Guilty By Association

Chapter 12 - The One Who Got Away

Chapter 12 – The One Who Got Away

 

Kelsey felt sick. She felt horrible. She could hear sounds from all around her.

Voices.

Shouting.

Kelsey wanted all of it to stop. Finally, she struggled to get her eyes open. And she was met with a bright light that made her want to crawl into a tunnel and stay there for the rest of her life. Her hands instinctively came up to shield her eyes from the sunlight.

Immediately she sensed something was wrong. Peeling her eyes open, she looked around. She was startled by the amount of people running around, and the fact that they were all dressed in uniform.

Kelsey instantly got up, not realizing she had been lying down until she felt her head protect against her actions, so she did what any normal person would do. She groaned.

“Calm down, cutie.” Someone said. “You banged your head pretty hard, in there.” Kelsey turned in the direction of the voice and found herself face to face with a really cute paramedic. Again, she questioned the sudden indulgence of good-looking men in her life.

“What happened?” She asked, pressing the palm of her hand against her head. She was horrified to find a large bump there.

“Don’t you remember?” He asked, handing her an ice pack. “You weren’t out for very long.”

Kelsey looked around, seeing several people on the phone. There were several red, white, and blue flashing police car lights. Slowly, it all started coming back to her. Kara. Caleb. Tiger.

“Oh my god! Where’s Dylan?” She suddenly asked, an image of his body landing on the floor coming to her mind. “Is he okay?”

“They took him to the hospital.” He informed her. “Wait here. I’m going to go tell them that you’re awake.” She nodded and the paramedic vanished into the crowd. She closed her eyes and fragments from what happened flashed through her mind. God, she’d been such an idiot. She shouldn’t have followed Kara. She shouldn’t have gone to that window. Now, she’d jeopardized everyone’s lives.

“Kelsey!” Someone’s voice snapped her out of her self-pity.

Kelsey opened her eyes and looked around, focusing on a figure making his way through the crowd towards her. Kelsey blinked, clutching the ice pack before she put a smile on her face. She was certain that Alex was going to give her hell for what she’d done.

Alex came to a stop in front of Kelsey, not saying anything. He was frozen. “I know what I did was foolish, wrong, senseless. I shouldn’t have—”

Kelsey didn’t get a chance to finish her apology, though, because in that time, Alex had closed the distance between them and pressed his lips against hers. Kelsey’s eyes widened at the sudden intrusion as Alex’s hands came up and cradled her neck while hers just lay flatly on her lap, clutching the icepack she had yet to use.

Instead, her eyes fluttered shut on their own accord and she was just about to lean into the kiss, maybe even return it, when suddenly Alex pulled away, releasing her completely.

Her eyes opened and she stared at Alex who was staring back at her with his own set of wide eyes. “A-am I forgetting something?” Kelsey furrowed her eyebrows, wondering if before her daredevil stunt, she’d professed her affections to Alex. No, Kelsey thought. They had a fight. She must have hit her head harder than she thought. With that in mind, she finally took the icepack and pressed it against her head.

If she got a kiss from Alex every time she did something like that, Kelsey might consider doing it more often.

“I’m sorry.” Alex said, not looking horrified, just shocked. That made Kelsey feel slightly better. “That was uncalled for.”