I unwillingly handed Amber the ten bucks she so desired from me. I watched as she counted the ten single dollar bills with a rather nasty smirk on her face.
"No need to worry about this one girls," Amber said as she stuffed the dollar bills into her shirt, "She's a push over... just like Ken." The look she gave me when she said Ken's name could have turned the strongest of men into stone. Something in my blood boiled at the mentioned of Ken's name as I felt a good 5 percent of my morale drift away from me. Amber was going to pay, and not just because slandering Ken's name was my sole purpose in life nowadays.
Meh, I really didn't care that Ken was leaving the day he announced it. It wasn't until the day later when no one sat with me at lunch besides Iris when the truth hit me. He was gone. Ken was out of the building and possibly never coming back. But the thing was, I kind of KNEW he was going to come back. If over 10 years of watching The Young and the Restless and Days of Our Lives had taught me anything was that Ken would be back; whether he be radically changed or as if he had been in suspended animation this entire time, he WOULD be back eventually.
So... why, whenever his name was mentioned, did I feel so alone?
I remember the last few things he told me too before he left. And who really could, I took what he said the wrong way and it's left me scarred for a good while.
"We'll meet again Bridget," Ken informed me as he watched me close my locker for the day, "Then we'll talk about what we've done since I left. Dad can't keep me in that military school for long if that means being away from you."
"Yeah." I said, giving an obnoxious sniff of doubt. "Then we could do something together like old times."
"Maybe we could... we could dance." Ken suggested, starting to blush a deep red. "You know... maybe privately if you want..."
Although I knew what he meant when he asked if we could 'dance,' my very strange mind was thinking of the other form of 'dance' where 'privately' meant 'in the bedroom.' And by the way Ken had blushed so brightly, I wouldn't be surprised if he was thinking the same thing.
"Maybe..." I slowly admitted, not wanting to admit I didn't want to do what I was rudely thinking in my brain. "But we might have to agree on a song to dance too..."
I looked at Ken as he gave me a wide and grateful smile. Wow, how badly did I realize I liked that smile after it was thousands of miles away from me.
"What about a good bye kiss?" Ken asked as we left the building together. I walked home, but Ken's father was waiting in his Jeep to take Ken directly to military school. It was THAT far away.
"Uh..." I stammered as I looked around. Amber and her clique weren't in sight or hearing range, Castiel was hanging out by his favorite spot watching all the pretty girls go by, Nathaniel also wasn't within sight or hearing range... Dare I try to do it? Ken already stole my first one...
To interrupt my thoughts, Ken's father nastily honked the horn at us. They had to be on the road NOW if they dreamed of getting there by tomorrow.
"I... I have to go." Ken told me, disappointed, as he started to dash toward his father's Jeep.
"H-hey Ken!" I shouted, almost against my own will. Instantly, Ken turned around to look at me one last time as I blew him a kiss. It a simple gesture (I kissed the palm of my hand, then pretended to blow the kiss off the palm of my hand) but it made Ken blush so brightly. I'm sure his father gave him some form of a love based lecture on it later as they drove down the road.
"Are you gonna miss him?" someone said from behind me. I looked to see Iris, my first real, new friend since coming to Sweet Amoris.
"A little." I told her. "I didn't really like him, but I really didn't hate him either."
"Do you think he'll be back?" Iris then pestered. I looked at her and smiled.
"I have no doubt." I informed her as we watched Ken's father's Jeep pull away from the school with Ken waving behind to me eagerly. Oh yeah, there was no doubt that I might see him again soon...
I don't believe in us completely.
But at those sort of times, because you're by my side,
The light known as "you" finds me in the middle of the night.
... ... ... ... ... ... ...
Simple and clean is the way that you're making me feel tonight,
It's hard to let it go...
-Utada Hikaru (Hikari [main chorus translation] and Simple & Clean [latter chorus])