In the dead of night, Bobby ushered his friend into the darkened Kennedy house. "Come on, Eve, quick!" His eyes cautiously jerked back and forth from the living room to the stairs.
"Are you sure no one's awake?" Evelyn whispered sharply — equally nervous, if not more.
He tapped on his watch, "It's after midnight," his cheekiness caused the girl to roll her eyes.
The atmosphere in the house was peculiar; balmy and heavy, a phantasm of a blazing flame in the fireplace. But the two souls marched on in the oblivion for the intoxicating Holy Grail — they needn't a source of light as their brains had memorized the pattern in which the couch was placed, the coffee table was set, and the part of floor that creaked.
Bobby left for the dining room and returned with a chair, which he placed near a tall antique vitrine. "Hold it for me," he instructed Evelyn before hastily stepping on it.
"You sure it's up there?" She asked skeptically — reckoning the old man would hide it someplace better — but nonetheless held the chair firmly in place.
"I remember..." Bobby paused mid-sentence as his hand rubbed the dusty top of the cabinet, "Joe telling me about this... back when he and Jack wanted to impress some friends." He glanced down at Evelyn, showing his foolish smile once he found the key, "Jackpot!"
The girl blinked rapidly before tearing her eyes away, a wave of goosebumps rushed through her body — Bobby mentioning Joe's name, as in the younger and deceased one, was unusual. It had been God-knows-how-long since he spoke of him with joy.
"Who knew he had it in him, huh?" She absently muttered as ancient memories of the dead man played in her mind.
Bobby stepped down the chair, wiping his dirtied hands against his shirt. "What do you mean?"
"Joe..." Evelyn shook her head to refocus, "I didn't think he would do such things."
"What things?" The look on Bobby's face showed genuine confusion; as though the remark was never made.
"Jesus, Bobby..." she scoffed, looking away in disbelief. "Sneaking alcohol!"
Bobby instantly shushed her with a finger against his lips. But it was too late when the sound of footsteps began echoing down the corridor upstairs.
"Shit!" The man used the adrenaline in his body to unlock the cabinet in the spur of the moment.
"What are you doing? We gotta scram!" Evelyn's hands were desperately grasping at him.
"Shut up!"
The two of them continued to produce further noises that resulted in the light to the stairs flickering. "Who's there?" A voice that could only belong to the patriarch bounced off the walls in the living room.
Bobby's hand reached inside the unlocked cabinet for any bottle he could grab. Then he yanked on Evelyn's wrist with the other hand and they hid behind a wall that separated the parlor from the dining room. He intuitively wrapped his arm tightly around her, the bottle safely tucked between their bodies.
As they suspired heavily, breath colliding with one another, she shut her eyes. It was the closest they had ever been, physically, that she couldn't ignore the overwhelming pressure on her chest. "Bobby—"
"Quiet, Eve!"
She was shut down instantly for murmuring his name. Though with all the ruckus, he remained responsible for her; securing her in his everlasting arms as they hid from the enemy — as if God forbade him from ever letting go.
"Are you kidding me..." Joe groaned in exasperation as he discovered his most precious twenty-eight-year-old whisky was gone from the abandoned cabinet. He began chanting, "Come out now, whoever you are. I don't have time for this!" Feeling his eyelids growing heavy again, he dragged himself to the couch, grunting as he fell onto it.
The patriarch was going to Paris for a certain "high society" event being hosted on the 12th of May, and while he was more than ready to execute his role as an aristocrat, he still needed his sleep. Thus, from having his blood pressure going up the roof, he got his six hours of sleep on the couch instead.
"He's dozing off!" Bobby exclaimed while laughing breathlessly — it was as if he's choking on his own spit. He was amused and bemused, by his father's snoring in the parlor.
Evelyn used the little strength she had left to push him off of her. She couldn't fathom how he could find amusement in the situation — she was not entertained, not in the slightest.
The reckless smile faded away from Bobby's sweaty face, but he loved it when the girl became flustered around him. He knew she enjoyed having her boundaries pushed. "Come on, to the roof!"
Evelyn followed him through the dining room and straight into the kitchen to use the back door. That was intense, the girl thought, but little did she know, her whole life was about to change.
Evelyn was walking down a path to a disaster that she once thought a blessing from God — a blessing that seemed too good to be true. Something she had been chasing after since the first time she laid her eyes on the boy, Bobby Kennedy.
Five-year-old Evelyn was shyer than a mouse. She was anything a parent would want; disciplined, well-adjusted, and most importantly, ladylike. Being the only child of the two French socialites, she couldn't be happier to move away from France; from all the parties her mother would throw — at the same time their money, too. Though, the manners her mother had taught her slowly fade away, and she blames it all on "those Kennedy boys" — those boys showed Evelyn the American dream; parties unlike the ones where adults discuss F. Scott Fitzgerald, but those with alcoholic drinks, music, and perhaps excessive displays of love.
But Bobby was a life jacket to Evelyn, each time she finds herself standing on the edge of a cliff — ready to fall into the deadly water — he would pull her back into reality. When she swims endlessly into the water, he won't allow her to go any deeper, afraid she would find herself lost in the endless abyss of American hedonism. Once Jack, the card dealer, had pulled her into the deep ocean, Bobby would dip his hand into the biting water, and pulls her back out.
He would curse at her, warn her, and even scold her to be careful around his brother, "Jack's a shark. People would tell you he's not as dangerous as he looks, but they forget he bites and relentless with his prey." Evelyn nods and smiles. She heard him, but never listens.
However, when the first tragedy — one that caused a death — struck the family, Jack changed. Everybody did, but he was affected differently. Joe was not around to keep him in check anymore, his life jacket was gone — vanished into the thin air.
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