Dog Days

32 ~ everything about you

I HAD FANTASIZED ABOUT KISSING KARA BEFORE.

They always ended with a slap in my dreams, but we ended up on a couch in reality. Fuck, she knows how to kiss, was my first thought. Her fingers lost beneath my hair, holding onto it as we took our time kissing, pausing to breathe, kissing again. After confessing that we wanted to kiss each other, I decided to take the first step but didn't mean to jeopardize the conversation.

I could tell opening up was killing her, but she needed this closure. Kara made herself believe that I would kick her out of my life once I learned what happened, so she wanted to tell me and end this before we would go further. I admired her strength for baring herself no matter how it pained her.

When her hand slid onto my cheek, she leaned against my forehead and whispered, "Fuck."

Though I was the same, I wanted to humor her: "Thought we'd first finish the talk."

I was right; that made her laugh. "Oh, God, Austin. I was in the middle of the most depressing tale of my life, and you make me laugh. Why did you even have to kiss me?"

"To prove you a point." She gazed at me, the expression on her face softer now. "I'm here, Kara,"—I held her hand with both hands—"I'm not going anywhere." Because I knew the end of this story. I just didn't know her point of view.

Kara sighed. She looked torn; she wanted to believe me but still lowered her expectations. Life disappointed her so often that she learned to expect worse in every circumstance — be the pessimist. I wanted to show her that her life wasn't full of storms. If she was patient enough to wait, a rainbow would pop up out of nowhere. "Where was I?"

"You said that you were coming to kiss me,"—I pecked her—"to prove Mila a point."

"Right," she replied with a playful grin. As she went into the teller mood, though, her expression completely changed: the storm was back. "I couldn't find you anywhere, and I went up to take another shot of alcohol." She shut her eyes. "I was already drunk, you know. Alcohol and rage together created chaos. That girl didn't know it — all she wanted was to stop bleeding. I saw him then, Mila's boyfriend, Lucas."

When our eyes met, she knew that I knew.

"I'm that girl, Austin. I slept with Lucas that night. Do you know what's funny? I'm not the first girl Lucas cheated on Mila with. I knew it before; in fact, I tried to tell Mila, but she accused me of being jealous of her relationship in a sarcastic way. She was so sure of me being jealous that she didn't see the betrayal in front of her." She sighed, shutting her eyes. I wanted to say something, but letting her finish was a better decision. "Even now, I blame myself for depending on someone that much. I made many mistakes to find the love I was desperately looking for. Two weeks later, I realized I missed my period and did a test. My life went crashing down when I learned I was positive. Everyone turned against me because of the bitch story Mila fed people, and nobody hated Lucas as nearly as they hated me. I was the one who was dismissed in the end. I couldn't bear it. Being pregnant on top of it all made me depressed. I considered abortion, but Ace stopped me there."

"Good that he did," I replied smilingly.

"Yeah." She smiled back. "We decided to move to Boston to be away from everything and bring up my baby in safety. I didn't want her to be the bitch's daughter."

I wanted to hug her and tuck her away from her bad memories. Listening to her story was like watching my sister from a different perspective — where she wasn't the sweet little girl I grew up together. She was the bully in this narrative, and she'd done bad things. However, she sounded exactly like the villain in Veronica's story. She blackmailed people, turned people against them. What made her hate people this much?

Though we were a family on the front, we lacked that love Kara was searching for. What went wrong? Dad loved his job more than us. Ma loved my father but ended up looking for the love he couldn't give her in different hearts. We, two poor kids in need of parental love, were left off with silent family dinners, fake love in front of others. They taught us that you needed to show your perfect, smiling face to others no matter what you went through. We were a perfect family.

I blinked when Kara touched my arm. "You dozed off. Are you okay?"

I realized I'd drowned in my train of thought and totally missed what she said. I'd love to tell her that my family was a tragedy, but it was a long story, and I didn't want to steal her stage tonight. "Yeah," I said. "Sorry."

Kara stared at me in concern. This woman was so careful that sometimes I thought she could read right into me. She had such a big heart, and I was a lucky beast that she spared a place for me in it. The long stare between us did end when she looked down. "Then, I saw you at the park and panicked because you are Austin Mayer," she said, looking up again in a smile.

"Now, it all makes sense."

She leaned back and played with her hem. "So, this is my story."

I held her hand and scooted closer to her. "Want to write another?"

Kara narrowed her eyes. "Excuse me?"

"With me? Do you want to write another story?"

"Do you still want this after everything I told you?"

I cupped her neck and pulled her face to mine. "You're the most real person I've ever known." I love you was on the tip of my tongue. I looked at her shining eyes. She opened her heart to me, and she deserved to know my feelings. "I love everything about you."

Her eyes went wide open. Dropping the bomb on her wasn't the best idea, maybe. Was it too soon? As I panicked, she kissed me firmly. When she pulled back and looked into my eyes, her gaze was warm as hot choco. "I love everything about you, too."

I held onto her for the rest of the night until she had to leave.

I love you all!

Sev