Wednesday
Senn calmed down a bit after his friends stopped asking him about his secretive behavior. It was mostly Avan who caused them to change subjects for a while; telling the rest that Senn wasn't acting weird, because he simply was weird. Senn was fine with that. They laughed over it, and moved on, enabling him to breathe again.
"That chick in senior year," Lucas asked, right before taking a swag from his beer. "The one with long blonde hair who always wears bright colored jeans. She's hot."
"Dude, yes!" Avan called out enthusiastically. "That ass bro, it's amazing."
"Those colors make it stand out even more." Lucas nodded. "I'd do her if I could."
They both turned to Senn in unison, clearly asking for his approval of the girl. Senn knew exactly who they meant; Jessica. A girl with long blonde hair, skinny, always wearing bright colors. She was one year above them and they hardly ever crossed paths. But everyone knew Jessica, because of the bright colors she wore, and how well she could get away with it.
"What?" Senn asked, pulling up an eyebrow. He took a drag from the joint they were sharing while staring at them.
"The chick? Don't you think she's hot?"
"Dude, she's my cousin. That's sick," Senn said, laughing as soon as their smiles dropped, and they shared a look of disbelief.
"No way." Lucas shook his head. "She cannot be your cousin."
"Yeah, so stop ogling her ass, or I might stab your eyes out."
"Wow, protective much?" Avan leaned over to steal the joint, smirking at him. "Why don't you introduce her to us?"
Senn shrugged a shoulder. It wasn't like he actually knew her that well. They saw each other about once a month, and Jessica never exchanged a word with either him or Killian. She did babysit Liam every so often, but that was about as far as their mutual activities went. They had nothing in common, and they had simply silently agreed to not bother each other in school.
"Why not? Am I not good enough to become family?" Avan pushed him to answer differently—or in any way at all.
"I don't know her that well. But I know her well enough to know that she's my cousin and, dude, gross."
"Right, okay, another chick..." Lucas started, when the girls suddenly sat down beside them. "Joyce. What about Joyce?"
Avan and Lucas both, again, were staring at Senn, who rolled his eyes in annoyance.
"What about me?" Joyce asked, while she leaned closer to Senn.
"Which girls we think are hottest in school." Lucas sent her a wink.
Joyce giggled while she turned to look at Senn. "Do you still think I'm hot?"
Senn refused to answer right away. He wasn't going to say anything about her when he broke up with her for a reason. Joyce and he had been dating for about a year when things inside Senn just... broke. And he couldn't do it any longer. He couldn't keep telling her she was hot, sexy, cute, or anything for that matter. Something had simply snapped and he hadn't been able to pretend any longer. But he couldn't exactly explain why he suddenly didn't think she was hot anymore.
"I mean... yeah," he mumbled, adding a shrug.
"So, Avan would go all in with Jessica, I'd say Elif, and you say Joyce, again."
"Shut up." Senn shrugged Joyce's head off his shoulder. "Who says I like any girl? I just said I'm not interested in a girl right now."
"Yeah right," Avan said, laughing. "You're a guy. A seventeen-year-old, might I add. You're supposed to be horny 24/7."
"Well, I don't need a girl, and I don't have to check them out either."
"Why, want a guy?" Avan joked, laughing with Lucas while Senn groaned, leaning backwards until he was on his back, staring up to the sky.
"You guys suck."
"No, but you apparently do," Lucas pushed it further, pissing Senn off to no end.
"Good one, dude," Avan snorted.
Senn listened to their laughter for a short while, before he pushed himself up again.
"Yeah, yeah, very funny." Senn sighed, tired of this never-ending bullshit. When Joyce flashed an awkward smile, putting her hand on his, he simply turned his hand around to intertwine their fingers.
"Don't listen to them, they're idiots."
"Yeah, I'm usually one of them, you know," Senn joked. "I'm just tired. Liam was sick and he kept us all up this week," he lied, knowing he really had no other excuse to use.
"You're more fun than they are," Joyce giggled.
"Well, I'm going for a swim. Joyce, coming?" Samantha pushed herself up again. "Boys?"
"Sure," Avan answered, following her to the banks of the river. Lucas soon joined, and Senn and Joyce watched them toss their clothes aside, jumping into a deeper part of the river from a rock they had used to fish not too long ago.
"Want to swim too?" Joyce asked after a short silence, filled with background sounds coming from the river. Samantha was trying to push Lucas' head under water, while Avan was pretending to be a referee to judge if they were both playing fair.
"Nah, I'm good," Senn replied absentmindedly, turning to face her. "Want to share a joint? Avan and Lucas took most of the other but I'm not gonna smoke on my own."
"Sure," Joyce said, crawling towards his backpack. She searched the small compartment, retrieving weed eventually. "But you roll, because I suck at that—you know that."
"Yeah, I'll do it." Senn took it from her, and for a short while she sat in silence, while he rolled a joint. She—as always—sat down next to him, placing her head on his shoulder, and eventually started gently tickling his neck.
"Don't you ever regret breaking up? I still think we'd be an amazing couple."
"We're not, Joyce. I'm sorry. I don't feel that way anymore."
"But you just said I'm hot."
"Yeah, but I don't have romantic feelings."
"Does that matter? We don't have to be romantic." Joyce took the joint from him, taking a drag while never breaking eye contact. "We don't have to be together as a couple to have fun. But you don't even want that."
Senn looked through the curtain of smoke, right into her eyes, while a daring smirk appeared on his face. "Is our little angel proposing a purely physical relation?"
Joyce blushed, threw the rest of her wine down her throat and suddenly changed into a completely different person. Her eyes were daring him to turn her offer down, while she crawled close enough for him to smell her flowery shampoo despite the smoke. "What's wrong? Don't you want that? No strings attached?"
She kissed him, and he sat frozen in his place, allowing her to do so. The combination of the sun on their heads all day, the amount of beer, and the weed were all clashing inside his head. He felt mellow, drunk, hot, and he couldn't stop himself from answering her kiss, knowing full well that he didn't want this. But he wouldn't ever want Avan to ask him if he was gay again either.
And dealing with Joyce, kissing her, and pretending he wasn't gay was easier than actually defending a fake sexuality to two friends who'd known him since pre-school.
Senn was contemplating pushing her away when she crawled onto his lap, holding his head with both her hands, when his phone started ringing in his pocket.
He pushed her back, grabbed his phone, and answered, all before catching his breath.
"Senn, sweetie, are you coming home? Dinner is ready in half an hour."