Chapter Text
He was always there.
She closes her eyes and now they are six years old. They are first graders sitting together behind the desk. He says something funny and draws another doodle in his textbook, she just laughs. Mrs. Gardner is not pleased – he gets a detention after, but it is okay as long as he can make her laugh.
Now they are ten – they are playing with a globe in Big John’s office – John B and Pope are in the kitchen helping Big John with sandwiches because, let’s be honest, he cannot make them on his own. They are little kids playing with maps and laughing at strange names of some geographic objects. He says “Yucatan? How can you name it Yucatan? It sounds like a name of character from C.H.U.D.!”
They are twelve and now laying in one hammock. He asks if she can keep a secret and after she nods he tells her about his weird dream. He says that in this dream he was a ball that his dad kept kicking and his mom was just sitting on the bleachers waiting for the game to end. Little did he know that in about a year his life would be exactly like that? She listens, just holds out her hand to him and when he takes it, their finders intertwine. The safety lock as he liked to call it.
She has a lot of memories of him, of their moments together, of how they ended up there. She remembers how four of them became friends and she remembers exactly a moment when she thought that he was the one that understands her best – the one that sees her for who she is.
She takes a deep breath and opens her eyes. Sarah is sitting next to her and drawing her attention by kicking her leg. Shit, it’s her toast now, right?
She quickly stands and takes her glass of champagne in her hands. Deep breath, let’s just finish with this shitshow.
“Hey everyone, sorry. Lost in thoughts, I guess,” She breathes once again, all of the guests are now staring at her and, damn, right here and right now she just wants to fall into the ground, to be gone. Not that she did not want to hop on the plane and fly home since yesterday, but let’s just move on. “So, for those who I haven’t had a chance to say hello properly – I am Kiara. And this has got to be one of the happiest days of my life”, she says somewhat cheerfully. And now the whole room disappears as she looks in his eyes across the table. She cannot see anyone else, it’s like they are the only people in this big hall. Like it should have been. Him and Her.
JJ and Kie.
Kiara shakes her head. No, she has to move on now, she has to stop focusing on the past. Their past. She has to accept that right now she is watching him getting married to another girl.
12 years before
“SHOTS EVERYBODY”
Crazy in love by Beyonce is roaring from the speakers when Kie is dancing with Sarah. Another boneyard party surrounded by her favorite people and Kie cannot be happier. She can see Pope talking to some girl she has never met and she sends him an approved look when their gazes meet. Pope rolls his eyes at her and draws his attention back to the girl. And honestly Kie is happy for him.
She is laughing at the look that Sarah sends at Pope’s direction when John B joins them with Mai-Tai in his hands. He starts dancing with them both, but Kie is not stupid and she knows when things are starting to heat up, so she just dances away, back to the improvised bar, but a pair of hands land on her waist and she immediately knows who it is.
JJ is standing behind her with his stupid half-smile and silent suggestion to dance with him. And so she does, how could she not?
JJ Maybank is her best friend. He was always her best friend. He will forever be one, right?
Something Just Like This is playing and they are both screaming chorus out loud.
But she said, "Where'd you wanna go?
How much you wanna risk?
I'm not looking for somebody
With some superhuman gifts
Some superhero
Some fairytale bliss
Just something I can turn to
Somebody I can kiss
I want something just like this"
“It’s our song,” JJ gets closer to her and basically yells it in her ear.
“No, it’s not,” She basically laughs saying that. Who wants Chainsmokers’ song to be considered theirs?
“It could be though!”
And Kie wants to shag him off, but suddenly she catches his gaze and becomes mesmerized. It’s like his eyes are bluer, his image is more relaxed, laid-back in those lights and he just looks at her that way.
Like she hung the moon just for him.
Like she is his beacon in the night.
Like they are more than the whole world.
They are about to drunkenly kiss, aren’t they? Kiara doesn’t know who leans in first, because the next thing she remembers is feeling his breath on her lips, feeling him impossibly close. And she wants to give it all up, screw all the rules and just follow her heart. As if their collision is inevitable – she jumps in first.
1, 2, 3 . . .
And life sucks, you know? Because the next thing Kiara feels is not a touch of JJ’s lips on hers, definitely no. The next thing she feels is hitting the wooden floor because of some tourons that cannot walk straight.
Moment is lost, that’s it.
—
When Kiara wakes up the next morning on a pullout at the Chateau, she feels like crap. Indeed, yesterday she overdosed on alcohol and practically kissed her best friend, what could be worse? Oh well, what about facing that said best friend as the first thing in the morning?
“Mornin’ sunshine!” JJ’s voice echoes from somewhere, but Kie is too hungover to check on him.
“Go away!” She whimpers pitifully and covers her head with a blanket. A hangover is the worst thing that mankind has come up with. Sometimes it seems to Kie that this is even worse than the pollution of the planet. It should explain the scale of the disaster.
“And what's the fun in that?” JJ falls next to her on the couch and tries to lower the covers, and Kie succumbs to him – it's all because of too much hangover.
“Fun? Oh, I feel sick even thinking about last night”
“Wh..Which part?” JJ’s voice is suddenly confused and hurt [?], which for sure confuses her as well.
“What do you mean which part? All of it!” she whines again and covers her eyes with her hands. After two seconds realization hits her and Kie continues. “It never happened! Jage, you can’t tell anyone!”
Kie felt so embarrassed for falling on the ground yesterday. She felt so ashamed when JJ helped her to get up and she was so drunk that he had to carry her to Twinkie. And mostly she felt so much shame for her behavior on their way home. JJ made three stops on their way because he needed to throw up. How could this not be embarrassing?
He pauses for a few moments, but not like when is trying to come up with a sarcastic reply. Kie quickly looks at him and when he catches her he clears his throat.
“Yeah okay, Carrera, your secret is safe with me. Better lock it in my pocket and all that jazz,” he once again mocks her for her obsession with Pretty Little Liars and Kie cannot not smile when he does that. “I guess it’s a bad time to remind you that Sarah signed us for a beach cleaning group this evening, right?”
She hates him. Really, how could he be so fresh after this party? Oh, Kie can see why he is feeling this way – cause he was not drinking like he is in the remake of Hangover movies last night. But they are finishing school soon and this is their last bonfire as seniors, so Kiara had a pretty good excuse to let it loose.
Soon enough they all are going to go their separate ways and it is not something Kiara is prepared for.
Sarah received an early acceptance to Chapel Hills University, so she is moving away from Outer Banks soon. The same thing is happening with Pope – he is moving to San Francisco because he was able to get that scholarship he dreamed about. Even though, it is still weird for all of them that he is so interested in corpses and dead bodies, but whatever keeps him going forward.
Kiara is waiting for her acceptance letter from Duke. Her going to university is not something that she dreamed of, but it was her agreement with parents. She promises to try college and they promise to support her with her semester abroad ideal. Also, Duke has a great ecology program, so she cannot complain about that one.
Two people who were not thinking about colleges were John B and JJ, of course. And it’s easy with John B, because he is going to follow Sarah to Chapel Hill. When Sarah said that John B is going with her no one was surprised. They are the cheesiest lovebirds that you could imagine, so it was kind of given.
For JJ it was not this easy. It took all of them convincing him to try something for himself. He was determined to stay on the Cut and just slam around. How could he do that with his life? Kiara always thought that he was much more than what he thought of himself. JJ Maybank was a man of many talents, but agreeing that he is worthy of something [hell, even more than something] was not one of them.
Still, his art talent was the one that bought him a ticket out of Outer Banks. One day when JJ was out with John B and Pope, girls were left on Chateau duty and even though girls doing a cleanup is sexism, Kiara and Sarah found themselves tidying boys’ rooms.
That is where Kie found JJ’s sketchbook with illustrations for his graphic novel. And that is exactly when her brain clicked – they can get him out of Outer Banks.
So Kiara sent his works to an art program in Durham. And two months later he received a letter with an invitation to participate in their one year course with full scholarship. When JJ found out, he was mad at all of them. As it appeared, Pope was fully aware about Kie’s plan and he even helped her with filling the applicant form. Sarah was cheering her best friend all the way and John B… Oh, John B was the only one that was not aware. He was being his himbo-self, so JJ didn’t even question his involvement. So it left JJ not speaking to everyone but John B for two weeks.
Kie won’t tell anyone, but these two weeks were the longest weeks of her life.
Anyhow, when they all made up it was decided that no man was left behind – they all were leaving Outer Banks.
That decision was the one that brought JJ and Kiara even closer because now they were moving to the same city together after graduation. And that is why they were practically inseparable, because they were clenching to each other in the face of an unknown future.
While Kiara was counting days until her departure, Sarah was determined to make their last senior year memories unforgettable. So that is how their whole gang ended up cleaning the beach.
It was all good for Kiara, even her wild headache washed away after Pope’s magic hangover cure. She was surrounded by her favorite people, they were doing a good thing and it was simply a lovely evening, what a girl can dream about? However, of course everything had to be ruined - their group’s curator left because of a family emergency and that is how Caroline Fowley was assigned to curate them.
Kie was totally fine with Caroline until that day. The way the other girl hysterically gives orders and watches every move is madness.
“She is a dictator, really”, Kiara picks up an empty old can from the sand and tosses it to the trash bag that JJ holds.
“Yeah, I can tell,” He agrees while helping her with picking up trash. “Are we going to listen to her orders? Cause I’m literally done with this bullshit!”
“So you want to start a revolution?” She doesn’t need to look at him to know that he is smirking at her. Like she just said whatever was on his mind.
“Yeah, you know, off her head,” JJ imitates cutting his neck and Kie laughs at him a little too loud, which earns her another angry look from Caroline. “Oh, JJ Maybank quoting a book. I never thought I would live to this moment!”
“It’s a book? I know this from the movie, there was that weird chick with a big head,” He started mumbling in his own manner.
“Alice in Wonderland. And that weird chick is actually Helena Bonham Carter,” she tells him as a matter of fact. Here they are again having this flirty best friend-ish banter.
“Ya know Kie, you have so much faith in me – thinking I’ve read a book or me knowing anything about who Helena Whats-her-name is,” He quirks his brow at her and she just shags him off by moving further.
It takes them another twenty minutes to clean the spot that they were assigned to when the rest of the pogues join them. And when they lean into their regular routine of banters, arguments and uncontrollable laughs hurricane Caroline arises above their heads.
“Hey Sarah, I think you and your friends should split for a bit,” she says poisonously. “We don’t want to stay here for another day or two”
“Oh, I thought this whole thing was a bonding experience,” it’s JJ who answers Caroline’s remarks. “Open our minds and all that crap.”
John B laughs at his best friend’s comment and high fives him which earns him a jab from Sarah.
“Oh JJ, bonding could be done with people that you don’t know,” Caroline acts like she didn’t notice his sarcastic tone in the reply. “So if you want to bond, go find someone new, not the people that you spend your whole week with.”
And then she moves past their group to probably terrorize someone else.
“Dude! She was totally flirting with you!” John B exclaims not so quietly as soon as Caroline starts talking with another group of seniors. “Go for it, bree!”
“Nah, she’s too bossy for me,” JJ shooks his head at those words. He even makes a face which owns a smirk from Kiara. “And I am not looking for anything now.”
“When were you ever looking for anything at all?” Pope joins their banter.
“Yeah, go JJ, woo her!” John B encourages him and waves in Caroline’s direction.
Kiara is sure that he is going to joke it off and end this conversation. This is how it usually goes. But he surprises her because his glance lands on her and he looks almost like he is upset with her. And Kie cannot put her mind at ease - was he upset because of yesterday? Or was he upset because she is not encouraging him to pursue another meaningless fling?
“JJ, go!” It's Pope again.
And he goes. He quickly looks at her again and after that just moves past Kie, leaving her behind. That’s when it hits her – JJ is not hers, he doesn’t have to be near her 24/7. Was she jealous? Asked her a week ago she would have laughed and said that it’s insane. Now, when she looks at him leaving her she can only think about their moment yesterday. Of course, she remembers it. And of course she considered her fall as a sign from the universe. Kiara cannot ruin their friendship, she cannot lose him.
So instead they all watch as JJ goes to Caroline and openly flirts with her. Like he cannot be even more subtle about it. And Kiara can swear that she catches his glances at her from time to time, like he is watching her reaction. Or is he not? Does he feel ashamed about their almost kiss?
Kiara has so many confusing thoughts, but thankfully Sarah puts a hand on her shoulder, and this gesture grounds her immediately. Kie catches Sarah’s knowing look and silently thanks her for not saying anything. She cannot handle relationship talks right now. Especially relationship talks about her best friend.
It takes about ten minutes for JJ to get back to them and once he is greeted by wows and whistles, John B asks a question that was in all of their minds.
“How did it go?”
“Well, you won’t believe who is coming to kegger next Saturday!”