#southster

Kaikaina Grif wasn’t the sort of person to worry about things. She was like the ocean and moved with the tides of life. There wasn’t much that could throw off her groove and after her parents left, she thought that she could deal with anything that life would throw at her.

That was before the Dakota’s had shown up.

The twins were virtually inseparable and mostly kept to themselves. Their names were eerily similar so they’d been given the nicknames North and South. The taller of the pair was North, the shorter was South and Kai thought he was the hottest guy ever to walk the Earth. Until someone had corrected her and said that South was a girl.

Kaikaina had laughed it off, feeling just a little bit foolish for assuming that the twins were both guys.

Oddly enough, though their personalities were so incredibly different from one another, the two managed to become rather good friends. It was nice for a change. Kaikaina didn’t really have friends who were girls. It wasn’t because she didn’t want to be friends. Seemingly, girls didn’t want to be friends with her. Kaikaina was fairly sure it was because of they were jealous of how the guys seemed to fawn over her.

It was late on a Saturday afternoon. South and Kaikaina were supposed to be studying, but as it happened the text books were left unopened on the table whilst they sprawled on the lounge. They were talking about new video games and clothes and how annoying it was having big brothers.

“Hey, Kai?”

“Yeah?”

“Can I kiss you?”

Kai still thought that South was hot. South had the best arms she’d ever seen on a girl and her legs were strong. Kai liked how South’s glare would soften when she laughed and how she played with her hair when embarrassed. Kai was surprised when she realised she wanted South to kiss her too. She’d never…

“Sure,” she said.

South’s lips were warm and soft. Funny. She used bubblegum flavoured lip gloss.

It was a relatively short kiss though it was nothing like the rough, rushed kisses Kai shared with boys behind the gym at lunch time. It was a little too short, so when South pulled back, Kai leaned in to kiss her instead.

Things were just getting interesting when they heard footsteps coming down the stairs.

Kaikaina suddenly pulled back, her face flushing red. What was she doing?!

“Kai?”

“South, I—Sorry, I forgot its my turn to cook dinner. I’ll see you on Monday at school!” she hurriedly left the house, accidentally leaving her books behind.

Kai practically ran home. For most of her teenage years, she had been kissing boys. Boys were nice and hey were easy to wrap around her little finger. She had never thought about kissing girls before, but if she had, she thought she’d find it weird or unpleasant. She didn’t think she’d like tasting bubblegum flavoured lip gloss. She was so confused and didn’t know what to think. She needed to talk to someone to help her figure it out.

“Grif!” she shouted after she’d slammed the front door shut. “Grif!”

“Kai? What happened?”

She ran to her brothers room, still playing Halo with his friends exactly where she had left him when she’d gone to South’s house. He took one look at her panicked expression before turning to the TV screen.

“Sorry Simmons, can we pause our game? Kai needs me for something?” She could just make out Simmons’s voice over the headset.

“Yeah, sure. Just give me a call when you’re ready.”

“Thanks man.” Grif logged off and turned to his younger sister. “What’s wrong? If you’re pregnant, we can deal with it. You know I’ll look out for you.”

“What? No. I’m not pregnant…”

Grif sighed with relief. “Then what’s the problem?”

“You’ve kissed girls, right?”

Grif looked confused. “Yeah…Kai, we had this talk like four years ago. You’ve kissed stacks of guys.”

Kaikaina took a seat on Grif’s bed and hugged his pillow close. “Have you…kissed a boy before?”

Grif was exceptionally confused. Why was Kai asking him about kissing? If anything, she had more experience than him with most things. His first instinct was to vehemently deny it. No one needed to know anything but his sister looked so confused and scared…

“Where are you going with this?”

“South kissed me today and I actually really liked it. And then I kissed her back and it was nice but then North came down stairs and I freaked out. Like, I like guys. So why did I like kissing South? I wouldn’t have minded at all if she wanted to do more than kiss me too. And I keep thinking that it should be weird to kiss girls, but it doesn’t feel weird. It’s nice. So…have you kissed a boy before?”

“Yeah.”

“What…what was it like?”

“Just like kissing a girl? But without lip gloss or boobs?”

“So, like, it wasn’t weird or anything?”

“Kai. It doesn’t matter if you like girls and guys. Or just guys. Or just girls. Or neither. Some people might find it weird I guess but everyone is different. I don’t think there’s anything weird about it. South doesn’t think there’s anything weird about it. The guy I kissed probably doesn’t think there’s anything weird about it either.” Grif looked at Kai, hugging his pillow her brow furrowed. “If you’re bi and like both guys and girls there’s nothing wrong with that. I promise. If anyone else tells you otherwise, I’ll get someone to kick their ass.”

She looked to her big brother with a smile. “Thanks Grif.” There was a knock at the door and Kai stood to go and answer it.

“Who was it that you kissed?” she called half way down the hallway.

Grif grinned to himself and called out to her. “Simmons!”

Her hand hesitated on the door handle. She would definitely have to talk to him about that later. With a shake of her head, she pulled open the door.

“South…”

“Hey, look, uh…” She held out the text books. “You left these at my place and I thought you’d need them for study. Okay, I’ll be going now.”

“Wait…” Kai stepped outside and closed the door behind her. “I’m sorry for freaking out earlier.”

South shrugged. “I probably shouldn’t have asked if I could kiss you.”

“I actually liked it and that’s what freaked me out. It wasn’t anything you did.”

“Oh…”

“So, um, if you’re not busy tomorrow…maybe we could go out? To a movie or something. Like, on a date? We could go somewhere for lunch first?”

The smile South gave Kai was bright. “Can I kiss you again?”