Go Around

It was eight o’clock and Kennedy was sitting at her kitchen table in the deafening silence and staring and pieces of paper strewn about her table.
They had all come in the mail around the same time, just a few weeks after she had moved back to Maryland, and she had yet to open any of them. She didn’t want to know what colleges thought of her.
There were seven in all and they all lay in a straight line across her table, none of them more than half a centimeter apart from one another. She took a deep breath and grabbed the envelope furthest to her left.
Brown University; Rhode Island. She took another deep breath, shut her eyes and tore open the top of the envelope. She pulled out the paper and she lay in on the table in front of her, eyes still shut and she opened them and slowly read the letter. Brown University: rejected. A frown made itself blaintenly apparent on her face, but she quickly crumpled up the paper and tossed it aside and into the kitchen. She knew that one of these colleges had to accept her and if Brown wasn’t one of the Ivy’s that she got into then that was fine, but she knew she had to get into at least one Ivy League.
She grabbed the next envelope furthest to her left and bit her bottom lip. Yale; Connecticut. That was one she didn’t know if she was quite ready to open yet. She shook the thought of her head. She shut her eyes once again and tore open the top of the envelope and set the piece of paper on the table and opened one eye before she opened the other and she let out a little scream. Yale: accepted. She smiled to herself, knowing that she had earned this. She set the piece of paper on top of the envelope and set it above all of the other unopened envelopes.
She grabbed the furthest to the right now, just to spice it up a little bit. University of Southern California, USC; California. She knew that she was going to have the same procedure for the entire thing, but she shut her eyes again and her heart started to quicken. She’d never been to California, but it had always been a dream of hers to go. She tore open the envelope and pulled out the sheet of paper and set it on her table and she looked at it and quickly scanned it over. USC: accepted. A smile crossed her lips again and she was beginning to feel a little more positive. She set the piece of paper on top of the envelope and set it on top of Yale’s.
She grabbed the next furthest to the right and let her head flop back and she stared at the ceiling for a minute, debating whether or not she really wanted to do this now. She’d always opened three; she didn’t see why she needed to open the rest. She drew in a deep breath and focused. Harvard; Massachusetts. She shut her eyes and opened the envelope and took out the piece of paper and set it on top of the table and put her hands on her lap. She opened her eyes and let out a small breath. Harvard: rejected. She crumpled up the paper and threw it into the kitchen like she’d done with the last one. She had been accepted to exactly half of the schools of the envelopes she’d opened. She was about to cry, but she shook it off again and just grabbed the next one furthest to the left.
Princeton; New Jersey. She opened the envelope, without shutting her eyes this time and just set the paper on the table before she read it. Princeton: accepted. She smiled again, but she still wasn’t as happy as she would have been had she not opened that stupid Harvard letter. She set the paper on top of the envelope and set it on top of USC’s envelope. She grabbed the one on the right.
New York University; New York. She tore off the top and set the paper on the table and read it thoroughly. NYU: rejected. She couldn’t believe that she had been rejected to go to NYU, if the Olsen twins could get in then why couldn’t she? She crumpled up the paper and threw it as hard as she could.
Last but not least, Columbia; New York. She opened this last one and set the paper on the table and read it. Columbia: accepted. A smile spread across her face and she let out a scream and jumped up from her table and started jumping around her dining room. She already knew which one she was going to go to.
Some snuck up behind her and threw their arms around her waist and picked her up and twirled her around. She let out a couple of screams, a few ‘put me down’s, but she mostly giggled and when he set her down she knew who it was. She twirled around and saw Alex standing there in skinny jeans, a band t-shirt, his hair straight and all over the place but mostly in his face and her favorite crooked smile playing itself across his lips. She smiled at him and threw herself at him and wrapped her arms around his neck and at first he was a little surprised, but he hugged her back.
She was so short compared to him that she had to stand on her tippy tippy toes and he had to lean downward for them to be able to do anything. “Hello to you, too,” Alex said with a laugh in his voice.
Kennedy laughed and drew back from their spontaneous hug and when she looked at him she couldn’t get over the fact that he was hers – he loved her and only her and vice versa.
“Sorry,” she said and let out a little laugh, “how are you?” she asked, biting her bottom lip and trying to block all the envelopes sitting on her table because she wasn’t ready to face the fact that no matter what college she went to she would end up losing Alex again.
“I’m good, how are you?” he asked, slouching back against her wall.
“I’m fine. Did you enjoy your time with Lisa?” she asked him even though she really didn’t want to know the answer.
“Eh, kind of I guess,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders.
“Why just ‘eh’?” she asked, curious as to what could possibly go wrong with perfect little Lisa.
“Well, she made me watch this really stupid romantic comedy movie and I wanted to see the new action flick that just came out, you know, the one with Bruce Willis?” he told her, giving her his puppy dog eyes.
She let out a roar of laughter, “I am not going to feel bad for you because your girlfriend made you go with her to see a chick flick,” she told him and scoffed while looking at the other side of the wall.
“But you would never make me do that,” he told her, getting himself off the wall and strutting over to her and placing his hands on her hips. She giggled.
“I would never make you, but I know that you’re nice enough to let me watch my chick flicks if I’m really nice about it,” she told him and he dropped his forehead down to touch hers. She shut her eyes and breathed in his scent.
“We both know that if you had been the one to go to the theatre with me today that we would have seen the action movie,” he told her.
“Of course we would have because Bruce Willis is fucking awesome, but what I’m saying is if there was a chick flick that I really wanted to see then you would let me see it – I wouldn’t have to brow beat you into it,” she told him as he snaked his arms around her waist.
“That’s true, I would let you see it because I love to see you happy,” he told her and she smiled.
“You don’t like to see Lisa happy?” she asked and she immediately regretted it. She hated bringing Lisa up because it made everything awkward.
His face fell, “Not as much as I like to see you happy,” he told her honestly and she gave him a shy smile and he smiled with her. He moved his arms up around her shoulders and pulled her into a hug. She was a ways below his chin, but she hit his chest perfectly and he just hugged her and they stood there for a minute.
She felt his head move to one side. “What are all those?” he asked and her eyes widened.
She pulled away from him and licked her lips slowly and he looked down at her with his eyebrows knitted together in confusion. “Kennedy, what are all those papers?” he asked her again, this time using his hand to indicate to the pile of letters stacked upon envelopes.
“Um, I was going to wait to talk to you about this…” she said more to herself than to him.
“Why? Let’s talk about whatever this is now,” he told her. She wasn’t sure if he genuinely had no idea that it was college letters or if he was just mad at her for not telling him about her college plans.
“Okay,” she whispered and crossed her arms across her chest while she leaned up against the table. “Well, of course I applied to a few colleges and -” Kennedy started but Alex cut her off.
“Those are college letters?” he asked, backing further away from her but not far enough to make her feel paranoid.
“Yeah, they are,” she told him, looking at the ground, “I was going to talk to you about it when I made up my mind about which one I wanted to go to,” she told him.
“So you are going to go to college?” he asked her, almost perplexed.
She raised an eyebrow, “Of course I’m going to college. I didn’t work my ass off in high school and get good grades so that I wouldn’t go to a college. I’m going to go, I just don’t know which one yet,” she lied. She knew, but she didn’t want to talk to Alex about it ever because he already had hard feelings about her leaving.
“Of course I expected you to go, I just didn’t know it would be this soon,” he told her.
“Well, you still have a few months with me before I have to go anywhere,” she told him and looked up at him from underneath her eyelashes.
He let out a deep breath, “Where did you apply to?” he asked, making an obvious attempt to not seem as disappointed as he was.
“Um, I applied to Brown, Yale, USC, NYU, Columbia, Princeton, and Harvard,” she told him, trying to remember which ones she had applied to.
“Wow, getting a lot of the Ivy’s out of the way, huh?” he asked with a little laugh and his crooked smile which did nothing but make Kennedy’s stomach flutter.
“Well, you know me,” she told him with a little laugh.
“That I do,” he told her with a knowing nod. “So where all did you get into?” he asked her, trying to act happy for her that she had applied to colleges. Everybody had applied to colleges except for him; Jack, Rian, and Zack had all gotten acceptance letters from somewhere, but Alex just knew that college was not the way for him and none of them resented him for it or told him otherwise. Neither Jack, Rian, or Zack had decided to go to college though – they’re band was finally taking off and that was the only way they were going to get what they wanted.
“I got into Yale, USC, Princeton, and Columbia,” she told him, thinking of it in the order she opened all the envelopes.
“Wow, you got into three Ivy’s,” he told her, sounding impressed.
She smiled a victory smile, “I know, I’m so happy Alex,” she told him and threw her arms around him again and he hugged her back even though the thought that she was going to move somewhere else and he would lose her again was entering his head.
“I’m happy and proud of you, Kenne,” he whispered in her ear and she smiled.
“Thank you, Alex,” she told him, pulling away from him and looking him in the eye.
“For what? I didn’t do anything,” he told her, grabbing her hand and leading her out of the dining room and into the family room where they plopped down side-by-side on the couch.
“Of course you did. You did a lot by just being there for me,” she told him, resting her head on his chest.
“Well, I am very good at that,” he joked and she giggled.
“I’m serious. You kept me sane,” she told him, looking up at him.
“I didn’t keep you sane while you were in New York,” he pointed out and her smile fell from her face.
“No, but I thought of you a lot so I guess that kept me sane. God knows that New York is not a sane place so therefore you had to be what kept me grounded,” she told him and it was so preposterous that he just had to laugh. It was a hearty laugh, one of the ones where you have to throw your head back and just let it out.
After he was done laughing she got off the couch and walked up the stairs and to her room, him following shortly behind. “Are you mad at me?” he asked her, shutting her door quietly behind the two of them.
“No, I just needed you to willingly follow me up here,” she told him and gave him a mischievous smile and he shook his head.
“Why’d you need me up here?” he asked and laid down on her bed with his both of his hands behind his head in blowjob position – that was Kennedy’s word for it.
She walked over to him and laid down next to him and cuddled up to his chest, “Tell me you’ll spend the night with me tonight,” she told him, playing with the hem of his shirt even though she knew it irritated him.
He let out a little laugh and his crooked smile played on his lips. He wrapped his arms around her and kissed the top of her head, “I wouldn’t try to tell you any differently,” he told her and she nodded. “Oh, did you go and see Jack today?” he asked, the thought popping into his head.
Her eyes widened and her heart quickened, “Yeah, we talked,” she told him, trying to act nonchalant, but failing miserably.
“Did you guys kiss and make up, so to speak?” he asked her enjoying his pun.
“Yeah, we made up,” she told him, trying to be as short as possible to make him want to change the subject to something she didn’t have to hide.
“Kennedy?” he asked in an accusing tone.
“Yeah?” she asked, pursing her lips together.
“What aren’t you telling me?” he asked her.
“Nothing, I told you I went there, we talked, we made up and that’s that,” she told him quickly and he could tell that something was wrong because she never talked that quickly unless she was lying.
“Kennedy,” he slowly and in a warning tone, “what aren’t you telling me?” he asked her, looking her dead in the eye after taking her by her shoulders and moving her so that they were both sitting up.
“I can’t tell you Alex,” she said slowly, trying to look away from his eyes.
“Kennedy, I love you and I trust you. I tell you everything but you can’t tell me this one little thing?” he asked her and she could tell that he was playing her just because he wanted to know what his best friend hadn’t told him but had told her instead.
“I promised,” she whispered to him and he still held her by the shoulders.
“Do you love me?” he asked and he knew that this was going to be a low blow.
“You know I do,” she told him.
“Then tell me. If you truly love me you’ll tell me,” he told her, sounding confident.
Her face looked devastated. “Fine,” she said getting irritated, “you really want to know? Jack and Lisa fucked last night at her place,” she spat at him and it took a minute for the news to register to him, but when it did he was livid.
“He fucked my girlfriend?” he asked and Kennedy could tell that he was trying to contain his anger, but his use of the word girlfriend really irritated her for some reason.
“So she’s the one you love and get jealous over when she cheats on you but you love me when she’s just waiting patiently on the side lines for you?” Kennedy asked getting defensive and getting off her bed.
“Kennedy that’s not how I meant it. Even though I love you she is still, technically, my girlfriend,” he told her, back peddling.
“You have no right to get angry, Alex. You’ve been cheating on Lisa with me for almost three months but when she’s with someone who loves her back then you get angry and possessive,” she stated it rather than questioned it because she knew it would irk him.
“That’s not it, Kennedy! God damn. I feel betrayed by my best friend because even if he hadn’t known about you and me, he still would have had sex with her and she and I are dating,” he yelled at her.
Kennedy put her hands on her hips, “I’m not going to take your side on this. Jack is in love with Lisa like you are with me, maybe not as intensely as we are but he’s still in love with her nonetheless, and I’m sure that she will love him, too if she doesn’t already. Everybody could be happy Alex; you and I together and Lisa and Jack together – that way everybody gets love,” she told him even though she knew she was living in a dream world.
“He is my best friend, Kenne,” he said the words slowly.
“I’m a good friend of Lisa’s. If you want to use it that way then I’m betraying her by fucking you,” Kennedy threw her point out there.
“You were mine first!” he yelled at her and stood up from her bed, towering over her.
“First of all, I am nobodies, and second of all if you’re going to get angry over this then I suggest we stop whatever it is we’re doing because if you thinks it’s wrong for them to have sex once, on a one night stand, then you obviously you must think it’s an atrocity that we’ve been having sex at least 4 times a week for three months,” she told him. Most girls didn’t know how to stand their ground against Alex because he was charming and cute and most girls just gave in, but Kennedy fought for what she believed in.
He let out a sigh, “Fine, I’ll let it go and I won’t mention anything about it, but I don’t want it to happen again,” he told her, sitting back down on her bed.
She smiled, “I can’t stop them, but from the looks if it Jack didn’t think that it would happen again,” Kennedy told him.
“Okay,” he said, “come lay down with me,” he asked her and laid down on her bed and she followed suit.
She cuddled up to his chest and nuzzled her head against his neck which was one of his tickle spots so he sputtered out laughter.
“I love you,” she told him, shutting her eyes.
“Oh, Kenne, I love you, too,” he told her back.
“I know,” she told him and he smiled.
“You know that I do want you to go to college and I want you to have a career and everything else you’ve worked hard for, right?” he asked her, holding her in his arms.
“I know,” she told him.