KP – One Oh One : Part XI - The Intensity of Feeling
Kim's eyes snapped open from a dreamless sleep. Well, at least that was what it seemed like. Even just awakening, she was aware that the human mind almost always dreamed while sleeping and it was only because the events of that dream had remained in her subconscious instead of a quickly fading real memory.
Then too, she almost never recalled dreaming when she had taken sleeping medicine. Considering it was about four in the morning, she pretty much figured that had been the case. A while back, she was troubled with nightmares and her doctor prescribed a mild sleeping aid. That did help at the time, though she was a little uncomfortable taking them.
Something was wrong with the clock. Some of the numbers were brighter than others and the whole display looked slightly askew.
Reaching up above her bed, she turned on the light and realized why the clock looked funny. The plastic face of it was cracked, with a small section missing, allowing the numbers underneath to glow more brightly. Not only that, but it was at the wrong height.
The clock was no longer sitting on the low, round nightstand that had been her bed's constant companion for over five years. In it's place was one of the end tables from the family room. What's worse was that the clock sat alone on that table. There should have been a trio of photographs in simple frames there.
RON!
Kim's right hand grabbed her left ring finger. There was nothing there save for the tiny callous that had been forming since she started wearing a ring on that finger last February. Everything that happened the day before (?) came back to her in a rush. The foul mood she was in because Ron hadn't done his 'manly duties,' his admission that he withheld the identity of Alpha from her and her subsequent melt-down.
She sat down on the bed again, shivering despite the comfortable temperature of her room.
What had she done?
In the 'light of day' (despite it still being quite dark out) everything but that one admission seemed so trivial. Even what Ron had done himself, while something they needed to have a very long, very serious talk about, wasn't something that deserved what she did. Instead, in a moment of pure rage, she turned into something she thought herself incapable of. She turned into Queen Bitch, with her Drama Generator set on high.
Kim sat in the middle of her bed crying. This time it wasn't the uncontrollable wailing she had done in her mother's arms while she choked out a kind of explanation. It wasn't the meager whimpering she had done when she left and came back with the medicine to help her sleep. The memory of having smashed all her pictures and the table it sat on filled her with deep shame.
None of that, however, compared to the shame of what she had done to Ron. In taking her rings off and hurling them at her, she had, in effect, ripped his heart right out of his chest and thrown it on the ground. As if the image were recorded in her mind in high definition video, she could see one of the rings hitting his chest, the other sailing over his shoulder into the high grass. She had taken the symbols of what was most dear to both of them and had literally thrown it in his face.
All for what? Because Ron was uncomfortable with some minor sexual acts? What in heaven's name was she even thinking? What right did she have to expect him to perform when he had reservations, without at least talking them out? She thought he was being all high and mighty, but they had always told each other they would never pressure each other that way. Instead, she was only thinking about her own pleasure, about her own needs, not about his. Weren't those things always supposed to be for both of them?
Slowly her mind worked through those things. She was the one in the wrong, not in the asking, not in the wanting, not in the need, but in the fact she blamed him afterwards. If he had been the one to want it and she was hesitant, that would have been the end of the matter. In his mind it was always clear, they must both be ready, whether it was one of the bases they had already covered or beyond. The fact they had explored certain kinds of physical love before did not mean they were always ready to go there again at any time, and being honest with herself, she had to admit he was kind of right at the time.
Then her mind drifted over to the thing that had taken all of her frustration, all of the fear she had been feeling the last couple days and set her off on the rampage that destroyed part of her room. Her grief morphed once more into anger. Of all the enemies she had faced in her short life, Carrion was the one who had done more harm to her psyche than anyone. No whack schemes of Drakken's, no pitched battles with Shego, no desperate fights with the likes of Monkey Fist had left her with the nightmares and the waking fears had done as much lasting harm to her as that…thing had.
Why didn't he tell her?
Three months had passed since she was rescued from WWEE and Agent Alpha. For three months Ron had been keeping the simple fact that the man who had her in his power was the same one who had threatened her with the single most horrible thing she had ever faced. For three months he had been free and she didn't even know it.
What if he had tried something else during that time? What if he had done something to her while she was unconscious?
That thought alone simmered in her mind a few minutes. She almost didn't make it to her small waste can before she threw up. There wasn't much in her stomach, since she hadn't had anything to eat since lunch the day before, but what little there was came up violently.
Anger and rage again started replacing the sorrow she was feeling. Only this time she didn't have the energy to once again start wrecking her room. She sank down onto the floor, halfway into a fetal position and started crying all over again.
It felt like betrayal, betrayal of the worst kind, coming from somebody she loved, somebody who loved her…
…somebody who would clearly lay down his life for her in an instant.
Pulling up her nightshirt, she dabbed at her eyes. That was when she realized she was wearing Ron's jersey. Almost involuntarily she pulled the collar up over her face and breathed deeply. The shirt smelled of detergent and her own sweat, but the 'Ron-scent' would never completely leave the garment. Even in her sorrow and anger, that helped to settle her down a little.
It didn't help to stem her tears, though.
She tried to make herself think logically. The last time she was held captive, she was knocked unconscious with some kind of soporific. Carrion was not alone with her then, he was in the company of the other agents of WWEE, acting as their leader. There was some hope that he would not have had the opportunity to abuse her then, especially since she was being used to barter for the release of Gemini. There was also the depth of Carrion's evil. The revenge he wanted on her, while psychotic, was the kind where he would want her to be aware of the cruelty he could commit on her person. She would now have to see her doctor to confirm nothing had happened, but at least she felt a bit more at ease about that aspect of the situation.
There was a slight knock at her hatch. In the partial light of the lamp over her bed, she noted the latch had been removed. While she hesitated, it slowly opened. Her Mom climbed into the room carrying a small tray with a glass of water. She set them down on the edge of the opening and went over to her, sitting down in front of her.
"Are you feeling better?" She asked calmly.
Kim glanced over at the waste basket sitting just off to the side. "No." She said flatly. She looked into her mother's blue eyes for a long time, hoping to find some kind of answers there. Nothing coherent was there, except for the obvious look of love and concern etched there.
"Mom, what have I done?"
Anne frowned deeply. "From the looks of things, you did what you had to do."
"Huh?"
She shrugged. "You obviously have decided things can't go on like they have been. I guess that's what happens."
"Mom?"
"Well, if you consider all the horrible things Ron has done to you. Take for instance that time he outright lied about you and that boy on the football team. Or how he ignored you when the other girls started noticing him with his new haircut, or when he took advantage of that job you got for him at Bueno Nacho. What kind of friend is he, really?"
Kim looked at her mother in open shock. "What do those things have to do with anything? We got past all of that. I've forgiven him for them and he's forgiven me for my part too."
"Yes…yes you have, and so has he." She said after a few moments. Then she leaned forward and too Kim's left hand. "Then why did you break up with him?" She held onto her daughter's hand by her bare ring finger.
"I didn't…I…"
Anne let go. "Taking an engagement ring off and throwing it at him looks a whole lot like breaking up to me."
"Mom, I didn't mean to…I mean…I don't, I…" The tears started again. "I was just so angry with him."
She nodded, taking both her child's hands and holding them gently. "Kim, I wish I could tell you that everything is okay, that you can go right to him and everything will be right, but you've done something to him that's hurt him as deeply as what that monster did to you."
Kim shook her head, the tears flowing even faster. "No, I didn't mean that…No!" She got up suddenly, hunting the floor for her clothes. She had to get to him, to apologize, to make everything right again.
"Kimmie, please sit down." Anne said softly, divining what her daughter was up to.
"I can't, I've got to go find him."
"Kim, it's okay. Ron came here straight from school. You were already asleep by then, and the stuff I gave you knocked you out pretty good. It was stronger than those pills you took last winter. He still sat right outside your door half the night, hoping you would wake up."
"Where is he?"
Anne bit her lip. "He is downstairs in his room. Some time after midnight I made him go down there to get some rest himself. He wasn't in real good shape by that time. He hadn't had a shower in a couple days and he was even still wearing that battle-outfit of his under his street clothes." She stood up and barred Kim's path as she started toward the hatch.
"I've got to go to him, I've got to apologize."
"All in good time, honey. Sit down, we've got some things we need to talk about first."
Reluctantly she obeyed, mostly because she knew the only way she would get past the older woman was by force and that was not going to happen. She sat back down in the middle of her bad and her mother came over and sat down beside her.
"Tell me something. Is this issue about him not telling you the only thing that is going on between the two of you?"
Slowly Kim shook her head.
Anne just looked at her child with a neutral expression. "Be honest with me. When the two of you went away…when you came back, were you still a virgin?"
"Mom!"
"Kim, please, just answer the question."
Kim was sure she was turning just as red as the old hockey shirt she was wearing. "Yes…technically."
She raised an eyebrow. "Technically?"
"Well, er, technically in the sense we haven't made love."
"But you've done other things?"
Kim nodded slowly. "The second night we, uh, went a little further than we have before. We also saw each other naked for the first time, officially."
"And?"
"Well, we took a shower together a couple times too."
Anne nodded slowly. "So, in hindsight, do you think you were ready for that?"
Kim let her head fall back to her pillow. "Really, yeah, I do. I mean, it seemed so right then, it was…wonderful. I'm not ashamed of it, or anything, if that's what you're trying to get at."
"Kimmie, I pretty much assumed that was the case. The other stuff that happened, well, that was just more mission stuff, but there was definitely something different about the two of you afterwards and I pretty much figured you two had either started making love or something close to it. Honey, part of being ready for things like that is dealing with how it makes you feel. I know the two of you love each other and I'm not trying to say it was wrong for you two show it that way, but you have irreversibly changed the way the two of you see each other.
"Back when you started dating, you went overnight from a shy little girl who only rarely had kissed a boy to doing some making out that made even me blush. You two were like kids in a candy store with your parent's platinum card. When you realized he meant more to you than just your best friend, that altered your perception of him. When was the last time you looked at him and saw a random headed little goofball?"
"He's always been that way."
"Yes, but it used to bother you. You would tell him to 'get his head in the game' and 'quit fooling around' all the time."
Kim sat up on her elbows. "I still do that."
"You do, sometimes, but now it's become a term of endearment. What I'm saying is, taking your physical love to another level has taken how you feel about each other to a new level as well. You love him and now that you, well, I'll just assume you do things for each other and leave it at that, but that has made your feelings for each other even more intense. Couple that with some of the problems you have had outside of the relationship and it ups the ante even further.
"Now Ron's done something that hurt you. There's no way to sugarcoat it. What he did was wrong, even though in his head he thought he was doing the right thing."
"What do you mean." Kim sat fully up again.
"He had a very long talk with your father and I last night when he got here. James was livid with him, but at the same time he was worried sick as well. Ron was very forthright with his explanations. He was afraid of how you would react if you knew that thing was free. He saw some things in you the last time that scared him and, well, there were some selfish reasons involved there too. He was frightened you would go into some kind of shell and he would lose you, losing the ability to be with you. Then I sent James out of the room and asked him some of the same things I just asked you. He had a lot harder time talking about it, but he pretty much said the same thing as you, eventually."
Kim pulled her knees up to her chest. "Mom, Ron actually told you that we…"
Anne shook her head, smiling softly. "Actually, he used even more general terms than you did, and he left out the part about the two of you seeing each other naked and the shower thing. Yes, he was pretty freaked out about it, but I got the drift."
Kim got up and started pacing the floor. "Mom, I've got to…" She gripped her finger. "Why did I throw my rings at him. Now I bet they're gone!" The tears were about to start again.
Anne put out a restraining hand. "Kimmie, relax. Ron found them. He's got them with him. Just let him get a good night's sleep in. I don't think the two of you should go to your classes, unless you want to, but I think you'd be better off spending some time working this out."
Glancing at the open hatchway, the image of Ron, lying awake on the bed he spent almost the entire summer filling her mind, Kim made a decision. "I'm going to him now. I've got to make this right. I don't care any more that he didn't tell me. I love him and I've got to know if he still loves me." Before her mother could get up from her seat on the bed, she started down the stairs. She didn't know what awaited her, whether the anger between them would start all over again, whether he would simply keep the rings and tell her it was over, whether he would forgive her and put it all behind them or whether they would end up making love in that room. What happened didn't matter, as long as she went to him to try and put what they had back together.
She got to the door and tried the knob. It was locked, though that didn't surprise her. Gently she knocked. "Ron?"
Silence was the only response. She blinked back fresh tears. "Ron, are you awake? Ron, Honey, please. We need to talk. I'm sorry, I'm so, so sorry. I didn't mean to throw my rings at you."
She stood there a few minutes more, crying freely, hoping for some kind of response. Either him slowly waking and saying silly things as he did so. Still there was no sound save for the quiet hum of the air conditioning.
The lock wasn't hard to defeat. It wasn't meant as security, only to indicate the person on the other side of the door wanted privacy. All she had to do was put her thumbnail in the center of the knob and turn the key slot. She opened the door and stepped inside.
The bed was a rumpled mess. Ron's sweatshirt and cargo pants were sitting on the floor, wadded up. Sitting in the middle of his pants was a shivering Rufus. He was holding Ron's Kimmunicator.
Ron was gone, and so was his super-suit. The only other thing in the room was a sheet of paper he had taken from his backpack. On it was scribbled a name.
Dorian Conyers.
The first three letters of each name were circled. She thought that odd for a moment, that perhaps he might go by Dorcon with his friends. Then she gasped.
Reverse the two and you got condor. Carrion's father, Aviarius had a pet condor that he rode into battle and Carrion's own battle suit had the stylized wings of the giant bird on it.
That's why the Goth freaked her out so badly. She had recognized him subconsciously!
Dorian Conyers was Carrion!
And a voice in her head told her what she didn't want to hear...
...Ron was going after him!
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