Best of me: Kinlee's legacy

Ch 2 Adam Pt 3 Grounded

I was grounded. For a month. All I could do was homework and go to cheer practice. I couldn’t do anything else. Which really sucked because my first Homecoming was coming up and I couldn’t go. I kicked. I pounded my fists into the wall. I screamed and cried by to no avail my parents would not let me go. “Kinlee Jade, I do not understand how you think beating up someone you did girlscoutes with is okay!” my mother yelled at me as I soaked the pillow with my tears. They wouldn’t listen to anything I said. I had like, third degree burn marks on my stomach and they only cared about the stupid bitch Olivia. “Violence is never the answer!” My father lectured in between me threatening to kill myself. Which, is a bit dramatic, I understand now, but at the time I really wanted to!

“Kinlee you are just being a baby.” They kept saying over and over. In between the yelling back and forth and the sobbing and the constant thrashing about, I finally gave up. I sat in my room and took out my notebook. I wrote down everything. Feelings. Thoughts. Heartbreak. I wrote how unfair it was that I had to stay home for a week, then go back to school with the utter disappointment in myself knowing Olivia was probably going to represent our whole school on homecoming court or something, and I wouldn’t even be able to attend the dance to throw tomatoes at her rotten face.

Thankfully my parents let me keep my cellphone, after much debate that I needed it to keep tabs on the student council. So I was able to text Adam back and forth about how cruel my parents were being, and how I was bound to my room for days, and shunned from the outside world for a week.

“Im sorry” he sent to me. I frowned and typed back to him “Don’t be. It was all my fault. I should have just kept walking from her.”

Minutes later I got the buzz from my phone telling me he responded with a “I miss you.”

My heart fluttered. It pained me knowing that I was going to miss this whole week of school, but to see his face and tell him about my awful week, and how I couldn’t even go to Homecoming was more to even bear. “I miss you too fool” I responded, with a light smile. He always joked with me. But this night was different. There was this looming feeling that now the tables have turned. Olivia was defensive because for some reason she thinks I am with Adam more than just a friend. Which means she is going to try just that much harder for his affection. It really made me want to vomit. I hated how she acted, and how she talked. “Adam is MINE” she shouted at me before we got physical. Adam was not hers. Adam was my bestfriend. The one person who knew everything about me.

“Has Olivia tried to contact you?” I asked him via text. There wasn’t an immediate response, which shocked me because Adam always told me things like this. I rolled over on my bed spread, and turned on the music.

Some Kelly Clarkson blasted out of my speakers. ‘Behind these Hazel Eyes’. This was my jam. I sat up in bed and bellowed out the loud notes that she sings in the song. I hated how alone I felt. The next song came on. It was Emenim’s ‘Just lose it’. I acted crazy and ran around my room singing along. This all just sucked.

Finally after ten minutes of no response, I took it that Adam was either A asleep, or B, he was ignoring me on purpose. I opened up my notebook, and started to jot down pictures that popped in my head. The first one I drew was of a knife stabbing Olivia in the eyeball. I laughed crumbling the paper up after I finished and threw it away. The second picture I drew was of a football, then a cheerleader. I wrote down the number 23, and put it on the page. It was Adam’s sophomore number. I stared at the page for a good minute. Then my phone went off. Buzzzzzzzzz. It was a text from Adam. My heart fluttered again, and I quickly opened it.

“She just got off the phone with me”

What the- no, no, no! He can not be talking to her. I was instantly angry and called him on the phone. I was expecting him to not answer, but instead of the voicemail, I got his charming voice on the other line.

“Hello?” he said.

“What do you mean you talked to her?!” I yelled through the phone.

There was a long pause. “She wanted to talk about us.” He said.

I was getting mad. I took the notebook and started to scribble harsh black lines over the cheerleader. “About what?” I snapped.

I could hear him breathing heavier. “She just wanted to tell me that you were to blame, and she accidentally spilt the hot chocolate over my jersey and she offered to clean it for me. She said that she cant wait to go back to school.”

“Adam, she is just trying to coax you into feeling bad for her! She hates me. She is only doing this for your attention.” I said hoping that he wouldn’t fall for her tricks. That was one thing about Adam was that if a girl gave him attention he was lost in a spell of some sort. It was super annoying considering that everytime a new girl came around he would get infatuated, then a week later it would be old news. I often wondered how I was friends with someone like him if he was always girl crazy. What did he think of me? Did he ever think that we were more than friends? Or did he ever think that we were something more, but maybe I shot him down? Its so hard to tell, seeing how Adam has been in my life for years and years. But I still always wondered…..

My thoughts took me on a rollercoaster of emotions but I had to stop myself. Adam was still on the other line telling me how Olivia hates me and how much she wants him to stop talking to me. “She said that we should have just stopped being friends when Olivia and I dated.”

“Well do you agree with her?” I blurted.

“No! Absolutely not! Olivia is crazy. I wouldn’t ever date her. I cant help it if she is obsessed with me. But that doesn’t matter. Basically the last thing she said to me was that I was a douche and she hung up on me.” I sighed with relief. Thank God, Adam was not as stupid as I thought he was.

“So” he started “Tell me about your grounding.”

I laughed, and started to tell him about how awful everything was. “My parents said that I have to stay in my room and do my homework. Like how lame is that.”

“At least you managed to keep your cell phone.” He said.

“Oh I know! And that was a battle itself. I told them that I wanted it for the student council, but I really just wanted it so I could talk to you!” I stopped breathing. My heart stopped too. What did I just say? Did I just admit to Adam that I only wanted to talk to him.

”I mean, I don’t know what I would do if I couldn’t update you on how dead I was going to be by the end of the week” I recovered myself. I could feel Adam through the line almost taking a breath of relief. “Ha, yeah that’s true. I wouldn’t want you to die on me. That would be pretty sucky. Well, I have to go. Some people have school in the morning.” He kidded. I said my goodbyes and hung up.

I looked at my drawing on my bed. I cant believe that I really just blurted out to him that I wanted to talk to just him. And the way I said it… it was like I was falling in love or something?! How ridiculous to think that Adam could be more than my bestfriend. More than anything. But still. The thought was there. And would not leave my mind. All. Night. Long.