Fact and Fate

“Austin!” She giggled as she twirled in a circle around him. “Austin, come dance with me.”

He grabbed the petite brunette by the waist in an attempt to stop her spinning. The spinning that was rapidly making him dizzy as he tried to keep his eyes locked on hers. “Lily, you’re going to fall on your ass.” He laughed, tightening his grip on her hips, but she protested.

“I’m fine. Now, come dance with me.” She fell into his embrace then, the alcohol in her system causing her to loose her balance as Austin had expected it would. She giggled again as she tried to stand straight, failing miserably.

“Nope.” Austin laughed in her ear gruffly, his mustache tickling the skin there. “I think you’ve had enough dancing for the night.” He led her to the doorway, grabbing his keys from the nearby table as he called out goodbyes to his friends.

“Where are we going Austin? The party’s back there.” She twisted in his grip, trying to point at the house to his back but lost her balance again, twisting on her heel. Austin easily caught the girl, pulling her into his chest.

He chuckled again, looking down at his inebriated girlfriend. “And that, my friend, is why I’m taking you home.”

“No! I can’t go home like this,” Lily cried. “My mom’ll kill me!”

Austin simply shook his head, a smile on his lips, as he sat the thin-framed girl in the front seat of his rusted, beat-up two door; the fact that she hadn’t lived with her parents for a few years humoring him. By the time he rounded the hood and opened the driver’s side door, Lily was passed out, her head leaning heavily on the passenger door.

Austin sighed as he sat in the car, watching the girl he had grown so attached to with a smile on his face. “What am I going to do with you?” he muttered to himself before starting the engine and driving home.

**

“Amber? Are you home?” Lily called into the small apartment that her best friend never locked. When she didn’t receive an answer, Lily fell onto Amber’s couch, instantly reaching for the pack of cigarettes left on the coffee table.

She lit the stick, inhaled, and watched as the smoke billowed around her with her exhale. “John is a bad influence on you,” her friend’s voice called as the redhead walked from the hall, past the living room, and into the kitchen.

Lily laughed. “We smoked together way before John even started smoking,” she countered.

“But back then you thought it was a nasty habit and constantly whined about how we should quit.” Amber came back into the living room and sat next to her best friend. “How is your man candy anyway?”

Lily scrunched up her nose. “Why do you still call him that? It’s gross.”

“Because he is a man, and candy for my eyes. Yum,” she hummed.

“Okay. No.”

Amber smiled crookedly. “Oh, come on. You can’t tell me you don’t think JohnO is sexy.”

“Yes I can. ‘Cause he isn’t.”

Amber laughed haughtily. “Uh, huh. Now say that again without lying.”

Lily scoffed. “I’m not lying!” At her friend’s quirked eyebrow, Lily recanted. “Okay, fine, he’s sexy. You happy?”

“No, now you need to confess that you want him to bone you.”

Lily raised her hand in front of her face. “Now, stop right there. We’re just friends, Am. And I have a boyfriend, remember? Don’t cross the line.”

“Just friends my ass. He wants to bone you just as much as you want him to.” Lily smacked Amber’s arm, shaking her head as she tried to think of anything other than John or his body.

**

“Do you and Lily do the dirty? You know, now that you’re living together and all?”

Austin shook his head. “I don’t think that’s any of your business.”

“Yeah, so?”

“Dude, I’m not going to talk to you about mine and Lily’s sex life,” Austin retorted. He pulled a beer from the cooler at their feet, bringing it to his lips after popping the top.

“So you do have a sex life?” John teased as he copied his friend’s actions. Austin laughed, shaking his head.

They drank in silence, looking up at the star filled sky from atop the cliff they frequently visited. The view of the desert below was a sight John was thankful for growing up with, and one that Austin was slowly becoming attached to. The two boys hadn’t known each other long, but had formed an easy friendship around music, friends, and more importantly, Lily.

Lily and John had gone to high school together and hung around the same circles. Their friendship was convenient if not inevitable. She thought he understood her unlike anyone else. Well, anyone other than Amber.

And Lily had met Austin at a party shortly after he moved to Arizona. Being new to her city, she offered to show him around and formed a bond with the scruffy stranger over four am drinks in the desert and conversation that didn’t seem like it would ever end.

They didn’t keep in touch after that first night, simply because when she woke up, alone in her car that was still parked in the desert, there was no sign that the stranger had even been there. But a week or so later, their paths crossed again. She had wandered up to John, throwing her arm over his shoulder as she drunkenly slumped into his side. John attempted to introduce the two, only to find out that they had already met.

And, as they say, the rest was history. Austin and Lily began dating, and the three became friends—John and Lily closer than they were before.

**

“John, get your ass back here!” Lily yelled as she chased after the shirtless boy, holding both arms over her chest as she attempted to cover her exposed breasts.

“Not yet, Lil,” John called back. “You need to finish the dare.”

Lily sighed as she stopped running after the taller boy. Noticing this, John stopped too, still far enough ahead of Lily that she wouldn’t be able to catch him if she decided to pick up the chase again. “You’re so irritating, John.”

“But you love me.” He smirked, knowing that she was never really mad at him. “Now, drop those arms and do those jumping jacks.”

Lily glared evilly through the dark, wishing she could burn him with her gaze. “This is so degrading, you know that?” John nodded, waiting. After a moment of silence between the two friends, Lily huffed, her arms falling to her side. “You are never to speak of this moment again, you hear me?”

John nodded, gulping visibly as his eyes were drawn to her exposed chest. Lily sighed and started jumping slowly, attempting to keep her breasts from bouncing too much. John whistled at the sight.

When she had done five and a half jumping jacks, Lily crossed her arms over her chest once more. “Now, can I have my shirt back?”

“That was only five,” John stated, though he walked back toward the girl. “You owe me five more.”

Lily rolled her eyes. “Five’s all your getting. Now give me my damn shirt back.”

“Touchy,” he teased as he handed her the thin fabric.

She slipped the tank over her head and brushed her grown-out bangs from her face. “Another round?” she asked as she slipped under John’s arm. He chuckled, agreeing as they walked back to the towel spread out on the sand.

John popped the top off a longneck bottle and passed it to Lily as she leaned back on her elbows. “You not having another?” she asked, noticing his drink free hands.

He shook his head. “Someone has to drive us back to civilization.”

“Who says we have to go back? Let’s just stay out here.” Lily set her bottle to the side and lay back, taking in the stars. “Can’t we just lay here forever?”

John smiled at the girl beside him. “Sure,” he mumbled. Lying inches away from her, he turned his head to watch her, only to find her watching him. “What?” he questioned quietly.

She turned onto her side, her fingers dancing along his arm. “How long have we known each other, John?”

His eyebrows bunched together in confusion. “A while. Why?”

“Would you call us friends?” she continued with her questions, ignoring his.

“Yeah. What are you getting at, Lil?”

Again, she ignored him. “And would you say we’re close?”

John slid his elbows beneath him as he sat up slowly. “Seriously, Lily, what’re you getting at?”

Instead of answering, in one fluid motion, she sat up, tossing her leg over John’s lap as she straddled him. Her hands rested on his shoulders and before he could react, she pressed her lips to his.

John could taste the latest beer on her lips as he kissed her back, his hands moving to grab hold of her hips, unconsciously grinding her pelvis into his own. Lily let out a moan at the friction created and deepened the kiss. Her hands ran over John’s neck, and through the short, freshly cut locks of his hair.

She let his hands roam up her sides, over the waistband of her jean shorts, dragging the thin fabric of her cotton tee up her torso as his fingers danced along her soft skin. He pulled his lips from hers and attached them to her neck, sucking on the exposed flesh.

Lily couldn’t contain the moan that left her lips when John sucked harshly below her ear and throatily admitted, “God, you don’t know how long I’ve wanted to do that.” She just giggled, pushing at the boy’s chest. He fell onto the blanket, pulling her down with him. “You’re so beautiful, Lil.”

Her cheeks burned from the compliment and she tried to cover them with her hands but John pulled at her wrists. “Don’t hide from me.” He smirked at the faint pink across her neck and cheeks.

She smiled softly, shyly, before connecting their lips again in a new attempt to hide from John’s gaze. This time it worked, because John couldn’t resist her kisses, wondering why he hadn’t kissed her sooner.

John peeled Lily’s tank top from her body for the second time that night and reveled in the fact that she was comfortable enough with her body not to wear a bra beneath her oversized tank. It was sexy to him, so much so that he couldn’t contain his hips as they bucked upwards. Lily chuckled lightly as she kissed below John’s ear.

“Horny, are we?” He nodded, unable to speak as Lily’s hand wandered downwards. She unbuttoned his jeans easily and palmed his growing erection through his boxer-briefs. She hummed, still at his ear, as his head lolled back.

“Lil,” he gasped lowly. “You’re killing me.” He grasped her hips and ground their hips together, seeking the friction he was craving.

Lily smiled at the boy below her before a flashlight in the distance caught her eye. “What the fuck is going on?” the familiar voice called through the darkness. Lily covered her chest with one hand while shielding her eyes with the other as the light and owner of the voice came closer. She tried to scramble off John’s lap and search for her shirt, but in her panic, she couldn’t seem to do either.

John, though, could. He found the discarded shirt easily and handed it to Lily as he lifted her from his lap to sit beside him. He made fast work of buttoning his jeans just as the flashlight came to a standstill in front of them, glaringly bright in what was just complete darkness.

“Hey, man,” John greeted his friend, trying to act as if him and Lily weren’t just locked at the lips, half undressed.

“Don’t hey man, me,” he barked. “I asked what the fuck was going on.” He turned his glare from his friend to his girlfriend.

Lily jumped to her feet, reaching out to him. “Austin, it was nothing. We were just drinking,” she explained.

Austin laughed humorlessly. “Right, just drinking. What’s your story, bro?” he questioned John sarcastically. John gulped, but didn’t answer and Austin nodded. “Come on, Lily, let’s go.”

She glanced back at John, sending him a weak smile before nodding and following Austin down the path he had come moments before. They walked in silence, Lily a half step behind Austin. When he did speak again, it seemed too loud to Lily’s ears. “I don’t want you to see him again.”

Lily’s jaw dropped and her step faltered. “Excuse me?”

Austin didn’t miss a beat as he repeated himself. “I don’t want you to see him again.”

“You can’t do that!” She scoffed, coming to a complete standstill. “He’s my friend.”

“So, that’s what friends do these days?” he asked rhetorically.

She crossed her arms over her chest; not liking the look Austin was sending her. She felt as if she were one of those girls she used to make fun of with John. The ones who tried to sleep with any god-looking guy in sight. The ones who wore little to no clothing and didn’t even bother pretending to be interested in anything but sex—one of the girls that John and the guys used as a warm body. She didn’t think of herself as a warm body, and didn’t like being regarded as such.

“Stop being a jerk, Austin.” Sure, she knew that she was at fault here, but she couldn’t bring herself to apologize, because what she had done didn’t feel wrong, not while she was doing it, and certainly not now.

“You know what? Go. Go be with him. That’s what you want, right?”

“Austin—”

“Go!” he yelled in frustration. She flinched from his tone, her shoulders hunching as if they could protect her from his words. Austin sighed, his free hand jetting through his dark locks. And considerably calmer and lower, he said, “I kind of knew it all along. I don’t know why I’m so surprised.”

Lily’s eyebrows pulled do down and inward, confused by the change in Austin’s demeanor. “Wh-what are you talking about?”

“You and John. Anyone would have to be stupid not to realize you’re perfect for each other. And even dumber not to see the way he looks at you.”

“Austin, you’re confusing me. John doesn’t look at me any way.”

He laughed lowly. “Sure he does. I noticed it that first night at the party. He only had eyes for you. And he was jealous that you liked me.”

“Austin—” She moved closer to him, trying to lock her sparkling eyes on his.

“I shouldn’t have fooled myself into thinking I could stop him. I think I always knew you two would end up together.”

“Austin—” she tried again.

He smiled faintly at the girl as she tugged on his hand. “It’s okay, Lily. I get it. I’ll see you later.” He turned and continued walking, this time at a faster pace, toward the highway where his car was parked behind John’s pickup on the side of the road.

“Austin, wait!” Lily called, though she didn’t make a move to run after him. “What the hell just happened?” she asked herself as she sat down in the sand surrounded by darkness and a silence she had never heard before.

“You okay?” John’s voice called softly as he came to a stop. She nodded, a wordless response. John extended his hand. “Come on, I’ll take you home.”

She accepted his help as she got to her feet, letting her hand slip from his as she dusted the seat of her shorts. John began walking slowly, keeping Lily in his line of vision, but she stopped him with a hand on his arm. “Wait.”

He did as she requested, waiting patiently. “What was that back there?” She stuck a thumb over her shoulder as she spoke. John’s eyes followed the direction of her hand as if it would show him the answer.

Shrugging, he answered. “I’m sorry, Lily. I didn’t mean for things to get out of hand,” he started but stopped at her shaking head.

“You didn’t start it John, I did.”

“Yeah, but I shouldn’t have let it go so far. I should have stopped it. ”

Again, she was shaking her head. “I wouldn’t have wanted to. I wouldn’t have let you stop.”

“Lil, what are you talking about? What about Austin?”

She shrugged. “What about him?” When he didn’t respond, she changed her line of questioning. “John, can I ask you something?” Still confused, he nodded, waiting for her to make some sort of sense. “Do you like me?”

“What kind of question is that? Of course I like you, you’re my friend.”

“That’s not what I mean, John.” He knew what she meant, but was reluctant to answer truthfully. “Do you like me? ‘Cause I like you. Have ever since you got tongue-tied at Prom when my brother accused you of grabbing my ass.”

“I didn’t grab your ass!” he defended, smiling now.

Lily laughed. “I know.”

They stared at each other for what felt like minutes, though it was only a matter of seconds, before John closed the small space between the two. He cradled Lily’s cheek in his palm and brought his lips to hers softly. “Yes, I like you,” he breathed.

“Good. ‘Cause I’m pretty sure I just got kicked out and need a place to stay.” She smiled up at the boy she had secretly crushed on since high school, marveling at how even after staring at his eyes for years, she had never seen the look they held now. And she was determined to see it again.

“Come on, let’s go home.” He threaded his fingers with hers as he pulled her by his side and led them to his truck. This time, he wasn’t letting go. He wouldn’t let someone else come between them to sweep Lily off her feet. That was his job now.