She Kissed Me Barefoot (girlxgirl)

Chapter Six- Adrienne

Chapter Six- Adrienne

        I could see the sunlight through the lids of my eyes long before I bothered to open them. I just felt so comfortable in that drawn-out moment, so at home. My blanket smelled like how we used to bake Christmas cookies at my Pa’s in the better part of my 18 years. Before the fights, before the divorce, before the disowning and the coming out and before my older sister left the house at 1 am and my older brother left his life at 2 am and I left my childhood when I found myself alone in the world at 3 am. Before that, life was pretty damn good. It smelled of vanilla and cinnamon and it felt warm against my skin. I pulled the blanket in closer to me, but that’s when I froze. It was rising and falling under my touch, slow and calm.

        My eyes flew open and I sat up as fast as I could. Oh, fucking hell. I groaned and set my head in my hands. Here I had been, asleep on a strange bed in an unfamiliar bedroom, with my arm tucked in around Landon’s waist as she slept. Shit, shit, shit. What happened last night? It hit me in a tidal wave: Trent flirting with me, cutting the cake, kissing and then seeing Casey throw down her cue and push her way out through the back door. I could remember following her to the door and then just standing there in the doorway for a few seconds, watching her try to pull herself together and wanting to be able to do it for her. I knew it was because of me, it had to have been because of me. What else could have shaken her like this? Remorse flooded, burning, down my throat, settling in my stomach and pulsing like intoxication through to my fingertips. But it wasn’t warm like alcohol. It was icy.

        Then I had spoken. The conversation was terse and cold and harsh and I wanted more. I’ll make this clear now, in case you haven’t caught on yet: I don’t fall for people. Guys are hot and I’ll check out girls if I can get away with it, but I don’t crush. I’ve had my fair share of casual sex with boys, but I never got attached. That’s what shocked me during that conversation: in an instant, I went from zero to eighty, without warning.

        One second I felt cruel; the next, I wanted to hold Case while she cried and hold her while she laughed and hold her while we woke up each morning and hold her while we argued about whose turn it was to do the dishes and I wanted to know how she takes her coffee or if she’s more of a tea person (or if she possibly has a very well-hidden dark side and does vodka shots every day before her morning commute) and where she wants to go once we’re out there in the hypothetical Real World and I wanted to be her first kiss and her last kiss and everything in between.

        Trust me, that’s too much emotion to have hit at once.

        I don’t think I really meant to kiss her. I just meant to get closer, to feel the brush of her skin against mine, to comfort her, to know for absolute certain she was real. I couldn’t really press the brakes that fast, though, and so before I knew it I had tossed away my shoes to get more on her level and pressed her up against the wall.

        When I finally broke the kiss, I freaked. Not a girl, not a girl. I did not just kiss a girl. But there I was, a panicky walking Katy Perry song with a pounding heart and a smudge of runny indigo eyeliner down her cheek.

        Now I pushed the blanket off of my legs and onto Casey, who laid in a peaceful doze at my feet. Slowly, it dawned on me that the room must’ve been a basement, as there were stairs in one corner and only a few tiny windows in the top two feet of a couple of the walls. My party dress was gone, replaced by someone else’s sweatpants and t-shirt, which smelled like Landon had when I woke up. I stared down at her and she looked innocent as ever, while questions swelled up inside of me and tightened my chest, threatening to split me open. What on earth had happened last night that had ended with Landon sleeping in my arms? What had happened with that guy? Why had I blacked out, and why did I have this pounding headache, and where the hell was I?!

        My shoulders heaved and shook and I was damn near close to crying right there on the bed. What if I had somehow ended up doing it with Landon? Oh, god, I'll never be able to live with myself. There was no way I had done that, no way I had been so intoxicated and manipulative that I had actually taken advantage of her. I willed myself not to even consider that, and yet… There we had been. Me in her clothing, her in my arms. I buried my head in my hands.

        Right then, Casey started to blink awake. Joy. What perfect timing. I must’ve jostled the mattress a little too much. Groaning, Landon turned over towards me, stretching and yawning. If I go now, I can make it out of here before she really wakes up and notices—

        “Whoa! Adri?” she asked drowsily, sitting up and cocking her head to one side. She looked me over for a moment, then seemed to deflate a bit. “Oh. Right.” Landon plopped her head back down on the pillow, pulling the blanket up and over her shoulders. I sat there and stared at her in shock and panic. A moment passed. She looked up confused at me again, running her hand through her hair. “I, uhh… Are— are you okay?” I shook my head slowly. “Are you going to throw up again?”

        I couldn’t stop staring at her and quivering.  

        Finally, I had to ask.

        “Casey, did anything… Did we… After the party, did you and I… I woke up with you in my arms and…” Landon dug her fingers back into her hair, trying to process my rambling. “Did we do it?”

        “Did we do-- oh! No! This- this isn’t what it looks like, I swear.” Casey scrambled frantically to reply.

        “Oh, thank god.” I sighed with relief. Landon studied me closely as I got off my knees and sat down crosslegged on the queen-sized bed.

        “Do you remember any of last night?” I bit my lip.

        “I, well… After the- um…” I stalled, not sure what to say about the kiss. Could I just pretend I had forgotten that? It would be better for everyone. “I left and ran, and then that dude caught up to me, and he was trying to take me home and I didn’t want to go, because I wasn’t feeling well, so I tried to get away but it was like running through molasses and then someone yelled and I don’t remember anything after that.” I spilled it all out in one long sentence, barely taking a breath. The tan girl nodded at me slowly as I bit my lip. “Did I black out?”

        She looked up and away as though she was trying to remember. “I don’t actually know. You were conscious enough to talk to me after I got him off you.”

        "That was you, yelling?” She nodded.

        “I punched him, pushed him, kicked him in the nuts a few times.”

        “Ouch. Was he trying to hurt someone or something?” The girl sounded like a freaking ninja.

        “He had drugged you.”

        “He what?!”

        “Roofied you,” she replied matter-of-factly.

        I shook my head slowly. “That explains so much.”

 

        She told me the rest of the story, how Brix had pulled up just in time and they had sped away and I had resisted being taken in for care. We arrived at Landon’s house late in the night, but she texted on the way. Her parents were in bed already, so she and Brix took me straight downstairs to her bedroom, which was in the basement. It occurred to me that I had never been in her bedroom before. I had set myself down in her beanbag, so Case and Brix stayed to keep an eye on me. I vomited once, and while it all went in her trash can, they decided to change me into some of Casey’s old clothes and have me brush my teeth with a spare. Pretty soon I had passed out, though, so Brix went upstairs to sleep in Hazel Landon’s room. (Hazel’s the eldest of the Landon girls: there are three, and Case is in the middle.) Apparently, Casey couldn’t sleep, so she stayed up and wasted time, and about half an hour later, I woke back up. I found the beanbag too uncomfortable, and she offered me her bed.

        “So you got into it, and I was gonna just sleep in the beanbag or something. But you kept asking for me, and finally I got up to see what it was, and you just held out your arms and pulled me into bed with you. I guess I fell asleep.”