Call It Karma

“What you don’t trust me?” John said with a big, mischievous smile on his lips, holding his hand out to Elliot who was nervously crouched lower towards the ground. She twisted her lip, she knew this was a trick question, because if she didn’t admit she didn’t trust him she’d have to take the leap. If she did, well, that was another issue all together. She placed one hand over her rapidly beating heart and extended her right one elegantly and nervously towards John’s.

“Don’t worry, I do this all the time,” John tried to soothe her nerves. Elliot’s feet were beginning to burn from the black asphalt composite that had absorbed the sun’s scorching heat. She tried to straighten her stance as John readjusted his grip on her hand so their fingers were intertwined. “Elle, trust me,” He stopped and turned, gently caressing her cheek with his free hand and looking her straight in the eyes with such conviction she instantly did.

Elliot took a sharp breath and nodded her head meekly. “Fine, I trust you,” She admitted quietly, her cheeks a bright pink from both the light sunburn she had acquired from being out in the sun and from blushing. John’s smile immediately doubled and he looked so happy, the wind seemed stronger out here as her hair blew wildly. She looked over the ledge to see all their friends standing around expectantly.

“Come on, Elle! You can do it!” Jared called out, cupping his hands into a makeshift megaphone before returning his arm around a smiling blonde also clapping and cheering her on.

“John, if I die, I will come back as a ghost to haunt and cock block you for the rest of your life, I swear,” Elliot threatened, but it only evoked a soft, raspy chuckle from the tall lanky boy next to her.

“Noted, all right. Let’s do this,” He said, leading her to the edge of the roof overlooking the pool. “On three, okay? One, two, three!”

Elliot didn’t have time to be nervous as she lunged off the roof, squeezing John’s hand tightly as she enjoyed practically five-seconds of free falling until the water tension broke under her butt. She winced at the slapping pain before she opened her eyes underwater to see John’s Cheshire cat grin as they both floated up gasping for air. Her blood was racing through her veins due to the adrenaline and she couldn’t keep the big, stupid smile off her face.

“See, I told you there was nothing to wo-” John began saying until Elliot pressed her lips to his, both of them treading water in the deep end of Jared’s pool. It seemed appropriate that people were cheering, Elliot pulled back and smiled bashfully at John.

“That was fun, taking the leap with you,” Elliot whispered before swimming over to the side of the pool. Where Dahlia, Jared’s girlfriend, was waiting for her with a big margarita. Sophie and Eric were with Kennedy’s dad and Elliot’s mom for the day. To see Madison taking shots with the rest of the group and a big white flower clipped into her hair and her long blonde hair hanging carelessly reminded Elliot that they really were just twenty-two.

“Kennedy, your turn bud!” John called out, smoothing out his wet hair with his hands after he reached a depth in the pool he could stand on.

“No, no, no, I got kids man. I can’t be jumping off the roof,” Kennedy shook his head vehemently. Elliot chuckled as she sat dipping her feet into the water next to Dahlia both of them in bandeau bikinis, Dahlia’s a light purple and Elliot’s a mint green. John and Jared thought they looked like an advertisement.

“I’ll do it with you,” Madison pipped up, finally something separating her from the makeshift bar that Jared had set up in the backyard near the barbecue and a giant cooler full of beer.

“Do it!” Both Elliot and Dahlia cheered loudly, but barely audible among the other party guests. Elliot stood up looking around for her sunglasses as the descending Arizona sun seemed to glare right in her eyes. She found them inside, it was eerily quiet in the house, Elliot looked around feeling as if something wasn’t right. She heard a thud from a back room and her adrenaline heightened as every hair on her body began to stand. She walked as quietly as she could towards the door and found John standing through the threshold and she let out a yelp.

“What’s wrong?” John asked before Elliot placed her index finger, to gesture for him to be quiet. John straightened up his back and stood protectively in front of her as another thud came from the back room. It didn’t make any sense because the bathroom was in the front hallway. John grabbed a golf club from Jared’s golf bag and held it like a baseball bat.

“John, maybe we should get Jared,” Elliot whispered so quietly she didn’t even think John could hear her, but he shook his head and continued forward as the thud and shuffling sounds got louder and louder. Elliot was convinced that her heart was beating loudly enough that whoever was making the noise would hear them coming. They stood facing a white door realizing that the sounds were coming from behind the door. John’s hand reached for the door and Elliot reached to keep him from opening it.

“What if there’s a criminal behind that door and, like, he has a gun or something?” Elliot whispered at the same level again, her eyes large and a worried frown on her lips. John rolled his eyes and pushed the door open only to see their friend Max with a blonde underneath him. Elliot’s eyes grew wider and her eyebrows furrowed, unsure of what to do. She looked away and flapped her hands awkwardly, motioning for John to close the door, but couldn't form the words on her lips.

“Oh shit, I am so sorry!” John immediately apologized, his hand dropping the silver driver and clasping his hands over his eyes like a little kid. John closed the door before hearing a couple of shrill yells from the blonde and Max arguing back. Elliot rushed out towards the kitchen, John hot on her tail and she barely made it into the room before she broke out laughing.

“Oh my goodness,” Elliot laughed, letting her rest on John’s shaking chest, his laughs almost harder than hers. Elliot shut her eyes and let the relief, embarrassment and sheer awkwardness of the situation out with her laughter, John wrapped his arms around her tightly as they started laughing in sync.

“Never did I think I would see that much of Max again,” John muttered between laughs. This peaked Elliot’s interest as her head perked up like a meerkat in the Kalahari Desert.

“Again?” She twisted one corner of her lip into a smirk.

“Again? No, I definitely said ever,” John laughed off with a denial and coyness that caused Elliot to laugh even harder until tears came leaking out the side of her eyes. Soon enough both of their laughed began to slow and the familiar ache of their abdominal muscles hindered their ability to laugh harder. Elliot smiled after a moment of silence came and she studied John’s face, he looked older now that she actually looked at him. “What?” He asked interrupting her observations and a blush crept on her cheeks again.

“Nothing, you look sunburned,” Elliot lied, a giant smile on her lips giving away how happy she was with him. It was a lightheartedness that reminded her of when they were young and didn’t even know how young they actually were. She pressed her lips to his chastely and ran her fingers through her damp hair, walking towards the door.

John stared at her walking away, there was an expectation lurking the corner of his mind, it was just waiting for him to wake up and realize that this was all a dream. Elliot and his relationship, her words to him, everything. He bit his lip and tasted a familiar metallic taste in his mouth and smiled before running back outside.

The Arizona sunset had turned the horizon into a vivid watercolor, with shades of pink, oranges, purples and dark blue streaking the sky. The mountains seemed to turn a lavender color with them, John turned to look over towards Elliot, who was now sitting between Madison and Dahlia laughing with drinks in their hands, and frowned. She was beautiful and fleeting just like the sunsets.

“JohnO,” Kennedy slapped John’s back and a sharp pain followed, he realized Elliot had been right and he was indeed sunburned.

“What?” John hissed with his teeth clenched together, he snatched Kennedy’s red solo cup and took a swing feeling the faint burn of alcohol on his tongue.

“Dude, don’t do that thing where you think too much about the past,” Kennedy raised an eyebrow as John passed the cup back. John tilted his head as his brow wrinkled with thought.

“I’m not thinking too much,” John muttered back, still bitter about the back slap on his burn and he didn’t want to talk to Kennedy about Elliot. After all, it was his fault she and John had broken up, he had his facts wrong.

“Whatever you say,” Kennedy’s voice stiffened from this cold attitude John was giving, Kennedy withdrew and walked over to Madison, “Come on, baby, we have dinner at my dad’s,” he said as he helped her up, Madison clearly buzzed to say the least. Elliot smiled as Madison placed a kiss on both Elliot and Dahlia’s foreheads before waving to random party guests.

“Be safe you guys!” Elliot called out raising her glass.

“If they were safe they wouldn’t have had two kids!” Someone called out from a mass of guys chortling like thirteen-year-olds at a “That’s what she said” joke, Elliot rolled her eyes and saw John’s eyes fixated on the colors in the sky and she walked over to him, gently stroking his arm.

“What’s up, chicken butt?” She joked, nudging him gently with her shoulder, a giant childish smile on her lips.

“I love you,” John pronounced as if he was partially amazed and partially surprised himself. Elliot’s breath was sucked from her lungs from surprise and her face looked as if he had jumped from the bushes scaring her half to death. It wasn’t the words that scared her, she had heard ‘I love you’ before. From her parents, from her friends and from guys that wanted something or just as an expression, but this wasn’t that type of ‘I love you’. This was the type of ‘I love you’ that someone said to another person that meant ‘You are everything to me and I want to spend the rest of my life with you’, Elliot stared vacantly at him. She waited for him to take the words back or apologize, but he didn’t his eyes stayed on hers.

John’s breathing had nearly stopped, his heard was pounding against his ribcage as he waited in anticipation, those words weren’t even the ones he meant to say. He was going to give her some bullshit response and change the subject, but those damn words plagued his mind. The dreams he had about her and the way that she smiled at him never left his mind.

“Um…” Elliot murmured.