Keep your friends close and your enemies, closer

“Hey Lance, I got a way for you to pay me back.” Kent called out as soon as we stepped through the front door of his cousin’s house.

“Oh hey there, cousin. Who’s the pretty girl?” A guy about two or three years older than us suddenly appeared before me. The typical ‘emo’ boy, if I had to label him. The long bangs, tight shirt, skinny jeans and checkered vans.

I smiled at him. “Hey, I’m Ashlynn.” I extended my hand for his but he brought it up to his lips and kissed it.

“And I’m Lance. Nice to meet you.” I smiled but turned my head about an inch to look at Kent, who was standing next to me. He caught my eye and gave a small shrug.

‘He’s gay.’ He mouthed. I formed an ‘O’ with my mouth before turning back to Lance.

“So, what can I do you for today?” Lance grinned, clapping his hands once.

“Ash here needs a haircut.” Kent gently combed through my hair and when his fingers abruptly stopped just above the gum, he held up the strand of hair to show his cousin the problem.

Lance raised an eyebrow and frowned. “How did that happen?”

Kent released a loud laugh at that. “It’s so hilarious, you won’t believe it. She -”

“No, no.” Lance interrupted, before turning back to me with a sweet smile. “You’ll be the one to tell me all about it. Come on, sweetie.” He reached for my hand and pulled me towards the bathroom.

That was when I started to panic. “Wait. You’re going to cut my hair with like only one eye?”

Lance turned back to roll his eyes at me, whilst Kent’s laughter rang from behind me. Lance dragged me inside the bathroom, apparently ignoring my protests and shouting.

~

“So, what do you think?” Lance spun my chair around so I was facing the wall-sized mirror in front of me. I honestly didn’t know why there was a mirror that big in a bathroom, but I’d rather not know anyway.

My eyes immediately widened at my reflection. My hair wasn’t like really short or anything, but it was different than my previous one. My curls were still there except they were layered and were more unruly. He had also shortened my bangs so they weren’t in my eyes anymore and were more easily tamed.

“Wow.” That was all I could say. I tried to get more out, but I couldn’t.

“Do you like it?” He asked, somewhat nervously. I tried to look at his expression from the mirror but he wasn’t facing me.

“I love it. You know,” I twirled my chair around so that I was facing him. “If you weren’t gay, I’d have kissed you already.”

He shrugged. “Why not give one to Kent instead?”

I tried to hide my blush by raising my eyebrow suspiciously. “Why would I do that?”

He smirked. “Why wouldn’t you?”

I narrowed my eyes at him. “Do you know things that are unknown to other people?”

“Maybe. But I know one thing, for sure. However you feel about him, he feels exactly the same way.”

I stared at him warily. Firstly, I wasn’t sure if that was necessarily the case. I mean, Kent feeling the same way?

Secondly, does Kent know? Lance can’t be that smart. I just met him. How could he know me so well?

“Anyway,” Lance pulled away the sheet that was over me, spilling all my hair on the bathroom floor. “I’m done. Now off you go.” He shooed me.

I smiled before leaning nearer to kiss him on his cheek. “I appreciate it. I doubt any of my friends would actually cut my hair in the middle of the night.”

Lance returned the smile before he pushed me out of the bathroom. I kind of stumbled, considering I hadn’t been expecting it.

“Whoa.” The one-word statement was said in this very low manner, but I still heard it. I slowly turned around to come face to face with Kent. He got up off the sofa and started to make his way towards me.

I made an attempt to smile at him, and playfully fluffed my hair. “So, what do you think?”

He managed to control his facial expression, but not his eyes. His eyes were huge as he stared at me and his mouth was slightly left open. All in all, it was a good attempt to hide his surprise.

“Gorgeous.”

I furrowed my eyebrows together and smiled at him. “Really? Thank you.” I closed the gap between us and embraced him. He didn’t hesitate to close his arms around me and pull me closer to him.

After a while, I pulled back, but kept my arms around him. I looked him straight in the eye and murmured to him. “You’re coming back home with me. You’ve got tons of explaining to do. Okay?”

He merely nodded before leaning to give me another hug. This time, he pulled back with a grin. “We better get you home. It’s like about two in the morning already.”

I laughed. “Sure.” Kent took my hand in his and walked with me over to his car. I shouted a ‘Goodbye’ to Lance as soon as we were out the door.

~

Kent drove up to my driveway about fifteen minutes later. He got out of the car before he came over and opened the passenger door for me. I looked up at him and smiled as he offered his hand and walked me to the door.

As we stepped inside the living room, I invited Kent to take a seat. “I’m going to go take a shower for a little while. Stay here.” I pointed my finger at him as a warning, and jogged over to my bathroom as he made himself comfortable and switched on the television.

I didn’t want to make him wait long, so I quickly soaped myself and shampooed my hair. I was out of the bathroom in ten minutes, flat. I took another five minutes to dry and comb my hair. I skipped down the stairs as soon as I was done and smiled at the sight of Kent watching the TV. I didn’t know why I did it; maybe it was because I thought he might leave.

He met my eyes as I sat on the sofa, and gave me a grin before turning to watch the TV again. I sighed. “We need to talk.”

Kent raised an eyebrow at me before he switched the TV off. He leaned forward in the recliner and interlaced his fingers together. “What about?”

“About why you’ve been ignoring me.” I strode over to sit at the coffee table so that I was directly in front of him. He looked to the floor and was silent. I ducked my head so that I could meet his eyes.

“You said you’d tell me. Please?” I begged softly, trying to hold his gaze.

Kent gave a deep sigh before he took my hand in both of his. “You remember the dare, right?”

I frowned, but nodded anyway. Where was he going, with the holding hands and the dare?

“I tried to tell you something after we kissed, but I got interrupted.” I nodded again, because I remembered. How could I forget the kiss?

“If you recalled, I didn’t just get interrupted once, but twice. I’ve always been a little superstitious so I was kind of convinced that because I kept getting interrupted, it meant that I wasn’t meant to say what I had to say.”

My frown got deeper. Where was he going with this?

“It felt weird to keep all those feelings in me. I’ve always been an open person, so it felt weird. Anyway, when I saw you back at school, I didn’t know how to react. I thought it would be better if I ignored you, because that might mean the feelings would go away.” A pause.

“I was wrong, though. If anything, the feelings got stronger. And I hurt you, by doing so. That wasn’t my intention at all, believe me.” He stopped to push back a strand of my hair away from my face, but his hand lingered afterwards. He must have thought I would feel weird about what he just did.

“So, what are you saying?” I didn’t know why I said it softly, but it would probably feel weird to say it out loud.

“I’m saying,” Kent interlaced his fingers in mine and stared me straight in the eye, “that I... think I might have a crush on you.”

On reflex, I pulled my hand away from him. I hadn’t realized we were only about a few inches apart. I held my hands together and tried to ignore his expression. He was hurt, I could see that, by what I did, but I had to think.

“So, you… like me?” I asked slowly, trying to make sure I wasn’t just imagining he said that.

His hand flew up to the back of his neck and he averted his eyes away from me. “Kind of, yeah.”

I shook my head. “Like, for real?”

He nodded silently.

I paused. “Seriously?”

His eyes went back to my face, only now he wasn’t embarrassed. He was just really exasperated. He held my face in between both of his hands and pulled me closer to him so that our noses were almost touching. “I like you, Ashlynn Campbell. Yes, for real. No, not kind of. Can you hear me now?”

I pried his hands away from my face and took his face in my hands instead. “I heard.” I smiled and leaned forward to kiss him.

Kent brought his hands to my waist and tugged at it, so I stood up, pulling him up along with me. Our lips were still attached together as I pushed him back to the chair, with me sitting on his lap.

After what seemed like only a second, I pulled back with a slow smile. He caught the smile and returned one back to me, resting his forehead on mine.

“Can you tell me something?” Kent asked, breathing a little heavily.

“What?” I asked, kissing his lips once more.

“What exactly were you doing on the road in the first place?” He raised an eyebrow, while his hands pushed my legs so that it was lying across his lap.

I frowned at his question. I hadn’t told him the whole story. I only told him I got bored in the middle of the road so I laid down to watch the stars.

“I’ll tell you some other time, okay?” I couldn’t help, but yawn. I was so tired.

Kent kissed the top of my head and brought me closer to him. “You’re tired. Go to sleep.”

I clutched at his shirt. “Stay with me, will you?”

He chuckled but kissed my cheek. “Of course. Anytime.”

I wrapped my arms around his neck and made myself comfortable as he combed through my hair.

That simple gesture knocked me out for the rest of the night.