A Promise Is A Promise

[4] Claire

Kayla had been acting so weird since the night Frankie and I kissed. When the three of us were in the same room, she couldn't stop glancing at our captain, which seemed to make it obvious that she was keeping some sort of secret. Or maybe she was just uncomfortable with the whole thing. She said she didn't hate me for it and I believed her, but I couldn't help thinking that maybe she did a little bit. I didn't like thinking about my best friend being capable of feeling that towards me, but she'd grown up Catholic, and around here, that could only mean three things: you were an alcoholic, you were homophobic, or you were both. I knew she didn't hold any negative feelings for Frankie, but maybe now that her best friend was changing, her feelings were, too.

Things took a complete one-eighty after Frankie asked me if I wanted to come over and I agreed to. K stopped looking at her entirely. Eyes were cut away, stares broken, gazes avoided. I was sure our captain would've noticed if she wasn't so preoccupied with whatever she was always thinking about. Usually she joked around with everyone during class, but lately, she'd been so buried in her own brain that she didn't even seem to know what day it was.

I was kind of afraid she'd be like that when I went over to her house, but she seemed focused on me. I was certainly focused on her, especially when we went up to her room and were all over each other. Her lips covered my skin in a thousand places, lingering on the ones that forced me farther under waves of desire.

The way she handled me was so meticulous and it felt so practiced, but it was also like what she was doing was just for me. I knew she knew what she was doing and that she wasn't a virgin. I wasn't, either, but I'd never done anything like this with a girl before. I'd never kissed one, not even when I was drunk. Now one was on top of me, pulling my shirt off and making it increasingly difficult to hold back whatever sounds were fighting to escape me.

Her hands found my waist after her mouth had, her fingers daring to tug on my jeans. I reached for one of her hands and grabbed it to get her to wait. "Stop, Frankie," I requested, breathless. "No further than this." It wasn't exactly that I didn't want to go any further, but it was way too soon. We'd only kissed once before and I was barely sure my attraction to girls was something I hadn't made up. Sleeping with her forced everything into a tangible state, into one that made all of this a real thing that was happening. Honestly, I was too scared to let it be a real thing right now.

"Yes, your highness," she lowly returned, her voice rumbling against my stomach. She let her touch drift up again, her lips following. They went to my earlobe and drew a shudder from me. Before I had even stilled, she'd moved to my neck.

"God, that feels so good," I told her, my words as airy as before, and it really did. I felt like I was floating above the earth, weightless and dizzy from the gratification this brought me. The last time I'd felt like this, I was fifteen and sure I was in love with my boyfriend. Now, the thought of a boyfriend seemed faint, but possible. Whatever this thing with Frankie was, it didn't rule them out, but it made them pale in comparison.

She laughed against me and said, "Couldn't tell." I just sighed and pulled her head closer to mine so I could kiss her.

The more comfortable I got with her, the more I let my mind slip away to the past few weeks and to my best friend.

Everything had been weird, except for that one, brief moment at her parents' New Year's party. In the few minutes after I explained what happened in Frankie's car, everything went back to normal. But then hours slipped by and I couldn't stop thinking about what she was thinking. Did she still think it was a bad idea? Did she still think I was using Frankie? Did she think I was making a mistake or that I was just going through a phase?