In the Stars (11 page)

AS I AM arriving at Starbucks, I make sure I am looking straight ahead at where I am going. I don’t want any more mishaps with Adam, giving him more to laugh at. While I’m opening the door, I notice him look up from the counter and smile at me. Once I get closer, he gestures toward his feet with his hands. “I think I will be staying right here until you are seated. You know, trying to make this an incident free visit and all.”

I smirk the side of my lip up at him. “Oh gee, thanks for the concern. I just hope you don’t end up spilling hot coffee on me or something. Like I said, it does seem to be only around you that all this happens to me. So that still leads me to believe it really is your fault.” I start looking around the shop to see if Tara is here yet.

“If you are looking for your friend, I have not seen her come in yet. Do you want to order now, or wait for her?”

I look back at Adam, and smile. I can’t help but wonder if he was looking out for Tara on my behalf, or on his own. “I guess I will order now; that way I can get us a table.”

I sit down at a small table where I can see the door. I am just getting ready to take my first sip, when I see her come walking in. She sees me right away, and we both give a small wave. She holds up her finger to say she’d be there in a second.

I take notice how truly beautiful she is. I never thought she looked ugly, but let’s face it: Saturday was a very rough morning for her. Today, she actually looks very refreshed. Her hair is down with large bouncy curls on the ends. She has on the cutest pale pink button up coat, with a thin scarf around it looped just right. She has on black leggings with tall black boots, and her makeup looks flawless. Especially around her eyes—those emerald eyes. Seeing that, of course my mind has run straight back to Eric. This is not good. Let it go, Caroline.

Adam’s face really lights up when he takes sight of her. Yeah, I think he was looking out for himself when it came to Tara. Adam is talking with her as he is ringing her up. They continue talking, as he walks over to make her drink. They both look over at me and smile, and then Tara gives him a little wave as she is walking away. Adam’s eyes never leave her until she sits down. He glances up at me, and I give him a big smile. He quickly busies himself with another task.

Tara removes her coat and hangs it on the back of her chair before she sits down. She has on the prettiest turquoise top. I decide then, that she and Raleigh would get along just fine. They obviously both have great shopping skills.

“Wow Tara, you really look great. I hope that means things have not been all that horrible for you?”

She shrugs. “Honestly, it has sucked. I just chose to use shopping and the salon as my coping mechanisms. It seemed like a better plan than drugs and getting overly intoxicated daily.”

“Yes, shopping does seem like a much wiser choice, and you are obviously very good at it. I am sorry, though, if things are really hard for you right now.”

We both give each other a little smile. “Well, I will admit that Saturday night, once I was alone, I did throw myself a drunken pity party. The only good thing that really came from it, though, was that I passed out and slept in late, so that was a little less dwelling on it all time.”

Tara seems a lot calmer this go round. The main clue to this is the fact that her hands aren’t flying all around as she is talking. Her voice is a little shaky, but overall she really does seem to be handling herself well.

“I’m sorry you had to be alone Saturday. You didn’t have any friends close by that would have stayed with you?”

“There are a couple girls I have met here I could have called. It just had been such a crazy day already, and wallowing alone seemed like the next step to be taken. Eric and I ended up back at my house, and I had to practically kick him out after several hours. During this time, Andrew had kept calling, and, being that Eric wouldn’t let me answer my phone, he eventually ended up at my house. Luckily, Eric had already left by that time.”

I see Tara’s eyes starting to water up, and I hand her a napkin. She takes the napkin and shakes her head. “No, I am not going to do this again today. This is going to be a good day; he isn’t worth all this shit.” She gently dabs at the corners of her eyes and straightens herself up in her seat. I can tell she is a determined girl, and I am happy to see that.

“So, I guess let’s start with your brother. Did he give you a really hard time about having to drive here and figure out what was going on?” As I said these words, I could feel a blush rising to my cheeks again. Just a mere mention of him and my body takes over—damn it.

I notice Tara’s hands start to rise and move around as she was getting ready to speak again. She caught herself, though, and, instead, tucked her hair behind her ears. She then cupped her hands around her coffee cup to keep them still.

She gives me a slight smile. “Oh, Eric tried to go all hardcore on me at first. Then I think he finally paused long enough to realize I really was hurting, and that wasn’t really the time for it. I guess, being I am the only girl and the youngest; he really tends to be extremely overprotective of me. Plus, add on the fact that he is a detective, and that makes him even worse about it all. He really is great, though. I know him and my brother, Nicholas, truly love me and don’t want to see me hurt. Eric is going to be 27 in March, and Nick is 23. I am 19, so of course, to them I am just a foolish girl who has a lot to learn.”

I am sipping away on my coffee as Tara is talking to me. I do perk up, though, when she mentions Eric’s age. I knew he was older than me, but 26 doesn’t seem too bad. Actually, the whole mature, has his act together thought makes him even more sexy. I can now feel the heat rising in me again. This guy has to be bad for me. I mean, he isn’t even anywhere around and I have only met him one time, yet I can’t help but get worked up thinking about him. The dreams have still been coming as well. Now that Raleigh gave me the whole uniform image, I am pretty sure I know what my dream tonight will be about too.

Suddenly, I feel Tara’s fingers touch my wrist. When I look at her, she has a very big smile on her face. I sit my cup down and look back at her very puzzled look. She starts laughing then. “Oh, I saw you blushing, Caroline, and I noticed it a little earlier too when you mentioned Eric’s name.” I start to protest, when she holds up her hand to stop me. “Oh, you don’t have to explain yourself to me. I realize my brother is a good looking man. Honestly, lots of women realize it, and it tends to get a bit annoying the way they sometimes act around him.”

I feel my posture fall slightly. I really don’t care to think about other women around him. That is just completely wrong of me, though; especially since I am all too ready for another day with Kyle on Thursday. “You didn’t act like one of those women I am talking about, though, Caroline. Don’t worry; you held your ground pretty well with him. I have to tell you, he actually mentioned you several times Saturday as well. It seemed kind of odd how curious he seemed to be about you, as well as the deep concern he showed about your safety. He kept repeating about how careless some of your actions were, and how you could have been hurt. Then he would turn around and say that I should really be appreciative that you were willing to try and help me and listen to me.”

I can’t help but perk up at this information. He really talked to Tara about me? Does that mean there was an actual interest? At the same time, though, I realized what she was saying about him, finding my actions basically foolish. Once again, I am the immature girl in his eyes. “I won’t lie then; Eric most definitely caught my attention. I might have even thought about him a time or two since. I am sure, though, as far as his thoughts toward me, he pretty much just looks at me as a reckless immature girl.”

Tara is still smiling at me and shaking her head slightly back and forth. “Think what you want, Caroline, but I know him, and that was not his only thought. Yes, he tends to go all discipline like at times, but there was something else there too. Not that he would probably ever admit it. He tends to make it very clear that with his job he is just too busy for any type of steady relationships. Guess he is one of those in the moment type of guys.”

I just nod, and actually feel a little disappointed after hearing about Eric not looking for any type of relationship. “Well, it doesn’t matter anyway. I probably won’t ever even see him again.” My phone then chirps with a new text. I look down, and get a smile on my face. It is from Kyle, and I feel as though it is a sign. This is the man I should be thinking about; not Mr. in the moment Eric.

Kyle:
Sorry, I just got a chance to read your text. Glad you liked the flowers, and love the thought of u thinking about me. Will talk to u soon.

I send him back a quick response.

Caroline:
Can’t wait, will talk with u soon.

When I look back up at Tara, she has a puzzled look on her face. “Well, whatever that was sure did seem to make you happy. I’m not holding you up or anything, am I?”

My voice stutters slightly. “Oh ummm, no, you aren’t holding me up. That was this guy Kyle I am supposed to be going out with Thursday. We had a date once already this past weekend, and he is really nice. He even had flowers sent to me today. Piper wasn’t too thrilled to realize the delivery wasn’t for her. I really can’t stand rooming with that bitch.” Tara smiles at me, but I can also see the sadness in her eyes too. I am sure now isn’t an easy time for her to hear about me going out with a really great guy. The fact that I just brought Piper’s name up like a dumb ass, surely didn’t help at all. Tara is just beginning to try and accept her relationship is over. and Piper was the other girl per say.

“I am sorry I brought her name up. She is just such a selfish person, and it sucks having to room with her.”

Tara shrugs her shoulders and looks off to the side. “You don’t have to apologize, Caroline. She irritates you, and you were just talking to me about your day. It isn’t your fault at all that she shacked up with Andrew. I am pretty sure she hasn’t even given him the time of day since. The fact being that he tries to call and text me more the last couple days then the whole time we have been in college. So, obviously, he is lonely at the moment.” She looks back over at me, and wipes away a tear escaping from the corner of her eye. She gives her head a slight shake, and then tucks her hair back behind her ears again.

I give her hand a slight squeeze. “So, do you want to talk about how things went once Andrew showed up at your house? If you don’t, that is fine, but I am here to listen if you do.”

Tara squeezes my hand back, and gives me a smile. “You really are great, Caroline. You make it where it seems this whole incident really isn’t as horrible as it feels. If it didn’t happen, I might not have ever met you.”

She releases my hand, and tucks her hair again. “Basically, when Andrew showed up, he could tell as soon as he saw me something was horribly wrong. He tried to take me in his arms, and I just pushed him away. I asked him where he had been, and he tried to play the whole we-had-a-few-drinks-and-I-passed-out bit. As soon as I said Piper’s name, though, his whole stance fell. He knew his bull shit wasn’t going to work on me with this. He tried apologizing with the whole this-is-the-first-time-anything-like-that-had-happened-and-he-never-meant-to-do-this-to-me excuse. He also said that maybe we should take a break and see how things went. He knew he wanted to spend his life with me, but just needed to live a little outside of that for a while.”

She gives me a very smug look, and I just shake my head back and forth at her. “Yeah, can you believe that shit? I want you, but you need to let me go have some fun on the side for a short time. He, of course, never mentioned I should date others as well. I guess he felt he could just go have his fun, and I would just sit around like a good bitch and wait for him. Well, that is not happening. I shoved him out my door, and told him to take all the time he wants, because we are done. I don’t think he believed me at first, but when I didn’t answer his phone call or text later on he became more persistent. He asked for space, yet he starts calling nonstop and showing up at my house even a couple times. I then threatened him with involving my brothers. He hasn’t showed up since, but has tried to call a couple more times. It has been the hardest thing I have ever done, but I know this is the way it has to be. Like you said, life goes on, and I will make the best of it.”

I give Tara a full on smile. “Damn straight, good for you. Since we are both here together, I will help you to make that happen. It will be good for both of us, and being away from my room is always a plus. Do you ever exercise? It really is a good way to blow off steam, and I am due for a good work out.”

“Actually, there is a great spot where my house is that I go jogging at. You are welcome to come with me any time. I would really like that.”

I notice Adam out of the corner of my eye, coming over toward our table. “I will have to take you up on that then, Tara; jogging is a great release.”

Tara and I both look up at the same time, as Adam is pulling up a chair and sitting at the side of our table. He just smiles at us, and we both give him a confused smirk. “So, ladies, sorry to interrupt, but I am off now, Caroline, and just wanted you to be on the lookout.” I give a huff, and Tara looks between the two of us, completely confused. Adam then reaches his hand out to Tara, and she reaches out to shake it back. “Hi, I’m Adam. I mentioned to you at the counter earlier that Caroline and I are in a class together. I didn’t get a chance to tell you, though; she seems to be a complete klutz around me. I think she just isn’t very observant of her surroundings, but she seems to think it is all my fault that she keeps falling into me. So I figured a fair, proper warning would be nice before I start walking around the area again.”

I squint my eyes at him, and Tara just smiles. “Oh, a smart ass, huh Adam? Good; I really need another one of those in my life. There is a real shortage of them right now.”

He just laughs and nods his head at me. “Well, I will let you two get back at it. Very nice to meet you, Tara, and I will see you both around I’m sure.”