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Everyone expected Joan and JFK's relationship to change after prom night. Especially Cleo, Gandhi and Abraham, the ones who found them together in the meat locker. And once they found them, the whole school knew about it within an hour. The trio plus Marie Curie had stood shocked in front of the bed.
"I didn't see it coming either. And by it, I mean me," JFK had exclaimed. Abe stared at Joan, feeling tears rising in his eyes.
"But, Joan! I love you!"
Her eyes had widened, then her eyebrows furrowed. A frown crossed her face and all she said was: "If you guys don't mind, I'd like to get dressed." That left no room for interpretation and the four clones left the couple alone and didn't see them for the rest of the night. They could only assume that they spent the rest of the night holed up somewhere. They all ended up at the Grassy Knoll, sitting quietly at a table. The awkwardness that Abe and Cleo were harboring from before was gone as they tried to understand what had just happened.
"Out of everyone that I thought JFK would ever sleep with, I never thought it would be Joan," Cleo said, finally breaking the silence.
"I never thought Joan would move on from Abe to sleep with JFK," Gandhi added.
"I can't believe that Joan was in love with me this entire time," Abe lamented, slamming his head down on the table. Gandhi, Marie and Cleo all shared an incredulous look.
"Do you think they'll get together or is this just a one time thing," Marie asked the table. As Gandhi's girlfriend, she was now officially part of the group.
"Knowing JFK, this is just a one time thing," Cleo said. She had no doubt in her voice whatsoever.
"Do you think Joan will let that happen," Gandhi inquired. "She takes things a lot more seriously than he does."
"Either it's a one and done thing, or they'll date for a few weeks and then break up," Abe answered. Everyone couldn't help but agree. Those two options were equally likely and they knew that they had to wait until Monday at school to find out. There was no way they would see JFK and they doubted that Joan would actually talk to them about it.
So yes, they expected their relationship to change. They never saw this coming though.
----
Joan and JFK talking by her locker at least a foot apart, as if they had always been friends. They weren't showing any signs of being in a relationship or that they had slept together at all. They just seemed to be talking. Marie and Gandhi separated from the group, going to their first class together and leaving Cleo and Abe to confront Joan and JFK. Cleo grabbed her partners hand and dragged him over to the other two.
"Hey," she said in the fakest voice she could muster. "Oh my gosh! Look who it is! Joan and JFK! We haven't seen you guys since prom night."
"Probably for the best," Joan grumbled. She slammed her locker shut. "You two have probably been having a grand old time swapping fluids."
"Swapping fluids," Abe asked, dumbfounded.
"Shag. Get it on. Bang. Do the, uh, nasty," JFK offered. Abe's eyes widened and Cleo just groaned.
"No we haven't done that!" Joan and JFK shared a surprised glance and then looked back at them.
"Really," they asked in sync.
"No! Joan, I'm in love with you," Abe urged. Joan's eyes flew open and she took a step back.
"You were being serious?"
Abe was convinced he had finally gotten through to her. "Yes! It's always been you Joan. I've been in love with you this whole time but I've just been too stupid to see it. You've been there for me through thick and thin and I can't imagine my life without you in it."
Joan blinked once. And then she blandly said: "Okay."
"Okay? Then you'll be my girlfriend?"
"No." She looked stunned that he would even ask.
"But, I love you," Abe said again. He was sure that if he just said it enough times that she would be convinced and then run back into his arms and they could be together forever.
"Okay. That doesn't mean I'm going to be your girlfriend. You love me. Good for you. But I don't want to be in a relationship with you."
"Is it because of him," Abe demanded, pointing rudely at JFK.
"What if it has nothing to do with him and entirely to do with the way you've been acting towards me this whole school year? If I don't want to be with you Abe, that's no ones fault but yours."
Abe went to say something else, point another finger or make another comeback, but Cleo just gripped his arm and dragged him away. Even she could tell when enough was enough.
"Are you, uh, okay," JFK asked from behind Joan.
"I'll be fine," she said plainly. She then turned back to look at him and hand him a book that she had in her hand. "You'll need this if you want to past that test."
"Are we sure they actually had sex," Gandhi asked when Cleo and Abe gave him the run down. "Because I've bumped into them three times now and they don't look like a couple and they don't act like anything happened at all."
"They're just...friends," Curie added.
"No they definitely did it," Abe grumbled.
"I know what JFK looks like post-cum and that was definitely it," Cleo added.
They were all dumbfounded. This behavior was unlike anything they had seen from their two friends, JFK especially. He didn't just hang out with someone he banged and act like nothing went down.
"We could just ask them directly," Gandhi suggested. Cleo and Abe froze as it dawned on them. Why didn't they think of that?
----
Cleo walked into her shared bedroom with Joan. The goth was sitting on her top bunk scrolling through something on her phone. That wasn't what startled Cleo. Joan was wearing JFK's signature red sweater. They had to be together!
"Hey, Cleo," Joan greeted absentmindedly. Not even a bite of malice. Something was definitely off.
"Hey, Joan. Where'd you get that sweater?"
Joan looked down at the sweater that she was drowning in and then back to her phone. "JFK gave it to me so I would stop bothering him."
That threw Cleo for a loop. A new picture came into her head. Joan kept on trying to pursue JFK after the mind blowing sex they had but he didn't want her anymore. So he gave her his favorite sweater as a way to get the little stalker to stop chasing after him.
"It was that good huh," Cleo asked in poorly disguised disgust.
"Eh, it's a nice sweater."
"Not the sweater, the sex!"
That finally got Joan to look up from her phone and let her eyes lock with Cleo. She raised an eyebrow at her roommate as if she was trying to figure out the motive. Cleo guessed she didn't find what she was looking for because Joan just shrugged and went back to her phone.
"Yeah it was pretty good."
This just left Cleo even more confused. Because no one in the world had ever slept with JFK and then gone on to describe it as "pretty good". She shook her head to clear it.
"Are you two a thing?"
Joan quickly shook her head. "Definitely not a thing."
----
Abe marched right up to JFK. His teammate was fixing his hair in the mirror after a basketball game.
"Kennedy!"
"Whaddya want Lincoln," the clone asked. He didn't even look away from the mirror.
"I want to know what you did to Joan!"
"Nothing?" JFK sounded like he really didn't know what Abe was talking about. The audacity!
"Oh, so you didn't fuck my best friend?!"
JFK sighed and put his comb down, finally turning to Abe. "Did you, uh, see me sleep with Joan?"
"No."
"And did she tell you that I, er uh, slept with her?"
"No."
"Then I don't think it's any of your business." Kennedy didn't even let him get another word in before he grabbed his comb and began walking away. "Also, she's, uh, my best friend. Know your place."
----
Abe, Gandhi, Marie and Joan all sat at their lunch table. They ate in silence, the two boys and Curie watching Joan eat as she typed in something on her phone. All of a sudden, she swallowed her food and looked up at the boys.
"Don't wait up for me after school, I'm going home with JFK."
"Why," Marie asked since the boys were too busy catching flies in their mouths to talk.
"He just got the new Resident Evil game and we're going to try it out."
The bell rang to go to class and Joan got up immediately, not waiting for a response.
"Wait, Joan," Abe called out. She stopped and turned to look at him. "Is JFK your best friend?" He had to ask. The question had been on his mind since the presidential clone had told him so. There was no way, right? After everything that he and Joan had been through.
She slowly nodded. "Yeah, of course he is." And then she walked away, leaving Abe more confused than ever.
----
"You must have lost your touch Kennedy," Cleo said. JFK looked up at the girl who had approached him at lunch.
"My, uh, touch," he asked. Cleo sat down across from him.
"Your touch sex-wise. Joan said that it was just "pretty good". Clearly you're not as good as you used to be. Or maybe you just didn't try for her."
If JFK was annoyed, he didn't let it show. He looked at Cleo for a moment; he kind of just stared. She wondered if he hadn't heard her. But then he opened his mouth to respond before seemingly rethinking his wording.
"You're, uh, easy to please Cleo," was what he decided on and she didn't know whether or not to be offended. "Joan likes quality, not quantity. I'm, er uh, working on it."
"Working on it? So you're still sleeping together?"
He put his sandwich down. "Did she tell you that we slept together?"
"Yes."
"Then yes, we're still sleeping together."
Cleo smirked, satisfied with her knowledge. She couldn't wait to report back to Abe.
----
"They're sex friends," Cleo exclaimed. She had met up with Abe and Gandhi to tell them what she knew. "Joan says they're not a thing but JFK says they're sleeping together still."
"They both said that they're best friends. That must be why," Abe concluded.
"I don't know whether to feel bad for her or not. He's just using her for her body, she has heartbreak coming for her," Cleo retorted. "They'll be over in no time and then we'll have our partners back."
The group all walked away to their next class, not noticing JFK and Joan standing behind them. He smirked and looked down at her.
"Not a thing, huh?"
"I think "thing" is a very crude way to describe what we are," Joan fired back. "It serves them right. Just because we aren't dry humping in the hallway doesn't mean that we're not together. It just means we have some semblance of self respect."
"I, er uh, love it when you use big words."
Joan chuckled and then stood up on her tiptoes to kiss him before beginning to walk to class.
"Dinner with your dads tonight," she asked.
"Yeah. Then afterwards, I, uh, have a new technique to test out!" He winked and she just rolled her eyes.
"How about we get through a couple rounds of Call of Duty first, and then we can try it out."
"Deal. Hey, Joan?" She stopped a few feet away from him so that he could ask his question. "Do you think they'll, uh, ever realize we're together? Like, for real?"
Joan looked back at where she could see Abe and Cleo's figures disappearing among the crowd. "Those two? It'll take them forever."
"Wanna bet on it?"
"I put twenty bucks on six months."
"I, uh, put fifty on a year."
"Well we'll have to last that long."
"That's what she said."