“Oh really?” he asked. “May I ask what’s so important?”
“No,” was my immediate reply. “It’s private. Besides, what’s so urgent? I haven’t seen you for months. So why are you even here now?”
Immediately, the man changed tactics and a look of sorrow came over his face.
“I know things ended kind of quickly between us,” he mumbled apologetically. “That was my fault. But after I got the flu, it seemed like you didn’t want to see me anymore. Why? Everyone gets sick once in a while, Kels,” he whined. “I know I was out of commission for a few weeks, but I expected you to wait while I got better,” he said defensively.
This was thick. I straightened, shooting him a sharp look.
“Rick, I know you weren’t sick during our anniversary lunch. I know that’s not why you bailed. It’s because you had plans to go to the shooting range and then ATV driving with your buddies. In fact, you put a deposit down weeks before, so don’t give me this ‘flu’ stuff.”
He brightened immediately.
“Yeah, that’s it!” was his excited reply. “I went to the shooting range and had fun with my friends, but I was too embarrassed to tell you,” he added in a sorrowful manner. “Like you said, I put a huge deposit down ahead of time, and was going to be out two hundred bucks if I didn’t show up.”
My head shook with impatience.
“But why did you lie?” I pressed. “Why didn’t you just say that? I know two hundred bucks is a lot, but still. We could have gone somewhere else afterwards,” was my exasperated answer. “What was the point of lying like that?”
He bit his lip, that thin form keeling to the left as if caught in a gust of wind.
“Well, you know, I just didn’t know what to say,” he hemmed and hawed. “Plus, you’re always so busy and Amber told me you’d gone out that night, anyways. So I figured you didn’t want to see me, and when after a few weeks, we broke up, it was just easier to leave things as they were.”
I rolled my eyes again.
“You know I can’t put up with lying, and that’s what you did,” was my tired sentence. “I’m sorry Rick, but it’s over between us. It was over months ago, and there’s no possibility of reconciliation. We’re done.”
This guy was unstable because he went from zero to sixty in two seconds flat, becoming a hissing, boiling engine of anger.
“Oh yeah? Well, I wasn’t trying to get back with you anyways,” he spat. “That’s all your imagination.”
I rolled my eyes again.
“Could’ve fooled me,” was my dry reply. “After all, why else are you here?”
And the true reason came out then. Once again, Rick did a one eighty, making my head spin.
“It wasn’t for real,” he pleaded. “It was just a mistake, and I was never happy with her, Kelsey. It’s always been you, I swear.”
My eyes squinted at him, hardly daring to believe my ears.
“I’m sorry?” was my stilted reply. “What’s going on?”
The full story burst forth then, along the lines of “the dog ate my homework” combined with a heavy dose of self-pity.
“Well, I met this girl at the shooting range that day, and she was soooo amazing,” he wailed, cheeks flushing red as his Adam’s apple bobbed. “She was sooo pretty and cute, and thin too. You’ve always had trouble being thin, and Britney is naturally that way,” he said, levelling me with an accusing glare while letting out a sniffle.
Honestly, his insults couldn’t even touch me now. I rolled my eyes again impatiently.
“So what’s with this girl? I get it. You went to the shooting range and met a girl who likes guns.”
Rick sniffled again, even wiping at his eyes this time.
“Well yeah, because you’ve never liked guns. You would never go to the shooting range with me, so when I met Britney, I thought she was amazing,” he confessed. “But the thing is after Britney and I started going out, I realized she isn’t half the woman you are, Kelsey. You’re the one, and I fucked it up,” he said with another self-pitying sniffle.
This was news to me, frankly, but I didn’t feel anything. Because Rick meant so little to me now that his games seems childish and dumb.
“It’s going to be okay,” I said soothingly, putting a small hand on his shoulder. “You’re going to be okay. There are lots of women in the world, and Britney just wasn’t the right one for you. But you know what? You’ll meet someone else, and it’ll work out.”
What I hadn’t anticipated was Rick pressing his advantage. Because the moment I touched his shoulder, he managed to swing around and grab me, pressing my curvy form against his before smashing my mouth into a disgusting kiss.
“It’s you,” he groaned against my lips, his fishy smell surrounding us. “It’s always been you, Kelsey.”