Loving Kinnick (Rewritten)

Loving Kinnick

There were moments in life that made me rethink every decision I made. After shooting my dad, I remember hearing the police sirens and wondering if I would be in prison for the rest of my life. At the time, I was ten. I should have been more worried about going to bed for school in the morning as opposed to picking up a gun to defend my mom, but these things happen.

Then I started taking Benadryl when I turned twelve to sleep after suffering from PTSD. When I was sixteen, people I called friends left me to die in my pick-up truck after smoking laced weed. It wasn't only the drugs I regret taking but the people I trusted to keep me safe.

I regret the moments I raised my voice at Bo and belittled her for all of the things she couldn't do. It made me realize that in moments like this, I would rather see her crying with laughter than staring at me with teary eyes as she realizes that she could no longer accept all of the things I've done wrong in my life.

But I will never say sorry for getting behind the wheel that night. She lay in the passenger seat of her mother's car, bleeding from the scar she now has on her forehead. The door handle burnt through the skin on my hands, scarring them permanently as I fought through the pain to pull the door open.

In my drunken state, I tried to do the best I could. I used the pocket knife in my jacket to cut her from the seatbelt that wouldn't budge. As she stirred in my arms, her caramel eyes opened to see her mother. I wanted to do nothing but accept her request - I should have pulled her mother out, but the world wouldn't have Bo. And although I was stumbling around, I could tell from where I stood, her mother wasn't coming out of the car alive.

I won't forget the air that night and how it smelled of charcoal-like metallics. Nausea settled over my body because I remember what it was like when my mom accidentally burned her hair over a candle, and the early morning was filled with burnt keratins. It wasn't until I talked to John that I realized I wasn't smelling a car that caught on fire; I sensed burning flesh, and I will never forget it.

As the car caught fire, I listened to the girl in my arms cry for her mom. The moment I heard rattling from the vehicle, I knew I didn't have time to pull her mother out, but I had enough to drag Bo away before anything could hurt her.

When the engine blew, glass went flying into the air. The impact sent me backward with the girl in my arms, but when I woke up, I was in a hospital bed, and the curly-haired girl was gone without so much as an explanation from law enforcement. Before I could process the night before, police were in front of me, reading me my Miranda Rights. When I say police, I mean Seth.

That was the last time I saw Bo until she came to the gym, and like lightning, every memory from that night came flashing back. For some reason, I couldn't remember how we got there, but she was the girl I pulled from her mother's burning car. And she didn't remember me. Not at all. I waited for some kind of realization, but it never came.

"Tell me it isn't true," tears splatted from her lips as her words came out forcefully.

As I said, I regret many things, but as she fell apart in front of me, I knew this would always be at the top of the list. "Baby, let's go home. We can talk about all of this -"

"He isn't lying?" She choked. "You killed her?"

I ran my fingers through my hair, tugging on the ends of my hair. "I don't know! I was too fucking drunk!"

"What were you doing when he pulled me from the car?"

My face twisted with disbelief as I directed my gaze toward Seth. "Are you fucking serious?"

"It is true," he spat blood onto his wooden floor, making Bo cringe with disgust. "And you know it."

"Then show her the scars on your hand from yanking on the fucking door handle until it opened!" I shoved him backward. "Tell her how you shielded her body from the glass as the windows exploded! How did you get her out of the passenger seat when the seatbelt wouldn't budge?"