𝐌𝐈𝐃𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄 | 𝐉𝐉 [edited]

015

Rafe invited her to go to the OBX summer movie series. She was way too high for her own good and immediately declined his offer, remembering there was a good chance her sister might be there, she could've sworn she had heard her mention it the other day. She had Rafe drop her off at her house and fell asleep within minutes of falling onto the couch.

It was dark outside by the time she woke up, the sound of the front door opening causing her to jolt out of a deep sleep. She assumed it was Kiara coming in through the door but when she heard another voice, another familiar male voice, she groaned and pushed herself off of the couch and made her way to the kitchen.

"Kiara?" Riley called out, seeing the figure of her twin in the dark room. She switched the light on as she walked in to see Kie lifting JJ's arm from around her neck and sitting him down on the stool.

"Hey uh-" Kiara began.

"Holy shit," Riley cut the girl off once her eyes adjusted to the light and she got a good look at the blonde's face. "What happened?"

"Your stupid fucking friends happened," Kiara muttered behind gritted teeth. "Listen I have to drive Pope home." She looked over at JJ who had his head in his hands. "He looked like he was going to puke and I didn't want him to do it in the car so I brought him here."

"And you're just gonna leave him here?" Riley scoffed.

"I'll be back soon," Kiara said curtly and turned quickly on her heel, making a beeline to the door.

"You can't just leave!" Riley called out for her, following behind Kiara as she walked out, but the door was quickly shut in her face. Riley slowly turned around, biting on the inside of her cheek as she let her eyes fall on the bruised and beat-up boy in front of her.

"I can just go," JJ said before standing up from the chair. He took one step before stumbling forward due to his lightheadedness. Riley quickly grabbed onto both of his arms steadying him before he could fall.

"Yeah I don't think so," Riley guided the boy back onto the stool. JJ was looking down at the ground which only tempted the girl to place a finger under his chin and tilt his head up so she could better examine the cuts and bruises that littered the skin on his face.

"I'm fine," JJ muttered.

"You don't look fine." Riley walked over to a cabinet, grabbed a washcloth, hydrogen peroxide, and antibiotic cream, and brought it all back over to the kitchen counter.

"Listen I really don't need you to-"

"Shut up," Riley cut the blonde off. She wet one end of the washcloth with water and began to gently pat it on JJ's bleeding cuts and busted lip.

"Rafe did this?" Riley asked the boy, assuming he was the friend that Kiara had been referring to.

JJ nodded, "Kelce and Topper, too. But Pope got Topper pretty good." The blonde smiled thinking back to how proud he had been of his friend for head-butting the Kook.

Riley only nodded her head, disappointed that her friends would do this to them. "So did you do something to provoke them?"

"Of course you would ask that," JJ said.

"I didn't mean anything by it," Riley responded quickly. "I just-"

"I did say you always think the worst of us didn't I?"

"Seriously?" Riley said. "We're gonna do this again?"

"Forget it," JJ mumbled. There was a prolonged silence before Riley spoke again.

"I was just asking 'cause..." Riley paused, considering her following words very carefully, "they're my friends."

"They shouldn't be," JJ said.

"So does that mean it was unprovoked?"

JJ went silent.

"Just forget it," he replied after a few moments.

"I'm literally cleaning up your wounds and you can't tell me what you did to those guys to deserve these?" Riley motioned to his face.

"Hey, you're one of them," the boy said, referring to the fact that she was a Kook. The corners of his lips quirked upward slightly as she rolled her eyes. "I don't know if I can trust you with this kind of information."

"I'm not a snitch," Riley shook her head.

"But how do I know you're not lying?" JJ pressed, the small smile still lingering on his lips.

Riley had given up on trying to get it out of him. She then took the other half of the cloth and soaked it in the hydrogen peroxide. "This is gonna sting."

JJ's smile immediately fell from his lips and he sucked in a sharp breath as she reconnected the cloth with his face. He screwed his eyes shut until she was finally done. Riley squeezed a little bit of the cream onto her pointer finger and began to dab it over the cuts.

"Where'd you learn how to do this?" JJ asked the girl.

"Well, besides it being common sense," Riley began earning a scoff from the boy, "I watch a lot of medical shows."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah," Riley sighed.

"Hm," JJ hummed in reply, "you wanna be a doctor?"

Riley laughed softly at his question. "I don't know, maybe."

"Interesting... the more you know," JJ teased.

Riley rolled her eyes, biting the inside of her cheek to try and keep herself from smiling. Once she was done cleaning up his face she got a pack of ice from the fridge. She brought it up to his swollen lip before he reached his hand up to hold it for himself.

They connected eyes, deeply and in complete silence, the first time they had done so since she had been helping to soothe his wounds. He seemed to be intently studying her and then he suddenly smiled out of nowhere.

"Are you high?" He asked.

"What?" Riley scoffed. "No, no I'm, I..." she began to stutter over her words. "Why would you think that?"

"Your eyes are bloodshot," he said with a laugh. "And you just look a bit... a bit dazed."

"Well I'm not high," she said tersely.

"I thought you said you weren't a liar," he replied.

"I said I'm not a snitch," Riley replied, a smile now forming on her lips. "Exhibit A, I would never snitch on myself."

"Well, well, well," JJ said, shaking his head. "Now what would provoke the Kook princess to get high on this fine Tuesday evening."

Riley's smile faltered for just a second, considering the true answer to his question. She quickly turned to face away from him, pretending to go look for something else in the medicine cabinet. "I don't know what you're talking about," she said. "I told you I'm not high."

Suddenly the two teenagers heard the front door open and Kiara appeared in the kitchen seconds later.

"Well I think Heyward's gonna kill Pope for that shiner on his eye," Kiara announced.

JJ stifled out a laugh. "Did you drive past the chateau?"

Kiara nodded. "The lights are out, John B's a goner. Do you wanna just stay in our guest room tonight?"

"Parents?" JJ raised an eyebrow.

"Not home until tomorrow night," Kie affirmed.

"Yeah, alright then," JJ said, standing up from his seat. before he walked upstairs with Kiara he turned back to face the girl still standing in the kitchen. "Thanks for uh.. for cleaning me up."

"No problem."