He was never mine

Chapter - 5

Berry

"I, I didn't, I mean," I stuttered. "I was just checking to prove you that, he's a player," I continued

"Ooh really, or you wanted to see how good player he is to have a little play with him," my best friend tried to wink at me, but who would have told her that, she was bad. It was like she squinted her one eye and the other one was struggling to stay open by flapping thicker lashes.

"Oh please, no way. I got a chance yesterday, but didn't want to, and there's nothing to be embarrassed of checking out someone's profile, especially who happened to be my unanticipated setup."

"Fine, enough with the taunting. I was just messing with you, okay. Now just throw it out of the window," she said while pulling the computer towards her and started typing.

I silently nodded.

Kaitlyn Brown, aka Laura's number one adversary for a reason, and the reason was her boyfriend's closeness with her. We started scrolling through her pictures, once she accepted my request. Apparently she's on i********: from the sun kissing her skin, until the darkness fades the bird's shrill, except for the nocturnal birds.

"Is she prettier than me," out of no where Laura, who was staring at the computer intently asked me.

It wasn't like her. She was always comfortable in her own skin, the way she looked. She was gifted with terrific genes, thanks to her interracial parents. The pretty, hot, smart, artsy girl, that's how she was known as in the school, while I was being called 'grumpy aunt.'

"No, not a chance. And anyways, her beauty wouldn't validate the fact that Miles doesn't love you anymore. The way he sees you, trust me he loves you, but no one else," I said it genuinely

"Okay, I believe you," Laura shut the computer with her gratuitous suspicion. "Would you now just move your perky ass and freshen up, cause we are getting late."

I rolled my eyes playfully, "It was only your idea to stalk your boyfriend's suspected night lover."

Laura smacked my shoulder and pushed me towards the bathroom

***

The Sunday bustling in the cities is always worth to witness. However, I wasn't a kind of person who would adjacent myself to any kind of assemblage. But somehow it was always good to be around with the people I loved the most, even in the hustle bustle of the city.

We went to an Italian restaurant, which wasn't showy or peculiarly ornate, it was rather small and picturesque. The floors and the walls were wooden, along with sconces pinned into the corners of the wall. The arrangement of the tables was in two horizontal lines, parallel to one another. The paintings from Renaissance period were hung on the wall very neatly in a uniform alignment with one another. Every table was donned in beige satin tablecloth. The lights weren't lurid to dazzle the frail eyes, but it was mild, which made the ambience very light and breezy for the people to relax with their friends, partners and the family members.

A soft murmuring of music was played in the background like it was bound to heal a wounded soul. A middle-aged man adeptly clamped into the bow and swaying it back and forth on the cello, weaving a beautiful melody.

People around us were chomping on their food and lost in the succulent conversations. The indistinct chattering of the customers and clattering of the forks and knives against the food-filled plates or the almost empty plates made a generic restaurant impression.

One couple was having their own fun in the extreme corner table. The guy slid his hand under his presumable girlfriend's skirt. The girl didn't mind the public surveillance from afar, instead a childish giggle escaped from her mouth. I shook my head, looking at my menu.

"What?" Laura interjected

"Don't look. The couple in the corner is doing hanky-panky. I wonder if the girl got something more interesting downtown than her uptown," I snorted

But my curious friend got no digestion for warnings as her eyes darted to the corner table and glued on them, until the girl glared at her.

"Har har, the poor girl must be thinking you have your eyes on her man," I snickered watching the girl looked at Laura death in the eye.

Laura gave me a quick sarcastic smile, "enough already," whilst checking her phone to distract herself from the embarrassment.

"Fine. Chill. Have fun. Eat and belch."

"Fine. Okay. Let's dig into the menu, but let's not belch," Laura wrinkled her nose, while exposing her teeth.

The menu was piled with all the authentic Italian food. Mine and my friends love for Italian pasta brought us here. In our school days, sometimes we used to ditch our classes and go to our favorite Italian restaurant back in Cold Spring, it was far from our school, so we had to bunk our classes and drive to the place. Those days.

"Hey, my favorite people," a voice approached our table and we instantly turned our heads to see, Sandra.

We got up from the seats and had our usual group hug. Last night she was so wasted that we couldn't have a proper conversation. She looked different with her pink highlights on her raven hair.

"What took you so long?" Laura inquired

"Nothing, I just had the worst hangover and to subside it, I tried some home remedies, cause even Aspirin wasn't working," Sandra replied

"Is it Cassandra? Who asked you to have a tequila shots race?" Laura chastised

"Ugh, please don't pull the full name card and yeah, blame Toby for that, not me," Sandra huffed. "He always instigates me."

Sandra for some reason turned red. The crimson spread over her cheeks and nose was the evident in her furtive demeanor. Her baby blue orbs still had the hint of last night's galloping effect. At that moment I only wished to read her mind. What was going on her turbo speed mind? She was always one of the sharp minded people I had ever known, could easily pass as the brain of the group. But also very naïve when it comes to relationships and gullible to anything nice poured into her ears.

"Are you okay?" I asked

She was snapped from her reverie, "Yeah, I am. Why?

"Nothing, you tell me why you're flushing?"

"Oh, I am cold, I guess," she casually answered

"You guess?"

"Oh, Berry, stop your interrogation," Laura broke my chain of odd questions to Sandra

"Wait-" Laura looked bemused. "Are those, are those hickey on your neck?" She pointed at Sandra's neck.

My eyes chased the pointer and I immediately smirked at Sandra's littered neck with love marks, which she stealthily tried to conceal with some concealer and by yanking her jacket's collar till it reached the hotspot, but Laura was a hawk eyed, nothing goes unnoticed from her sight. Thanks, to my high neck T-shirt underneath my jacket that I didn't get to be the victim of my hawk eyed friend.

"Uh, umm, yeah, I hooked up with this guy last night," Sandra said fumbling a bit

"No, s**t, that's why you disappeared into the thin air," I ejaculated the words while fixating my eyes on her.

"Who's he? Share the details," Laura got excited and almost prod my eyes with the fork, which she was fidgeting.

"Chill. Just some random dude, okay." Still somewhat Sandra looked flushed. "Can we just order our food now?"

"I second that," Laura spoke rubbing her belly

We ordered our food. I ordered my all time favorite creamy garlic chicken penne pasta, whereas Laura had lemon pepper shrimp with Fusilli pasta and Sandra had baked penne with roasted vegetables, she was a hardcore vegan.

We ate our food in silence. The chewing permeated the air sporadically as a silence breaker. I occasionally glanced at my friend Sandra. She seemed conflicted, I only wished I could help. "So, Sandra, why did you drop out of law school?"

She halted her fork from spearing on her food to ponder, "I felt that, it wasn't something I wanted to do in my life."

"So, you left? Just cause you felt it," I asked in askance

"yeah, it's pretty much it, why?"

I scoffed, "don't tell me that some Jesus look-alike guy asked you to do that."

Sandra was quick to scowl at me.

It wasn't something new for her. Once Someone on the street stopped to say her 'god bless' when she sneezed, who happened to look like Jesus Christ. She thought it was God who wanted to enlighten her soul in some way. She never missed an opportunity to regale about it.

"No, Berry, no one asked me to do so. It was just that, I never wanted to go to a law school. I was swerving, but now I am on the right path."

"Yeah, the path of being homeless," I said wryly

"Berry!!" Laura widened her eyes to give me a warning look

"What? I questioned. "It's true, isn't it? I mean you moved to a city with a dream to make it big by leaving something, which could have landed you somewhere great. A dream isn't going to feed you. A well paid job sure does."

Sandra sighed and kept her fork aside on the table, "I know, you are probably right, but a risk is worth for all the dreams a person shape to make it real in their only life, isn't it?

She was right, too. What we are without the dreams? Motionless and empty inside. A life without dreams is just like a photo album without the pictures, which emerges the nostalgic memories in it. We turned around every page for a reason to relive.

Dreams are the weapon we could use against our hapless reality, and escape to a better world than we are already living in. A hope. Yes, a hope to be free of all the bondages we are being tethered with, one day. And that will be suffice to live for another day. The best thing about them is that, they also die with us; fulfilled or unfulfilled.

I smiled and held her hand and squeezed it tight. "We are always there for you, just remember that don't be amenable for someone's need."

She rested her free hand on the top of my hand, "yes, I know and don't worry, I have changed a lot in these years. I have grown. The owner of the bar, where I work promised me to have a gig for my band."

Cassandra Mullen aka Sandra, wasn't only about the brain, but also a talented musician. She had formed a band, during her stint at Stanford.

When I and Laura first met her, she was a demure, raven haired girl, who used to bury her head inside the books and her only getaway were the school library. Now she's a punky looking girl with a spunky attitude. People sure change over the time.

"That's great," I and Laura cheered for our friend in unison

We finished eating our food and ordered the dessert. A Bombolone for each of us to satiate the final craving we had for a proper Italian meal.

We laughed and talked whilst gorging into the dessert.

While we were talking about our school days, I didn't know why I asked about something or someone, which was totally out of context for which I later cursed myself. "So, do you know where Natalie Jones is now?" I earned their raised eyebrows at me, which made me push the words back in my mouth, but the words already been spewed out.

"God!! Are you still holding grudge against her? Come on, it's been ages since high school," I tried to look indifferent about what Laura said, but she wasn't fully wrong.

"No, hell no. I don't even remember. Her name just randomly popped in my head, that's all," I pretended to not remember anything, but how could have I forget my ex boyfriend back in High school cheated on me with her.

It wasn't like I was in love with Aiden or someone, but it was my longest dating relationship, for about 6 months.

"Oof, thank god then," Sandra breathed in relief. "By the way, who knows where is she. She was always a mysterious kid."

Right. Natalie, wasn't a typical high school type girl. She had rather a reticent personality. A beautiful girl with excellent academic performance, who wouldn't love the combination, but I always wondered what she was wretched and distant about. No wonder why, Adam was interested, seemed he had an inclination towards ambiguity.

Why even I was thinking about, Adam? Why even I wanted to know where, Natalie Jones was? It wasn't like I cared, whether or not they had a relationship, but to my dismay, the inkling of them being together was itching my security. My inner self reacted like a besotted loon, the reason was beyond cosmic matter.

I forced a smile as my friends kept reminiscing about school and the stunts we used to pull, to break into random senior parties, whereas my mind was utterly in vain, distracted; and my thoughts juggling and clashing with one another.

"Let's go get a drink," Sandra knocked out the balance of my thoughts

"Oh, no I can't actually I have a meeting with a person," I said

"You call that meeting? Why making so formal, just say I gotta swat a mosquito from my skin," Laura mocked

I rolled my eyes, while Sandra looked between me and Laura scrunching her nose. "Am I missing something?"

"No, Laura is just being dramatic. I need a roommate, who can pay half of the apartment rent. So, I am meeting that probable roommate of mine, just to have a background check."

"Huh, just a background check will be an understatement, last time she scared the hell out of a girl who said she was a firm believer of life after death," Laura flaunted the anecdotes about my encounter with the contenders to Sandra.

"Yes, the afterlife theory is a hoax. Death is the last sensation we feel, and after the halt everyone vanishes into the obscurity, isn't it?" I asked for a support to Sandra

"I agree, but are you allowed to sublet your apartment? Isn't it illegal?" Sandra's law abiding nature couldn't help but asked

"I had a permission from the landlord, don't worry, Miss almost lawyer."

"All the best with your meeting, then," Sandra said. "I hope you find your perfect mate, I mean roommate."

***

The underneath of my boots taped the cobblestone, passing each and every small shops on display, until I reached my destination. I tucked my hands inside the coat seeking the warm comfort and sporadically bumping shoulders with the other rushing pedestrians. My nostrils along with the walk carried all the melded fragrance and stench from the cologne to the burning cigarette, until I forced my sense to stall for a bit when the putrid reek of piss diffused from the concrete pavement.

It was almost 5 pm in the evening, the daylight was about to settle down, but beforehand, it had turned up to hover above the head for its last kiss, till we meet again.

The sun was glowing and flattering the sky by giving a light golden shade, which was a hypnotizing sight, especially for the weary eyes. The distance between me and my apartment was receding, and a man near the building was speaking over the phone whilst running a hand through his dark curly hair. I saw him from behind, but by his body language anyone could have easily told that the man was conflicted.

I said I am fine and I don't need you anymore, were the words spat out of his mouth, with a familiar throaty voice passed my ears.

It was strange to be suddenly a fascinated onlooker and froze by someone's certain movement and expressive voice. I reached down my building with an intrigue clouding over my eyes.

My limbs were declined to move ahead for some unnerving reason, yet the scent my nose was picking with each step I took was invigorating to pass the figure with a dark mane, which was ruffled back and forth by the graceful wind. I was about to cross the object of my fascination, when he turned around in a swift motion.

My eyes grew wider and tried to adjust the sight under the clear golden light, bestowed upon us. A familiar face, unveiled, but in a different light. Our previous encounters weren't under a natural gleam like at that moment. Those counterfeit lights shunned the actual countenance.

In the natural light his face was as clear as like a blank canvas, before splashing the colors on it. Few dark brown freckles splatter over the canvas, around the cheek and the nose area and there was a faint scar affixed over his right eyebrow, almost a non-existent one. I didn't notice it before, as I said clear as like a blank canvas.

Was it from an accident or a dire fight? No, that wasn't the time to dwell on, I rebuked myself.

My tongue was heavy and swollen and not capable enough for moving. I couldn't muster up to utter a single name.

"Adam?"