Deviation

“I’m definitely ready to get out of here,” I muttered to Jessica as I stared at the people around the bonfire. Bud Lights were in each individual’s hand other than mine and hers. Across the tall flames sat a couple sucking each other’s faces off. It reminded me of a car crash; a horrible sight you just can’t help but gawk at as you pass by.

“If I could help you there, I would. But I’m not your ride,” Jessica said as she stared across the fire as well. Every now and again she’d move her head to one side or the other in infatuation. These two were really going at it; they hadn’t come up for a breath of air for what seemed like a full ten minutes now. I watched her widen her eyes and finally look down at her high topped converse.

“No, you’re not. Because you decided it would be a good idea if your brother took us to this party,” I reminded her, my face contoured into a perfect sneer. She raised her to head to look at me and shot me an apologetic smile. I rolled my eyes, “But I guess you forgot that we hate high school parties and your brother cops a lot of pussy at them. So he never wants to leave when we do.”

“What can I say? My brother’s a stud-muffin,” Jessica responded with sarcastically. She picked up a stick near her foot and began doodling in the soft sand around us. Sure, the house we were at was a beautiful one; set on the lake shore with a bonfire, a crystal clear pool and nicely stocked with enough booze to get all of Tampa drunk of their asses. But this scene wasn’t for me. When Jessica was finished with her ‘artwork,’ she tossed the stick into the bonfire.

I looked down at our feet. There stood three stick figures. Two girls were off to the side, one of them holding a gun and pointing it at a boy stick figure that seemed to have been shot. There was an arrow pointing at the girls; it read ‘us.’ The other arrow was at the dead man; it read ‘Kennedy.’

“Creative,” I complimented as I stared disturbed at the murder plan Jessica had drawn for her brother. She nodded as she as well looked upon the mural. And then we were back to stage one: staring at the couple across the fire.

“Hey Jessica,” A voice said from behind us. Heavy footsteps through the thick sand came from behind until a body was seated next to the girl to my left. We both curiously looked over, hoping it was Kennedy but knowing it wasn’t; the voice was too husky. To Jessica’s sheer happiness and my anger sat James Pennington, a boy Jessica had been obsessed with since sophomore year.

“Oh, hi James, what’s going on?” She asked, her love-struck eyes sending him so many obvious signs. Her back was completely turned to me at this point. I was just a warm haze behind her, my body heat blending in with hers. I was now left to fen for myself.

I sighed as I stood up from my spot on low lawn chair. There had to be somebody I didn’t completely despise at this party. I was determined to find them and possibly some wine along the way. My first stop was the kitchen.

As I looked through all the tall glasses of hard liquor, I couldn’t find a single bottle of cheap red wine. My brow furrowed when I finally turned around empty handed. Nobody was in the large kitchen; everybody had their filled drinks in hand. I was alone with so much alcohol and none to satisfy my needs. I glanced at the clock on the microwave. In bright red letters, it flashed ‘10:55 P.M.’ A loud sigh escaped my lips.

“Oh, that was not a very content sigh,” I heard from the entrance of the kitchen. My eyes wandered over to see a tall, lanky figure holding what I assumed to be an empty red cup. In a white v-neck, black jacket and dark blue skinny jeans stood John O’Callaghan, the singer of Kennedy’s band; a boy I had been secretly infatuated with since the day I met him and he sang me a verse from a song he was working on.

“I’m not a very content girl at the moment,” I replied with, propping myself up and sitting on the counter I was leaning against. John made his way over and began looking through the bottles of alcohol next to me. When he found the Jack Daniels, he stuck his hand into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out a can of Coca-Cola.

“Why not? This party isn’t as lame as I thought it would be,” John shared as he opened the can and began pouring his drink. Although I was sitting on the counter, John was tall enough to look towards me and be at eye-level. I gazed right into his soft green eyes before bashfully looking away and shrugging.

“I hate parties. Everybody acts even stupider than they usually are when they get a little alcohol in their system. It’s like, how can I hold my alcohol so well compared to you when I consider myself a light-weight after having four cups of wine and you’ve had two Bud Lights?” I questioned out loud, swinging my feet but careful not to hit the cupboards below. When John never replied, I looked his way. He was leaning against the counter, a smirk upon his face.

“And you just turned eighteen,” I heard him mutter under his breath as he raised his red cup to his lips. My brow furrowed as he took a long sip. But before I could ask him what I meant, he propped himself up and took my hand as he said, “Come on, let’s get out of here then.”

“Get out of here? John, I’m pretty sure you’ve had more than one drink tonight, I don’t think it’s safe,” I questioned as I hopped down from the counter and followed him through the house. We avoided the living room, the most crowded room the party and passed by the room filled with couples making out. It reminded me of the bonfire and Jessica. “Not to mention, I can’t leave Jessica. She’d be really mad if I escaped this hell hole and left her here with her busy brother.”

“Calm down, Karma,” John laughed when we finally walked out the front door and were met by the soft, warm winds of Arizona air and the small stars above our heads. His hand was still grasping onto mine as we maneuvered our way through the grass of the host’s front yard and he didn’t let go when our feet met the sidewalk. “I just wanted to go for a walk.”

“Oh,” was all I could muster up as we walked hand in hand down the street. I let my eyes look upon every car but every now and again, I’d catch myself looking at John. With a smile on his face, he stared straight forward, his head swinging back to catch the hair falling in his face from time to time.

“Okay, follow me, this is where the trail gets a little tricky,” John said as we came to a sudden stop before a hill with a few trees. I shot him a look as he let go of my hand and began climbing up but he didn’t see it. Hesitantly, I followed, ducking under branches and ignoring the small stems from bushes that kept scratching my leg through my jeans. When we finally got the top of the hill, John smiled at me before taking a sip as he looked toward the view.

We were standing on what seemed to be the highest point in Tempe. I could see everything from here; from the lights across the lake to the lights from the other side of the freeway across town. My eyes widen as I stepped a little closer, “This is beautiful.”

“Isn’t it?” John responded with, his eyes looking from the view to me. A proud smile shone on his face when my eyes wandered back at him and like a chain reaction, a smile appeared on my own face. “I found it with Jared a while back; probably my sophomore year. We call it Top of the World. Pretty place, it is, but the mosquitoes will eat you alive.”

“Wonderful,” I muttered under my breath, suddenly feeling as if every bug in the area was on my skin. I had an irrational fear of all creepy-crawlers. They were ugly and I was prone to every kind of bug bite. Just as the thought passed through my head, I felt something crawl across my foot. A loud yelp escaped my lips as I brushed it off and cowered towards John’s tall body.

“Did I mention there’s a rather high amount of spiders as well?” He laughed as I pouted and kept close. A chill went down my spine as I crossed my arms and looked upon the ground incase the spider had come back for revenge. “Are you really that afraid?”

“I hate spiders more than I hate stupid high school parties,” I snickered, lifting my eyes off the ground and meeting his eyes. They stared at me underneath the moon, so bright I could see the green even through the dark night. For a long moment, neither of us said anything. I began feeling a little uncomfortable, my eyes looking down from his eyes to his lips and finally my feet before the silence broke.

“Then we should get out of here before they all prey upon us,” He remarked, chuckling a little at his own teasing. I rolled my eyes, though I had a smirk on my face. But I was happy to leave with one more glance towards the city lights.

“Just as long as we don’t go back to the party,” I suggested, my feet already guiding me towards the trail we had come up from. John was close behind but he didn’t say anything in response. We walked down the hill, nearly falling face forward because it was so steep. But when we finally hit the sidewalk, John took my hand again. A smile reappeared on my face; I was happy we weren’t under a streetlight.

“If you don’t want to go back to the safety of a crowd, then I’d be happy to escort you to the nearby park,” He whispered in my ear before pulling me towards another streetlight. We walked in a comfortable silence this time, John swinging our hands playfully as he hummed a song I couldn’t put my finger on.

Before entering the park, he tossed his empty red cup into the trashcan and resumed walking. I figured we’d sit on a picnic table, but he guided me straight to the swings and let go of my hand to sit down. I copied his actions and sat down as well, my hands holding onto the cold, rusted metal.

“So Karma, tell me about yourself,” John sighed as he twisted the swing’s chains together and then let go, letting himself spin in circles. I dragged my foot against the woodchips as I thought about how to summarize myself in a positive way; nothing came to mind.

“That’s such a general demand,” I countered, looking towards his swinging body, “What exactly do you want to know about me? I’m not a very interesting person.”

“That’s not what I’ve heard,” John shared, looking at the woodchips. I could see the faintest smile on his face as I furrowed my brow. Who had he been talking to about me? And what had they been saying? John answered these questions when he realized I was too caught up in my own thoughts to question his last statement. “Sometimes when I’m talking to Jessica, she’ll bring you up while talking. And you know her; she goes off into little tangents that are so irrelevant to the actual conversation. Well, for her birthday last year, when you were in Oregon for winter break, I took her out to dinner. And all she did was talk about you.”

“Oh, Jessica,” I sighed, remember that terrible winter break. It was filled with family members who criticized me every time I turned my back and absolutely no internet connection. I was thankful I had phone service; otherwise, I wouldn’t have gotten all the text messages Jessica sent me. Every hour, I’d receive another, ‘I miss you, why the hell did you have to leave me?’ Or even a few, ‘It’s my birthday week, this sucks so many dicks!’

“Yeah, but I thought it was adorable,” John replied, “She told me about the time you guys went to Lake Tahoe during the summer of your freshman year and how you didn’t care that she wet the bed because she didn’t want to walk to the bathroom in fear of being attacked by the humungous ants.”

“That was the worst trip ever,” I remembered. I awoke that morning and rolled right into the middle of a wet spot on the mattress. I opened my eyes to see Jessica standing in the doorway with her eyes wide open; I took an hour long shower and slept on the cot that night.

John laughed, breaking my train of thought. I looked his way to see that he had gotten out of his swing and was now walking behind me. He talked as he disappeared into the shadows, “She also listed some things she loved about you; she was feeling very nostalgic that night. She was telling me how she missed the annoying way that you’d always change the music in her car. How whenever you slept over, you’d steal most of the blanket in the middle of the night. And when she’d awaken in her own house, you’d already be downstairs, making her something to eat.”

Staring across the playground, I thought of all the times I had shared with Jessica. I thought of her downfalls; the way she moved a lot in her sleep, how she was so irresponsible with every piece of chattel that got into her grasp, how we always had to go on a hunt for her phone after a party. And I thought of her perks; the way she always let me borrow anything I needed. How she had nearly every album known to man. The way she always knew exactly how I feeling just by looking at me.

It wasn’t until two cold hands touched my waist when my swing went back that I realized why John had gotten up from his swing. He was pushing me.

For a moment, we both stayed silent and I let his hands touch the exposed skin on my back whenever the swing backed me up into his out-stretched arms. His cold skin against mine made me tingle to this touch. But it wasn’t long until I had gotten high enough and he grabbed the blue plastic and pulled me back down the safety of the ground. Standing behind me, I could feel his warm gusts of exhaled air above me.

When he leaned down, he pressed his lips against my cold cheek before whispering in my ear, “It was everything she said – all your pros and cons – that made me want to figure the rest of you out for myself.”