You Make It Hard to Breathe

I was on the kitchen when I heard Kenny jogged downstairs. I was making sandwichs for lunch, and I hope Kenny didn’t mind about it. Kenny sat on the counter, picked an apple to his mouth. I served the plate of sandwich in the table, gave him the one with bacon on it.

“Thanks, Riley” He said in a mouth full of apple. After he was done with his apple, he grabbed his sandwich and brought it to his mouth with full bite. When he swallowed the sandwich, he was smiling widely, I stared at him in confuse.

“This—umh the best *gulp* sandwich ever!” He shouted, he brought my sandwich up in the air while he was pointing at it. My heart was beating faster, and blood was rushing to my cheeks. I had never got a compliment like that before. I only smiled at Kenny’s act.

“What’s wrong? Uh… I’m sorry, I should’ve not done that, but the sandwich is perfect, I swear!” He calmed down himself and sat down again. I shifted in my chair, and only staring at my sandwich.

“No no it’s cool, I just never had a compliment like that in ages” I chuckled, I felt Kenny’s eyes on mine. His eyes were in confused, I tried to catch up with my food.

“So Ken, you said earlier that you’re in a band, right?” I tried to break the awkward silence between us. He smiled proudly when I asked him that.

“Yeah it’s called The Maine, we’re still pretty small though” He grinned widely

“I’ve never heard about it, maybe I’ll google it later” I chuckled. We finished up our lunch in silent, probably because we didn’t know what we should talk about.

After lunch, we decided to watch movie. I sat next to Kenny, giving a lot of space between us. I didn’t know why I have to sat that far, I mean he’s my cousin right? “Why you sit that far? Do I look like a rapist or something? Come here, I don’t bite” He extended his arm to me, I scooted over awkwardly.

He put his arm around my shoulder, I leaned to his chest. I could even feel his heartbeat. My cheeks got really hot, my heart is pounding. I’ve never been this close to any boy. Any boy. I hurriedly pulled out from Kenny.

“Whoa whats wrong Riley? I’m sorry if I scare you” He looked at me in confused, maybe he thought he was doing something really wrong. Well, he didn’t do anything wrong, it was just me being so late-bloomers. Maybe I should tell Kenny the reason so he wouldn’t feel like I was insane.

“Uh… I’ve never been this close to a guy, I mean any guy…” He looked me in disbelief. “For a pretty young lady like you? You’ve got to be kidding” I shook my head.

“I’m a loner. I only have one friend, and it’s a girl. And one more, I’m socially awkward” I chuckled at the last part. I heard a knock on the door when Kenny actually wanted to say something. He sighed and I walked to open the door. The person behind the door keep banging faster and faster, I swear if they fasten their knock this door would be destroyed.
I opened the door and I saw four guys standing infront of the door. The long-haired one is might be the one who banged my door. The four pairs of eyes stared at me, I cleared my throat to get their attention.

“Uhm… Who are you?”

“You don’t know us?” Asked the tallest one. I shook my head. The long-haired guy and his friend with the red head put their hand in their chest dramatically.

“Well, I’m John. Those are Pat, Garrett, and Jared” I smiled and shook their hand one by one.

“Is Kennedy here?” Ask John again. I nodded and let the quartet in.

“Oh there you guys! I thought you’re gonna make it tomorrow” Kennedy suddenly appeared from the living room. All of them cheered and ran to Kennedy, giving him a group hug. I chuckled at that scene, it was cute.

After a several minutes of group hug, they pulled out. I went to the kitchen to take an apple juice for them. I opened the cabinet and searching for a glass, glad I found it quickly. After that I opened the fridge and took out the apple juice. I put the glasses and the apple juice in a tray and brought it to the living room.

“Guys here an apple juice” I put the tray in the table and I felt four pairs of eyes was staring at me. And I heard Kenny chuckled.

“Don’t eye-raped her guys, really. This is Riley, my cousin.” I smiled and waved to them.

“Finally she tells us her name!” Pat jumped from the couch and hug attacked me. I was taken back a little bit, I hugged him after a second of hesitation.

“Pat stop, I wanna hug her too!” Said the red haired, I guess he was Jared. Pat pouted and let go of me, he took a steps behind and let Jared hug me. “Nice to know you, Kiddo. Please don’t kill us if we are gonna to messed up your house” I chuckled at his comment. After a seconds, I pulled out a hug.

“Kenny, your cousin is a hot stuff” Said John, I wasn’t sure what to do with his words. I didn’t even know if that was a complement or not. “Cut it off, O’Callaghan” Kennedy nudged his shoulder, and John just laughed. I was in deep shades of red. I was out of my imagine that someone could call me pretty or hot or anything like that.

“No, Jeez I was kidding, Kenny. Please don’t get scared with me Riley, I’m not a pervert!” I titled my head up and looked at John. Shit, this guy was really tall! I smiled and I gathered my courage to hug him. I put my hand around his skinny body. And he gladly hugged me back.

“Don’t mess up my house please” I said after John pulled out the hug. “I won’t!” He chuckled and he pour the apple juice to his glass.
When I looked around, I saw the last guy with the copper messy hair. He sat at the farthest couch in the living room. His eyes glued on the phone. He seemed not happy right now, but I know I didn’t have a right to bother him now. But I wanted to be a good host to him.

I gathered my courage one more to approach him. I stood right in front of him. And he seemed realize that there was someone in front of him. He titled his head up. “Hi” It was the only thing I could say.

He just stared at me. Then its hit me, his eyes. His eyes like stared right into my soul. I felt my heart stopped for a second and I hardly can breathe. His eyes like an ocean in a sunny day, blue and shiny. Before I could get crazy, he was the one that broke the stares. He glued his eyes to his phone again.

I stood in confused, he was so rude, what have I done?

“I’m talking to you, you know…” I mumbled. He just nodded “I know”. I was taken aback with his action. Why did he had to be so rude? I didn’t want to get trouble with this, I turned around my heels and walk to my room.

He was so rude, Garrett was so rude. But his eyes, his eyes is heaven...