XXI
Alexander David Turner
SHOCKED THAT SHE fell, I grabbed her hand in an attempt to help her up, yet fell down on top of her. Kimberly's blue eyes looked up at me, and she bit her lip nervously. If I'm honest, this position didn't bother me apart from knowing that my heavy weight was bound to crush her frail body.
I got off her, but my leg was unnoticably intertwined with hers that caused her to go on top of me, making our previous roles reversed. God, I could stay like this forever, her messy blonde hair sprawled over me, and her tiny body on top of mine.
We just stayed like that for moments, admiring each other. Well, I was, I don't know about her. She was looking at me though, perhaps, if I was lucky she was staring? I don't know anymore. Does she still have feelings for me? I feel like I know her but at the same time it feels like she is impossible to read.
"Sorry," she blushes, and tries to get off me but falls again. It's like God put some sort of glue between us.
Best make use of it, because let's face it. I don't mind one bit.
I smirk and hesitantly join my lips to hers and I am immediately greeted with a feeling of Kim's lips, a feeling that I have been wanting ever since I laid eyes on her. She hesitates before smiling into the kiss, and loving it almost as much as me. I'm welcomed with her heat, her radiation. This is what felt like home; being near her.
Her small hands run through my jelled hair, and I groan. I missed that, I missed it so fucking much. My hands rest on her pale cheeks, as my fingers caressed them from time to time. Slowly my hands went down to her upper body and gradually to her lower body, as I lifted her skirt and rubbed her right thigh. She didn't stop me once.
She removes her lips from mine causing me to pout. She giggles, as her tiny hands attempt to unbutton my shirt, and leaves her blessed hickeys all over my neck and chest. "You're so beautiful," she breathes.
"Must have gotten it from you," I smile and she rolls her eyes playfully. I missed her so fucking much. "My turn," I whisper, and she bites her lip as I unbutton her slightly damp white blouse. It was time for me to leave my not so special hickeys all over her precious neck and chest. She covers her stomach and I take her hands off. "None of this bullshit. Okay?" I say softly and kiss her hand.
This whole experience felt like a dream, too incredible, too amazing to be true. Leaving a final kiss on her chest, I button up her slightly wet shirt. I help her get up, as I eventually get up myself.
"Do you have some spare clothes in your locker?" I ask, and she licks her lips as she shakes her head.
"I have my knee socks, I don't have a top though."
"That shouldn't be a problem, should it?" I smirk, coming closer towards her, and she pushes me straight off.
"Piss off," she giggles, as I smile and give her a forehead a kiss.
"I've got a Lacoste on me, d'you want it?" I offer, and she hums in response. "Well?"
"What colour is it?" She asks, looking up at me. She didn't have to look that high up. We didn't have much of a height difference.
"Picky," I joke as I poke her sides. Squealing uncontrollably, she wriggles out of my grip and giggles. She looked her finest when she laughed, I think most people do. It's the state of pure joy, if the laugh was real, and oh my was her laugh real. I often got confused as to whether I was hearing a harmony sung by angels, or just Kim's laugh. Raising the middle finger, she causes me to chuckle. "Ey, I hear ya, love. It's sky blue," I speak and put my hands up in surrender.
She groans, and I know she hates wearing bright colours but she looks bloody amazing in anything she wears. She's so cute. She's one of those people, the special ones, that have the gift of making almost everything adorable. "It's blue for one-"
"Sky blue," I correct, and her face resembled that she was done with my shit.
"Go fuck yourself," she retorts, in a mockingly angry manner but I could sense the elated smile behind it, peeking through like sunshine behind clouds.
"Over you? Gladly, my love," I whisper huskily, and she almost shivered. I missed witnessing the effect I had on her, but I had to see the effect she had on me everyday. I am myself quite a romantic fool, I must admit, but she has made me more lovesick then I have ever been. She has driven me insane.
"Um, Anyway," she continues, shyly tucking a strand of her gold stream of hair behind her ear. "I doubt it'll even fit me," she finishes and I roll my eyes. What bullshit. She was loosing so much weight that I was scared she might even disappear, and her not knowing that really made me realise how much her anorexia was affecting her.
"Trust me, sweets. It'll be baggy on you," I speak, and toss the sky blue Lacoste towards her as she catches it and mumbles, "I wish." It was like hearing something you really didn't want to hear at all. The smile is rubbed right off your face and it is replaced with a frown. I wanted to realise her self worth - the true one.
"Al?" Kimberly calls, and I turn around to face her. "What does this... Make us?" She questions, asking things that I wish she didn't have to ask. But she did, of course she did. She's Kimberly Browne for God's sake. Questions eat alive the poor girl.
"I don't know, beautiful," I reply, coming towards her and cup her cheeks in my rather large hands. "But this needs to be a final goodbye," I whisper, as the remains of my shattered heart break even more. I hated this. I hated this so much. Before Kim had brought up the question it felt like old times. It felt like we were still together, and now I was putting an end to something I didn't want to end.
Please understand, Kim. Ugh why did I even say that? As if I haven't done enough, I can't fucking control myself, and crush her feelings even more. I have no idea how to act around her. I don't know what to do. All I know is that it can't stay like this anymore
She looks up at me, puts her hands through my hair and kisses me softly. "I might be falling for you, Al," she says and looks up at me, scared of what I was to reply. I was surprised from her confession, if anything I thought her feelings would lessen for me. What really surprised me was that she chose to say it now, when I just told her this had to be it; it had to be the end.
"I might be falling for you," I respond with a smile that she joins me in, before I kiss her a final time.
After staring at each other for a while, I knew I had to say goodbye, or at least one of us had to. It made me feel so cold, so rude, so disrespectful. I just admitted to her that I might be falling for her. I told her that I could love her. That thought seemed so, so bizarre to me.
"But what about- you know, everything that happened, I mean why-" She asked, looking up at me with these eyes that made me feel like my feet were sinking.
"I, I don't-" I say, and I can't even bother to make up any bullshit because it's not worth it. I don't want to hurt her.
"I know we have to say goodbye and I know you don't want to say it," she breathes, and I sigh. "Goodbye," she whispers, looks at me sadly, kisses my cheek and leaves the classroom, with her bag and my shirt in hand. She left with the wind, no sound at all, apart from the cracks in my heart only becoming more prominent.
It was almost heartbreaking to see her leave, as if it was easy for her. It looked like she was rushing out, perhaps to breathe. She was overwhelmed and I felt horrible for making her feel like that. I hope I didn't pressure her into anything. Everything we did she seemed relatively happy about. Right?
Why was it that the person that I wanted the most, I couldn't have. I didn't just want her, I yearned for her. You know those people who just mean the world to you, but you don't know why? The reason for why Kim makes me so happy is still anonymous to me. Life just tastes and feels better with her.
Obviously her secretly fluorescent yet exquisite personality must take some role in the happiness she willingly gives me, but the rest is still unknown. Why couldn't I move on to someone else? Why do I spend ages reminiscing over every small involvement we have from her looking at me to her kissing me?
The annoyingly powerful feelings of admiration of course. What else?
It gave me a writing mood, and I smiled. Perhaps something good was to come out of this. I rushed to one of my desk drawers, and desperately searched for my pocket sized black leather notebook in which I wrote a series of poems, the latest ones being indirect letters to Kim.
Grabbing a pen with my right hand, I flick through the immensely filled pages of my messy, dishevelled handwriting displayed in black ink. Smiling in relief, I find a blank page, and title it Febuary 19th 2011. After placing the lid on my pen, I rest it on the desk, and flick to September 4th 2010. The day I met her.
white smoke
foggy skies
tobacco odour
exchanged shy smiles
i don't know what is, about you
what it is that draws me in
perhaps the way your two fingers hold cigarettes
perhaps the dark circles beneath your eyes
perhaps your severe shyness
but theres something about you
something that draws me in
I remember that day only as if it were yesterday, and as common as that phrase is, it couldn't be more true. I could hear Kim's unintentional stutters, how she took shyness to it's extreme and found it impossible to form a single word in my presence.
I remember smoking with her for the first time, as wrong as it was, it felt right. Not professionally, not socially; it just did. As much as I enjoyed it, I did actually regret it for a couple of days. I was in a state of apprehension, extremely anxious that someone was bound to find out and I was to end my career as a teacher.
Oh Alex. If you only knew what extent you would be drawn into. I sigh again, not wanting to look through any of my poems afterwards, knowing that the feelings within them were to only become stronger gradually. You can't know these kind of things. That's the thing about love; it comes at you with surprise, leaving you with strong feelings of incredulity and admiration.
I went back to today's date: February 19th 2011. I begin to get that writing feeling, that feeling where a million ideas pop in your head, and you're dying to get them down. The feeling where that adrenaline and loving flows through your veins, planting a seed, consequently making flowers bloom within you.
Kimberly Eve Browne is a girl who's bold, beautiful. She's one of those great things that are potentially bad but look beautiful all the same. She's thunderstorms.
She's thunderstorms
Lying on her front
Up against the wall
She's thunderstorms
I've been feeling foolish
You should try it
She came and substituted
The peace and quiet
For acrobatic blood
Flow concertina
Cheating heartbeat
Rapid fire
She's thunderstorms
Lying on her front
Up against the wall
She's thunderstorms
Here is your host
Sounds as if she's pretty close
When the heat starts growing horns
She's thunderstorms
She's been loop-the-looping
Around my mind
Her motorcycle boots
Give me this kind
Of acrobatic blood
Concertina
Cheating heartbeat
Rapid fire
She's thunderstorms
Lying on her front
Up against the wall
She's thunderstorms
In an unusual place
When you're feeling far away
She does what the night does to the day
She's thunderstorms
Lying on her front
Up against the wall
She's thunderstorms
But then the flowers die in your veins, causing the love and adrenaline to stop flowing, ending all ideas of creativity. I sigh, looking at the state of my palms, that were covered in ink, from the desperate, rapid ways that I write.
"Hey, Al," Alexa Chung's voice rung through the room and I spun my head round in surprise.
Why is she here? What did she see? Why did she call me Al? "It's Mr Turner for you, Miss Chung," I reply softly, trying to make the situation seem like less of a big deal than it was.
"Is it now?" She smirks, coming closer towards me. Oh god, no. "I don't think it is if you owe me big time, Al."
Owe her big time? What bullshit. "I don't see why I owe you big time, Miss Chung," I reply, still keeping my cool.
"Ah, forget I said anything," She smirks, then pauses. "Kimberly Browne, quite the student eh?"
"What do you want, Alexa?"
She smirks again. "There we are," she speaks, coming closer to me and patting my head as I grimaced. Get the fuck off me. "I don't know what it is that I want yet, but once I do, you better do it in a flash, Poet Boy, otherwise your very close friend Tom will know everything."
"He already knows."
"Even your quick little make out session just now? I don't think so," She smiles sweetly as I sigh. "See you in class, Mr Turner," she says, and walks out the door. "You told him, didn't you?" I asked. "You took that picture." She stopped and looked at me. "Why? How?" She just smirked, and waved goodbye.
Running my hand through my hair frustratingly, I sigh. Why can't I ever get anything right? I always find a way to fuck everything up. I've made such a mess of things, such a mess that I can't even forgive myself. I kick the wall in exasperation, to only feel agonising pain and someone's presence.
"Didn't anyone tell you not to kick walls?" A familiar Irish accent speaks.
Getting myself together, I turn around to see the person that I expected. Richard. His dirty blond hair was scruffily placed on his head, and his eyes were filled with false amusement and anger. I didn't want to see him. He was like my inner demon, except he didn't know the full story. It was so hard to keep this to myself.
"Yes, Mr Glen?" I speak formally, not wanting to cause any problem whatsoever. I was quite surprised as to why he was hear so early, well for himself anyways. I couldn't think of a reason as to why he was here other than to beat the shit out of me for what I did to Kimberly.
"Formality won't be necessary, Sir," He retorts, coming closer towards me, and closing the door behind himself as I sighed. The last thing I needed was a reminder of what I did. It was all I thought about anyway, there was no need for an extra reminder.
"I'm afraid it will be, as you are my student," I say, continuing to keep my cool. I really didn't want to get anything. Richard is a decent lad, I know that. I know that he cares about Kimberly, but I don't want him to have a go at me, even though I deserved it.
"Oh please, Alex. Cut the crap. Kim being your student didn't stop you from being informal."
Please stop.
"What is it that you want, Mr Glen?" I retort, unable to handle this for much longer. If he was going to beat me up, I'd rather that he would do it now rather than post ponding for ages.
"I want to know a whole lot of things, Al," Richard spits, his voice dripping with hatred. "I want to know why you think it's okay to destroy my best friend, when she is already a step away from dying," he starts, and I'm already fighting back a tear. I'm a monster, yes I know that Richard.
"What a massive asshole you must be to destroy such a fragile girl," He continues, and I couldn't be more hurt myself. Yes I know, I don't deserve to breathe, I don't want to hear it because I know it already. Please stop Richard.
"I want to know why you think it's okay to talk to me like that, Mr Glen," I snap back, defending myself even though I didn't want to. I couldn't describe it really. I had to show that I was completely fine, and if I was completely fine then I would stand up for myself.
Richard begins to laugh. "Really? You don't think I have a good reason to talk to you like this?" He says rudely, pointing towards himself. "Let me give you a taster," he smiles sarcastically, "just a taster. Don't worry. Let's start off with the fact that Kim might actually be in love with you! You could be her first fucking love and you used her for a promotion. A promotion! A fucking promotion. Take your promotion and shove it up your ass along with your pride, Mr Turner. What you did was despicable and I don't know how you live with yourself. "
I know how I live with myself, Richard. I just don't. "Do me a favour, Richard."
"Back to Richard, are we? Go to hell, Alex. Why in God's name would I do a favour for you," he spits, shaking his head. God, everyone does hate me.
"Listen to me now Richard. I listened to you. I have to tell you something," I begin and he raises his eyebrows. "Something you can't ever tell Kimberly." Perhaps what I was doing was wrong. I don't care anymore. I have to do this.
"And what would that something be?" He speaks, clearly uninterested.
"Something that would make you take back everything you just said."