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There are a seldom few things in this universe that are known for certain. An object in motion remains in motion. Energy can not be created or destroyed. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. Jesus was a white American who hated gay people and approved of mega churches. Stuff like that.
And for a while, Kendall Price thought that the fact of her heterosexuality was one of those things in this universe that was concrete truth. For the first 18 years of her life, Kendall was great at convincing herself that she was not attracted to other girls. But if hindsight is 20/20, the past version of Kendall was blind as a bat.
Really, if Kendall thought back, it probably would have been less obvious for her to tattoo the word lesbian across her forehead.
There was her obsession with the movie Hercules that definitely had nothing to do with Megara. Her obsession with the movie Aladdin that definitely had nothing to do with Jasmine. Her obsession with the movie Atlantis that definitely had nothing to do with Kida. Or Audrey. Or Helga. (Seriously, what’s up with that movie?)
Then there was the way she was so disappointed to find out that even though Mormons believe in a Heavenly Mother, it’s definitely against the rules to pray to her, depict her, or even talk about her too much.
When she became a teenager, Kendall thought she was just really, really good at abstinence because she wasn’t feeling lustful at all towards men. She thought that the heat that rose to her face when her non-Mormon friend at school wore a low-cut shirt was just anger at the lack of modesty. She thought that her excitement at the idea of only having one husband but a whole bunch of wives was just her being connected to Mormonism’s polygamous roots.
Most importantly, she was certain that everyone found women more attractive. I mean, they just are. Women have longer hair than men. They wear better outfits than men. They have better hygiene than men. They have better boobs than men. Stuff like that. It was never that she, personally, found women more attractive, it’s that women just are more attractive. It didn’t make her a lesbian, it just made her a person with working eyes.
These were little, perfectly placed explanations in her mind that served her well. But they all crumbled pretty quickly on her mission trip.
When a sudden crush was paired with unprecedented doubt in the beliefs she’d grown up with, it was only too easy for her insistence that she was straight to come crashing down like a jenga tower.
Sister Claire McKinley. Sister McKinley had long red hair, curves, and big blue eyes. The more Kendall looked at her, the more Kendall never wanted to stop looking at her. Kendall wasted a couple of months trying to tell herself that she didn’t have a crush on Sister McKinley. And then Claire wore a form-fitting top one singular time and Kendall sort of gave up.
After that, denial was impossible. Kendall could try to pray it away, rationalize it, or pretend she was just “being friendly,” but the truth had already taken root. Every time Claire so much as smiled in her direction, Kendall felt like she was going to dissolve into a puddle on the floor.
Kendall’s attraction to Sister McKinley was kept successfully secret until one fateful evening between the two of them.
~~~
Sister McKinley was going to be so upset with her. Luckily, that was exactly what Kendall was going for.
It all started when Kendall figured out that Claire was attracted to her.
*** A brief interlude ***
Signs Your District Leader Might Be Sexually Attracted to You Even Though You’re Both Girls and You’re Both Mormons So Really You Shouldn’t Be Feeling That Way:
- If she tells you that she deals with same-sex attraction, this might be a sign that she deals with same-sex attraction. In other words, there’s a chance that she’s attracted to the same sex.
- If she volunteers to braid your hair during companionship study and spends twenty solid minutes “trying to get the part straight,” while her hands keep grazing your neck and she keeps saying things like “wow, your hair is so soft” in a voice that could double as a love confession.
- If she insists on praying together kneeling side-by-side, but every single time your knees or shoulders touch she makes a sound halfway between a hiccup and a guilty gasp and then prays three times faster, like she’s trying to outrun the gay.
- If she casually suggests that the two of you should “hold hands to keep warm” when it’s 72 degrees outside, and then doesn’t let go for the entire walk to dinner even though you passed three perfectly fine heated buildings on the way.
- If she lingers in the doorway of your room at night to ask if you “need anything,” and when you say no, she sighs like you’ve just broken her heart, then returns thirty seconds later with a glass of water anyway.
*** Back to the story ***
But after a few months of this special attention that made Kendall’s heart glow with her new signature blend of egotism and sexual attraction, Sister McKinley’s attentions started dwindling.
Through a series of events involving Kendall’s crisis of faith, Kendall’s mission companion, Arden, telling a lot of highly blasphemous faux-doctrine, and an impromptu visit from the mission president, their whole mission got disbanded and disfellowshipped. While most of the sister missionaries wanted to take the opportunity to do all the things they hadn’t been allowed to do as Mormons, Claire seemed to react the opposite way. While Arden Cunningham focused on seeing if she could get her compilation of false scripture published and mass-produced, Claire got determined to be a better, stricter District Leader than she’d ever been before. She made the girls wake up fifteen minutes earlier, she made the chore charts even stricter, and she was somehow more anti-coffee than ever.
And, for the record, the sister missionaries were not happy about this.
They made up nicknames for Claire which were mostly just girl-versions of famous dictators. Everything from Julia Caesar to Clitler. They grumbled and gossiped to each other about how stuck up she was. Once, Sister Pop-tarts said “she’s so anal you couldn’t get a pin into her ass if you used a sledgehammer.” You get the idea.
Most of the sister missionaries kept their secret disdain for Claire just that: a secret. But Kendall did no such thing. For she had discovered a new way for getting Claire’s attention:
Making Sister McKinley Super Mad.
- Figure out something that’s guaranteed to get you a lecture and then do that. The crazier the better.
- Casually “slip” the story to Arden — who, by the way, couldn’t keep a secret if you stapled it to her tongue — and wait approximately five minutes for it to spread through the entire district like a rash.
- Pretend to look small and bashful while Claire storms in. Meanwhile, secretly revel in the intense eye contact, the furious blush, and the fact that she literally had to hop onto her tippy-toes to scold you properly.
Sure, it usually ended with Kendall wrist-deep in dishwater, scrubbing away her “bad attitude.” But if the punishment came with that much of Claire’s undivided attention? Totally worth it.
And this was one of those times.
The first time Kendall had a major faith crisis, she went on a coffee bender and immediately thought, If this is how magical coffee is, imagine alcohol.
So, a few days ago, while scheming her next way to make Claire adorably furious, the memory popped back into her brain like a divine revelation. Lightbulb moment. The Plan™.
She marched straight to Nabulungi Hatimbi and asked for assistance in “breaking the Word of Wisdom in the funniest possible way.” Nabulungi didn’t even blink. Within five minutes she’d unearthed a dusty bottle of vodka from her freezer and set it on the counter like a sacred offering.
The vodka? Way nastier than Kendall ever imagined. It tasted like industrial-strength glass cleaner (and Kendall would know — long story). It was weirdly thick, like water’s evil cousin, and it clung to her tongue for what felt like an entire geological era. Even chasing it with lime did nothing except remind her that citrus wasn’t nearly as heroic as people claimed.
But still. Totally worth it. If Claire McKinley was going to kill her for being drunk, then at least Kendall would die knowing her plan was insanely stupid. Which, honestly, was exactly the vibe she was going for.
Kendall stumbled back to the mission hut, giggling maniacly the whole way. She didn’t actually feel very different emotionally, but her feet were somehow worse at walking correctly and there seemed to be a lag between her thoughts and her mouth that overrode her social filter. Her eyesight was a few steps behind, like her brain was connected to bad wifi. She had the sudden urge to make out with someone or cry or throw up or maybe just keep smiling like a crazy person. Actually, why was she smiling so hard?
Kendall knew Claire’s schedule pretty well now and she knew Claire was always the last to go to bed. Which meant that right now, eleven o’clock at night, was probably the perfect time to “accidentally” get in trouble.
Kendall accidentally threw the door open way too hard, causing Claire (who was exactly where Kendall knew she’d be) to startle so hard that she dropped the glass she was holding.
“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” Claire yelped, turning around to see who’d just barged in.
“Sorry,” Kendall hiccuped. “I thought the door was, like, a foot farther away.”
“Why would you—” Claire hesitated, before realization dawned on her. She immediately stopped trying to collect the shattered glass and went bright red in the face. “Are you… inebriated?”
“What does infatuated mean?” Kendall asked, the cartoonish smile still plastered across her face.
“Inebriated,” Claire repeated.
“Impersonated,” Kendall tried.
“Inebriated.”
“Impregnated.”
“INEBRIATED.”
“Masturbated.”
“Sister Price! Drunk!”
“Rude,” Kendall grumbled, thinking that Claire was just calling her that all of a sudden.
“No, inebriated means— oh whatever,” Claire fumed.
God, Claire was pretty. Unfairly pretty. Her eyes were icy blue, like they’d be cold to the touch. Kendall reminded herself that touching someone's eyeballs was not romantic and was actually just kinda gross. Whatever. Her red hair cascaded over her shoulders like water, all glossy and hypnotic, and Kendall found herself wondering if she’d ever get in trouble for trying to touch that (probably, worth it). At least it’s better than touching her eyeballs.
She reminded Kendall of Nicole Kidman in Practical Magic. Or Kate Winslet in Titanic. Or… honestly, many women in most movies Kendall had had “unexplainable” childhood obsessions with. Back then, she’d chalked it up to loving costumes or great cinematography. But no. In the kitchen of the mission hut, Kendall came to a higher amount of acceptance than ever before. Her feelings for Claire were nothing new. And instead of being “confusing” as her mom always suggested such feelings would be, it actually just made a lot of things make more sense.
Claire was still talking — something about Kendall being in so much trouble and irresponsible and blah blah blah — but Kendall couldn’t actually make out the words. The world had developed this buttery little glow, like someone had smeared Vaseline on the camera lens, and all of Claire’s freckles stood out like constellations. Her round face, her dimples, the way her mouth pinched when she was furious… it all blurred into the most distracting sight Kendall had ever been blessed with.
Her pulse pounded in her ears, the vodka heat buzzing through her bloodstream. Every nerve in her body was screaming one very specific suggestion: kiss her already.
“Are you even listening to me?” Claire hissed, her voice finally cutting through Kendall’s inner monologuing.
“I’m definitely looking at your lips,” Kendall offered, “But I don’t think for the reasons you want me to.”
Claire’s resolve faltered for a second. “Sister Price, that is a completely inappropriate way to—”
“Are you mad at me because I’m drunk and that’s wrong or are you mad at me because I let myself break the rules and you don’t?”
Kendall didn’t feel like she was in full control over her mouth at the moment but she also didn’t have the capacity to regret anything right now.
“I have no idea what you’re talking about—”
“No, like,” Kendall cut in, desperate to explain what she’d meant. “I’m drunk right now and you’re like ‘ahh don’t be drunk ew that’s not okay!’ but you don’t actually think it’s wrong for me to be drunk, you’re just jealous. You want me to guilt myself because you guilt yourself for the temptation you face. So you’re mad that I don’t hate myself for this because you think it’s unfair.”
Kendall reached out and set her hands on either side of Claire’s face. At first, it was just clumsy drunken instinct — an attempt to anchor herself, to measure the space between them when her vision refused to cooperate. But the second her palms brushed Claire’s skin, the excuse fell away. Warmth bloomed against her fingertips, soft and steady, and Kendall’s breath caught. She didn’t move. She didn’t want to.
Claire’s breath hitched, shallow and uneven, as though her lungs had forgotten how to keep pace. Her lashes fluttered, her gaze unfocused, and for one impossible moment she seemed to lean forward, into the touch. A faint sound slipped from her throat — barely a sigh, almost a whine — the kind of involuntary noise that gave her away completely.
And then it shattered. The sound startled Claire back into herself, as if she’d heard it echo too loudly in the quiet kitchen. Her hands shot up, batting Kendall’s away, and the sudden force sent Kendall stumbling backward across the cool tile.
“None of what you just said is true in the slightest,” Claire insisted, regaining her composure. Kendall let out a stubborn little groan of exasperation.
“See, I think this would all be solved if you just acted on your temptation,” Kendall hypothesized. “Then you’d stop being the Wickedest Bitch of the East.”
“The what?”
“It’s just one of your many nicknames,” Kendall hummed, waving her hand dismissively. “It’s a nicer one, believe it or not.”
“I have ‘many nicknames?’” Claire fumed.
“Oh shoot, I wasn’t supposed to tell you that,” Kendall groaned. “Shush, you’re focusing on the wrong thing here. The point is, you should kiss a girl and I volunteer.”
Claire looked like her brain was experiencing some sort of syntax error. “What!?” was the only thing Claire was saying in response. But when Kendall didn’t elaborate, Claire said: “Where did that come from?”
“Well we all know that the thing you’re tempted by is being gay or whatever,” Kendall explained, as if she was talking about the weather forecast. “Who cares? So you like tits! Don’t we all? I love tits! I love your tits especially.”
“Stop saying ‘tits,’” Claire blushed, looking like she wanted to shrivel up and die on the spot.
“Claire McKinley, my hippopotamus… hypotenuse… whatever, my science theory thing—”
“Hypothesis.”
“Yeah, that! My… hippocampus is that if you just kiss me then you’ll feel less bad about me being drunk because you’ll have acted on the thing you keep trying to tell yourself not to act on. Then you’ll finally give the chore charts a rest and you’ll let us sleep in past the butt-crack of dawn and you’ll be happy. And you don’t have to feel guilty that I’m drunk because I’ve wanted to kiss you for months now and I miss when you were more obvious about your crush on me because you were so pretty when you blushed and— mmphf”
Claire’s mouth was suddenly against hers and Kendall was rendered unable to finish her sentence.
Wait, what?
Claire was grabbing Kendall by the face and moving her mouth against Kendall’s like she was trying to devour her. Kendall was so taken aback that for a few seconds all she could do was stand there with her eyes open and her arms frozen at her sides. It was a combination of never expecting Claire to actually do that and also, well, vodka. Finally though, Kendall’s brain caught up—
She’s kissing me, she’s kissing me, she’s kissing me,
… and Kendall reciprocated. Her eyes fluttered closed as she finally began moving her lips against Claire’s. Kendall’s hands settled on the sides of Claire’s waist, memorizing the curve. Claire kissed with intention, like she’d been rehearsing this exact moment for months but hadn’t admitted it even to herself. It was commanding and precise at first, but it softened as Kendall leaned in. Every detail—the scent of lemon in Claire’s hair, the warmth of her skin, the soft curve of her lips—was magnified, absurdly vivid, a sensory overload she had no plan to resist.
Kendall let out needy little high-pitched hums that vibrated through both of them as Claire’s fingers threaded into her auburn hair. Kendall felt a pulsing between her legs — only making her kiss harder, deeper. This was that sort of Jack-and-Rose kiss that Hollywood had always promised. Kendall allowed herself to fully lose herself the whirlwind of hands, mouths, and heartbeats. Eventually, though, Claire started moving her face away. Kendall chased her at first but reluctantly allowed Claire’s hands to hold her shoulders in place so they could properly come up for air.
Still, they hovered so close it felt like the air between them was humming. Foreheads nearly touching, breaths mingling, Kendall’s grin was dumb and permanent. Claire blinked, cheeks flushed to perfection, eyelashes heavy, and let out a soft, exasperated breath. “You are impossible, Sister Price.”
“I think the word you’re looking for is ‘incredible.’”
“Vocabulary critiques coming from the girl who couldn’t remember the word ‘hypothesis.’”
“I only remember,” Kendall stopped to count on her fingers, “... four words.”
“And what are those?”
“Kiss me again, Claire McKinley.”
“That’s five—”
And now it was Kendall’s turn to interrupt Claire. The frantic energy of their earlier kissing faded into something much softer and more precious. There was less forcefulness, more just a beautiful, easy symphony of love and lust.
Kendall decided to try something. She leaned back a bit, planting a small kiss against Claire’s nose, then her cheek, then her jaw, then finally her lips contacted Claire’s neck. Claire gasped softly as Kendall mouthed at her neck — peppering it with little kisses, licks, and sucks. Some of what she was doing might leave a mark, but Claire certainly didn’t seem to mind. Her hand went into Kendall’s hair, encouraging Kendall to stay where she was. Kendall was all too happy to oblige as she nipped at Claire’s collarbone, flicked her tongue against her neck, and even nibbled slightly on her ear.
Claire sighed and hummed contentedly — until Kendall’s hands started sliding under her shirt.
Claire stepped back and let go of Kendall. Cold air rushed in where the warmth used to be.
“Claire…” Kendall whined, stepping towards her. Claire kept the distance between them.
“Kendall, you’re drunk,” Claire reminded.
“This again? I thought we were done with—”
“I’m not guilting you,” Claire explained, “I’m just… after so long… I have to know it’s not the alcohol.”
“I told you, I’ve wanted to kiss you for months and—”
“But would you have made this choice?” Claire interrupted again. “It’s a very different thing to want something than to think it’s the right thing to do. I shouldn’t have kissed you at all, Kendall. You’re not yourself right now.”
Before Kendall had the chance to protest, to explain herself, to get Claire to kiss her again — Claire left.
~~~
Right after getting drunk with Nabulungi, the three things Kendall had wanted to do on her stumbling pilgrimage back to the mission hut were make out with someone, cry, and throw up. And, impressively, she ended up managing all three in one night.
Her lips still burned with the memory of Claire’s, her scalp tingled where Claire’s fingers had threaded through her hair. Those echoes clung to her like bruises — small, tender reminders that left her reeling with equal parts shock and loss.
By the time she made it back to her room, that manic smile she’d been wearing all night had finally slid off her face. Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes as she collapsed onto her bed, praying sleep would swallow her whole.
But lying down only made things worse. The world tipped and spun like she’d been dropped into a carnival ride she couldn’t get off — a slow, relentless tilt-a-whirl. At first, there was something almost comforting about it, like being rocked in someone’s arms. But then the rocking sharpened into lurches, turning her stomach. The sheets felt too hot and too tight, the darkness pressing in on her as the nausea built.
Within minutes she was on her feet again, staggering down the hall to the communal bathroom. There she spent the next several hours folded against the toilet, caught in a brutal loop: choking sobs until her chest ached, followed by heaves that left her trembling and hollow.
By the time the sky outside paled toward morning, Kendall had made up her mind about one thing. Coffee was definitely better than alcohol.
~~~
A few hours later Kendall regained consciousness. At some point she’d been moved from the bathroom where she fell asleep to her bed where she woke up. She looked over at the nightstand between hers and Arden’s bed. A sticky note rested on the table. She rolled over to grab it but the motion made her head throb.
“What the fuck,” Kendall complained, squeezing her temples with her hand.
Oh right, hangovers.
Kendall whined from the sheer exhaustion of it all. Her entire body felt like it had been wrung out, stomped on, and then put back together slightly wrong. For a second, she thought maybe she’d dreamed the whole thing — but then the memories staggered back, one by one, like drunken party guests.
Naba, laughing at her for making faces at the vodka.
The wobble-legged stumble back to the mission hut.
Her “scientific hypothesis” (oh good, she could remember big words again) about how kissing Claire would be therapeutic.
The actual kissing. The breathing. The moaning. The neck kisses.
…And then, less romantically, the crying. And the vomiting.
What a night.
Without turning her head this time, Kendall flopped her hand towards the nightstand and groped around until she had a firm grasp of the sticky note. She peeled it off and tried to read the faint words. Even focusing her eyes was painful.
How on Earth do people become alcoholics?
But eventually she was able to figure out what was written.
Sister Church found you sleeping on the toilet so I hauled you back in here. Your mascara looks kind of scary/awesome so you might want to address that when you get up. If you feel like it, I would appreciate you letting me know what happened. I’m here for you always.
<3 - Arden
Kendall closed her eyes and palmed her forehead. She felt bad for worrying Arden and for falling asleep on the toilet. Which reminded her: what time was it? Evidently, Arden had taped a shirt over their window to stop the light from waking Kendall (which was very sweet of her) but brightness still seeped out from around the edges. Which meant it was day time.
And then — Claire. Last night. The kiss. Claire’s worry that it didn’t count because Kendall was drunk. Kendall checked in with herself. Nope. Still wanted it. Still meant it. Claire deserved to know.
She swung her legs over the bed, instantly regretted it as her skull staged a protest march, then pushed through anyway. Mission: find Claire.
But — mascara. Arden had warned her, and sure enough, the mirror in her compact revealed raccoon chic. With no bathroom access unless she risked a hallway encounter, Kendall did what any desperate, hungover missionary would do: spit, thumb, smear. Effective? Not really. Sanitary? Absolutely not. But it knocked the look down from “Halloween ghoul” to “messy indie-rock frontwoman.” Close enough.
Snapping the compact shut, Kendall squared her shoulders. Claire time.
~~~
Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow. Ow.
It wasn't that Kendall had never noticed how bright the sun in UGANDA was, but it was another thing entirely for that amount of light to feel like it was slapping her in the face every time she opened her eyes to, y’know, see where she was walking.
Kendall had been searching for Claire for at least two and a half hours now and it was getting ridiculous. Every time someone knew where Claire went, she was already gone by the time Kendall got there. If Claire had been just a little bit less gorgeous or a little bit worse of a kisser, Kendall might have called it a day.
And of course, it wasn’t just the superficial. Claire was smart. She was funny. She could be catty and rude, but she could also be sweet and genuine. Kendall had yet to meet a version of Claire that she didn’t fall in love with.
With every step, Kendall came closer and closer to acceptance over the fact that “love” really was the only word to describe how she felt about Claire. It was such a strong word — it left so little wiggle room for backing out or playing cool. But it was the only honest assessment. It made the last several months of attention-starved crazy behavior more understandable. Kendall Price was testing positive for lovesickness.
That’s when Kendall noticed something. Was the sun getting… less mean? Despite herself, she squinted towards the sky. It wasn’t just her imagination: clouds were starting to darken the skies. Of course. A rainstorm. Perfect timing.
Kendall only had about sixty seconds before the torrential downpour started and she couldn’t see a damn thing, for a whole new reason this time.
She’d been in between neighborhoods so she genuinely couldn’t tell if she was getting closer to the north village or the south village. Or even if she was just walking in circles. Hot rain pelted her in the face as wind whistled in her ears. After a minute or so, Kendall could swear she heard something besides wind. A noise like yelling. Someone yelling her name.
“Kendall? Kendall?” the voice called. Kendall couldn’t tell who it was — and she still wasn’t certain that she wasn’t just imagining things.
“I’m here! I’m here!” Kendall cried, squinting through the pouring rain. Eventually, she could slightly make out a very recognizable silhouette. Kendall stumbled towards the figure of Claire McKinley, holding an arm by her face in hopes that she could shield herself from the painfully aggressive rain drops. Every step made Claire more visible. White shirt. Red hair. Blue eyes.
“Claire!” Kendall shouted, despite them only being a few feet apart. Claire looked relieved to see Kendall.
“Why are you out here!?” Claire demanded, slipping immediately into that dangerous ‘angry mom’ tone Kendall knew too well.
“I’m out here to find you!” Kendall said, hair whipping across her face. She shoved it away uselessly. “Duh.”
“God, you’re so stupid.” Claire’s voice was half outraged, half relieved.
“Why are you out here?!” Kendall shot back.
Claire hesitated, then: “—the same reason.”
Kendall could have smugly rubbed it in. Instead she did something harder: she stopped being snarky and decided to be stupidly, painfully honest.
“Claire… I didn’t kiss you because I was drunk.”
Claire blinked like she’d been handed a glitching transistor. “Really? We’re gonna talk about this now?”
“A dramatic rainstorm is the perfect place to talk about this!” Kendall said, because of course she thought that was a logical defense. Claire rolled her eyes, but she wasn’t actually mad — not quite. Not yet.
Kendall took a breath that tasted like metal and lime and said, “I kissed you because I love you.” She let the words hang, ridiculous and loud between them.
Claire’s jaw tightened. “You—what?”
Kendall rushed on, words pouring like the rain. “I got drunk because I loved you. I ‘accidentally’ misorganized your file cabinet because I loved you. I ‘forgot’ to do the dishes because I loved you. You used to make excuses to hold my hand, to sit with your leg pressed against mine, and then you stopped and I went feral because any attention from you is attention I treasure. Because I love you.”
Claire’s shoulders lowered a fraction. She looked like she wanted to interrupt and didn’t know whether it would be petty or tender. Kendall hadn’t realized that it was possible for those Disney princess eyes of hers to get any wider. And yet here they were.
Kendall laughed — a wet, embarrassed sound. “I don’t know why you stopped. I just know that I’ve been a little demon for months because I like it when you look at me. Because I love you. I’m standing here in a rainstorm getting wrecked because I love you.”
Claire swallowed.
Kendall’s voice tightened, a little ashamed. “My mom used call feelings like this between people like us ‘unnatural.’ I think she meant it like a warning. But falling in love with you? It’s the most natural thing I’ve ever known. I’d kiss you sober. Of course I would. You are… you are perfect to me.”
Claire’s mouth trembled. She opened it, closed it; chose not to speak.
Kendall kept moving, faster now, as if speed would prove sincerity. “I’m not perfect. I know people think I act like I am sometimes, but I’m not. People think I’m obsessed with myself but I’m not. Most of the time I can’t stand myself. I hate myself for being an egotistical bitch. I hate myself for being unsure about whether I actually care about being a good person or if I just want to be perceived as one. I hate myself for thinking that I was some fucking chosen one for 19 years of my goddamn life.”
Claire’s hand — suddenly warm and real — found Kendall’s wrist and held it. The touch steadied Kendall like an anchor in a stormy sea. Kendall very well might have been crying at this point, but there was too much water on her face to tell.
“But trying to convince myself to hate being in love with you? That’s the absurd part. So I stopped trying a long time ago. And I’ve never been happier.” Kendall laughed again, smaller this time. “If being gay is a choice, then choosing this — choosing you — is the smartest choice I’ve ever made.”
There it was: the blunt little truth, wet and unadorned.
Claire’s thumb brushed the back of Kendall’s hand, slow and deliberate. For a second the rain was just a soundtrack. Claire’s voice came out quiet, threaded with something Kendall had waited months to hear. “You’re impossible, Kendall Price.”
“And you,” Kendall sniffed, “say that a lot.”
“I love you too,” Claire admitted. “But you knew that already.”
Kendall laced her fingers between Claire’s and leaned forward, providing them all the time in the world to back up or change their minds. They didn’t, of course.
~~~
There are a seldom few things in this universe that are known for certain. An object in motion remains in motion. Energy can not be created or destroyed. For every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. And most importantly, Kendall Price and Claire McKinley loved each other. They loved each other when the clouds cleared, when the hangovers faded, when the alcohol ran out, and when the songs ended.
In fact, as many of Kendall’s favorite childhood movies would say:
They lived happily ever after.