Kinsey awoke the next morning to the feeling of a body sinking down next to hers on the mattress. She didn’t have to open her eyes to remember that she was in her childhood bedroom, the sound of the ceiling fan over head, the chain clinking ever so lightly against one of the lights with each passing did that for her. And she also didn’t need to open her eyes to know that the body next to hers was Brenna’s, because it was how Brenna used to wake her up every Saturday morning to watch cartoons. First, she would lay there silently, hoping that Kinsey would wake up on her own. Then, she would move to the next tactic, one that she still considered subtle.
Kinsey bit back a laugh as Brenna’s first attempt, flopping her arm across Kinsey’s back, neck, stomach, whichever was closest, was tried. In this case, Kinsey felt Brenna’s arm, now considerably more heavy than her seven-year-old twiggy limbs had been, plopped down right onto Kinsey’s navel. When Kinsey didn’t respond, Brenna moved on to the next step, sighing loudly every ten seconds or so. This was what usually fully brought Kinsey out of her slumber and now was no exception. With a quick movement, much faster than Kinsey was used to moving in the morning, she dug her hands into Brenna’s side and shoved her unceremoniously to the floor.
“Ow!” Brenna shrieked as some bony part of her collided with the hardwood floor.
“Serves you right for waking me up,” Kinsey grumbled, sitting up and looking over the edge of the bed at her sister’s crumpled form, now laying intentionally dejected-looking on the ground.
“I think you broke my arm,” Brenna whined. Kinsey just rolled her eyes and got up, offering her hands to her little sister until they were accepted and they were both on their feet and on their way downstairs. “Mom made waffles and your phone keeps ringing. Mom sent me to wake you up. Are you going to throw her on the floor, too?”
“No, she made me breakfast,” Kinsey stated, “And one hell of a martini last night.” Brenna laughed.
“Those were good martinis,” Brenna agreed as they walked down the hall to the kitchen, “So, are you ready for today’s festivities?”
“Oh, you mean am I ready to face my best friends who won’t talk to me? Abso-fucking-lutely!” Kinsey gushed fakely, “No, I’m dreading it with every fiber of my being. Why?” Brenna shrugged.
“Well, your phone goes back and forth from getting calls from Taylor, calls from Tif, and you even got one from Isaac about an hour ago.” Kinsey wondered what time it was that she had so many calls, and the clock over the stove told her it was only ten-thirty.
“Isaac must’ve called from the airport then,” Kinsey said, “Wonder what he wanted.”
“Who knows. You’re all crazy,” Brenna stated before sitting down at the table. Kinsey couldn’t disagree with that statement and greeted her father, who she had seen only briefly and mostly drunk the night before, and then snagged her cell phone from the counter.
“Well if it isn’t Ms. Popularity,” her mom teased.
“I’m not sure I want to hear any of these messages,” Kinsey responded honestly, going into the dining room to listen in peace before she planned to inhale an entire plate of waffles whole. The first message was from Taylor.
”Hey, it’s me. Isaac tried to call me a bunch of times last night, but I didn’t answer. I was too busy talking to Mom and Dad. They’re being really cool about everything and I hope yours are, too. Anyways, I listened to Ike’s messages when I woke up and he wants to talk to you and me alone before the whole family gets together. He sounded like he’d calmed down a lot… I don’t know,” he sighed, “I’m going to come over to pick you up around 2:30 so you’d better be up and showered by then, or else. See you soon.”
Kinsey smiled and debated whether to keep or delete the message for a few seconds before saving it. The next was from Tif.
”Hey, Isaac called me last night… holy crap. Now I know why you needed to talk to me. He wants to talk to you guys this afternoon, before the party. Please talk to him. He… well, he really needs to talk to you. I can’t wait to see you. I still have a hard time believe this whole ‘you and Taylor thing’ is real. I need to see it to believe. Well, maybe not see it like Zac saw it but-“
Kinsey rolled her eyes and deleted the message without listening to the rest of it. Leave it to Tif to be horrendously sassy in an inappropriate situation. The last message was from Isaac and Kinsey wasn’t sure if she wanted to hear what he had to say or not.
”Kins, it’s me. Please get together with Taylor and meet me at the diner at three. I really want to talk to you two. I’m not looking for a fight, so please come. I… no, I want to say everything in person. I’ll see you at three, hopefully.”
When she had deleted that message, she shoved her phone in the front pocket of her hoodie and trudged into the kitchen to join her family at the table. It didn’t take long her for her clean her plate, and she was upstairs getting ready within twenty minutes, which gave her a lot of time to primp and prepare before Taylor arrived.
The doorbell rang at 2:35 and Kinsey was in the kitchen with her mom, leaving her dad the opportunity to go answer the door.
“Is Dad going to be nice to him?” Kinsey asked her mom, helping out by frosting a sugar cookie while she waited.
“Of course,” her mom said with a little half grin, but Kinsey knew that smile well enough to be nervous of it. Kinsey listened with straining ears to hear what was going on in the front hallway, but all she could hear was muffled voices and then footsteps coming their way. Taylor came into the room with slightly reddened cheeks and went immediately to Kinsey’s side. But once he was there, they both just looked at each other, unaware of what to do. Everyone in the room was looking at them expectantly, Kinsey found when she took a glance around. Just when she was about to ask what their problem was, she realized. They were waiting to see what she and Taylor were going to do, and Taylor seemed to realize that as well and leaned in to kiss her, but at the last second, Kinsey got nervous and tipped her head, leaving him to give her an awkward kiss on the cheek.
“How’re you doing?” he asked her, obviously trying to ignore the painfully uncomfortable moment that had just taken place.
“I’m okay. Ready to get this day from hell started!” she said.
“It can’t be a day from hell if there are sugar cookies,” Brenna chimed in from the other side of the island. She held up a half-decorated turkey as if it proved her point. Kinsey just snatched it out of Brenna’s hands and offered it to Taylor. He grinned at her before biting off its head.
“Okay, we’re leaving,” Kinsey said, before taking a bite of her own, finding the cookie ripped out of her hands by Taylor before she could even contemplate a second bite.
“We’ll see you at the Hanson’s in an hour,” her dad said, “Have fun, kids.” Kinsey noticed as Taylor swallowed hard at her dad’s words and with that, they left the house.
“What did Dad say to you?” Kinsey asked exasperatedly, but before he answered, he grabbed her and gave her a kiss, leaving her breathless and half-panting on her parents’ front porch.
“That’s what you get for denying me in front of your parents,” he rolled his eyes before shoving the rest of the cookie in his mouth. She glared at him before following him down the sidewalk to his mom’s CR-V.
“I didn’t know what to do! They were just staring at us, like they were waiting to see if we were for real or not,” Kinsey sighed, opening the passenger’s door and sliding in.
“Well I wasn’t going to shove my tongue in your mouth in front of them. Especially after your dad just stared me down before letting me in the house. I thought he was either going to punch me or eat my face. It was scary.”
“He’s just trying to put the daddy-fear in you. Don’t let him scare you. He just knows your banging his baby and no Dad is comfortable with that kind of knowledge.”
“He knows we’re having sex?”
“He’s not an idiot, Taylor! We live in the same place and we’re in our twenties. Yeah, he knows we’re sleeping together.” Taylor just shuddered lightly at the thought and pulled out of the driveway. Kinsey relaxed back into the seat and watched the familiar streets pass as he wound his way out of their development.
“So, did Isaac call you, too?” Taylor asked once they were well on their way to their destination.
“Yeah. He just said that he wanted us to get together this afternoon so he could talk to us at the diner and that he wanted to say everything in person,” Kinsey shrugged, “Same thing he said to you.”
Taylor was chewing nervously on his bottom lip, “I know it’s just Isaac, but… he’s my older brother and having him yell at me like that last night…” Kinsey smiled understandingly at him before reaching over to put her hand over his, sliding her fingers between his and giving it a squeeze. It didn’t feel strange, being affectionate with Taylor when they were alone, but as had just been proven in her parents’ kitchen, being that way around others had the potential to be weird. She didn’t want to give them a self-fulfilling prophecy, but she couldn’t erase the uncomfortable feeling that had filled her when she realized that everyone was watching their every move, not that she could blame them. People were used to watching them fight like they were some kind of freak show, and now they were just the same people with an exciting and shiny new act to gape at.
“Well, here goes nothing,” Taylor sighed as they pulled in front of Cook’s Diner, their longtime favorite place to eat in Tulsa when they didn’t want a lot of people around. It had been no surprise to either of them that Isaac had picked the location due to that fact and that they had the best banana cream pie any of them had ever tasted. Isaac was a sucker for it, and Kinsey was sure before they stepped through the door that he would already have a slice of it in front of him on the white and gold flecked tabletop.
When they entered the diner, they saw Isaac seated in the back corner with, as Kinsey had predicted, a slice of pie and a carafe of coffee in front of him. He spotted them immediately, but didn’t smile and wave them over. At least he knew it wouldn’t be appropriate, Kinsey thought to herself as they made their way wordlessly to the table.
“Hey guys,” Isaac said dully, though it was clear from his expression that he was trying. He looked completely exhausted.
“Happy birthday,” Taylor said to him before sitting down, sliding over so Kinsey could sit beside him.
“Yeah, happy birthday,” Kinsey repeated.
“Thanks,” Isaac snorted humorlessly and Kinsey knew that it was instead a prime example of a terrible birthday, not a happy one, “You want some coffee?” When both Taylor and Kinsey declined, Isaac took a deep breath and started using his fork to draw patterns in the creamy yellow dessert. “So, I wanted to start out by apologizing. I don’t expect you to accept it right now, but I overreacted when I found out that you two have been sleeping together. I’m honestly not exactly sure why I did. I think it was mainly a gut, defensive reaction to the way you acted when you found out about myself and Tif, Tay.
“That night, I was so happy to finally break the news to you guys. It had been so terrible hiding our relationship, but it was just so perfect the way it was that we were hesitant to potentially mess it up. That’s not what we said out loud, of course, but I know that I was thinking it, and I’m sure Tif was, too. Tif and I have always had a good connection. I felt close to her right when we first met her, even though I didn’t do anything about it until, what, nine years later? And I think that was why we waited so long, because we knew that when we did, that everyone would be okay with it.
“But, I’m going to go out on a limb here and assume that you guys waited to tell us for the exact opposite reason. I have to be honest here and say that I’m not surprised you two slept together. Tif and I have been joking for years that if you two would just do it and get it over with, you might be able to just have a normally functioning friendship. But, I don’t know… what feels wrong and what I reacted negatively to last night, is the fact that you two kept doing it and that you did it when Zac and I were home, I’m assuming. That’s just really messed up. And, I don’t know how it happened, or why it kept happening, so I’m kind of hoping that you’ll fill me in a bit. Because, right now, I’m just really hurt and confused.” Kinsey sighed and grabbed the carafe to pour herself a cup, not because she wanted any, but because it gave her something to do with her nervous energy while she waited for Taylor to start speaking, which she knew he would start doing any second.
“I don’t know what to say, Ike,” Taylor started, “We didn’t say anything at first, because it was just sex. We both knew that it was just sex, and we also knew that most people think sex-only situations don’t really work… which they don’t. And after the whole TMZ disaster, Kinsey finally started to get her head out of her ass and realized that maybe there was something more between us than just the physical stuff.” Kinsey rolled her eyes at his teasing and sipped at the black coffee.
“Oh sure, make me the late bloomer,” she said before giving him a smile.
“When we got to spend all of Zac’s birthday weekend together, things really started to change. We’d never gotten to spend that much time together and it was surprisingly nice,” Taylor continued, “And I mean that honestly. Kinsey and I have known each other since the day she was born and I never once thought that I would want to be with her like this. It’s weird, Ike, and we’re still getting used to it, too. And yes, we should have told you guys anyway, that day you came back from here. But right then, we realized just how hard it was going to be to get people to take us seriously and we completely chickened out.
“We know that this all seems really out of the blue to you guys just because you haven’t gotten the chance to see things progress the way we have. Things are still new. But they’re good. And if you want to be pissed at us for sneaking around, you have a right to be. But we just hope that you’ll give us a chance to show you that we’re, well… we’re past the just sex part, but we don’t really have an identity beyond that,” Taylor laughed.
“No, we don’t,” Kinsey said before taking another sip.
“Anything to add?” Taylor asked her, nudging her leg with his under the table.
“I think you covered it pretty well.”
“Well, you answered some of my questions,” Isaac said before his mouth broke into a smile, “I just have a really hard time seeing you two being… couply. It’s fucking weird.”
“Tell me about it,” Taylor rolled his eyes, “I don’t think anyone knows what to think of us.”
“Um… not to bring up bad things. But we need to get going here in a few minutes and I need to warn you guys,” Isaac started, “While I have calmed down and am at least trying to fit all this insanity into my head, our younger brother has not.”
“Still looking like he has a nasty case of roid rage?” Kinsey asked, finding herself still completely horrified by the behavior of the guy she had thought was her best friend. Weren’t best friends supposed to love you no matter what? Like family? Hadn’t it always been that way for them before?
“More like he drank about six drinks during the four hour flight. He was totally flirting with the flight attendant because they should have cut him off after two or three. I don’t know what his problem is. He wouldn’t tell me why he was so mad, all he would do was rant and rave about how ridiculous you two were and how fucked up it was that we had to find out the way we did. And yeah, I wish we could have found out without Zac having to see you two together, but man… he’s pissed and he’s not calming down,” Isaac told them.
“Oh, I’m sure Mom and Dad just loved having him show up like that like,” Taylor stated.
“He’s being plenty nice to them. I think he’s saving it all for you guys,” Isaac said.
“Can we just run away again? Do we have to go?” Kinsey joked to Taylor.
“You’re so not running away. Whatever Zac has on his mind, we need to just let him get it out. Ticking time bomb Zac is not the Zac we want to go back to New York with.”
“We’ll be okay. Remember?” Taylor asked her, referring to their discussion the night before.
“I just wish I knew why he was so angry,” Kinsey said under her breath.
“Based on what he was going on about last night, I have a theory, but I don’t want to say anything. We’ll find out soon enough,” Isaac told them. They both just nodded and watched as Isaac finished off his pie before they all headed for the door. “I took a cab here.”
“I’ve got Mom’s SUV,” Taylor explained before using the remote to unnecessarily double-honk the horn as he unlocked it.
“Please let me drive,” Isaac practically pleaded. Taylor looked sadly at the keys in his hand before tossing them in Isaac’s direction. Kinsey smiled as she watched, knowing that it was the closest thing to an apology Taylor could give Isaac. He wasn’t about to say he was sorry for the same reason Kinsey wouldn’t; because he wasn’t sorry. Not for any of it. Part of her wondered if things would have wound up the same if they had just told Isaac and Zac after the first time it had happened, but she knew that it wouldn’t have. Because then it would have just happened and it would have been dealt with and they would have moved on. By keeping it a secret, it was allowed to develop into what it was now. As he slid in the backseat beside her instead of taking shotgun, she knew that what she had told her mom and Brenna the night before was absolutely true. She loved him and she wanted so badly to tell him. He seemed to feel that she was looking at him, and his gaze came over to meet hers.
“Ready to go face the psycho formerly known as Zac?” Taylor asked her.
“No,” she replied honestly, “I’m really not. I’ve always known how to deal with Zac, but he’s just a different person right now.”
“Well,” Isaac chimed in from the front seat, “At least there’ll be plenty of people there to serve as a buffer.”
But as soon as they walked in the door, they found Walker and Anthony standing there waiting for them.
“You need to get down there and deal with him now. Talk it out, beat each other up, I don’t care. But he will not talk like that in front of everyone anymore,” Walker told Isaac and Taylor sternly before turning to smile at Kinsey, “Hello Kinsey.”
“Hi Walker,” she said, and found her dad still giving Taylor that weird Dad look.
“We’ll go talk to him,” Isaac said.
“Tifani and Brenna are down there trying to keep him calm,” Walker told them.
“Tif’s down there?” Isaac asked at the same time Kinsey asked, “Brenna’s down there?” And with that, they all took off into the basement. They found him laying on the floor, repeatedly throwing an ancient bouncy ball from their youth at the wall. Tif and Brenna looked more than happy to see them enter.
“Thank god,” Tif breathed, rushing to Isaac’s side, “How much did he drink?”
“Three Long Island Iced Teas and three rum and Coke’s,” Isaac shook his head, “What’s he doing?”
“Who knows,” Brenna said, “He’s being completely freaky right now. It’s really not attractive.”
“You don’t know how happy I am to hear you say that,” Kinsey said genuinely.
“So what did he say to piss everyone upstairs off?” Taylor dared to ask.
“He asked Anthony what he thought about the fact that you had been secretly, and I quote, humping the shit out of his daughter for the last two months,” Tif said, “And then, he asked Jennifer if she’d ever let Anthony take dirty pictures of her because he, and again I quote, he wanted to know if it ran in the family.”
“I’m going to murder him,” Taylor said resolutely and looking every bit capable of doing so before Isaac reached out to grab his arm to stop him.
“Taylor, he’s out-of-his-mind drunk. He can hardly stand up straight,” Tif said.
“I don’t give a shit if he’s piss-his-pants drunk. I’m still going to give him a black eye,” Taylor said.
“No you’re not,” Isaac sighed, “We don’t fight, Taylor, and we never have. So don’t-“ he started, but that was when they all realized that Kinsey was already gone.
“Zac Hanson. What is your fucking problem!” she demanded, kicking him repeatedly in the side until he looked at her, “Well?”
“You and him are my problem!” Zac said, and Kinsey found herself amazed that he could even form those words from how incredibly drunk he looked. He forced himself into a standing position to square off with her.
“How does the fact that Taylor and I are sleeping together give you any excuse to get drunk and make insanely awful comments to my family?”
“Kinsey, sleep with whoever you want. Sleep with Tyler, sleep with Taylor, sleep with that stupid guy you dated in college. I don’t care.”
“Obviously you do. You’ve made a lot of really stupid decisions in your life and I have never judged you, Zac! Where the hell do you get off judging me?”
“I can do it because I had to see you get off,” Zac said, “What were you thinking? Taylor? Of all the people in the world you had to have sex with Taylor?”
“Yes, I did. And again, what the hell do you care? So you saw the pictures. Get over it, Zac. Was seeing me like that that disgusting to you?”
“Of course not. Kinsey, I’ve always thought that you were this perfect person. You’re my best friend. And you’re smart and funny and pretty. And you never settled for anything in your life. You never put up with guys who didn’t treat you right and now you’re with Taylor? Do you have any idea how many times I’ve watched you cry because of things he said to you? How many times I have hated my own brother because he made my best friend feel like shit? Some of the things he has said to you ‘jokingly’ I wouldn’t say to my worst enemy. He is not nice to you and now he’s what, your boyfriend? Your lover? I do not understand why girls always want to go for the bad guy. Girls could have a hundred guys be nice to them, and they always want the one who’s a dick!” Zac ranted, clearly not finished before Taylor stepped over to intervene.
“Oh what, Zac, are you going to come in now and say that you have feelings for Kinsey? Is that what this is about? Are you jealous? Because you’ve always said that it was just friendship between you two,” Taylor said and Kinsey felt her eyes go wide. Was that was this was all about? The feeling made her stomach sink to her feet. She would never in a million years want to hurt Zac, but she had never had anything other than friendly or sibling-like feelings for him in their lives.
“No Taylor. I don’t have feelings for Kinsey, but now that you bring it up, I might have. If you hadn’t come out and said that Kinsey was off-limits all those years ago, maybe I would have. I thought you were just protecting her but no! You did just want her all to yourself just like I accused you of!”
“That is such bullshit, Zac. You either have feelings for someone or you don’t. You think that I knew way back then that I had feelings for Kinsey? I didn’t,” Taylor said.
“Whatever,” Zac said dismissively, “I would expect something like this from you, Taylor. But you, Kinsey? I expected better from you. I thought that you weren’t like every other stupid girl. I thought that you were a better person than that. Boy was I wrong.” And then, Kinsey did something that she had sworn she would never do to anyone in her entire life and she smacked Zac across the face, the sound like a gunshot, silencing and stilling everyone in the basement.
“Zac,” she said, her voice fighting to remain controlled with the hysterical sobs threatening to bubble up from her chest, “I know that you’re way beyond drunk right now and you’re going to regret most if not all of this in the morning, but I am not sorry for slapping you because you deserve it. Taylor and I might have picked on each other for the last ten years, but what you just said to me is infinitely more hurtful than all of those things combined. I thought that you were my best friend. My best friend would have been mad at me for sneaking around, but he would have gotten over it. I have no idea who you are, but you need to get over yourself immediately because Taylor and I are not going anywhere. We are together and I am in love with him so either get over your trauma or stay the hell away from me.”
She realized then what she’d just said and turned to find Taylor staring slack-jawed at her. As she looked into his eyes, she forgot about her stinging palm, and her irate and drunk best friend, and the other three dumbstruck occupants of the room. “Taylor, I’m in love with you.” She felt the need to repeat it, to be sure that he understood that she meant it, that she hadn’t just said it in the heat of her speech. He nodded dumbly, taking it in.
“I’m in love with you, too, Kinsey,” he said, his voice hardly a whisper. Kinsey stepped forward and wrapped herself in Taylor’s arms, letting him hold her close as her body shook with an incomprehensible amount of intense emotions.
“Oh give me a fucking break,” was all Zac could manage before he went down, passing out drunkenly on the basement floor. Brenna, in an obvious force of habit, ran to Zac’s side and Tif and Isaac made their way over.
“Okay, the sex stuff I could handle, but this… I don’t know…” Isaac told them, only half jokingly before going to help Brenna get Zac into a more comfortable position. Tif just smiled at them before winking and following Isaac’s lead. Kinsey turned to face Taylor.
“Do you really love me?” she asked, “I don’t mean to be like that, but… holy shit!”
“I do. God help me, Kinsey, you can make me more angry than any other person on the planet, but I do love you,” he laughed, “We are just a disgusting Hallmark card right now.”
“Well, this all means one thing,” she said, happy to ignore Zac’s stupid, mean drunk ass and the heaving it was taking to lug him to the couch, “We have to make it official now.”
“We do? Do I… have to buy you more flowers?” he asked.
“No, you just have to let me call you my boyfriend,” she shrugged, “My irritating boyfriend.”
“How about your sexy boyfriend?” he asked, pulling her close.
“It’s really going to depend on the day,” she teased.
“I think I can handle that,” he smiled, kissing her softly on the lips. Kinsey pulled back reluctantly from his embrace, therein breaking the comforting bubble his presence had created. Outside of his arms, her hand still hurt and her eyes still wanted to cry and her mind still wanted to know if Zac had told her the whole truth. In a series of a few minutes, she had gained a boyfriend and potentially lost her best friend. As much as she wished those places in her heart were interchangeable, they weren’t.
“It’s going to take a lot to fix this,” she said softly, watching as Brenna crammed a pillow under Zac’s neck while muttering “Stupid, hot loser” under her breath.
“We’ve got time,” he told her, “Now let’s go upstairs and face the parents.”