Chapter 1
Late
Kira was never late. Her mother had taught her from an early age, “to be on time is to be early”. Now at the age of 20, it wasn’t even something she tried to do, it was simply a habit — Kira was always early, never late. Yet at this very moment she found herself zooming through campus, slamming her bike into the rack without locking it, running full speed up the steps and through the hallway only to walk into her Advanced Accounting course 4 minutes late. Ignoring the shocked faces of her professor, T.A., and fellow classmates, Kira took a deep breath and calmly walked to an available seat, her laptop already out and ready for notetaking. Once seated she slowly looked up at her professor Dr. Ian Kelly who, with slightly furrowed brows, gave her a nod then continued with his lesson.
Normally the most attentive student, Kira found herself daydreaming throughout most of today’s class, nearly missing Dr. Kelly’s announcement before class ended about the weekly quick being moved up to Thursday this week. Quickly noting the change, Kira gathered her belongings and, after assuring Dr. Kelly all was well, left the classroom. Her escape was interrupted though, by a strong hand firmly grabbing her upper arm and spinning her around while pulling her to the side of the hallway.
Kira tried to remain calm, slowly inhaling through her nose as she raised her deep brown eyes to look into the slate grey gaze above her. Matteo “Matty” De Silva, was the T.A. from the class Kira had just left. More importantly, he was Kira’s best friend — though after last night Matty wasn’t sure if Kira still considered that to be a valid title. Matty was without a doubt handsome — with a strong and lean athletic build, standing at 6’2, olive skin that, in California, tanned year-round, dark brown hair that almost looked black and provided the most interesting contrast to stormy grey-blue eyes which, much like the sea, seemed to change with the phases of the moon (or more accurately with Matty’s emotions). Kira was in every way Matty’s opposite — and yet as beautiful as he is handsome. She was almost considered “petite” at only 5’3 however even with her natural curves, there was a leanness to her body that, along with great posture, made her seem taller than she was. Her skin was a beautiful dark brown, the color of mahogany with slightly less of a red undertone. Her hair was the darkest brown and sat in tight coils naturally but, like Matty’s eyes, Kira’s hairstyle changed often depending on her mood.
…
Past
They had met on Kira’s first day moving into her freshman dorm — Matty was a R.A. (residence assistant) for the 2nd floor which had male students but because his 3rd floor counterpart was running late he had agreed to do the initial welcome walk-around for her floor as well. When Matty walked to Kira’s door her back was turned to him and she was singing along to her phone, currently playing a Stephen Marley station on Pandora. Kira was surprised when she heard someone knock on the doorsill and felt her neck and cheeks heat up when she turned around to the hottest guy she had ever seen standing in her doorway. After quick introductions and the usual spiel about dorm life and orientation schedules, Matty couldn’t help but to continue talking to Kira with a conversation about music. Rather than the usual 5-10 minutes, Matty spent 30 minutes talking to Kira, only leaving when her R.A.., Sarah finally arrived and asked how far along Matty had made it through her floor.
After that first meeting, Kira and Matty seemed to keep running into each other. First it was at orientation when Kira found herself on a team led by Matty for a freshman-sophomore relay race. Matty split the group into pairs, partnering himself with Kira and they spent most of the time getting to know more about each other’s’ hobbies and interests, realizing they shared a love of outdoor activities like kayaking and exploring in general. Next Kira joined some girls from her floor at a club/organization fair and while talking to the International Studies group, saw Matty at a table a few rows down. She made an excuse to leave her friends and headed to Matty’s table, only to realize it was for the co-ed business school fraternity that she was planning to join, as her major was Accounting. After signing up, Matty asked if she had eaten yet and when Kira answered “no”, he offered to join her at the “welcome week” bbq in the quad. Bakırköy travesti Kira and Matty ended up spending hours talking about their majors and goals, both during and after school. When they finally were ready to head back to their dorm, Matty asked Kira if she wanted to join him at a reggae concert at the end of the week. Slightly Stoopid was going to perform on campus and since their first conversation has been about reggae (and all) music he figured she might be interested. Kira of course said yes.
It was at the end of that first week, during the concert when Matty first realized he wanted their quick found friendship to be more. Dressed in grey Dickeys shorts that matched his eyes and a white Bob Marley t shirt, Matty styled his dark hair and headed upstairs to meet Kira at her room. When he arrived Matty was surprised to see another guy in the Kira’s room. The stranger was Matty’s height with similar dark hair and bright green eyes. The stranger’s frown was quickly replaced with a smile that didn’t quite reach his eyes as he held out his hand and said “Hi, you must be Matt, I’m Nick”. As Matty shook Nick’s hand and wondered who the fuck he was, he felt a small hand touch his other arm. He turned to see Kira standing, looking even more beautiful than usual. Her dark hair, twisted into long passion twists that stretched to her lower back, was pinned back on one side, showing off long red, gold, and green earrings. As usual, she didn’t have much makeup on, just a thin black eyeliner and mascara, but instead of her usual plain Chapstick on her lip she had a shiny gloss that made Matty want to bite, kiss, and suck on them all at once. Matty didn’t realize how nervous Kira was getting as he stared at her hair, her eyes, her lips, and finally her body as he took in her cute outfit of a white Bob Marley tank top and black jean shorts. He also didn’t notice how annoyed Nick was getting until her heard him utter “dude, what the fuck” in the background.
Coming back to reality, Matty turned red and apologized to Kira, telling her she looked amazing and asking if she was ready for the show. Kira bit her lip and shifted her eyes between the two guys as she explained to Matty that Nick was a guy from her high school — they saw each other the day before during a class that they share and while they were catching up, he mentioned the show, so she had invited him to join them. Matty said that was fine of course and they headed to the show, but while Kira cluelessly skipped ahead, Matty and Nick were simultaneously sizing one another up and trying to figure out how to get rid of the other. At the concert, they ran into more of one another’s friends and ended up with a large group of about 12, all singing along, dancing, having a great time. As a slower song started to play, Kira looked for Matty to dance with but as she made eye contact with him, she felt Nick’s arm around her waist, pulling her to him and whispering in her ear asking her to dance with him. Kira accepted Nick’s request and found herself getting lost in the music, swaying against Nick’s body but she couldn’t help thinking of Matty. After a few more songs and the encore, the group of friends decided to all walk to the yogurt shop off campus for froyo. Not wanting to be rude, Kira allowed Nick to keep his arm over her shoulders and eventually wrapped her arm around his waist as they walked to the shop. When they got there, she noticed immediately that Matty wasn’t with them anymore and sent him a text — ‘Hey, where’d you go? — but didn’t get a response. Eventually the group headed back to campus and, after agreeing to meet Nick for coffee the next morning, Kira headed to her dorm. She stopped on the 2nd floor, hoping to find out why Matty hadn’t shown up for froyo but he wasn’t in his room, so she continued to her own. She didn’t hear from Matty at all during the weekend but on Monday ran into him at the dining hall. She asked if everything was ok and he said it was, then they chatted like normal, but something felt different. Matty and Kira continued to hang out regularly and friends turned into best friends quickly over the course of that first year. Kira eventually started dating Nick and Matty started dating Sarah, the R.A. on Kira’s floor. They each knew they wanted to be dating one another but neither would say so, so year after year they remained just friends.
….
Present
As Kira stood in the hallway, Bakırköy travestiileri staring at Matty’s broad chest ahead of her, she crossed her arms and rolled her eyes, waiting for him to say something. Matty’s eyes were filled with uncertainty and anger, but his voice pleaded, “What the hell K? You can’t just ignore me. Let’s just talk, please, come back to my apartment or we can go to yours or wherever, just fucking talk to me. Please.”
Kira bit the inside of her cheeks and slowly looked up, into Matty’s eyes, then with as much disdain as she could muster slow stated “Fuck. You.” The anger flared in Matty’s eyes, as Kira forcibly pushed him away from her then stormed down the hallway and out of the doors. As she jumped on her bike to pedal across campus to her next class, scenes from last night flashed through her mind.
…
Last Night
Kira got home from her part-time bookkeeping job at 4:30pm. Sweaty from the bike ride home she jumped in the shower, hoping to rinse off before Jason (the cute guy from Business Law that asked her out last week) arrived to pick her up for their date. Kira hadn’t dated anyone since she and Nick broke up halfway through Sophomore year. After the breakup she decided to just skip dating all together for the rest of college. Honestly, everything she needed from a guy, she got from her best friend Matty — everything, except for the physical that is. Now at the start of the 2nd semester of Junior year, she realized Matty will graduate at the end of this school year and probably won’t want to stick around another year just to hang out with her. So, when Jason walked up to her after class at the end of the first week and used some silly pickup line about having to dropout if she wouldn’t agree to a date, she decided to go for it.
Kira quickly scrubbed up and rinsed off, using in-shower oil to moisturize because it was quicker. She pulled her hair, currently styled in a braid out, into a quick low bun and pulled on a simple black turtleneck and blue skinny jeans, then laying her black ankle booties out near the door. About 2 minutes after she was dressed, Jason knocked on the door and they headed on their date. Dinner at BJs was fine, though Kira thought he was a bit annoying, complaining 3 times about her only being 20 and not being able to get a real drink with him. Overall, the conversation ended up being mostly about classes and Kira found herself eating quickly, hoping for the date to end as soon as possible. When they returned to her apartment Jason wanted to be invited in, but Kira refused. He got a bit bent out of shape and they started arguing in front of her door. But Jason quickly left when Kira’s door opened and Matty was standing there ready to teach him what it meant when a lady said No.
Kira wasn’t surprised by Matty being at her apartment, she had given him a key when she moved in, in case she ever locked herself out, or if she needed him to grab something while she was on campus or at work. Every now and then he would just show up in the middle of the night when he and his girlfriend had a fight and he didn’t want to stay around her — since Kira was usually sleeping, Matty would let himself in and Kira would wakeup the next morning to a sleeping Matty on her couch. Tonight, was different though — Matty was drunk. Drunk Matty was usually funny and a lot of fun to be around. He was already the life of any party but get a few drinks in him and Matty was the epitome of ‘happy drunk’. Tonight however, Matty was a different kind of drunk, one that Kira had seen glimpses of before but never quite to this extent — he was jealous drunk.
Kira was relieved when Matty opened the door to her apartment and Jason ran away like a dog with its tail between its legs. She immediately turned around and gave Matty a big hug thanking him for saving her from that uncomfortable end to a terrible date. Matty held her and whispered, “anything for you K”. Kira smiled and closed the front door, locking it before kicking her shoes off and sitting her keys down. She started taking her sweater off and unbuttoned her jeans as she walked towards her bedroom, not worried about Matty seeing her underwear as he had seen it all before — it’s the same as swimwear, right? In her room, she told Matty — who she assumed to be sitting in the living room — about the terrible date as she unhooked her bra and slipped on an oversized t shirt (one travesti Bakırköy of Matty’s old shirts). When she turned to leave her bedroom though, Matty was standing at the doorway. Kira was startled as she asked Matty “hey, what’s wrong?”
Matty looked at her, the storm raging in her eyes and slowly asked “why’d you even go out with that asshole? Do you just say yes to any fucker that shows you attention?”
Shocked Kira replied “what the fuck Matty? Why would you say that?!” As she moved closer to Matty Kira realized what she hadn’t before, Matty smelled heavily like vodka. “Are you drunk?”
“Don’t change the fucking subject!” Matty yelled while moving so close that the front of his body was against Kira’s.
Kira lifted her hands to press against Matty’s chest, but he grabbed her wrists and pushed her back against the wall in her room. She felt his hands move under the big t shirt and grab onto the sides of her waist just above the band of her thong. Wetness started to pool between her thighs at the feel of his hands on her bare skin, the warmth of his body pressed against hers and his deep voice vibrating next to her ear lobe as he said “you want to talk to me all day, hang out all the time, then you cuddle up to me half fucking naked every night but never want more with me, I can never fucking have you, but you want me to listen to you talk about your dates with every fucker on campus and watch you prancing around flirting with every fucking guy you meet.”
He squeezed her waist a little tighter and she could feel him growing against her, her heart beating quickly, nipples hardening against the fabric of Matty’s shirt and the wetness starting to drip down her inner thigh. “I’m done K, I’m fucking done. I don’t want to hear about any more dates, I don’t want to be your fucking best friend. I want you, all of you, or I want nothing at all, and I’m done.”
Not knowing what to say in response, and feeling embarrassed by her body’s intense reaction, Kira did the only thing she could think of, she got mad. “Who the fuck do you think you are talking to me like that?!”
Kira’s outburst surprised Matty enough that his grip loosened, and he took a step back from her. “Look, we’ve been friends long enough, you know how I feel about you and I know you feel the same. I’m just saying let’s stop fucking around and be in a real relationship already.”
Kira knew what Matt was saying was true and was reasonable, but she was already mad and wasn’t ready to let him off that easy. Plus, the idea of starting an actual relationship with Matty was terrifying because he meant everything to her and if the relationship didn’t work out, she didn’t think she’d be able to recover from that. So instead of talking it through Kira kicked him out. She told him to go fuck himself and called his best guy friend to come pick him up. Then, she cried.
Kira cried all night until her alarm went off in the morning. When she jumped in the shower to get ready for class, she broke down crying again, putting her behind schedule. It was the worst night of her life. She thought about the past 3 years getting to know Matty, getting to love Matty. She thought about how he was always late. He always waited until she showed interest in someone else then he would want to be more affectionate with her and start doing things that pushed the boundary of their friendship. When she was free though he would date other girls, like he knew she was there no matter what and didn’t need to pay extra attention to her until it was too late because someone else had already done it. Now, he had finally expressed (in the worst way possible) how he really felt but she had told him to go fuck himself. Kira didn’t know what would come next, what she would say to Matty, how they would move past this. All she knew at this moment was that her feelings for Matty were much stronger than she had ever expected, her desire for Matty was way hotter than she had ever felt, and, for the first time ever, she was about to be late.
…
Present
As Kira peddled across campus, she replayed last night and she replayed every day and every night of the past 2.5 years. Every moment with Matty and every moment without. As she dismounted her bike, she was stuck replaying the moment last night when his proximately had set her entire being on fire in a way that she had never felt before. She had been waiting to ‘meet the right guy’ to give herself away completely and there wasn’t any doubt now that Matty was that right guy. Kira knew without a doubt that she was in love with Matty and that she wanted to be his and for him to be hers. She was still mad at him but as she sat down for her next class she sent a quick text — I want you too, all of you.