’t keep my eyes off of. Most of his old high school buddies came home for the holiday, and he’s turned into the senior I lusted after once again. I’ve seen a smile on his face more than once, and I swear he even laughed.
Though the reason I may or may not be on my third cranberry and vodka is because he hasn’t bothered treating me like his … well, girlfriend. Are we boyfriend and girlfriend? He asked me to be together with him, but we never made it official with titles. Do we need them? Isn’t our connection deeper than that?
Well, maybe not. My friends know about us and have hung out with us. But do his? Everett hasn’t brought me over to his house, so maybe his parents don’t even know.
All of my insecurities as a teenage girl, especially one who has been so tossed around by her love interest, creep out and invade my blood like poison.
I’ve just been openly staring at him throughout the night, willing him to look at me, but he hasn’t. Hasn’t come up to kiss me, or put his arm around me, or introduce me to his friends. Of course, they all know me, just not as his girl. How badly I want to be called his girl.
“Why are those guys running through the fire?” Bianca yelps.