Still Not Over You(7)

I’ve been watching her all day, catching hints and flashes. Glimpses of her moving through the windows. A ghost I thought I'd chased away years ago, who shouldn't even be here.

She's not quite the same, true. This Kenna is older, more collected. That awkward young thing blossomed into an adult with that first entirely enticing, entirely maddening blush of new womanhood clinging to her like some heady perfume the second I got in her face.

Too bad the little things about her body language are too much the same. Still familiar enough to jolt me, until all day I’ve been out of sorts, close to making mistakes every time someone on my crew checks in with me about setup for the Milah job.

Skylar, my lead and logistics manager, tells me the singer wants us helping her entire entourage of stuck-up groupies. Whatever, I say, as long as Milah Holly understands we're security and not their damn servants. Skylar drops off as soon as she catches the edge in my tone.

The one Reb put there without trying.

Fuck. This isn’t going to work.

She’s already got me off my game, detached from my job, and I hate it.

I hate how grown-up she looks.

How her eyes, behind her sleeker, thinner glasses, are still the same clear, liquid green that seems to expect something more from me. Hate how it's the same pool I could lose myself in too long. Hate how one phone call from Milah’s manager, later, tells me I have no choice but to rely on Kenna when Milah needs me in Sonoma by Saturday afternoon, and it’s Friday now.

I fucking hate everything about this. About her. And about the demanding brat signing my next six figure check.

I've tried to come up with a work around all day, but it’s just not happening. I’m backed into a corner, and I can’t even get my head around what’s happening now.

Not when I keep remembering. Reliving what happened years ago – on the day I truly met the girl who shouldn’t be here tormenting me.





*



Ten Years Ago





Sometimes, teenagers can be complete and utter pricks.

That’s the first thing I think when I see her crying. I barely know her; she’s just a shadow who hangs around my best friend now and then, someone I vaguely identify as his little sister, McKenna. Kenna, right?

I probably shouldn’t even be talking to her. I’m eighteen, close to graduating, and she’s this dorky fourteen-year-old freshman.

But she looks almost afraid of me. I find her out behind the bleachers on the football field after school, sobbing her eyes out. Like someone hurt her and she thinks I’ve come to deliver the killing blow.

Something about that look makes me want to fix it, even if I’m not the one who fucked it up. It's not my business, true, but for some screwed up reason I want to make it mine.

She’s curled on the grass, leaning against a post. I sit down on the other side and rest my back against the wood. That way she doesn’t have to feel like I’m looking at her, judging her.

“You want to talk about it?” I ask.

“No!” she forces out, sniffling, her voice thick.

“Okay. Whenever you're ready, I'm here.”

For some reason, that sets her off crying again. I just wait and listen.

Sometimes people just need someone to be there with them when they’re sad, but I hope I’m not embarrassing her and making it worse. Thankfully after a while there comes another sniffle, and her breathing sounds easier.

“Sorry, it's just...” she mumbles. “Thanks. I guess.”

I look over my shoulder. She’s taken her tear-streaked glasses off to reveal the largest, widest green eyes I’ve ever seen, swimming and nearly glowing with their wet sheen. She’s busy stretching her bulky, ill-fitted shirt out of shape trying to clean her lenses before she darts a quick glance toward me, then reddens and looks away.

“Not here to make fun of you,” I say. “It’s okay to talk. Really.”

I think she'll clam up again, when she lowers her eyes to her suddenly motionless hands. But she lets out a lifeless shrug and whispers bitterly, “Just boys being boys. Assholes, I mean. And I’m an easy target.”

“Did someone hurt you?”

“No. Maybe?” Another shrug. “Just my feelings. Jonah McMillan thought it would be funny to –” Her voice hitches as if she’ll breakdown again, then smooths as she clears her throat and continues with a touch of stiff pride. “He pretended to invite me to Homecoming. Big fancy fake letter and everything. And when I went to ask him if it was a joke or something...”

“He humiliated you,” I guess, a slight growl curdling my voice. “Like a fuckstick with nothing better to do..”

“In front of half the girls in my class!” she finishes with a touch of ferocity, her eyes sparking. “God. I tried to say I knew it was a joke, a stupid one, but he was too busy telling everyone how pathetic I was...thinking he’d ever go out with me. Like I’d be interested in him.”

“Real cute,” I offer, an awkward attempt to get her to laugh. It works, even if it’s just a kind of quick throaty hurting chuckle hidden behind a pinched smile.

“He’s an asshole, is what he is,” she counters, but a bruised smile lingers on her lips. Slowly fading. “I just…I don't even know. Now, they’re all calling me Princess. Like I think I’m too full of myself when they’re actually all too good for me.”