ONLY ANGEL | JJ MAYBANK

CHAPTER FIFTEEN
warning: this chapter includes topics relating to drug addiction

•••

JJ Maybank is pretty sure that Collins Jacobson is the girl of his dreams.

He knows how presumptuous a statement like that is, he'd be the first to admit it that he sounded absolutely insane. How could he know such a thing? He'd never searched for this girl to know what qualities checked all the boxes for him. He had no clue what it was that made him feel like she was somehow made for him- that is, until he met Collins and realized she was everything that he wanted and more.

Out of the many times he'd been called selfish by his friends, JJ had never been so egocentric to think that there were things on this earth that had been specially curated for him and him alone. But the existence of this girl who had entered his life at such an unexpected time had seemed to change his whole perspective on the universe. No one could be this perfect unless they had been carefully crafted, specially hand-selected, and meticulously calculated to fulfill his every desire. JJ didn't even care how repetitive it was at this point, he would keep saying it ten times over, again and again: Collins Jacobson is an angel on earth.

He thought that he liked the kind of girl who sought to spend her days on an adrenaline high, the ones who made provocative remarks about what goes on under the sheets and whose only motivations in life was their own selfish objectives. These girls were easy to come by, he'd come across many at their infamous keggers, and he'd become well acquainted with this personality type. Those were the kind of girls he'd come home with, so that had to mean that he liked them, right?

Basically, JJ thought he'd fall in love with someone like him. Collins was pretty much anything but. The only thing that somehow made them make sense was the fact that everything that made them different, didn't work against them, it became a part of each other that they loved. JJ was boisterous and rough around the edges, and Collins was reserved and delicate. He was the hammer and she was the china teacup; they would never make sense together in any world of logic.

Except in the dimension in which JJ didn't have to destroy everything he touched. Perhaps they could be living in a world where he could be the kind of hammer that fixed things instead of broke them. Only then would he and Collins make perfect sense.

JJ thinks all of this as he's looking at Collins from where he sits on the railing attached to John B's dock. They retreated back to the home base after discovering the well where the lost gold of the Royal Merchant had to be held in. They were going to start making their plan to extract the gold, given that it wouldn't be easy since it was under the home of a rumored serial killer. A lot of thought and careful planning was in order for this scheme of theirs. Now, they were just left waiting on John B to get back from whatever vague excuse of his he'd given them on his way out, they all had to busy themselves or else they were too antsy with anticipation. How could they not be? They were about to become millionaires.

Clearly, JJ had decided to quell his boredom by admiring Collins, the one thing that could probably distract him from anything on earth. Not knowing if she ever thinks of him the same way that he's currently thinking of her is pretty much the only thing that keeps him from feeling like becoming rich will bring him immense happiness.

She was stretched out on the deck, lying on her stomach with her eyes trained down on her notebook filled with lines upon lines of writing etched across the paper. She had topics and ideas over what she wanted to write her college essays about, organized into bullet points for her to remember and choose from the best. Her brows were knit in deep thought and there were teeth marks on the end of her pencil where the eraser was.

"What are you working on?" JJ asked, deciding to finally steal her attention away from her work to turn it over to him. He jumped down from his spot to wander closer to her, as though a magnetic force was pulling him towards her after feeling the distance between them for too long. He squatted down next to her, easing himself lower until he was on the floor with her, legs straightened out in front of him and his arms propped up behind him.

Setting her pencil down on her notebook, Collins sighed softly and looked up at him with the same gentle gaze that she always has on her face, even when it's clear that she was distraught about something. "Just thinking about things that I could write about that could charm an old person into paying for my education."

"Now in my dictionary, we call that scamming." JJ emphasized. "I'm actually very well acquainted with the term as a matter of fact. Show me what you got, Ponzi."

Collins shook her head at him, but the corners of her mouth were still turned upwards in amusement. "It's only scamming if you lie in it, which I'm not planning on doing."

"Doesn't everyone? The whole point of these college essays and applications are to make you look better than the next guy. There's bound to be some exaggeration here and there."

"I don't know." Collins shrugged. "I suppose that's true but if I'm going to be writing about overcoming obstacles or my personal growth in life, I kinda feel like that's something I shouldn't be dishonest about, you know?"

"I guess not if you wanna go with the honesty route." JJ agreed with a slight nod. Of course she would be taking the more righteous approach, Collins is an angel, she's incapable of sin and here he was, acting like the devil on her shoulder. "So what are you thinking of writing about?"

He attempted to make an effort to peek over and catch a glimpse of her paper, but Collins was quick to cover it with her hands and block his sight from reading anything that she'd had already written down. "It's a work in progress, right now. Nothing that I feel ready to share at the moment."

JJ studied her carefully, a faint frown on his face at her secretiveness. What didn't she want him to see on her paper? Whatever she tried to hide, it only made him more curious. He'd shared something extremely personal to him with her, something that he'd never tell just anyone, something she had brought out from him because she made him feel safe enough to share it. Didn't he make her feel the same?

Choosing his words carefully, JJ said, "You know that you can tell me stuff, too, right? Anything you feel like telling, at least. I feel like we always talk about me but never about you. So if there was anything you wanna get off your chest, I'm here." Way to be subtle, JJ.

"I know I can talk to you about stuff." Collins replied, and she looked genuine when she said it, but there was just a voice in JJ's head that kept yelling, then tell me something, goddamnit! "I just don't want you to read this stuff because I feel like it sounds stupid. My greatest strengths are blah blah blah, being an active member of my community is important to me because... It all just sounds so pretentious."

"That's probably why everyone that I've ever met that's gone to college are entitled jerks. They all got in based on who could brag their way into an acceptance letter the best."

"I don't want to be like those people." Collins told him, her voice gone quieter.

"Collins, if I've learned anything about you this summer, it's that something like that happening is utterly impossible." JJ deadpanned with a grave expression.

Collins looked down at the floor with a bashful smile on her face. "You're sweet."

"Enough to give you a toothache."

She chuckled. "They're aching alright." Although, she didn't think she could ever get enough of his honeyed words.

"But seriously, there's absolutely nothing that you want to tell me?" JJ asked seriously, before he attempted to joke, "No childhood trauma that you'd like to unpack?" Except he was also sort of serious about that.

"It kind of sounds like you're fishing for something specific."

"No! Not at all. Just... if you did want to talk to me about something, you can, whatever that something may be." His neck burned hot with embarrassment. He was coming off too pushy. He didn't want to pressure her into trauma dumping out of coercion. He wanted her to want to tell him these things out of her own free will. "I'm sorry, forget I even said anything."

Biting her lip as she hesitated to utter her next words, Collins stared down at her notebook, knowing full well that written on its pages were parts of her life that had left crater sized holes in her. She thought about how honest JJ was with her the night before, how special she felt to know something about him that shed a different light on him from the person he always tried to emulate. He'd been able to be vulnerable with her, to open up and be candid about a part of his life that he struggled with.

If he could be transparent about himself as much as he was with her, it only felt right that she was the same for him. But it wasn't just that it felt like the right thing to do, it was also something that Collins wanted to do, and that felt important to distinguish.

"When I was little, there was a brief period of time where my parents were actually pretty good at their job and we were an actual family for once. My mom was clean, her parents had sent her to rehab for the very last time and she'd managed to stay on track for a personal record of 3 months. Within that short window she'd managed to sweet talk Charlie into going to some wilderness retreat for boys that cost way more money than she had back then, but all that convincing and planning kept her mind off her addiction." Collins swallowed back the lump in her throat that was making her voice sound all croaky like she was about to start crying at any minute. She hadn't even gotten to the sad part yet, why was she already choking up?

JJ placed a gentle hand on her arm to show her that she had his full attention, and he was there for her. She feigned a small smile in appreciation for the gesture. "So that just left her, me, and Dad at home for the summer. It's the only one where I remember them fondly. I think I ate more toasted marshmallows that year than I have in my whole life because we spent every weekend next to the bonfire and my mom liked the idea of S'mores Sundays. She said it had a nice ring to it. I also think a heavy proportion of sugar in her diet helped her cope, but I don't know, it was a long time ago."

"No, it sounds familiar. My dad did the same thing for a while, but he hasn't tried to stay clean for years. Peanut butter chocolates were his favorite sugar fix." Collins brought her hand up to squeeze his comfortingly. How messed up was it that they could bond over something like that? It appeared that both of their parents had done a number on them.

"She'd almost made it the whole summer without tripping up. I suppose third time's the charm because she'd been through the whole rehab thing and relapsed both times only weeks after being released. But she'd managed to hold off longer after the third rehab visit, so there was hope that maybe she could stay that way. Until one night, I guess it all just became too much for her." Collins took a deep breath. "She wasn't thinking straight that day. She'd been stuck at home with me while my dad was at work and for some reason, she just couldn't fight it anymore. I just remember her grabbing my hand so tight I thought the bone would shatter, and she dragged me along with her to her dealer's place a couple blocks away."

JJ wondered if it was the same one that his dad used to go before he started going to Barry. It was a dingy old place that had been busted a couple of years ago after a bad batch took out enough of its consumers for the police to trace it back to the source. JJ's dad had been lucky to not have been one of the unfortunate souls. The only reason why he was still able to sit on his recliner was because around that time, he'd been scamming the hospital into giving him prescription pain killers after a work injury, he was on the ban list now obviously. 

"I was only ten and I was just sitting there, in a coke house with my mom, watching her destroy herself all over again. She went from this near-perfect parent, to just another tweaked out druggie that I should've always known she would be. She was never going to stay being the mom she was that summer." Collins grimaced and stared hard at the calm water off by the dock. "For the longest time, I just kept going through that day, over and over again. I couldn't seem to figure out exactly what flipped the switch. Was it something I did? Something I said? Was it even about me at all? A part of me wishes it was and wishes it wasn't. Because if it was then at least I could finally understand why she couldn't fight the urge off anymore, why she ruined everything. But then at the same time, if it wasn't anything I did, then that must mean that I was never really a factor at all. I didn't mean enough to her to make her stay sober. I wasn't special enough."

JJ tried to swallow, but there was a lump in his throat that got in the way. She'd just described his childhood perfectly. As a matter of fact, he still asked himself those same questions to this day, no answer to any of them to be found. He understood her confusion as to where it all went wrong. He knew what she meant when she contemplated over what her role was in the 온라인카지노게임 of her mother's relapse. What she didn't know, but what JJ could tell her, was that no matter what the real reason was, she didn't have to bear the burden of responsibility. No kid ever should.

"I never told Charlie about what happened that day, or how good she was while he was gone. I didn't want him to feel angry that he hadn't been there to stop her from taking me to that place, but mostly I didn't want him to feel bad for missing out on her when she was okay. I know he had a good time at that retreat. Even though he came back to the disappointment of her relapse, he still had something to remember fondly about that summer. Just like I have that time with my mom when she was good."

As Collins went quiet at the end of her 온라인카지노게임, JJ felt a knot in his chest tighten after hearing the sadness in her voice. She didn't cry, no tears had fallen despite even her own expectations to. But for the first time, JJ caught a glimpse of a crack in her soul that her mother was responsible for inflicting, and he understood how and why it was there. Her timid eyes held more behind them then anyone could possibly discern, and she had pulled down the mask for him.

"I'm sorry." He breathed, squeezing her hand so tightly. "You never should've had to live through that. I wish I had something better to say to you, I wish that I could do something about it, but I just- I'm sorry."

Holding his hand and placing her other on top of it, Collins looked JJ in the eyes in sincerity. "Whatever it is you think you should be doing to help, I think you're already doing it." Their recollection of those similar words exchanged that night by the Hawk's Nest when it was just the two of them, brought small smiles to their faces. It'd never been all that simple to comfort someone through a hard time, but someway and somehow, for Collins and JJ, it all came so easily.

"I think you understand me better than a lot of people on this planet." JJ stated with honesty.

Collins smiled a little bit upon hearing his words. That was a pretty good compliment if you were to ask her. "I think so, too, vice versa."

"Good parents just weren't in the cards for us, were they?" JJ chuckled, shaking his head. "There's gotta be some kind of zodiac, or psychic explanation for why the universe chose us."

"Which rising sign breeds unreliable, pill popping, childhood trauma-inflicting moms and dads?" Collins wasn't even sure if what she said made any sense but it was her attempt at cracking a joke. She hoped he thought it was at least a little bit funny.

Much to her relief, JJ snorted and said, "Fuck if I know."

Collins was the first to sputter with a few restrained giggles, until she stopped holding them back and JJ soon joined in after her. They each began to shake with laughter, filling the air with the sounds of their amusement in the midst of a topic as heavy as their poor guardianships.

"What's so funny?" A voice called out to them from the start of the dock. They turned to see Pope approaching them with a curious look on his face. Exchanging glances with each other, JJ and Collins made the unspoken agreement to keep their conversation just between the two of them. There were plenty of other jokes that they could share with their friends, but this one could stay limited to just them.

"Nothing." JJ yelled back, squinting under the sun as he looked back at Pope. His eyes flickered over at Collins and he sent her a sly wink.

"Okay..." Pope responded suspiciously, but he didn't dwell on it. "Well, JB's back and he brought company."

Even from where they were sat, they could both see the raise in Pope's brows like they were in for something bad when they returned. He turned and left before they could question it any further. They were about to see for themselves in a few minutes anyways.

"No effing way!" They heard Kie's voice exclaim from John B's porch before they were able to assess the situation clearly. On the couch was none other than Sarah Cameron and John B with about two feet of space between them, looking exasperated with Kie already. "You brought her here so now she's in on this?" As Collins, Pope, and JJ came tiptoeing into the room, all heads turned to look back at them. Kie looked over at them for help, her eyes saying, "Can you believe this?"

"Look, all I care about is that her cut, comes out of your share." JJ deadpanned, earning him a roll of his eyes from John B.

"You know, I don't remember taking a vote." Kie snapped, "This is our thing. A Pogue thing."

The glare on Sarah's face that was pointed straight at Kie was staggeringly sharp.

"I gotta say," Pope voiced next, "I'm just a tad uncomfortable with all of this." Kie gestured to him as a prime example that she wasn't totally in the wrong for this.

"When are you not uncomfortable?" John B accused with a scowl.

"I don't know!" Pope shrugged. "I've ridden on the back of JJ's bike before pretty comfortably!"

"It's true. It's the most relaxed I've ever seen him." JJ added. "I guess I just have a gift as a motorcycle driver because even Collins mellowed out on the way here." As all eyes fell on her next, Collins shrugged before nodding sheepishly. It was true.

"That's cute guys." John B murmured in annoyance.

"You know, we were all extremely comfortable until you brought her."

"Stop talking about me like I'm not here." Sarah said nippily. They were the first words she'd uttered since she'd been there. Despite the whole conversation thus far circulating around her, she hadn't spoken up for herself once until now.

"Then leave." Kie shot back.

Sarah just looked at her, then scoffed and turned her attention back to John B. "I told you."

"Told him what, exactly?" Kie demanded with a frown. "That you're a liar--"

"No, that you're a shit-talking bitch."

Collins quickly covered her ears at the harsh curse and tried to drown out the bickering between the two girls that immediately ensued afterwards. Meanwhile, John B was clenching his jaw angrily, caught in the middle between the fight with one of his best friends and his girl crush. JJ and Pope were too busy placing bets to even try breaking this quarrel up if they wanted to.

She hated listening to people fight. It was even worse that they were her friends-- not that Sarah was really even her friend, they didn't even know each other, but still. Collins didn't like how mad Kie was because it meant that her anger would be practically inextinguishable. The only way they'd be able to calm her down was if Sarah was out of the picture, and was that really even fair? They wouldn't have gotten where they were without her help and if John B wanted her there, didn't that count for something?

Just when Collins thought she couldn't bear to endure another second spectating the battle between the girls, it finally came to an end. "Everybody, shut up!" John B suddenly yelled above the other voices that overpowered his brain from his own thoughts. As the tension in the air stilled, John B took that as his opportunity to take the floor. "Kie, you are my best friend, right? And Sarah, you're... you're my girlfriend."

"Ohhh, that's new." Pope whispered under his breath.

This was a shock to everyone else in the room. Collins couldn't help but hold her wide eyed gaze as her eyes flickered between John B and Sarah. All of a sudden, it was like a pair of goggles had been strapped around her head and it was registering the other two teens as a couple.

How had that happened so fast? Was it supposed to be that simple? Two people like each other, so they just decide to date, just like that? No insecurities, no tribulations, no time to think or second guess themselves. Collins wasn't even sure if that was possible for her.

"She's your girlfriend now?" Kie chuckled bitterly. "What was all that talk about how you were just using her for information? Get a map, cut her loose... I think I recall you saying that the other night, don't you, Collins? You called him out on it?"

"I don't want any part in this conversation." Collins said with a sigh, standing up straight before heading out the door and removing herself from the equation. She couldn't play sides. Of course she wanted to stick by Kie and be the loyal friend that she always wanted to be, but no one ever told her how hard it was when you're able to switch perspectives and put yourself in the other person's shoes. How could she be loyal to one friend when that meant betraying another?

Sarah did play a part in them finding the gold. She led John B to the riddle in Denmark Tanny's letter, she gave them the map leading them to the Crain house. She'd done more than Collins had, that's for sure. And now her involvement was under debate because of her past with Kie? A past that no one really even understood because every time they asked her about it, Kie deflected it like the Bubonic plague? It didn't feel very fair to let that be the only reason why she couldn't join their group.

The fact that Collins couldn't pick a side either made her empathize with John B a little more, even though he was further into the thick of it than she was. At least she could step out and remove herself from the table; he was strapped down by his ankles and wrists and tied to a chair.

Right after Collins had left, nothing was done for a good moment. Sarah looked like she was still registering what Kie had exposed John B for and everyone else was just waiting for the shoe to drop and see where that led them next. As JJ shifted his gaze around the room, he finally just decided to get up and move to follow after Collins. What else was he to do?

"You too?" Pope raised his brows at him incredulously.

JJ nodded. "Yeah, I believe I've said all I have to say. As long as JJ's share stays the same, I don't have anything else to add. Therefore, adios muchachos."

Kie just rolled her eyes, knowing damn well that Collins was his primary motive for leaving. Otherwise, he'd still be sitting next to Pope in their little peanut gallery watching the shit-show go on like day time television. JJ was so whipped.

He slipped out the doorway before anyone else could protest his leave. He didn't have to go far as Collins had only gone as far away as out of earshot got her, which was the hammock hanging on the tree in the front yard. She saw him coming while she swayed side to side, practically cocooned as the middle of the hammock sank where her weight rested and the sides curled inwards.

"What? You didn't enjoy any of that?" She asked him with a quirked brow. "Is your popcorn cooking right now?"

JJ just pulled his lips in tight and grabbed the nearest branch hanging over him and hung off of it like a monkey bar. "For the sake of not sounding like a total asshat, I did in fact, not enjoy the whole exchange in there. But I do find a cat fight entertaining every once in a while."

"The claws are definitely out on both sides." Collins said, blowing a long breath out through her mouth. "I'm not good with conflict. At least, not the kind we're dealing with. I don't know how to fix it without being in it. And in it is the last place I want to be."

"You've never had a disagreement with a friend? Never had to come to a resolution after giving each other the silent treatment or whispering behind each other's backs?" He was pretty sure that those were like, milestones to every teenage girl's middle school to high school experience. She had to have at least one instance in her past which she could apply to their current situation.

"No, I've never had anything like that happen to me." Collins felt her cheeks grow hot and she knew they were probably red with embarrassment. "I've never really had a friend to fight with; let alone friends that fought with each other." Again, not like she and Sarah were even friends, but in regards to Kie and John B, this was uncharted territory.

She looked down and averted his gaze out of self-consciousness. Yet another thing she had revealed to him about herself. He was probably going to think that was so pitiful for her to have never had friends before. Only a freak could go 16 years without any.

"That's not necessarily a bad thing." JJ tried to reason. "And you've got friends now, which is pretty much all that matters. Maybe this'll be helpful to us, to get insight from an unbiased perspective."

Shrugging her shoulders with a wary look on her face, Collins said, "The closest thing that comes to it is when Charlie and I have had our moments. But in the end, you know, we're family. No matter how hard, or how tough it gets, we're still stuck with each other at the end of the day. It's different."

Stuck with each other. The words clung to JJ's thoughts as he stood next to Collins and took a moment to let the gears turn in his mind. Meanwhile, all the way at the Chateau, the screen door snapped shut as Kie stormed out towards the docks and Pope followed feebly behind her. Clearly, there hadn't been any good progress since they'd removed themselves from the conversation.

Soon after, Sarah was fleeing the scene. She kept her eyes facing forward and didn't bother making contact with Collins or JJ on her way out. The two just stayed quiet as she rolled her bike to the road and rode away without sparing them so much as a second glance.

"There's no way they're going to even sit in the same room together again, let alone work as a team." Collins's brows were knit to form a worried crease between them at the state of affairs they were in.

A lightbulb went off in JJ's head. "Wipe that frown off your pretty little face, I've got an idea."

Studying the mischievous grin on his lips, Collins felt her stomach start to turn. "Should I be scared?"

"Considering the job I'm about to give you, I would be."

Great.

JJ had lived up to his words, because the next day, Collins found herself in a position that she had no desire in being in. She'd drawn the short straw, and it was all thanks to JJ and his brilliant idea, which of course John B loved because it involved him not having to pick between his best friend and his girlfriend. It also didn't really involve him, period, because he wasn't even going to be there for the majority of it. Collins, however, was going to be there for every second of it and could've done with a plan that didn't put her in the middle of a boxing match.

"You owe me for this, John B. Big time." She pointed at him from across Heyward's boat as she spoke over the speaker they had playing music to drown out Sarah's yells from below deck. The boys had locked her in there while Pope brought Kie over and she was threatening all kinds of torture.

"How about we say I owe you a million bucks and call it good?" John B offered, a teasing smirk on has face while Collins held her stern gaze.

"I'm holding you to that." She pointed at him.

"Shh, I see 'em coming." JJ hissed, signaling for them to cease talking while he and John B moved to their places.

Collins craned her neck to catch a glimpse of the HMS Pogue driving over to them, Pope at the wheel pulling the boat up close so Kie could jump on and assess the damage. 

"What happened?" She asked with a hint of annoyance in her tone due to the fact that they'd dragged her out there to fix yet another one of the many things they've broken before.

"Uhh, the alternator's not alternating anymore." JJ stammered, and Collins refrained from narrowing her eyes at him because he couldn't possibly have sounded more suspicious than he did just then.

"Did you check the plugs?"

"No, no, you should check them." The two boys began to shuffle out of the helm to clear out of her way and also flee off the boat to Pope, their getaway driver. JJ flashed Collins a quick thumbs up and mouthed, 'good luck' on his way out.

"They are so useless." Kie grumbled to her, and Collins instantly looked away from JJ to smile tightly and nod in agreement with her. Shit was about to go down in three, two, one... "Is this a joke? There are no plugs, like, at all."

"Sayonara!" John B exclaimed before he and JJ dove into the water with a splash loud enough to make Kie shoot up to her feet to see them swim out to the HMS Pogue.

Collins cut the music on the speaker and stood up, practically hiding in fear of Kie's wrath that would no doubt be unleashed once she opened the hatch door to reveal her worst enemy and the realization that they were stuck out on the water with each other dawned on her. Not to mention that Collins would probably have to suffer from a lot of the backlash because she had been in on the whole plan.

"Are you guys serious?" Sarah cried. There it is. Now that Sarah was out, the tension in the air just skyrocketed. The two girls watch helplessly while they were stranded by the three idiots ahead of them.

"Get your asses back here!" Kie barked next, her fists clenched at her sides.

"We can't, not until you two figure it out!" John B shrugged like his hands were tied.

"Collins is the buffer! Don't let them kill each other, okay?" JJ beamed at Collins from across the water, and the girl just waved meekly from where she stood, fearing for her life in that moment. It wasn't just John B that owed her for this, JJ was going to have to make this up to her for conjuring this whole scheme in the first place. And it better be something good.

"I will kill every single one of you." Kie threatened.

Unfazed by her threat, Pope replied, "There's food in the cabin and JJ rolled a blunt."

The two girls then resorted to stripping down to their bathing suits in order to jump into the water and make their escape. Collins was just about to open her mouth in protest, as Kie spat, "I would rather drown than stay here with you." The amount of ice in her voice made Collins shiver.

Sarah just rolled her eyes, pulling her tank top over her head before saying, "Fine, be my guest. Maybe you'll finally shut the hell up."

"Guys, they're not gonna let you out of this." Collins finally spoke up from behind them. "We'll be out here all night, they aren't picking us up until morning."

"I can't believe you were in on this." Kie huffed, shaking her head in dismay. Collins tried not to let the stabbing pain in her chest at the obvious betrayal in Kie's voice affect her. It was a perfectly understandable response; she also was going be hearing a lot of the same stuff that day so she might as well get used to it. "You knew how I felt about her."

Joining in, Sarah said, "It's literally not any of your business anyway. This has nothing to do with you."

"Don't talk to her like that." Kie snapped. "She's not one of your servants that you can push around, Kook Princess."

"In what way was I pushing her around just now?"

Collins turned and looked back at the boys on their boat and silently wished for the safety and security that they had as far from this debacle as they were.

Sarah shook her off and turned her focus back on her task at hand to get the hell off that boat and as far away from Kie as she could get. "Whatever, I'm out of here."

She jumped off the edge and landed in the water, quickly paddling to try and make it to the boys' boat before they could leave her behind. "They're not coming back for you!" Kie shouted at her, already giving up on what was clearly a fruitless attempt to get away from there.

"Good luck!" The boys whooped before their boat was speeding off, deserting them on the water, too far away from land to bother swimming.

Sarah was left alone in the water, her paddles losing their strength before she released a sharp shriek and disappeared below the surface in a splash of water and air bubbles. Collins jumped forward to lean over the railing in alarm as Sarah thrashed around and treaded back to the boat in desperate flails. "Oh my God." Collins gasped, anxious that something terrible had happened to the girl.

"I got stung by a jellyfish! Shit!" The blonde wailed while Collins threw the ladder down and began pacing the boat in search of a first aid kit.

All the while, Kie was still standing in the same spot that she'd been standing in since Sarah had jumped into the water, unfazed and in no hurry to offer any assistance to the girl she despised terribly. She just stood there aimlessly while Collins frantically looked for anything they could use to help.

"Seriously, there's no first aid kit anywhere on this thing?"

"I think the boys used it to fish a beer out of the water once." Kie recalled vaguely, clearly unfazed by the fact that it could've come in good handy for a situation more emergent than wasted beer. "It floats, you know."

"Yeah, it's the density. Whatever's less dense than water floats." Collins sighed. That didn't help them with their situation.

Sarah suddenly came up the ladder, panting and whimpering from the pain of the giant jellyfish sting on her abdomen and the tire from swimming against the currents. "Shit, ow."

"Well, you swam right into a man-of-war, I don't know what else you thought would happen." Kie shrugged bluntly. Collins shot her a look and mouthed, 'be nice', but the girl couldn't help but find some joy in her enemy's suffering. "Does it hurt?" She hoped so.

Sarah just winced as Collins carefully examined her wound, ensuring not to actually touch her in case some of the tentacles were on her skin. "Hey guys, you know what they say about curing jellyfish stings... you have to pee on me."

Kie and Collins both just stared at the girl while she grimaced uncomfortably. "I have a better idea."

Nodding her head, Collins seconded Kie's statement and stood up before she began shedding her shorts off until she was only in her bikini bottoms. "You do your idea and I'll do mine." Kie tipped her head affirmatively at her and the two split off into different directions, Sarah remaining slumped against the edge of the boat.

Collins slowly started making her way down the ladder, an empty water bottle in her hand as she gripped the sides and eased herself down each step. Her feet dipped into the water and she squatted down as best as she could whilst still holding on to the boat to fill the bottle up with seawater. Once she had retrieved what she needed, she returned back up to the boat and walked back to Sarah with the bottle of seawater and a towel in her hands.

"Is that your pee? Did you leave so you could pee in that?" Sarah's words came out between anxious breaths and she looked as though she couldn't bear to bring her eyes to the bottle to study it any more beyond just a glance out of pure disgust.

Cinching her brows at the girl, Collins's face twisted in repulsion. "What? Ew, no, that's a myth. This is saltwater. I'm gonna use it to flush out the sting."

Sarah managed to release a breath in relief at the news. "Oh, okay. Thank God. I really didn't want you to pee on me."

"That makes two of us." Collins knelt down beside her with her materials at the ready, and got to work. "This is gonna hurt a bit, but don't worry, I'll try to be quick." As she began liberally pouring the water onto Sarah's skin, Collins gently tried to clear away any debris from wound with the towel while the girl sat there, biting her lip to endure the torture.

"I got something for the pain." Kie said once she returned, a small plastic box in her hand which she presented to them to reveal a lighter and a neatly rolled blunt inside.

While she began to light up, Collins finished what she was doing and sat back with a sigh at her poor attempt at first aid. "Not much else to do without bandages or ointments."

"This'll have to do." Sarah breathed, snatching the blunt out of Kie's hand in the middle of her drag.

Rolling her eyes in annoyance, Kie watched as Sarah brought the end to her lips and began drawing air. "Go easy, it's JJ's cousin's cripple."

"Charlie and Ricky usually sell out of that stuff like crazy." Collins added dumping the rest of the water bottle contents on the towel while she held it over the edge of the boat to rinse any jellyfish remnants off.

"You want some?" Kie asked, raising her brows while nudging her head at the blunt in offering.

Collins hesitated before she declined, which she typically did when it came to drugs and alcohol. Even when it was Charlie who was telling her it was okay and knowing that if anything were to happen, he would be there for her. She'd always refused out of moral obligation, the knowing that she wasn't legally allowed to and that it wasn't her thing, along with the fear of trying any drug that she could potentially become addicted to and fall into the same downward spiral that led to her parents' demise. But this time, something in her stopped her from immediately rejecting Kie's offer, something that made her for a split second, reconsider what her next answer would be.

It couldn't hurt to try, just this once... But then Sarah went into a fit of coughing from the smoke, and Collins was reminded of why she always said 'no.' 

"It's okay." She waved off. "She needs it more than I do."

Kie just continued to simmer with annoyance at the blonde girl, stealing the blunt back from the girl and taking another drag. "Trust me, you're gonna need it more if you think you're gonna be able to get through this night sober."

Thinking with more careful consideration, Collins felt her rigid principles begin to go slack. She liked to think that she had more self-control than her parents; that seeing their mistakes would help guide her from making the same ones, and therein make her stronger than them. They'd already taken some much from her-- a stable family life, a childhood, a future free from their haunting memories. Even in their absense, they'd still somehow held a power over her which kept her from experiencing things out of fear.

To hell with that. When her parents chose substance abuse over their children, they signed away their right to hold any jurisdiction they ever had for them.

She reached over and took the meager roll of paper and herb as Kie passed it to her, and Collins felt like she was doing something so unbelievably uncharacteristic of her that she was almost having an out of body experience. The entire act of holding the blunt between her fingers, lifting it up to her mouth where suddenly everything was in slow motion and as she was drawing in her first breath through this tiny little filter between her lips, Collins had crossed into unknown territory.

The smoke filled her lungs and out of pure immaturity and inexperience, the girl sputtered and started coughing as her airways protested to the tainted air.

"Attagirl." Kie said, patting her on the back nonchalantly before sitting back with a sigh.

While Collins got all of her coughs out of her system, Sarah looked up at the sky and suddenly began to giggle to herself, the effects of the weed slowly setting in. "Wow, hey, would you rather- I was imagining you like this just now and it was pretty funny— but would you rather have nipples for eyes, or eyes for nipples? Like, imagine if you get really old, and your boobs get saggy, and your nipples, if they were your eyes, you could see if your shoes were untied."

Not a hint of amusement reached Kie's eyes while Sarah couldn't help but chuckle and Collins was still too busy picturing the whole situation both ways in her head and feeling equally disturbed by both.

"Is this like, your first time smoking or something?" Kie questioned in annoyance, causing the blonde to go quiet and shake her head solemnly.

Raising her hand timidly after taking another pull from the blunt, Collins admitted quietly, "It's my first time." It didn't seem like the high had hit her quite yet, but seeing as it hadn't taken long for Sarah to start showing signs and she was a couple of drags in with the weed in her system, Collins felt that she wasn't far behind.

"Hey, Kiara," Sarah's voice came out small and soft, like she was scared that any word that came out of her mouth would be shot down immediately. And she would be right about that.

"Oh my God, enough with the 'hey, Kiara!' bullshit." Kie huffed angrily. "Why'd you do it?"

Here it was. The back온라인카지노게임 that Collins had been waiting for. She was finally going to get an explanation for all the bad blood between the two girls. She started mentally preparing herself for whatever shit was about to hit the fan, but a sudden wave of cloudiness struck her and Collins found herself feeling like she was about to sink into the floor from how relaxed she was. She smiled softly, and poked the floor beneathe her and she felt like the hard surface pitted under her fingertip like a comfy cushion.

"Why did I do what?" Sarah shrugged, bringing Collins's attention back to what was really important. She could see that Sarah actually did look clueless as to what Kie was referring to. It wasn't like she was playing dumb and pretending not to know, she genuinely had no idea. Collins supposed that the obliviousness could've been a result of the high, but a part of her was open to believing that Sarah really didn't know what she'd done wrong.

"We were best friends. We stole beers from your dad's fridge, we watched movies together, we cried about boys. And the next thing I know, I'm watching your birthday party happen from Instagram."

"The first part actually sounds kinda nice." Collins murmured warmly, ideas of sleepovers spent sharing secrets over the beam of a flashlight and laughter behind closed doors at every hour of the night filled her mind. Those were the kind of things that she'd craved as a kid and never felt like she'd ever get to have as she got older. On the other hand, seeing as how things ended up between Kie and Sarah, maybe it was okay.

"It was one party." Sarah grumbled defensively.

"You invited everybody except me." Kie pointed out. "And then you told everyone that I was the reason that the party got busted."

"Okay, well, who else would've called the cops?"

"You never asked." Kie replied back with more hurt in her voice than she had let on all night. It was the voice of a girl who'd lost someone she cared about, who she'd felt betrayed by and saddened by the loss of so much that she'd grieved over it. Grief for the death of a friendship. "You just let the rumor go that I was a rat. You were my best friend, and then you ghosted me. And I don't even know why! I mean, really, what did I do?"

"You liked me." Sarah blurted out. Kie furrowed her brows and stared hard in confusion at her. Nothing about that made sense, so she waited expectantly for further elaboration. "When people get close to me, I feel trapped. And... I bail. And then I blame them for it. I'm really sorry... And I miss you. Do you think there's a chance that we could be okay again?"

It was quiet for a while after Sarah's big confession and expression of feelings that were quite plainly very personal to her. It couldn't have been easy to say words like that in that context out loud, Collins could somewhat empathize, as she'd only recently started opening up about circumstances of her own.

In an effort to assume her primary role in their whole situation, otherwise known as, her task as the mediator, Collins turned to Kie for a response next. "Is there anything that you maybe want to say to address what Sarah just said, Kie?"

"Honestly," Kie let out a long breath as her eyes flickered between the other two girls, then once settling on Sarah's, she gave her a small shrug, "I don't know."

The air went still once again. Collins continued to sit like a fault line between two shifted mountains that had been shaken from their places of origin. She had a girl on each side of her, both with their own grudges to hold close to them but at least Sarah was brave enough to admit that she was willing to put their differences aside. There was still some work to be done with Kie; she'd been carrying a lot of bitterness with her for a long time, she wasn't sure how she could adjust without it.

The good thing is, they still had the rest of the night to figure that out.