POV: Frankie

There aren't a whole lot of things in this world that piss me off.

Scratch that.

There are a whole lot of things in this world that piss me off, but nothing gets under my skin more than a cocky-ass cis man who thinks his shit don't stink. 

And Malik-- tall, dark, and disgustingly handsome-- fits the damn bill. 

I may have scoffed at the idea of working in the kitchen a few weeks ago, but I had quickly started to enjoy it. Rowan and I would blast early-2000s emo music and slice bread, wielding our (dull, might I add) knives like microphones. It was the most alone time I got with her, and I wasn't exactly eager to give it up, especially now that we'd kissed. 

But, here I was, mopping the damn floor while Malik poked and prodded Rowan at the stove. I caught wind of her giggle, and slammed the back door open, running right into Marley who was smoking a cigarette. Simultaneously, we raised our eyebrows at each other. She quickly put the cigarette out and crossed her arms. 

"What's wrong?" She asks as I slump against the back wall of the mess hall, yanking my apron off. I let out a heavy sigh. 

"Camp is stupid," I mutter, just wanting to start another fight. Marley hunches down beside me. 

"That's a bold statement coming from the counselor-in-training who seems to be having the most fun," Marley points out, brushing her feathered,  fawcett-like hair behind her ears. I cringe at the flair she puts on counselor-in-training, like it was just soo hilarious. I glare at her. 

"I'm trying to make the most of it, Marley. I am. I know you went through a lot to set this up, but fuck, it's.. it's hard." I moan, chewing on the skin of my lip. Marley rests her hand on my upper arm. I flinched, but softened. 

"You can pretend all you want that you're enjoying this for my sake, Frankie, but I've seen you with your campers. And with Rowan--" Her eyes sparkle, amused. "I know that this whole thing isn't easy one hundred percent of the time-- hell, imagine how I feel, running the girl's home all year!  But, god, Frankie you have such a knack with children. It's refreshing you to watch you help Brynn into the water after watching Blake fall out of their kayak over and over again," Marley chuckles. 

"I wish I could have seen that," I admit, smiling softly. I missed Blake. 

"Well, I can't promise any boating shenanigans, but we do have the group session scheduled tomorrow," Marley reminds me. I groan. Of course, just to bother us even further, Marley had insisted that we regularly do check-ins like we did back at home. Y'know, because the orphan's will completely lose it if we can't have our weekly group therapy session in which we, well, completely lose it on each other. Makes sense, right?

"No offense, but having a group therapy session when we're supposed to be watching 12-year-old campers brings me back to my first point-- camp is stu--"

"--Frankie!" Marley cuts me off, sighing. "I get it. It's stupid. Think what you want to think. But you and I both know that what's bothering you has nothing to do with this stupid camp," Marley says with exacerbation, laughing slightly. It wasn't often that she got so tough with me, and I felt nerves creep up my body like a trail of ants at a picnic. 

"Fine. I like it here. I like Rowan. I like the campers. I guess I just wish I could do this as me a regular person.. not a charity case," I sigh. Marley must be loving this. Hell, this was better than group therapy-- it was practically a confession, and I ain't no Catholic. She squeezes my hand. 

"You're not a charity case, Frankie. I think you've really proven that to yourself by getting swept up in the, frankly, quite normal dramas that come along with going to camp," Marley smiles to herself. I let the silence fall, and she finally stands up, bemoaning her aching knees as they crack twice. I chuckle, and she offers a hand to help me up. 

"Thanks," I muster as she brushes her backside off. I do the same. 

"You're welcome, Frankie. I'll see you at group-- but in the meantime, get back in that kitchen. You can't win anything by running away,"

After an awkward dinner shift, and a quick inhale of a burger, Rowan and I snuck off towards the showers again while our campers finished eating and gathered around their own nightly campfire. We walked in silence, but I felt the unsaid words hovering in the air like the smog that seems to hang around LA. Once we got inside the shower unit, I noticed that this time Rowan kept her body turned away from me as she prepared to get in the shower. 

We entered our separate stalls silently, steam quickly filling the room and clearing out the tension both in our bodies and between us. 

"Do you like him?" I ask, surprising myself. I wondered for a second if I had said it aloud at all, or if I had only imagined it. A minute passed, and I swallowed the raw burning feeling that was crawling it's way up my throat and threatening me to say something cruel. 

"No," She finally said, quietly. I let myself sink into the rigorous water that pelted me from above, closing my eyes. If I couldn't see the disgusting shower stall, it couldn't touch me. If I couldn't see her, she couldn't hurt me.

I heard a squeak as she turned her water off, but I wasn't ready to emerge yet. 

As I let the water run down my face and my back, I barely noticed Rowan pull the shower curtain back behind me. I turn and stare at her, shocked, and she stares back, wide-eyed and vulnerable. 

Slowly, as if the hot water would last forever, she reaches out her hands, running them from my shoulders to my wrists, spraying beads of water against the tile as her fingers travel. She grabbed my hands, and I held them back, never once breaking eye-contact. Although, I can promise you, I desperately, desperately wanted to... well, you know. Glance downwards.

"I like you," She finally whispers, her breathing laden with a gossamer nervousness that I didn't want to break. I moved my hands from her palms to her waist, then her hips. Then my chest against hers, my knee between her thighs. My lips upon hers. Hot water ran down my face and made our soft, loving kiss so sensuous I could feel my heart tremble. 

"I like you too," I whisper against her lips, wanting all at once to devour her soul-- and also, to teach her a lesson for earlier. I bit back my desire, but drag a hand up to run my fingertips through her hair, pulling it slightly, forcing a small, almost undetectable moan from Rowan's lips. I push her hair back behind her ears to reveal as much of her neck as I could, planting kiss after kiss after kiss on the soft skin below her jawline, rosy from the heat of the shower, but accentuated by goosebumps as my fingers crawled down her spine. 

As I was about to bring the kisses downward, the water suddenly ran violently cold, causing us both to scream. I quickly shut the water off, and Rowan hops out to grab our towels. I pant as she wraps me in my towel. She embraces me for a minute, but all I can think about is how embarrassingly wet I was between my thighs. And not from the shower.

"Come here," I murmur as she attempts to step away from me. She obliges, and I grab her by the waist and plant one more kiss on her neck, this time marking her as mine. As she pulls away, I give her a wink. "I told you-- I'm in charge here," 

Later that evening, I overhear Kalea gasping over the whopping hickie I'd left on Rowan's neck. She kept blushing profusely and pulling her hoodie strings tight, but the damage was done. All of the counselors knew, and everyone was fucking loving it. Rowan, as expected, had apparently always been a bit of a goody-goody, and her friends were eating it up, excitedly trying to guess who'd done it. It was such a strangely amusing game for them-- as if there were so many options. 

"It was totally that Malik guy, right?" Blake says in an annoying valley-accent, sidling up to me at the campfire where I had hesitantly sat beside Taylor and Cal. I shove them off the log, rolling my eyes. 

"Fuck off," I mutter between barred teeth, genuinely upset to hear his stupid fucking name. Hell, I'd be happy if I never even had to see his smug-ass face ever again. Taylor snorts, casually roasting her marshmallow. 

"What?" I ask, turning to her and glaring. Here we fucking go again. 

"Nothing. I'm just surprised you managed to turn Miss Teen Spirit into a dyke, too," She laughs, Cal following suit-- even though, as far as I can remember, she was also a member of the girl's team. 

"Don't fucking call her that," I spit in a warning tone, closing my eyes and trying to control my breathing. Blake tries to put their arm around me but I push them off, my skin crawling like I'd been bitten by dozens of tiny fire ants. 

"I just call 'em like I see 'em," Taylor mumbles back, the bitch in her voice really making an appearance.

"Yeah? So what do you call yourself? A miserable little slut?" I finally yell, standing up and grabbing her marshmallow stick from her, stomping on the perfectly golden puff it with my van-clad foot until it was nothing but a sticky pile of soot. She stands up to meet my gaze, crossing her arms and smirking. 

"Okaaay, no need to slut-shame, ladies," Blake says jokingly, popping up in between us."We're all above that here--"

"Shut up Blake," I hiss, ready to take Taylor into the woods and show her how I really feel about her. 

"Why don't you call her by her real name--" Before Taylor can finish her sentence, I'm lunging at her, ready to beat the living shit out of this bitch. 

Before I can manage to wipe the look off her sorry little face, I feel myself being restrained. I'm on the ground, breathing heavily as I watch somebody else-- Dylan, I think, get in front of Taylor, drag her a good distance away and sit her ass down. Dylan's ears are red, and he's yelling loudly, but I don't hear what he's saying. All I can hear is my heartbeat as it commands my body, my vision, my veins, my ears-- all thumping in a languid, putrid rhythm.

"Dylan has it under control, Frankie," Rowan's voice hits me, and my body runs cold. Fuck. 

Her arms are still around me, but when I roll over to meet her gaze, her brow is set and I feel her disappointment wash over me. Well, it wasn't like she hadn't seen me have a go at Taylor before, what did she expect?

"Did you hear what she said?" I mutter, struggling to sit up. 

"Yeah. Everybody did," Her jaw is clenched, and she relaxes backwards to stare at the night sky, and I instantly feel bad for causing a scene. 

"I'll fucking kill her," I mumble, grabbing Rowan's hand. She quickly pulls it away. Fuck, she must think I'm completely crazy, right?

"Don't say that," She whispers, her voice trembling. Before I can reply, Blake sits down next to me, sighing loudly and capturing both of our attention.

"God, Frankie, you really have to stop picking fights with people," They say jokingly. I can't help but laugh, and even Rowan cracks a smile, trying to remain stoic as she blinks a few tears away, her eyes reflexively tracing the big dipper. I try again to grab her hand, and this time she hesitantly accepts it. Blake notices, and smiles wickedly at me. I sigh. I don't know what I would have done if she hated me.

"I just-- fuck, she can say whatever the fuck she wants about me, but she--" Rowan squeezes my hand, cutting me off with her warmth. Blake shrugs.

"Forget it, Frankie. She might be talking about us, but she does it to get to you. We all know you're, like, the sweetest person at the girl's home, and you're leaving soon, and she just wants to make things hard for you--" Blake sighs, putting their chin between their knees, following Rowan's gaze towards the stars. 

"I'm not sweet," I mutter back dryly. Blake snorts and Rowan stifles a laugh. 

"Yes you are," Rowan whispers back, leaning forward towards me again. Then, her tone shifts. "But this really can't keep happening, Frankie. I mean.. God. You scared me. And I know you're better than this. Come on-- would you really have wanted one of our campers to see you trying to beat the shit out of somebody?" 

Her voice is laden with frustration and disappointment, and I realized that I would do anything to never hear her sound like that again. I swallow. "I really would have preferred that you hadn't seen me try to beat the shit out of somebody," I admit, wryly. Blake laughs. 

"What about me?" They say, sticking their tongue out at me. I roll my eyes. 

"Like you haven't seen worse," I mutter. Rowan elbows me in the stomach. 

"What do you mean?!" She exclaims, her eyes filled with worry. Blake and I can't help but bust up laughing. 

"Not Frankie-- god, Rowan, Frankie is an entirely docile creature as far as group homes go-- I should really emphasize that-- like, did you know that Frankie's been stabbed?" Blake tackles me to the ground as I try to cover their mouth with my hand, and Rowan's jaw drops, waiting for an explanation.

What can I say? 

We all have our little stories.