BETTER OFF

23

KENZIE

"Logan?" I hum but don't move my head from his chest. We've been lying in bed for hours since we woke up.

An hour ago he ordered us coffee, because we both wanted to try and wake up but it didn't help. After we drank the coffees we laid it bed still feeling extremely hungover while we watched TV.

"Mhm?" He asks, his fingers sliding up my neck into my hair.

"Can you take me home or should I call a car?" I ask letting my eyes close as I relax into his touch.

After we ate last night, we sat and chatted in his room until Summer and Trevor came home from the party. Summer let me borrow some makeup remover and face wash before we all headed to bed. Even though Logan and I stayed up and talked until almost five am, deciding we are going to go into whatever this is as if we have no history. So we stayed up telling each other everything, even if we already knew it about one another.

"Yeah, I'll take you home," he answers, "Did you wanna go now?"

"In a little bit," I basically whisper starting to fall back asleep.

"Want me to wake you in thirty?"

I just nod, feeling perfectly relaxed as his fingers massage my scalp.

Logan keeps his promise and wakes me up thirty minutes.

I groan and roll onto my back, away from Logan.

"I don't want to get up but I know I have to," I groan, my eyes still closed.

"You don't have to," I feel Logan move beside me.

"I have homework to finish."

"Use my computer."

I open my eyes and turn to look at him. He's already looking at me, those bright blue eyes that I just want to dive into just staring back at me.

"You make a good argument," I sit up, brushing my fingers through my tangled hair.

"Let's grab food first," Logan offers. I look over my shoulder at him.

"You better not just be being like this because you think that's what I want," it's not like him to be so attached. I know we said we'd start fresh but it's really hard not to see him as the wild carefree party boy I dated in high school.

"I just want to hang out with you," he shrugs sitting up leaning close to me. He kisses my shoulder and I turn my face to see him, "I've grown up, Kenzie."

"I know, it's just odd to see you so...." Our eyes meet as I try to find the words but I get distracted by how sweetly he's looking at me. So I just lean over and kiss him. Just softly, savoring the way his lips feel on mine and the way his hand comes to my cheek keeping me close to him, his fingers make their way into my hair.

Never breaking the kiss, I shift into his lap as his arms wrap around me, sliding under the old t-shirt of his that I'm wearing.

I slowly pull away, my hands resting on his shoulders.

"What do you want to eat? It's my treat," I smile at him.

He smirks as his hands slide down my back.

"Don't say it," I chuckle.

"Fine, I won't but it's true," his hands squeeze my hips before slowly sliding down my thighs. "There's this sandwich shop close to campus, wanna go there?"

"Sure," I smile leaning forward and giving him a quick kiss. But before I get too far Logan brings a hand to my chin and presses his lips to mine again but he also keeps it short.

"Can I shower then we'll go?" Logan asks, his thumb sliding over my bottom lip.

I just nod and he kisses my cheek with a smirk. I slide off his lap so he can get out of bed.

"Do you want to shower too?" Logan sounds genuine as he asks and stands up from the bed.

I can't help but notice how low his sweatpants are sitting on his hips. He's facing away from me, even just standing there I can make out the lines of the muscles he's spent years building but my eyes focus on the tattoo on his left shoulder. It's a newer one, I've never seen it before. Unlike the mountains that circle his wrist and the numbers behind his ear, both of which he got as soon as he turned 18.

"I'll shower when I get home," I say eyes still on his tattoo. It's a beautiful timeline tattoo, a man with wings who looks like he's falling.

"Logan?"

"Mhm?" He turns to face me as he adjusts his pants.

"Your tattoo is beautiful," I tell him.

He looks confused for a second, "Oh! My Icarus one?"

"That's what it is? I wasn't sure," I chuckle.

"You know the story?"

I nod, "I went to Greece with my family a few years ago and we went on a Greek mythology tour, they talked out it there."

"Do you have any tattoos?" He questions.

"No," I shake my head, "My parents would murder me."

I still can't believe Macey got one.

"Really?"

"My mom still gives me shit for getting a second piercing on one of my ears," I scoff.

"Why?"

"In her words 'dancers should be pure and look pure'," I recite the words my mother lives by. She never even pierced her own ears, she still wears clip-on earrings. When Macey and I asked her to get our ears pierced it took years of convincing.

"Your Mom's pretty hardcore about all that stuff, huh?" He starts collecting clothing out of his drawers.

I nod, "Always has and always will be. Dance and cheer is her life."

"And you're gonna follow that path?" He asks turning to face me again.

"For now," I shrug.

"Well what's the long term goal?" He sits back down on the bed, turning to face me.

"Photography," I say it without even thinking. I don't usually tell people that's my long term goal. I usually just say something business related or I just say that I'm gonna follow my Mom's footsteps.

"That makes sense," he nods, "I still have..." His voice trials off as he stands up again and walks away to grab his wallet from the top of his dresser.

I watch him open his wallet and pull out a small white rectangle. It looks like a polaroid of some sort.

"This picture you took at my last high school game," Logan explains as he comes and sits right next to me on the bed. He hands me the little polaroid that's got my handwriting at the bottom, 12/15/2019 Logan's Senior Night. The photo has Logan fully ready for a hockey game while his Mom and Dad stand on either side of him and his brother's standing next to their Mom.

I remember taking it and then sitting next to his Mom for the whole game. Jenny is one of my favorite people, she's funny and has a very bubbly personality for a woman who runs a chain of coffee shops across all of Arizona.

"You carry that around with you?" I look over at him. First the photo in his locker, and now this?

"Yeah, is that weird?" He asks looking up from the photo.

"No, it's really sweet," I lean over and kiss his cheek, "You have a good heart, Evans."