Chapter 1: The Fun Begins
“Wake up Kennedy!”
I check my alarm clock. 8 AM. I roll on my stomach and throw my covers over my head.
“Rise and Shine!”
Just ignore her I think. Maybe she will go away.
Next thing I know, my best friend Julia is sitting on top of me, shaking me to rise from my warm concoon of pillows.
“Do you have to come in so early? I knew giving you a key was a bad idea”
Julia chuckles. “Maybe, but then I couldn’t sneak in, so we couldn't have gone to that insane party last night!”
There was a party last night? Why can’t I remember? Oh God, am I…hung-over?
I push those thoughts aside and try to converse with Julia about the pending subject.
I start to doze off into my own thoughts.
Suddenly, Im redirected back to Julia.
“I can’t believe you and John last night!”
“What?” I turn to her with eyes heavy and a hand pressed against my aching forehead.
She picks up on my total confusion about last night’s antics
“Oh my God! Miss Kennedy Forter you were drunk last night, weren’t you!”
Oh God no. This couldn’t be happening. My perfect reputation was just ruined. And what was this about John? John Port?
“Well, maybe…I don’t remember anything”
“So you don’t know what happened between you and John Port?”
John Port. He’s been my crush since last year. Freshman year. We used to be great friends, then stopped talking for a while, and had recently been catching up.
I was becoming impatient.
“Spit it out Julia! What happened?”
She replied with a smirk on her face, “He kissed you”
My face brightened. Everything was running through my mind. No way. This couldn’t be happening. Am I still dreaming? I pinch myself. Nope.
I had a million questions to ask, but before I could get a word in, Julia’s face lowered. She made the same face she always did when she had bad news. Her perfectly structured eyebrows caved in and her nose scrunched up. I always really inspected her when she made that face. She really was beautiful. I always wondered why she never had boys falling for her constantly. Anyways, in mid inspection she interrupted me, saying:
“…and then you slapped him”
“I WHAT?”
No, no, no I must have not heard her right. She continued.
“After he kissed you, you slapped him across the face. He stumbled back, totally baffled, and you ran away. And that was the end of that”
“You’re kidding right? Why would I do something so stupid?”
“Afraid not babe…It was the alcohol talking.”
“But I wasn’t drinking, I-“
“I know! Someone spiked your drink!”
It made complete sense. I didn’t even think that would happen at a friend’s house. But this was high school, things were different. People were different.
I stood for a second, and then out of utter shock, I fell back into a heap onto my bed. I needed to think. I was thankful for Julia’s company, but I needed to be alone.
“Wow, that’s…wow”
I couldn’t find the right words to say. Julia noticed my expressions and excused herself out with a hug. I squeezed her tight. I reached over the bed to pick up an over-sized sweatshirt that smelt slightly like a bonfire. I had worn it last week when John and I and some of our friends had a bonfire in our friend’s back yard. It made me sad, but happy to wear the sweatshirt. I didn’t care how it smelt. It was John’s sweatshirt and it made me feel safe.
I snuggled under the covers and turned on my phone. 4 new messages. I was anxious. I shook the phone, thinking it would magically load faster. Stupid slide-keyboard. I really needed a smart phone.
Finally, the phone displayed the messages. Two from mom, one from Julia, and one from John. I dismissed the first three and quickly clicked John’s name. I was expecting either a really long apology or a dreadfully long list of confusion and curse words. Instead, only four words. “We need to talk”.
I quickly threw on some clothes from the floor, not even bothering to check and see if they were clean.
John lived just up the block, and still in my slippers, I hugged myself tight as I walked through the brisk fall air. I finally reached his house, only to discover that his car was not in the driveway. Dissapointed, I walked home and checked facebook.
I scrolled past hundreds of posts before finally realizing I had a notification. I was excited to see that at least some good action was going on in my not so story-book life. I clicked on it. Sure enough, there was my name tagged in a significantly long post along with a photo attached.
I dropped my laptop and ran my fingers through my hair.
"Oh God, What did I do?"
