Before Kinsey’s eyes opened, she realized two things: that her feet felt like they were on fire and that she was wearing only her bra and a thong. Once she’d thrown her covers onto the floor, she saw that her knee-high black leather boots were still on her feet. Her still sleepy body tried to claw the zipper down, and it took her far longer than usual to get them off. She tossed them to the floor and watched as they landed on top of her dress, the one that she had taken off last night.
“Fuck,” she groaned as she remembered pulling it over her head right in front of Taylor, giving him a perfect view of her completely uncovered ass. “Fuck fuck fuck.” After finding some appropriate clothing to cover herself with, she headed to the bathroom to wash her face and hopefully silently vent some of her frustration before going downstairs. Why in the hell had she done that? Now it was all she was going to hear about for the next week since every time Taylor had something to make fun of her for, he took full advantage.
“So, when did you guys get back last night?” Isaac asked Taylor as they sat in the kitchen drinking coffee.
“Kinsey and I came back around two and we left Zac there. He was flirting and got all pissed when we tried to get him to go.”
“Oh way to go, Taylor. I can’t believe you just left him there!”
“We were drunk, Ike, and there was no way for me to physically remove him from the bar, so yeah. We left him there,” Taylor explained, “And plus, Kinsey had already been way over-served.”
“You weren’t so sober yourself,” Kinsey grumbled as she shuffled in the room wearing the most unrevealing things she could find in her drawers—a huge OSU-Tulsa sweatshirt and some long basketball shorts. As she dug around in the fridge for something to eat, Taylor entertained himself by whistling “These Boots Are Made For Walking.” When it became obvious that she was going to ignore him, he attempted a new technique.
“Isaac, what are those called?” he asked, pointing to the shoes Isaac had on.
“Flip flops?”
“Yeah, but people call them something else, too.”
“Sandals?” Isaac asked, obviously not really interested in Taylor’s questions.
“No, that’s not it…” Taylor said before snapping his fingers, “I know! Thongs!!”
“Go fuck off and die,” Kinsey spat turning to face him while her toast cooked.
“Do I even want to know?” Isaac groaned, rubbing his eyes. Taylor said yes while Kinsey said no and Isaac decided to drop the whole thing. Kinsey swore repeatedly under her breath as she spread peanut butter on her toast and Taylor sang “The Thong Song” to himself. Zac came in the room quickly a minute later, sparing Taylor a glob of peanut butter to the head, which Kinsey had been plotting the entire time she prepared her breakfast.
“Everything okay?” Taylor asked him as Zac sat down at the table and leaned in towards them.
“Um… there’s a purple-haired, tattooed chick with nipple rings naked in my bed,” he whispered, prompting Isaac to spit his coffee across the table, showering Taylor with the hot brown liquid.
“Gross!” Taylor shouted, getting up and running for the sink. Kinsey already had the handheld sprayer in hand and sprayed it at him as soon as he was in reach.
“Better now?” she asked, loving the annoyed look on his face.
“Better? First, you force me to endure the sight of you mostly naked and now you spray me with freezing cold water? How could I possibly be better?”
“You saw Kinsey naked?” Zac asked.
“Mostly naked,” Isaac corrected before turning back to Taylor and Kinsey, “And when? How?!”
“Well, with my eyes mostly,” Taylor rolled his eyes, pulling his wet t-shirt from his skin and airing it in the hopes of ridding it of moisture faster. But before anyone could respond, the girl Zac had described walked through the door and sat herself down at the table, helping herself to one of the muffins Isaac had set out and grabbing a section of the newspaper. The three guys and Kinsey all looked back and forth at each other in awe as this stranger continued to make herself at home while not acknowledging any of them, even Zac. Isaac opened his mouth to say something, but obviously thought better of it as Zac shot him a death glare. The mystery girl continued to eat her blueberry muffin in silence as she read the paper until it was finished. Then, she folded up the paper and turned to look at Zac.
“So are you going to call me again or what?” she asked.
“Um…” he started.
“I’m just fucking with you. Thanks for the lay… and the muffin. Have a good one!” she said before getting up and leaving. They all heard the front door shut and all eyes went to Zac.
“She was hot, right?” he asked, sheepishly.
“You’re going to get checked for STDs today, right?” Isaac asked.
“I used a condom!” Zac said defiantly, “Both times!!”
“She didn’t look crazy,” Kinsey chimed in, “Not exactly your type, Zac, but not crazy.”
“I don’t care how not crazy she was or how hot you thought she looked, Zac, go get checked!” Isaac repeated.
“Oh, I’m sure Taylor’s a pro at spotting the warning signs of STDs by now, aren’t you? I’m sure he’d be glad to give you some pointers.”
“Whatever! At least I wasn’t the one ripping my clothes off in front of people last night!” Taylor stated.
“I was going to bed, not trying to seduce you, you idiot. I was drunk!”
“I never said you were trying to seduce me, but since you brought it up, I’m starting to think that you were trying to but failed.”
“Oh my god, please stop,” Isaac sighed.
“You’re just mad because you’re the only one who didn’t see a naked chick last night,” Zac laughed at Isaac.
“I WASN’T NAKED!” Kinsey yelled, but they all ignored her and kept talking. She grabbed her plate and stormed out of the room. Once she’d reached her destination, the living room, she turned on the TV and settled in to eat her toast in peace. She was irritated with herself for getting so annoyed at Taylor. Hadn’t she just told herself upstairs that he would attempt to make her life hell with this new experience? She bit into a slice of her toast savagely and scowled at the episode of “How I Met Your Mother” on the screen in front of her.
Four episodes later, Zac plopped himself down on the couch next to her, freshly showered.
“Are you still mad?” he asked teasingly, reaching over to grab her bottom lip to emphasize the pout that had settled there without Kinsey realizing.
“Just annoyed,” she shrugged.
“With Taylor or yourself?” he asked, ever the observant one.
“Both. More Taylor though, obviously.”
“Oh come on, Kins. You know that if Taylor had done the same to you, you wouldn’t be letting him live it down either,” Zac pointed out. She finally removed her gaze from the TV and nodded at him.
“You’re absolutely right. If Taylor had dropped trou and revealed that he had a thong on I would definitely not let him live it down… ever,” she laughed and Zac laughed with her before groaning.
“Oh god, let’s hope no one in the world ever has to see Taylor wearing a banana hammock. Guh,” he shuddered before making an obvious effort to change the subject and Kinsey’s mood, “So, what’s the plan for the rest of the day?”
“Painting the rest of the kitchen, probably,” she sighed, already feeling her muscles ache at the thought. If anyone had asked her, painting the kitchen would have been far down on her list of things she wanted to do with the day, but she knew that unless it got done today when the guys weren’t working in the studio, she’d wind up doing the whole thing by herself.
“We can swing that. We were going to go shopping for a bit this afternoon, though. You want to come with?” he asked, smoothing his hand over her hair. Kinsey usually bounced back from Taylor’s attacks sooner, so he knew that the whole situation must have really been embarrassing for her. “Come on, Kins.”
“I think I’m just going to hang out here. You know, take a shower and stuff,” Kinsey said, picking at the hem of her shorts.
“Well, I’m buying you a present while we’re out,” he told her, placing a kiss to her temple before standing, “We’ll be back in a few hours.”
“Okay, later.” She sat there and watched another episode and all the while she could hear the guys puttering around, getting ready to go. Zac had just screamed up the stairs for Taylor to get his ass down there, and she could hear the echoing booms of Taylor’s shoes colliding with the steps the whole way down.
“Aren’t you coming?” Taylor asked, poking his head around the corner into the living room.
“Not so much.” She rolled her eyes at his look of concern.
“Fine, if you want to sit here and mope that’s your own prerogative,” he said, throwing one of his gloves at her before turning around and leaving.
“Don’t you need this?” she shouted, tossing it back into the hallway, but it lay there unclaimed even as she heard the front door shut and the condo go quiet. Once the episode was over, she stood and cleaned up her breakfast before heading upstairs to wash away the night. She could only hope that stepping under the scalding hot spray would make the irritation slide from her body. It ran down her back in steaming torrents and did exactly as she had hoped. After adorning her body in some old yoga pants and a tank top, neither of which she minded if they got flecked with paint, she grabbed her painting supplies and headed down to the kitchen to get started on the job she knew it was take them most of the day to finish.
It wasn’t that the kitchen was ridiculously big like the living room had been, it was just that prepping the room, painting around all of the counters, and moving the appliances would lengthen the procedure significantly. Kinsey did as much as she could without the guys’ help and had managed to tape almost all of the exposed edges in the room when the front door banged open, smacking hard against the wall behind it and making her cringe. There was already a light indentation forming where the doorknob kept hitting the wall every time Taylor came in the condo even though she had warned him about it multiple times.
“We have tequila!” she heard Isaac sing from the entryway and she didn’t know whether to sigh or smile. Yes, drinking with the guys was almost always a blast, but she really didn’t see how copious amounts of alcohol would expedite or enhance the painting process. Make it pass in a hazy blur, maybe, but nothing else.
“And pizza!” Zac chimed in, sounding closer than Isaac had. And with that, they burst into the kitchen bringing their dirty footprints and loud talking with them.
“I thought we were painting,” she said sassily, before ripping the bright blue tape and smashing it securely against one of the room’s window frames.
“We are, just with liquid reinforcements,” Zac grinned, taking in the increasingly grumpy look on her face and going over to stand by her, “Come on, Kins. It’s our day off. If we have to do manual labor, we’re at least going to party while we do it!” She rolled her eyes and moved on to the next window while the guys busied themselves getting out the blender, finding paper plates, and generally being as counterproductive as Kinsey could imagine them being.
“God, just stop for a minute and eat some pizza,” Taylor said, snatching the tape from her hands and reaching up to set it on the top of the cabinets, far above her reach.
“Give it back!” she shrieked, smacking him in the chest before using his shoulder as a balance to pull herself up on the counter where she’d be able to reach the tape. Taylor moved faster than her, however, and grabbed her around the waist, setting her back down on the ground before she made it up. “You are so irritating! Just let me have it!”
“After you eat some pizza.”
“I just had something a few hours ago.”
“Yeah, and now you’re going to eat some pizza. So just shut the hell up for once and go get a slice. Seriously, you’re making this take longer than it needs to. You could have been halfway done eating by now,” he said.
“Oh god, you two need to start drinking. You’re halfway nice to each other when you’re drunk,” Isaac said, shoving a plate with a slice of sausage on it towards Kinsey.
“I’m not drinking. It’s not even dark outside yet,” she replied, sitting down at the table and pushing away the margarita Zac had set in front of her. He rolled his eyes and pushed it back in her direction, knowing that she would give in and take a sip eventually.
“What is your severe trauma today?” Taylor asked her, “Lighten up and have some fun already. You’re only twenty-two once.”
“Not for much longer,” she grinned, completely ignoring the beginning of Taylor’s comment and instead focusing on her upcoming birthday.
“That’s right, you’re going to be super old soon,” Zac told her, prompting both Taylor to shoot him a dirty look.
“Oh!” Isaac said excitedly, “Tif called early this morning. She’s going to come visit for your birthday!”
“Yay!” Kinsey said, and as Zac had expected, she reached forward and grabbed the margarita, taking a sip without further comment, “I’ve missed her! How’s she doing?”
“Fine. Still hates her job, the usual,” Isaac shrugged, “She wanted to know what you want for your birthday.”
“Yeah, what do you want?” Zac asked, “You’re always so freaking cryptic about it.”
“Not having a detailed list of things I want doesn’t make me cryptic, Zac. I’m not you.” He gave her the finger and they finished the rest of their pizza without much of an incident. They eventually agreed that for every half hour of solid productive work that they did, they would either do a shot or stop and drink a margarita. After three hours of painting, Zac had the always brilliant idea of playing a game to pass the time in between drinking breaks. It had taken Taylor and Isaac almost five minutes to talk Zac out of playing Truth or Dare, and they had finally agreed to play I Have Never.
Kinsey decided to start things off with her ever popular choice of “I have never had a penis,” and the game was underway with much grumbling from the guys as they all took a prolonged sip of their fresh margaritas.
“I have never… gone to college,” Zac said, looking pointedly at Kinsey, obviously giving her some payback for her penis comment. She made a talking motion with her hand in his direction while taking a sip before getting back to the wall in front of her.
“I have never cried at a movie,” Taylor said.
“You have no soul,” Isaac laughed.
“You have no testosterone,” Zac said to Isaac.
“I have four words for you,” Isaac said, turning to him, “Fox and the Hound.” Zac swore under his breath and took a drink.
“I was five!” he wailed.
“It still counts, beetoch,” Kinsey said, making a face at him.
“Okay smart guy,” Isaac mocked Zac, “I have never kissed Kinsey.” Kinsey laughed as Zac took a drink, but noticed that Isaac was staring at Taylor.
“What are you looking at?” Taylor asked nervously.
“Why did you just take a drink?” Isaac asked him.
“I was thirsty,” Taylor lied obviously, his usual drunken tell of pulling at the collar of his shirt giving it away. Kinsey wanted to throw her paint brush at his head for being such a supreme drunk ass, but reeled in the impulse. Even heavily buzzed, she still knew that cleaning up that mess would be a real bitch.
“When in the hell did you two make out?” Isaac asked.
“We never made out,” Kinsey said quickly.
“Anyone else want another drink?” Taylor asked, his attempt at changing the subject failing badly as Zac joined the inquisition.
“What the hell? First, you got all weird last night when you found out that Kinsey and I actually kissed and now this? You have to fess up now,” Zac said.
“I did not get weird last night!” Taylor defended.
“Yes you did,” the other three said in unison. Taylor stomped his foot and crossed his arms across his chest.
“Just tell them,” Kinsey sighed, unable to even process that after all the efforts they had gone through to keep it quiet, that it was all coming out because of Taylor’s complete inability to lie when drunk. Taylor just looked at her for a lengthened pause.
“Tell us what?” Isaac asked, the tone of his voice a mixture of annoyance and excitement.
“When I was eleven and Kinsey was ten, we were each other’s first kiss,” Taylor said.
“How is it possible that we didn’t know about this?” Zac asked.
“It’s not exactly something we wanted to run around and tell people,” Kinsey said, “It just happened.”
“I just don’t understand how you two managed to find time in between fights to kiss each other,” Isaac said.
“It was before we started fighting all the time, and like Kinsey said… it just happened,” Taylor shrugged. Kinsey leaned against the unpainted wall beside her and couldn’t help but think back to that day.
They had all been in the Hanson’s basement watching “The Sandlot,” when Isaac and Zac had fallen asleep, leaving Taylor and Kinsey to entertain themselves while their parents were socializing on the back porch. They decided to go upstairs to watch another movie where they wouldn’t wake up Zac and Isaac.
“What do you want to watch?” he asked, settling down on the loveseat that faced the television. Kinsey shrugged and sat next to him.
“Don’t you guys have ‘Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead’?” she asked.
“Yeah, let’s watch that,” he said, getting up to get it out of their movie cabinet and put it in the VCR. They watched the movie in silence except for the laughter that erupted from both of them every few minutes. However, when Sue Ellen kissed Bryan, they both got very outwardly uncomfortable.
“Ew,” Kinsey said, but her eyes didn’t leave the screen.
“What?” he asked.
“It’s gross.”
“How do you know?”
“I just do, okay?”
“Have you ever even kissed someone?” he asked curiously.
“No!” she exclaimed, but then stole a sideways glance at him, “Why, have you?”
“Well, no, but too many people do it for it to be gross, you know?” he shrugged.
“I guess.” They sat in silence for a few minutes, trying to focus their attention back on the movie.
“Do you want to?” he asked out of the blue.
“Do I want to what?” she asked, obviously annoyed at her movie viewing being interrupted.
“To kiss someone,” he clarified.
“I don’t know. Why are you being so weird?”
“I’m not being weird, I’m just asking you.”
“Well, why do you keep asking me about kissing, Taylor?”
“Well, I… I was just thinking that maybe we could kiss and then our first kiss would be over with and we maybe…”
“Wouldn’t be weirded out by it anymore?”
“Exactly,” he paused, “So, do you?”
“I don’t know,wouldn’t it be weird? I mean, we’ve been friends for forever.”
“It’s just a kiss, Kinsey. It’s not a big deal.”
“Okay, did you want to do it right now?” she asked, pulling her legs off of the floor and hugging them to her chest.
“No, I thought we’d do it in three years. Yes now,” he said, rolling his eyes.
“If you’re going to be mean to me, I’m not going to kiss you,” she said, turning her focus back to the TV. Taylor sighed and scooted closer to her.
“I’m sorry, okay?” She turned to look at him and found him incredibly close to her, far closer than he had been a second ago.
“Aren’t you supposed to think that girls have cooties?” she asked with a smile.
“I guess I’m weird.”
“I’ve been telling you that for years,” she laughed quietly before sobering, “But it’s okay, I think I’m kind of weird, too.”
“Are you ready?” he asked, tucking his hair behind his ears.
“Sure,” she said, letting her feet sink back to the floor as Taylor leaned in. Kinsey closed her eyes and sat there waiting for him. He smiled and then hesitantly pressed his lips against hers. Their lips lingered together for about five seconds before he pulled back.
“Wait,” she said, her hand reaching out to grab his shoulder.
“What?”
“Can we do that again?” she asked. Taylor raised his eyebrows.
“Again?”
“I mean, if you want to. If you don’t, then just forget it,” she said, trying to sound indifferent as she leaned away from him.
“No no no, it’s okay. We can do it again.”
“Okay,” she smiled, this time leaning in to him. They jerked apart a few seconds later as they heard the back door slam shut.
“Wow, I can’t believe it,” Zac said, drinking some of his margarita as if it would make the news easier to handle.
“Actually it makes a lot of sense,” Isaac mused, “I mean, not for normal people, but for you two. You guys can’t go a day without fighting but you were each other’s first kiss. It’s pretty hilarious if you think about it.”
“You have a twisted sense of humor, Isaac,” Kinsey shook her head while finishing her drink, “I need about twelve more of these now, thank you very much, Blabbermouth!” Taylor shrugged weakly at her and finished off his own drink. They hardly managed to finish two of the four walls in the kitchen before being so drunk they were forced to call it a night. Kinsey would normally have been annoyed at the distraction and prolonging of the project, but after the awkwardness following her and Taylor’s admission had subsided, they had really had a nice night just hanging out and talking. After brushing her teeth and scolding Taylor again for spilling their secret, she went to bed. Her body sunk delightfully into the mattress and she drifted off to sleep rather quickly.
Some undetermined amount of time later, she was awakened by the sound of her bedroom door opening and shutting quietly. She was too groggy to ask who it was, so she merely tried to focus her eyes in the pitch blackness. Someone sat down on the edge of her bed and she felt a hand fall to rest on her leg. Kinsey had no idea who it was, their form undeterminable in the dark, but no matter which of them it was, she knew that they had no business crawling on top of her and placing a perfectly placed kiss to her neck. Despite herself, she reached up a hand to hold onto the neck of the person sucking on her flesh hard enough to give her a hickey. He seemed to take that motion as a signal to proceed and moved his mouth to her lips, his soft lips sliding against hers. A moan escaped her mouth as he lowered his body into hers, pressing his growing hardness into her thigh as they continued to make out fervently. Something deep inside of her knew that this wasn’t normal and an even smaller part wondered why he was in there in the first place, but as his hands moved quickly to remove her tank top as well as his own shirt, all of those thoughts flew away.
A few seconds later, their pants joined their shirts on the black obscurity of her floor. After his hand had disappeared between her thighs for a few moments to be sure she was ready for him, he aligned himself and with a swift hip movement from both of them was buried inside her, his breath catching in his throat at the sensation.
“Oh Taylor, that feels amazing,” she moaned into his ear. And with that, she woke up with a start, her body covered in a thin sheen of sweat from the sex dream she’d just been having. About Taylor.