Go Around

It was already 9 o’clock and Kennedy was racing about her house. This was usually the time she arrived at a party, but she had fallen asleep on her couch and had just woken up before she decided to hop in the shower. She had blow dried and flat ironed her hair with a deep side part and let a few of her side swept bangs fall in front of her face.
She flipped through every item of clothing she had in her closet and ultimately decided on a white tank top with a red pencil skirt that fell an inch below her butt. She put on a pair of white flip flops because they were going to the beach after all. Most people thought that pencil skirts were only means for work, but there were some pencil skirt that were meant to be a little more casual.
She grabbed a white purse off of one of the shelves in her closet and put everything she needed in it; phone, wallet, keys, chap stick, and a few condoms. She zipped her purse and took one last look at her appearance before running out of her house to her car.
The drive to the beach was easy and she found the site relatively quickly considering there was a gigantic bonfire with a bunch of yelling and loud music coming from it at in the middle of the beach. Kennedy hoofed her way out there because she wasn’t used to walking in sand, but she took a look at the time right before she approached; 10:15. She was late. So much for Alex getting to see her the normal time she was at parties.
She spotted Jack by the bonfire, taking a swig of his beer and talking to some guy that Kennedy didn’t recognize. Kennedy went over to him and wrapped her arms around his waist, “Ohmygod!” Jack yelled out of surprise, but then he started laughing and hugged her back, “God, you finally made it,” he said and kissed the top of her head.
“Yup, it took me a little while, but I got here,” she told him with a laugh, trying to move back from him but he was holding her too tight to let her go.
“Alex has been anxious to see you all night, Kennedy,” Jack whispered down to her and he had a cold smile on. At first Kennedy was taken aback, but then she realized that she shouldn’t be because she had told Jack that she and Alex were a thing but it surprised her because she had also told him that they’d broken everything off – apparently Jack knew them both well enough to know that was a lie.
“Is he here?” she asked, trying to look over Jack’s shoulder, but it was too tall for her at her five-foot-one stance so she decided to try and peek under his arm instead which didn’t work out so well either.
“Kenne, I really don’t think you should do things like this with him in such a public place,” Jack said to her, twisting her so that she was looking directly at him.
“What things?” she demanded, “He’s still my friend, Jack, and I can see him if I want to.”
“Kennedy, why are you trying to ruin their relationship?” Jack asked, putting his hand to his forehead.
Kennedy wore an astonished look on her face, “I’m not trying to ruin anybody’s relationship, Jack, I’m sorry that Alex would rather be with me than he would be with Lisa,” she told him, using exuberant hand motions.
“If that’s true than why hasn’t he dumped Lisa to be with you?” Jack shot back at her.
“Because I told him not to. Because I knew that everybody would blame me for them braking up which would, in turn, make everybody hate me. Jack, you and I used to be best friends but now you’re treating me like one of your enemies – someone you hate,” Kennedy told him, while touching his forearm which he shook off.
“I was really trying not to be mad at you, Kennedy, for what you did to Alex and me, but I don’t think that I can forgive you as easily as Alex did – but then again you aren’t willing to fuck me to get back into my good graces like you were willing to do with him, now are you?” Jack’s venomous words hurt more than Kennedy let on.
After standing there silent for a minute she said, “Fuck you,” then rolled her eyes minute and walked away and went to find the alcohol that she so desperately needed to make her forget everything, to make her completely numb.
She grabbed two beers and walked, with one in each hand, down to the water and sat on a log and watched the tides pull back and forth.
“Is this seat taken?” a voice asked and Kennedy was startled and looked back and saw Alex, holding his one beer.
She smiled and nodded, but didn’t say a word.
“I’m kind of surprised you didn’t try to find me when you first got here. I thought I kind of made it clear that I wanted to see you the minute you got here,” he joked and she laughed a little.
“Sorry, I ran into Jack,” she told him and finished off her first beer and threw it behind her and she heard it break on something, but she didn’t really care what. She hoped that some drunken dumbass walked around barefoot and sliced their foot open on it.
“What did he say that made you this upset?” he asked, propping his elbows up on his knees and turning so that he could look directly at her, but she didn’t want to look at him – she didn’t want to think about how much this would hurt Lisa if she saw them right now.
“Nothing,” she said and shook her head.
“Well, he must have said something,” he prompted, leaning into her and touching her leg, which she recoiled and turned and looking in the opposite direction from where he was sitting.
“What’s wrong, Kennedy?” Alex whispered to her, but she didn’t respond.
“Alex!” a girl yelled his name over and over again and Kennedy knew automatically who it was. Her high pitched voice that still had a way of sounding sultry.
Alex let out a sigh and turned to say something to Kennedy, “Don’t worry about it,” she told him, “go be with your girlfriend, I’ll be fine.” He didn’t say anything but got up and let her alone and she heard Lisa squeal but Kennedy didn’t turn around to see what was going on or what they were doing. She popped open her next beer and chugged it despite the disgusting taste. She’d never really been a fan of beer, she was more of a frou frou drinker, but beer would do if it was all she was given.
She tossed that one after she was done but she didn’t hear it break.
She was seriously starting to consider Jack’s words and she analyzed them even further. She knew and had come to terms with the fact that Alex was too good for her and that Lisa would be a better match overall, but that hadn’t stopped her from doing what she was doing. If she were to just tell Alex that she wanted to stop everything that they were doing, would he understand and try to remain her friend or would he go off the deep end like he did the previous time and practically cut off all ties with her because she thought they were better off as friends? She knew the answer. He wouldn’t want anything to do with her if she cut off all relationship ties with him.
She would love to believe that this, their relationship, was all about him wanting to have sex with her because she was the best he’d ever had in bed, but she knew that that was completely untrue no matter how hard she tried to talk herself into it being the truth. He was with her because he loved her and she knew that no matter what she did, that would never change. Her being the best lay he’d ever had just helped their relationship, just like out of all the guys she’d had sex with, he was still the best she’d ever been with. It was a bonus to their relationship, but not the first brick that helped build it.
Kennedy got off her log and walked back over to where the booze was and she grabbed three more beers which may have seemed like a lot but Kennedy thought that she could handle it. She chugged one and got cheered on by the guys at the party to continue and she did.
She didn’t know anybody at the party except for Jack, Rian, Zack, Kara, Alex, and Lisa, but everybody else was complete strangers.
After a couple of hours, Kennedy had had a lot more alcohol than she could remember and was stumbling around, drunk as an Irish man on St. Patrick’s Day.
Somebody was playing music as loudly as they could and Kennedy started dancing. She kicked off her flip flops because she liked the feeling of sand between her toes and she stepped on something and let out a, “God damnit!” and she clutched her foot in her hand. It started bleeding more and more and she realized that she had sliced her foot on a broken bottle, probably the one that she had thrown earlier that night. After a minute the pain went away and she started dancing around again, forgetting the pain. Someone came up from behind her and touched her shoulder and she whipped around and fell straight to the ground and she started laughing. “Oh my god, Lisa, you scared me,” Kennedy laughed out, but not recognizing that she had fallen to the ground.
“Kennedy, are you alright?” Lisa asked, concerned about how much Kennedy had drunk. Lisa leaned forward and stuck her hand out to Kennedy to help her up which Kennedy took thankfully.
“I’m fine, darling,” Kennedy said and looked up at the sky. “Have you ever realized how beautiful the stars are?” Kennedy asked in a daze.
Kennedy heard Lisa call for someone, but she had fallen back down and was staring up at the stars trying to make shapes out of them. The one good thing about Kennedy drinking was that she was a happy drunk – she wasn’t an angry, horny, and mean drunk. She was happy, loud, touchy feely, and just fun to be around – or she thought that she was fun to be around.
“What’s wrong with her?” Kennedy heard a male voice ask, but she couldn’t focus on who it was.
“I don’t know. I think she’s just really drunk,” Lisa said and Kennedy could make that out because Lisa was the only girl who Kennedy ever really hung out with.
“I don’t think so. I’ve seen her drunk before and she’s never acted like this. Do you think she could have been drugged?” asked a different male voice than the first one.
“I don’t think so. How would someone drug a beer without opening it for her? I haven’t seen her talk to anybody all night,” said the first male voice.
Kennedy was sick of people talking about her like she wasn’t there so she tuned them out and pretended not to be there. She started moving her arms and legs like she was making a snow angel, but instead a sand angel.
Next thing she knew, someone had made her wrap her arm around their shoulders and had placed their arm around her waist and yanked her off the ground. “I think I’m going to take her home,” the second male voice said, but Kennedy let her head flop back and rest on his shoulder so that she could keep staring at the stars.
The guy who was holding her started to walk and Kennedy could hear Lisa talking to the guy who was carrying her, but she couldn’t concentrate on what she was saying.
“Shut up for a second, Lisa,” the guy snapped at her and he stopped and put his other arm underneath her knees and swooped her up, literally sweeping her off her feet, and carried her wedding style, but she was still staring at the stars until she spotted the big dipper.
“Oh my god, I spotted the big dipper! Lisa, I spotted the big dipper! I’ve never been able to see it before,” Kennedy was really excited for the first part, but the last part she more just mused to herself than anything else.
“Good for you, honey,” Lisa said, but Kennedy could tell that Lisa wasn’t happy about something.
“Where are you taking me?” Kennedy asked in a childish voice to the man who was carrying her.
“To the car,” he answered in a strained voice.
“But I don’t want to leave, I love looking at the stars,” Kennedy informed him and that sent her into a fit of giggles. The guy ignored her, but then stopped and Lisa opened the car door for him and he put Kennedy into the passenger side of her car. “What are you doing?!” Kennedy demanded. “I just said I don’t want to go. I don’t want to leave!” Kennedy started screaming over and over again, but the guy shut the door and it muffled her screams.
He turned his attention to Lisa.
“Alex, I don’t want you to take her home,” Lisa told him with a serious face on and shaking her head.
“What would you rather me do, Lisa?” Alex asked her, leaning up against Kennedy’s car and crossing his arms over his chest.
“Have someone else take her home, Alex, like Jack or Zack – they know where she lives,” Lisa argued with him and stepped closer to him, placing her hand on his stomach.
“Jack is drunk and Zack’s only met her twice. I’m not drunk and I know how to take care of her. I’m going to take her home, Lisa, deal with it,” Alex said.
“She’s not your responsibility, Alex!” Lisa yelled at him, sending stray hairs all over the place.
“She’s my friend and that makes her my responsibility,” Alex told her, getting off the car and walking around to the driver’s side.
“Are you sure it’s because she’s your friend or because you’re still in love with her?” Lisa asked then gasped at her words and put her hand over her mouth.
Alex scrutinized her, “What are you talking about?” he asked, on the verge of opening the driver’s side door.
“I know about yours and Kennedy’s relationship, Alex, the one you had before she moved. You never told me. I knew that you guys dated, but I never knew the extent of it,” Lisa said to him in complete astonishment still that he hadn’t told her before Jack had to.
“I have the right to my privacy, Lisa,” Alex told her, “it just so happens that the parts of my life I didn’t want to be plastered all over the walls of the school involve this girl,” Alex indicated to Kennedy, who now had her knees to her chest and her head lopped against the window and was sleeping.
“That doesn’t matter, Alex, that’s not what I’m talking about. I’m talking about how completely in love with each other you were and how you would have pretty much done anything to be with her,” Lisa told him.
“Who told you all of this?” Alex asked, point blank.
“That doesn’t matter, Alex, and you know it,” Lisa told him, pointing her finger at him.
“Was it Jack? Or Rian?” Alex asked, getting upset that the only people who he told had gone to his girlfriend because they were scared that he couldn’t control himself around Kennedy.
“He told me how you tried to find her,” Lisa said, her eyes wide like Bambie’s after he found out his mother had been shot.
Alex’s eyes widened in shock. “That was all before I met you, Lisa,” Alex told her, his voice getting softer now.
“That doesn’t matter, what matters is that you hid it from me,” Lisa told him.
“Lisa, I don’t have the patience to deal with this right now. Kennedy needs to go home and I’m going to take her there,” he told Lisa gently even though he felt like screaming on the inside.
“Can I ask you one last thing?” Lisa asked, looking down at the sand she was standing on.
Alex let out a deep sigh; “Go ahead,” he permitted.
“Why didn’t you go and get her after you found out where she was?” Lisa asked him, looking up and looking him dead in the eye.
“Because she left, disconnected her phone, and cut off all ties with us for a reason. She obviously didn’t want to be found, so I let her be,” Alex told her, now his turn to look down at the ground.
“You should have told me,” Lisa commented.
“Why? It was before I met you and I don’t exactly enjoy bringing up my ex girlfriends with girls that I’m dating,” Alex snapped at her.
Lisa was silent for a moment, “Because she was important to you,” was all she said before walking away. Alex watched her walk away for a minute before getting in Kennedy’s car and digging though her pockets trying to find her keys. Alex didn’t even think about going through her purse until he saw it on the ground. He grabbed it and rummaged through it. His heart sank when he found numerous amounts of condoms in there, but he suppressed it and put the keys in the ignition.
Alex drove for the next half hour or so in complete silence to Kennedy’s house. He kept trying not to think about how many condoms were in her purse or how many she could have possibly used that night with how completely out of it she was, but it was hard. The thoughts just kept trickling into his head and he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
He tried not to be mad about the condoms because he knew that it was unfair to her that she wasn’t allowed to have sex with other guys when he was having sex with her and another girl, often in the same days – if not minutes apart from each other. But every time he thought about another guy touching her or kissing her he just wanted to hit something.
When they made it to her house, Alex noticed that Kennedy’s mom, Lorelei’s, car wasn’t there and it made Alex feel even luckier. He walked over to the other side of the car and got Kennedy out the same way he had put her in and he carried her up the walkway to her house and unlocked the door and carried her wedding style up to her room then gently set her down on her bed.
Alex sat on the chair in Kennedy’s room and just watched her sleep. He pursed his lips, deciding about what to do about their relationship and his and Lisa’s relationship because now that Jack had told Lisa everything it was going to make it a little more difficult to find time to be alone with her.
He brushed his shaggy brown hair out of his eyes and closed his eyes, picturing how Kennedy had looked before she moved to New York; long, thick, curly hair that made its way down her back, paler, and he was pretty sure that Kennedy had lost a bit of weight from when he last saw her because her boobs had gotten smaller and her curves less pronounced.
He walked over to Kennedy’s bedside and brushed her now short, straight her out of her face so that he could get a better look at the girl he was so in love with. “Why did you cut it?” he asked her even though he knew that she couldn’t hear him. “It was always one of my favorite things to grab onto while we were having sex,” he said again and let out a little laugh.
Kennedy let out an uneasy breath and Alex wondered what she was dreaming about. Kennedy shook her head slightly and took her free hand and placed it on top of Alex’s. “Alex,” she whispered then turned in the opposite direction.
Alex had originally intended to just take her home and then go back to his own house so that Lisa wouldn’t be suspicious had she chosen to check up on him, but looking at Kennedy now, he decided that he couldn’t leave her.
He stripped down into nothing but his boxers and helped Kennedy take off all her clothes but the tank top she’d been wearing and the underwear she had on.
Alex turned off her lights and walked stealthily over to her bed and slid in right behind her and wrapped his arm around her waist so that he was spooning with her.
“Is that you, Alex?” Kennedy asked in a whisper and her eyes still shut, but she placed her hand on Alex’s arm that was wrapped tightly around her.
“Yeah, I’m here,” he whispered back and nuzzled into her a bit, earning a little laugh from Kennedy. Alex’s other arm was underneath Kennedy’s neck and she was playing with their intertwined fingers.
“I thought you wouldn’t come back with me,” she confided in him and Alex could tell that she was still a little off and that in the morning she wouldn’t remember a word of this conversation.
“I’m right here,” he said as though it were proof itself that he would always come home with her.
“I was kind of worried you’d choose to sleep with Lisa tonight,” she told him, eyes still closed.
Alex let in a sharp breath. “I will always choose to sleep with you, remember that,” Alex told her.
“Um ‘kay,” she said and then Alex knew she was already back asleep.
He kissed the most sensitive part on her neck and whispered, “I love you,” in her ear.