The Beginning

-Devon-

Even across the room I could see the silver pendant swinging from her neck. Her red dress was bold and twined around her like a vise. Black satin flats christened her feet and didn’t help her height, which was tiny. Her hair was chocolate brown and her eyes as wide as a cats and emerald green. As she flaunted proudly through the guests, she locked eyes with me, beckoning to me with them.
I followed without hesitation, and quickly found myself next to her. Up close, I could see exactly how delicate her features were, but she still radiated unwavering confidence.
As we danced to a song unfamiliar to me, eyes trailed us. The stares side-stepped my shaky steps and mishaps. Except for a few glares in my direction, the audience was focused completely on her.
I felt like I was in a dream, an impossible one. It was because I recognized the girl I dance with and her name is one that is forever on my lips, parted on my tongue, ready in my throat. It is one that I would subconsciously whisper in my sleep, brighten up when it’s mentioned. It is a name that I know like the back of my hand.
The girls name is Kennedy, though I was the only one who bothered to learn it before tonight.
They announced it when she arrived at the Masquerade Ball at a billionaire’s mansion. There were many bachelorette’s before her, but it was her large green eyes and slight features that everyone remembered. And for a young lady attending this ball, it’s a good thing because in your eighteenth summer, the upper-class men must choose a wife, and she must accept him.
You can pick a spouse on your own time. The Masquerade Ball is just to help things along.
And I’ve decided that I want Kennedy, and I’ve known it for a while now. If only she already knew it.


-Kennedy-

The Masquerade Ball is something that has always been squeamish for me to think about. Nothing could get me to look forward to it, not even the prospect of finding a husband.
If we weren’t as rich and influential as we are, I wouldn’t have to even get engaged. I could stay unmarried for the rest of my life and set a good example for younger girls to follow.
In a perfect world, I could have all the money I desired, like I do now, and make my own decision on whether to marry or not. But it isn’t a perfect universe. There are people who are in charge, people who deserve to have authority, but haven’t been given any leadership. People demand, cower, don’t care, or are lucky enough to be left out of situations like that.
But as I entered the ballroom, my thoughts budged, only a little. All the young men my age, and even some of the servants, turned to stare at me.
My mother had picked out a scarlet gown for me to wear. If she hadn’t I would have worn yellow. My grandmother’s hulking necklace swung from my throat, and this is one of the only times I’ve ever worn my hair down. It cascades passed my shoulders and down my back to my waist. My mother had styled it to perfection. She had protested against me wearing no heels, but I wouldn’t allow it. She thinks that just because of my tiny height, I don’t hold my own in a room full of people.
But after the reaction tonight, she could not be more wrong.


-Devon-

I have known Kennedy all my life. Our parents are childhood friends and have always spent a lot of time together. As a result, Kennedy and I played together before we were even out of diapers.
But even when we got older, other boys didn’t like being around me, whether it was how I acted, or how I dressed or even talked, I never found out. Likewise, Kennedy seemed to be shunned by other girls her age. She hid her body with trousers and too-big shirts and didn’t sport makeup. Her hair was rarely brushed and always tied back in a low ponytail, staying out of her way as she had adventures like rope swinging into the cove and horseback riding in the dead of the night.
There was never a secret I could keep from her. She had the rare ability to read people like a book. In turn, she told me all of her heart’s secrets, and there have been a couple times when I’ve helped her keep them from others.
Kennedy and I understand each other better through one look than most friends understand each other through words. People see our connection and stay away, thinking we are together. What they don’t know is that we’re not, though I hope to soon be.
At the Masquerade Ball, I was hoping that this would happen. It’s my dream come true, and I have to pinch myself subtly to make sure I’m not asleep. Kennedy notices and smiles shyly, which is unlike her. Her face crisps with a blush and that makes me grin.


-Kennedy-

I realize that I look stunning at the Masquerade Ball and that’s the reason why all the boys are gawking at me.
I don’t care how many boys chase me. I don’t care how forcibly they crave me. What I do care about is my best friend. Devon.
Devon and I share everything in our lives. He knows me inside and out and is the only person that I absolutely know that I can trust.
He’s assumed that I’m too boyish to like anyone. He always thought that I’m too boyish to be liked. But as we dance, and I see how much he smiles, and feel how my skin transforms into a raging fire wherever he touches it, I realize exactly how wrong I was.
The boys here like me, though that’s what makes them boys, not men. They like me on the outside – they don’t truly know me. Devon does.
I look up at him and feel the butterflies in my stomach that I’ve heard about. I’ve never experienced them before, but now that I have, I determine that I like them. They make me feel more dangerous and compelling than an adrenaline rush.
Tonight, Devon is clean cut in a black tux. His hair is dark enough to mistake as black if you didn’t know better, and is tousled atop his head. His eyes are the same shade and are framed with eyelashes so long, thick, and dark that it looks like he is wearing eyeliner. Even though the sun isn’t as warm in May as it is during the summer months, Devon’s skin is already a tan color.
Our eyes meet and before I know what I’m doing, before he knows what I’m doing, I kiss him. I kiss Devon.


-Devon-

She kissed me. Kennedy kissed me. After all the months of daydreaming about this day, my wildest pleasures have come true. I’m elated, and when she pulls back I kiss her again. I can almost see all the stares on my back, all the bastards cursing me for being the lucky bastard among us.
Kennedy giggles against my mouth and I kiss her again and pull away a couple inches.
“You don’t know how long I’ve wanted this to happen,” I say.
Kennedy glows up at me. “Me either.”

Outside

-Kennedy-

In the days following the Masquerade Ball I was vibrant with happiness. My smile never wavered away and my mother and everyone else undoubtedly noticed the new, and in love, me.
Now they all see that I’m not that different from other young women. Before there were no similarities in sight; evidently, my dramatic daydreams with Devon starred my eyes.
He clouded my every dream, from picnics beneath a waterfall or romantic evenings at d dress-coded restaurant that only people of our wealth dined at.
He clouded my every thought. A rather large portion of my brain shouted his name. Another part, his stunning face. I couldn’t focus on anything for more than a few seconds and it took me forty to dress myself in the morning – I refuse to let the maid that my mother commissioned to help me in the morning do her job.
What’s been eating me alive is that I haven’t seen Devon since the Masquerade Ball. I crave to look deep into his dark chocolate eyes and to tease his hair with my fingers and kiss him until my lips are numb.
I want it all to come naturally to us like it did at the Ball. No unsure hellos and careful hand holding thought the odds of those events happening are highly unlikely. Even if we choose to convert our friendship into something more romantic, our compatibleness would never cease. We would still be the best friends we’ve always been.


-Devon-

My heart’s been beating feverously ever since the Masquerade Ball. My thoughts are revolving around Kennedy, and I’m positive I’m all that she can think about.
I wonder if I should visit her, or if that would seem too clingy for her. I wonder if she wants me to come over. Certainly, that would make her mother happy, and when her mother if joyful, Kennedy is the opposite. I learned many years ago that they are like hot and cold, black and white. Their wants and emotions are never the same. It’s hard for one man to please both women at once.
It’s been three days since I have seen her, and I miss her more than I ever have before. But as much as I want to see her, I don’t want to upset her by making her mother ecstatic. If I choose to visit her, I would have to do it so only we know. And we can go someplace only we know and have the time of our lives.
I’ll make it our little secret.


-Kennedy-

My eyes had only drifted closed a minute ago, and my thoughts scrummed into dreamland. But a light plinking on the glass of my bay window awoke me. I rose from my pillows and slipped my soles into my slippers. I crossed to the window and peered down at the ground as best I could.
Devon was here, throwing pebbles up to my window. He came to see me. He saw me and motioned for me to meet him outside. I nodded my consent.
I raced down the kitchen stairs, the ones that only the servants use, instead of the grand staircase. I’d rather not have the guards at the front door ask me what I was doing in my frayed and threadbare pajamas and slippers, out of bed.
Devon is there, outside of my bedroom where I last saw him. he is in the same pinstriped pajamas that my older brother wears to bed, and his hair lays flat on one side, like he just woke up. I long to run my fingers through it. I take a few steps closer until I’m right in front of him.
“Hey,” he says. “I couldn’t wait to see you the past three days.” His hands are stationed in his pockets and he seems fidgety.
“Me too,” I answer. “I’ve been waiting for you to come see me.” I didn’t want to go see him in case I missed him when he came.
He moved closer and wrapped his lanky arms around me like he did at the Ball. “I wanted to come so when I did we could be alone. And besides, I think it’s my turn,” Devon grins mischievously.
“To do what?” I asked.
“This.” And he leaned closer and caresses my lips against his.
After three long agonizing days without him by my side, this is the most wonderful reunion I have ever experienced.


-Devon-

The cool night air is as fresh and renewing on my skin as I’m sure it is on Kennedy’s. But we don’t feel any of it. Our skin is kept warm by the love in our hearts and in every nook and cranny of or bodies.
As it began to rain, we didn’t feel any of the icy water weaving off our shoulders and down both of our legs. My hair laid flat against my scalp for once and Kennedy’s dripped.
Our pajama’s maybe rumpled from when the other had bunched it into a fist, but our eyes shone brighter than the North Star and both of our mouths were swollen from our ravenous kisses. To escape catching a cold, we move toward the horses stables, still gripping the other’s hand.

Back

-Kennedy-

The stables took us out of the rain, but the sparse mist and nipping cold follow us inside. I wish I’d thought to bring with me the fur-lined coat that my mother had bought me.
My knees tremble so much that I’m tempted to sit down on the wooden planks and straw covering the floor, but I realize that it would only draw out the remainder of my body heat. My teeth begin to chatter, and at this change, Devon notices how frigid I am, save for the hand that he is grasping.
He grabs two of the plaid stable blankets and sets one on the floor and the end of all the horse’s stales. Devon motions for me to come closer and he wraps us both up in it like we are catipillars in a coccone. I inhale heavily. The intoxicating aroma of Devon was almost over powered by the rentch of horse menour.
Devon spoke in a hearty voice. “I don’t think I’ve ever smelled anything as baad as these blankets.” He scrunches up his nose and waves his free hand in front of it.
I chuckle at his joke. “Ross could beat them at their own game. He baths only when mother forces him into the tub.” Ross is my nine year old menace of a brother.
“That’s understandable, but have you ever seen the hunting bloodhounds when they get back?” Devon counters. “They’re always all muddied up and once they trashed all of Persons Street’s compost . . .”
I smile as he tails off, knowing that there’s nothing better that he’s got. That’s’ one of the things that I love about him. even when his offense is pitiful, he never surrenders without giving it everylast defense he’s got.
Suddenly, my eyes begin to flutter and I remember my three sleepless nights that I’ve endured. I yawn and settle more comfortly into Devon’s shoulder. I close my eyes for the night, not caring that we’re still in the stable.
“Goodnight, Kennedy.” And I feel Devon lean down and press his lips onto the top of my head.


-Devon-

In the morning, I awoke with the sun. Kennedy was still nestled into the hollow of my neck and breathing at the snails pace of a sleeper. I gently nudged her with my shoulder.
“Wake up, Kennedy,” I coaxed. “We have to get back into our beds before anyone notices and asks questions.”
That rouses her.
I quickly place the stable blankets back where I found them. Kennedy had already left because she has both the cook, Dorea, and her ladies maid, Elyse, to evade. I had neither.
The elabret house that I live in isn’t too far from here but is too great a distance to walk home. I guide my chestnut horse out of the last stall, the one always left for visitors. I called my horse Jack, and my mother rode his sister, Rose. I saddled him and we trotted away as stealthily as a hoofed animal could.
As I guilded Jack homeward, I thought about all of this. Kennedy and I. The Masquerade Ball confirmed that there was something between us, thought after tonight I wondered just how deep my feelings for her ran. Every time we kiss I feell ajolt where my lips were. I’m always surprised to feel that they’re still intact, but that something important is missing that was there before. I found that the slightest brush of skin against Kennedy’s makes my insides turn to mush and I’m putty in her hands.
Anything she wants I’ll get it for her. Anything that pleases her I’ll do again. I’d said to the bottom of the ocean if it’s sunken treasure that she wants. I’d build her a house with no tools and a bare back before I’d let her be unhappy.


-Kennedy-

I leave with the dew in the grass. The day’s sun evaporated the water dropplets as I trutched through the grass in my slippers. By the time I reached the back doorway, those and the hems of my pants were soaked and scraps of debris were stuck to them. I sigh lightly in the doorway and rolled them up and clutched my slippers in my hands. I scurried toward the stairs.
I didn’t make it half way before I heard a raspy throat clearing. It was undoubtedly from Dorea. She was a hunched, old woman who didn’t take anything from anybody. I respected her for that. Her hands were knarled and the joints were swollen from age old athretist, but they were always there to comfort me when my mother wasn’t.
I’ve always trusted her with all my secrets. I wish Dorea hadn’t caught me during this one.
“Where have you been, my child?” Dorea inquires. She was stationed in a plain kitchion chair at the table, across from the one that I sit at to eat my breakfast every morning.
“Coming in from the stables,” I replied, somewhat smoothly. For some unexplainable reason, I wanted to keep my fairytale night with Devon a secret even from the one adult I am the most honest with.
But she suspects I’m not explaining to her the whole story. “Come here and sit down, and tell me why you were in the stables.” Dorea kicks my chair out from under the table, signaling for me to sit down in it. Figuring I have no other option, I do, and stare down guiltily in my hands.
“Why were you in the stables?” she prompts.
The story of last night spills out of my mouth in one big waterfall. Admittitly, I leave out the kissing bits, saving those memories for myself. And I tell her how we got trapped out there in the rain.
Nodding, she understands and ushers me up to my room, with just enough time to get into my four-poster bed and to shutter my emerald eyes before Elyse enters. She draws me my usual bath and roushes me up. In keeping with our routine, I shoo her out.
I undress and lower myself into the comfortably warm water. I feel my muscels uncurl as I breathed in the lavender sprigs floating around.
After a while, I pull the plug and emerge from the tub. A full-length, golden guilded mirror hung opposite it and I find myself looking into thepolished glass for the first time. I finally see what all those people at the Ball saw; what Devon sees.
Fair skin, toned muscles, a small but curvy waist and rounded breasts. My hourglass figure is something that girls are envious toward. But before the Ball, I’ve never wanted it, barely noticed it. I would’ve given it up if I could, to spare myself all the admirers.
Now I’m glad for it. It gives my something to impress Devon with, something that I want to be proud of.


-Devon-

I got back into my mansion smoothly, not encountering a single face. I wasn’t ecpecting to see one, but worry kept mechanically ibbling at my stomach that we would get caught. Though I understood that someone would eventually figure out that Kennedy and I were not in our beds last night, I’d rather that happen later and not sooner.
The duvet on my bed is still rumpled from when I was tossing and turning, waiting for the mansion to be still. The sheets are twisted between the bedposts. The light was scarce because all the lamps are out and the curtains are draw across the windows, though coals still burned re in the fireplace. My eyes skimmed over my crowded desk in the corner and two doors, one leading to my closet, the other to a spacious bathroom. Maids clean the rooms daily, though I prefer to have my desk unorganized.
I cross to my closet and pull on my outfit for the day. My trosers are stained with mud and my shirt has holes along the seams. I would have to change when I return home for dinner, but my wreaked clothes are perfectionate for what I plan to do today. I plan on riding Jack.
When I go to saddle him up, he is prepped to go, despite the late night ride I took him on. He doesn’t fidget when I lead him out of his stale and outside, or when I mounted him. he quickly trotted when I nudged him forward with my knees. We cantered onto one of my favorite trails to take through the woods, easily.

Impressum

Tag der Veröffentlichung: 09.07.2012

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