Star Shines In Her Eye

Homecoming

     It had been several months since the last time I was home. I graduated a year ago from New York Film Academy and I had been working freelance in Manhattan ever since. It was springtime and I was so glad to be out of the city. I grew up in a small town in Central Michigan called Frankenmuth. I loved New York but I needed to be amongst nature and that's exactly what home was. The house I grew up in was just outside of town in a more rural setting. Our closest neighbor was about a quarter mile down the road and those neighbors also happened to be my best friends.
     Sammy Kiszka was my age and we were rarely apart as kids and teenagers. His older sister Ronnie was my spirit guide, I was an only child and she really acted as the best older sister a girl could ask for. The two oldest Kiszka boys, Josh and Jake, are 3 years older and they're twins. My birthday landed right between Sammy's and the twin's and we were all about to turn one year older within the next month. Sammy and I were turning 23 and Jake and Josh would be turning 26. The Kiszka family is offensively attractive and talented. The boys are in a band called Greta Van Fleet with our other childhood best friend Danny Wagner. They are stupid successful, touring the world, winning Grammys, ya know, the usual. Ronnie lives in Chicago and is becoming ultra successful in the PR world. I could not be more proud of them if I tried and I'm so lucky that I get to call them my friends.
     I looked at myself in the mirror trying to decide what to put on. My long dirty blonde hair was parted down the middle and reached the bottom of my shoulder blades. My 5'5" frame was slender and my long legs were toned from all of the city walking I did the last 5 years. I couldn't decide if I should wear my George Harrison shirt or my tie dye tee that I worked very hard to hand distress.
As I was holding the tees up I hear a very loud, hyper knock on the door. I knew my parents weren't home to answer and the knocks got crazier and more persistent so I ran down with both tops in my hands and a white bralette covering my small, perky breasts. I had on high waisted bell bottoms and my favorite Birkenstock's were on my feet. I swing the door open and Sammy is standing there, about to knock on the door again. His jaw slightly drops as he looks at me without my top. "SAMMY!!" I scream and jump into his arms. "Leah, WHY DON'T YOU HAVE A SHIRT ON??!" Sammy shouts as he hugs me. I unwrap my legs and arms from him and look at him, both of us smiling ear to ear. "I couldn't decide, you choose for me" I say as I toss the shirts at him "Go for George, always go for George. Now hurry up we have things to do, people to see!" I slip on the white tee with George Harrison's All Things Must Pass silhouette, half tuck it into my jeans and grab my slouchy purse and grab his hand "Onward and upwards, Samuel!"
Sammy didn't have shoes on (typical) as we ran hand in hand towards the Kiszka house. It didn't matter that I hadn't seen him since November or that we were about to turn 23, when we were together we acted like children and running through the grass with my best friend was exactly what I needed after the year I had.
They say New York chews you up and spits you out and they weren't wrong. I hopped around to different magazines and news outlets, selling my photos but it wasn't enough and I had to move out of my studio in Queens and come back to Michigan. The day I decided to make this move I called Sammy to tell him. He told me that he would call back in a few hours. I knew he was busy and couldn't listen to me every time I had a problem but I really needed him. I felt like my dreams were being crushed and he couldn't take a second to listen? When he called back he told me he spoke with his brothers, Danny and the team and they wanted to hire me as their photographer and digital media assistant and I would be able to go on tour with them, if I were to accept.
I cried when Sam offered me this opportunity, not only would I be able to feed myself but I would be traveling the world with my four best friends. I quickly accepted and began the process of moving halfway across the country within the week following. I was so excited to be apart of this experience with these boys, constantly being reassured that I was not riding their coattails. There was only one problem, I was in love with the oldest Kiszka, Josh, we had kissed in November when we were all home for Thanksgiving.
I have kissed all of the boys at some point, strangely enough. Jake was my first kiss in 8th grade, he was a sophomore at the time. I came over to their house, looking for Sam, crying about a boy I liked that didn't like me back, Jake kissed me and wiped my tears away. It was a kiss out of love and friendship and I couldn't have asked for anything better. I kissed Danny and Sammy during a drunken game of truth or dare when we were 17, we all laughed hysterically afterwards. Josh and I hadn't kissed until this past year and it meant something more than either of us understood and neither of us were prepared to face that at the time.