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Remembering Sunday

Nine: Hangin' On

I rolled over beneath my heavy covers, scrunching my eyes at the hint of sunlight that had tried to creep into them as I did. A few nights had passed now since I'd had my worst memory yet, and the lingering thought of it still left me on edge of what other horrible things may be lost in the back of my brain where my conscious couldn't quite reach. But regardless I'd somehow started to manage getting rather decent night's sleeps. Without crippling thoughts or flashbacks.


Not much more had come back to me since then, small almost meaningless things like flashes of Emily and days back in Boston, or bits of me and my dad working on the car that now sat completed in our driveway. Nothing huge, but still memories nonetheless. And as wrong as it felt to actually admit, for the time being I was okay with that.


Of course, I wanted to remember my life, and I wanted to remember it all right now. But I guess after the vivid trauma I'd watched myself go through, the break from the chaos was nice. It felt like laying in a body heated bed on a weekday morning, knowing you didn’t have to move anytime soon and could bask in the sunlight that was so rudely pouring through the windows.


Something I would have had every intention in doing myself had it not been for the boisterous grumble that sounded from my stomach the second I rolled to my back and started to sink back into the foam of the mattress. A bodily request that I knew would be persistent and pestering if I did not comply to it, and immediately.


It growled again when I sat up, rolling my eyes, I held my stomach. Begging the thing to silence itself as I reluctantly rose to my feet and made my way out of my bedroom. The idea of breakfast not wasting any time in making its way from my abdomen up into the very front of my mind.


It was the only thing consuming my thoughts as I skidded down the steps and hastily made my way into the kitchen where I was warmly greeted by a plate already sat on the counter. Loaded with mouthwatering food and a note propped up beside it. 'You're welcome, Kenn' it read in childlike script. I smiled at my father's chicken scratch and playful banter.


"Why, thank you!" I giggled aloud, snatching a fork from the drawer and digging right in. Stuffy my cheeks like a hamster might with scrambled eggs, toast, and bacon. It was a breakfast fit for a queen as far as I was concerned, and it hit just the right spot. Fore had my dad's well thought out plan not been in place, I probably would have remained too hungry for too long to notice his voice off in the distance, around the corner and down the hall.


Lips pinched, I slid my now empty plate into the sink and quickly wrapped around in the direction his voice had been coming from, being sure to stay tucked behind the edge of the wall. Out of sight and out of mind. I could see his office door propped open ever so slightly from where I stood, peering around the corner and listening closely trying to make out the words he was saying.


What I understood first was that he must have been talking on the phone, but to whom I couldn't quite figure out. Most of his sentences were lost in the distance, muffled and indecipherable. Daring to take a step closer, I moved out into the small corridor and soon I started to make words out of the muttered sounds he'd been making. And a name I recognized was soon after dropped.


Alex's to be specific.


"Yeah, I mean he'd mentioned she'd shown up at his house the night before when he'd helped me unload her car." My dad explained to the stranger on the other end of the line. Listening more intently now, I propped myself up against the wall. "She didn't say anything to me about it, but I thought it best just not to push her. After all he made it out to seem like she didn't even mean to do it, I just assumed she'd tell me about it once she was ready."


The other voice must have responded next, as my father paused for a moment. Building silence giving my own thoughts a chance to try and catch up before he continued on again. "Yeah, her and Alex have been hanging a bit when she feels up for it, and from the few things she's shared it's seemed to be helping her quite a bit!"


I couldn’t help the small smile that played on my lips at the subtle smear of joy in my father's words. "I just feel so terrible for him." He sighed, causing my short-lived smile to falter into a slightly confused frown. "I mean, after I got the call and word spread, I knew he wouldn't lighten up on me till I caved..." My dad paused again, releasing a sigh so heavy I could both hear and feel it from my safe distance away. "But just the fact that after all these years, he flew out to Arizona to see her after hearing what happened and had to turn around once they discovered she didn't remember anything. It was awful even for me to watch, he was devastated."


What did he mean by all that? I thought to myself, looking down at my hands crossed over my chest, trying my absolute hardest to dissect what I'd just discovered and yet understood nothing about. I didn't remember much at all about what had transpired after the crash. I'd all but entirely blocked it out of my head. The scratchiness of the hospital gown, the persistent beeping of the machines that bore through my skull, the horrid lighting that stung my eyes, and the paralyzing fear of being asked seemingly simple questions I couldn't even begin to find answers too.


It was a horridly confusing experience I'd been trying my hardest to push to the side. And now I was even more confused about it than ever as I ease dropped on my father's clearly private conversation. Had Alex really been with my dad the day I woke up? Had that seemingly goofy boy really flown halfway across the country, just to turn around? And what did my dad mean by after all those years? From what I'd been gathering, Alex and I were as close as two friends could be before my memory fled me. Why would doing something like coming to see me after an accident which rendered my mind basically useless be so shocking to someone like my dad?


None of that was making sense to me, and my head was slowly beginning to ache from all the questions I'd been throwing into its interior walls. Just hoping and praying an answer would bounce back at me instead of another humbling question. Biting down hard on my lip, I heard my father sigh and bid whoever he'd been talking to goodbye before the walls soon grew silent again. And in that quiet my curiosity prospered, quickly getting the better of me and moving my limbs on their own toward the door without my permission.


"Hey dad" I mumbled after knocking and pressing the door open a bit more. Leaving my hand to graze the soft grain. I watched my senior swivel around in his office chair and instantly perk up at the sight of me in the entry.


"Hey sport! Did you see what I'd left for out on the counter?" His eyes were bright and his smile was big as he laid his palms on the tops of his sweatpants, clearly not headed for the work office today.


"I did, it was very good, thank you." I told him, making my way slowly into the cramped space and toward the small blush colored futon in the corner. He just nodded silently at me as I lowered myself down and folded my crossed knees under my body. His grin never quavering as he watched.


He took in my string of movements and processed them correctly. "Something on you mind, kid?"


"Uh, sort of," I admitted, "you know how I've been kind of remembering more and more?" I inquired, scratching at the back of my head where my hair had begun to mat up in my sleep.


He nodded thoughtfully.


"Well, there are still some things that don't really make that much sense to me." I explained to him, watching his countenance carefully. "And I guess I was just kind of hoping, if you had a minute that is, that I could ask you some questions and try and fill in some of the bigger gaps, you know, about my life."


"Ask me anything if you think it'll help!" He grinned, watching me closely as I nodded. Biting down on my lip once again, I started to search my head for some of the bigger holes that had surfaced in my slow forming memory. The first big one coming to mind as I began to fiddle with the tips of my fingers.


"Well, we didn't always live here, right?" I asked, as if I was uncertain of my recollection till my dad nodded. As though urging me to go on. "Why did we move?" I asked, genuinely curious, "Did I grow up here mostly?"


He folded his hands over his round stomach and pondered his answer for a moment. "Not really," He started, "You were born in Providence, Rhode Island up in New England. Your brother Jake was seven at the time so the two of you sharing a room in the shoe box we'd lived in wasn't much of an option. So, once you were old enough not to sleep by our bed, we moved up north of Boston."


I nodded, most of that seemed to make sense to me. I remembered Jake. Not much about him, I couldn't quite picture him on my own yet. But I'd put that name to his face in a number of photos my father had shown me when he'd first brought me home. I knew he was my older brother, and that he didn't live with us and probably hadn't for some time. But that was the extent of it.


"Your mother and I split up when you were twelve, Jake was eighteen and already shipping off to college." He said, his smile starting to slip the longer he talked to me. "You didn't take it the best, and a year later when the house payments started to rack up I took a job opportunity down here in Baltimore and we moved. I thought it might be better for the both of us to have some form of a clean slate."


I nodded. Thinking back to the conversation I'd remembered having with Emily. This time small flashes of moving boxes and plane tickets flashed across my eyes. I just sat there for a second, ringing my hands as I absorbed this new information, sliding the mental note cards into the open gaps in the timeline of my life for time being. But I couldn’t ignore the question that was burning a hole in the back of my tongue, begging to be asked since the other night.


My head lifted and tilted to the side. "Why don’t you ever talk about her?" I asked him, furrowing my brows, "Mom, that is."


And instantly I saw a shift migrate across his face. His seemingly ever-present smile giving way for a frown to form, as the light slowly dissipated from his eyes. And I watched as he turned his head away from me, trying to hide the sight of their bright blue color fading to a subtler shade of gray. I could physically feel a thick cloud of tension start to settle between us as he cleared his throat.


"You know, Kenn," He coughed out, rubbing his neck. "I had brewed a batch of coffee earlier; would you mind fetching me a cup?" He deflected, quickly changing the subject and looking over at me once again with an unreadable plea in his eyes.


And despite how badly I really did want to know the answer, something tugged at my brain telling me not to press any further. That this was something we, as a two-person family, had constantly avoided discussing in our day to day lives before everything had happened to me. Reluctantly, I listened to it, quitting while I was ahead.


"Sure" I nodded through pinched lips and rose to my feet. Making my way into the kitchen where I pulled the glass pot from the coffee maker and went to fetch a mug from the cupboard. I stood staring into the shelves for a moment or two, contemplating which of the hundred brightly colored mugs I'd wanted to use that day, something that felt normal to do. Selecting a bright red one that said 'BU' in a familiar looking logo and placing it down on the counter.


But when I reached up again to slap the door shut, something I'd exposed in the back corner of the cabinet caught my eye, and I couldn't stop my hand from reaching for it had I wanted too. Fingers mindlessly wrapped around a small white coffee mug, with lilac colored polka dots. Pulling it free, I instantly noticed it's condition.


Poorly reconstructed, the disheveled thing had been smashed, and put back together piece by piece with thick ragged lines of clear hot glue. A smile formed on my lips without warning as I ran a finger down one of the sealed cracks, being pulled back in time to when it was once whole and pristine.


Keys fumbled and steps staggered, Alex and I pooled up onto my porch and trough my front door in a tangled mess of drunken giggles.


Our muscles were exhausted from running around and dancing poorly all night as I pressed a hand to my friend's shoulder for support. Stabling myself as I kicked off my sneakers and flung them into the closet door with an echo, shrugging out of my winter coat.


"Is your dad home?" He asked, shaking the fallen snowflakes from his hair as he followed my lead and pulled his coat from his long arms. Letting it fall to the floor beside mine as I shook my head.


"He's off in the city all weekend for work." I smiled, tucking the ends of my long sleeve over my hands and vigorously rubbing the fridge air off my arms. "So, I could use the company, and something warm to drink!"


Alex laughed loudly at my distracted train of thought. The sounds from his throat bounced off the walls and bounded ahead of me as I scurried on clumsy feet into my living room. Muttering something probably ridiculous or rude as he followed after.


"I swear! The cold made me sober." I practically wined, "Because around this time in the night I should be wanting to rally, and yet all I want is hot cocoa."


"That might just be the bud light talking." Alex joked, coming up beside me now where I'd stopped just short of the kitchen.


Wanting a change from the repetitive hip hop that had been pumped into our beer-soaked brains all night, I'd begun to search from something different on the towering CD rack by our media consul. My eye balls felt like individual bobble heads were rattling around inside their sockets as I pulled the first thing I found that could be classified as the farthest thing from Missy Elliott. Wasting no time, I popped it into the make-shift surround system and let soft country music fill the air of my otherwise empty house.


I shut my eyes gently as my favorite Dan and Shay song started to play, and I started toward the kitchen, hearing Alex chuckle and his footsteps trailing close behind. I hopped quick on fulfilling my mission, and instantly started to make my way around the space, collecting all the necessary ingredients. But I couldn’t help but notice when I glanced over at him the way Alex's eyes lingered on me. Watching as I pulled the hot chocolate mix from the cabinet. Leaned up against the counter, arms crossed tightly over his chest.


"Are you checking me out?" I asked him, a drunken giggle leaving me as I felt my cheeks heat regardless of my joking tone.


A blush which only deepened when I glanced again to see him smirking at me, "What if I am?"


"I'd call you a creep." I tried to shrug off. Biting my lip and rolling my eyes at my ridiculous friend. I hastily turned my attention back to the ingredients laid out on the counter before me. Tapping my finger on the counter for a second, trying to collect my scattered wits before remembering what it was I'd been looking for in the first place.


"Oh, right!" I scoffed aloud to myself and reached up to flip the cabinet over my head wide open. A wide range of glasses and mugs were pulled into view and I began to search for my favorite one. It took me no time at all to spot and retrieve the bright purple polka dots that had been gifted to me by my dear friend Michelle at Christmas.


And just as I went to place it down, a long straggly arm snaked itself around my waist. Pulling me from the counter and out into the center of the kitchen from behind. "What are you doing?" I giggled having not noticed him move behind me. But what I did notice was Alex's head dropping down to the crook of my neck, feeling him smirk into my liquor warmed skin.


"Dance with me..." He mumbled simply.


"You're drunk Lex." I rolled my eyes, spinning in his arm to face my flush cheeked pal.


"So are you," He pointed out. "Dance with me, Dee."


I could smell the mixture of whiskey and beer on his breath as it rolled down my face. The alcohol making his hands feel clammy to the touch as he dared to release my waist and pull the hand that wasn't clutching the mug up and around his neck. Both his hands finding my hips soon after as he slowly started to sway our intoxicated frames.


"When I taste tequila, baby I still see ya." He sang softly, the lyrics to the song sounding ragged as they slipped up through his thickly coated throat and down onto me. "Cutting up the floor in a sorority t-shirt."


I bit my lip and hung my head to try and hide the vibrant blush I could feel forming on my cheeks, chocking it up to my drinking. I stood there in my kitchen, my small socks brushing the tips of still damp sneakers as he swayed and spun us gently to the music. Humming the lyrics that he knew at my tilted down nose. The rest of the chorus passed like that, and then the second verse before I felt a single hand trail slowly and hesitantly up under my chin. Lifting my head up gently to look at him.


"When I taste tequila," He whispered again, his eyes meeting mine and I watched a change take place inside them. Something new, something I'd never seen before was growing inside his golden eyes and making butterflies form in the pit of my stomach. His hand never moved from my jaw as I felt cross-eyed. Watching his bubble gum pink tongue peek out from between his lips and lick at their cracked texture.


It was a look I'd never been on the receiving end of before. Not from anyone, and certainly not Alex. It had me frozen like a deer in headlights. Glistening irises making like Medusa's as I stood stone-like in my place, unable to move even a fraction of an inch. The only change in me being my breath catching in my throat as Alex slowly leaned down and caught my chapped lips on his own.


I should have freaked out! I should have pulled away and tried my hardest to quickly find something, anything at all funny to say to brush off the moment and pretend like it never happened. But I didn’t, and the moment continued. I even melted into him at the soft press of his hand on my spine, the tender kiss deepening as our lips molded together. Bringing the heat of my cheeks to an all-time high as I stood there in my kitchen, drunkenly kissing my best friend.


I felt his tongue slip from his lips and not a second later did the slick ceramic I'd been holding glide from my grip. Falling to the tile floor with a crash and shattering into a million pieces. The sound tearing us apart, and me back into my thoughts.



"Everything all right in there?" I suddenly heard a voice call. My fathers. And I shakily looked at my feet to see the mug I'd held just a second before once again scattered across the tile in a trillion tiny shards of clay and hot glue.


"Uh- yeah," I called back to him, wiping the tears that had fallen from my eyes. "I'm fine."




Notes

SAY WHAAAAAT! lol

be sure to leave a comment telling me what you think! And make sure you're subscribed to and have voted for this story if you're enjoying it

love y'all always
-Sarahhhh

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Comments

Omg... Alex.. This had me in tears.

hopeless1313 hopeless1313
9/13/18

@sarahbeth
I feel that

Daydreamers Daydreamers
6/27/18

@Daydreamers
Thank you very much! I feel like my writing kind of changed as I grew up but I kind of prefer it now it just feels more orderly and less all over the place but i try and stay in touch with all the creative dramatics my old writing have in them ;)

sarahbeth sarahbeth
6/26/18

@Newyork_xo
Thank you!!
I actually hadn't gotten around to listening to that song before you said that but I just did and it was so cute i can totally see how it relates to Kennedy and Alex!
and yes it still is! It was on an account that I lost access to bc this site changes the google log in so i never got to finish it.. but its called No Pads.. No Helmets.. Just Memories! Its been over 3 years since I've updated it but theres a ridiculous amount of chapters to kill time on

ps can't say its my best work it was my first ever fan fiction but if you search Jasey its down on the first page of results!

sarahbeth sarahbeth
6/26/18

I love what great friendships she seems to have had with all the guys while it still being very clear how different hers with Alex is.

Have you heard the new Shawn Mendes album? There’s a song on there called When You’re Ready that reading this story makes me think of... It’s cute.

One last thing - Your other No Pads story I see you and other readers mentioning- is that still on this site? I’d like to read it if it’s available, lol.

Newyork_xo Newyork_xo
6/26/18