K.I.A.R.A

Chapter 2 - The Social

Tonight Elise, Jake and I are going out to the local beach bar as it was our last day of school and we were officially in vacation mode, we all need a night out after the past few months of school.

I inspect my reflection in my full-length mirror as I straighten the small crease in my dress, it’s a red satin with black lace over it and it ends just above my knee. I match my dress with 3-inch black heels with a small red bow near the toes. I curl my hair slightly and soon I’m ready to go.

I grab my car keys from the table in the foyer, shout goodbye to my parents who are having a movie night and I make my way down to the beach café.

I walk in and pass a few tables before making my way out to the deck where we usually meet one another. Elise is wearing a midnight blue cocktail dress with 3-inch heels (just like me), her hair has been straightened and a few strands are clipped up to keep them out of her face.

“Hi Joe, the ladies will have cosmopolitans and I will have a Heineken.” Jake says as the waiter takes down the order and walks towards the bar area. We have been coming here so often that we are even friends with the waitrons here.

“I love that you know what we want.” I say to Jake taking a seat opposite to them.

Slightly winking Jake replies, “I know my girls very well.”

“I’m sure people think that you are dating the both of us the way you always call us your girls.”

“Is there something wrong with that?” he asks with a wink and Elise nudges him with her elbow for about the hundredth time today, the poor guy.

We both met Jake on our first day of high school, we were sitting in our first class of the day which was Geography and he sat beside us, we began talking to him as there wasn’t any work to do and soon we all ended up spending most of our time together since that day, we even ended up attending the same college, Jake wants to become a news journalist. We normally go and watch a movie, go out for something to eat or spend time at my house and have a few friends over for a day at the pool as my house is the only one right on the beach. He enjoys playing rugby as well as taking part in the local surfing competitions over the weekends as well as in the school holidays.

I suddenly look up and I see Travis walking in our direction, from what I can see he is wearing black faded jeans which sit perfectly on his hips and flow down to just below his ankles; he is wearing a sky blue colour T-shirt which matches his flawless yet tanned skin.

Trying not to stare at him is hard, but as I glance over to see his face once again, he returns my gaze like he has been doing all day and we make eye contact for the hundredth time today (Okay so maybe I'm over exaggerating a little but it feels that way) I don't know how to react so I give a shy smile and look towards Jake and Elise, hoping they didn’t notice but they did.

“I told you that he has a liking towards you.” Elise says with a wink.

“Oh be quite.” I say trying to act as natural as I possibly can.

“Hey, dude.” Jake stands up and giving Travis a handshake as they met during the course of the week in one of the classes they share together.

“Hey man.” Travis greets Jake and turns to us with his handsome smile, “Hi ladies.”

“Are you here meeting someone?” Jake asks.

He replies while watching at me, “No, I heard around school that this is the place to be so I decided to come and see what it’s like.”

“Take a seat, join us.” Jake sits back down next to Elise and Travis sits down on a chair beside me.

“Thank you.” he says with a smile. “Hi, Kiara.”

“Hi.” I could feel the redness in my cheeks rise once again.

“I'm glad to see that the two of you have met.”

“She helped me a lot this week, I don’t know what I would’ve done if it wasn’t for Kiara.” Travis states.

“It was the least I could do, I can’t imagine how horrible it feels to be in a new place and you have no idea where you should be.”

“Thank you, it made my life a whole lot easier.

“You’re welcome.”

“So how was your first week?” Jake asks.

“It was okay, can’t say too much about it as yet.”

“Here are your drinks, can I get you anything?” Joes asks Travis.

“I will get a Castle please.”

“No problem.” And with that Joe walks back inside and towards the bar.

“Hi, guys.” I hear a familiar voice behind me.

“Hey, Riley.” Elise says scowling at him and suddenly her eyes divert to me.

“Here you go, sir.” Joe arrives back with Travis’s drink. “This is for you.” he says handing me a drink which is blue in colour.

“I didn’t order this.”

“It’s from the manager.”

“I don’t even know the manager.”

“He says that he has seen you here often and thought you needed one of his special drinks.” Joe says with a smile.

“Thanks Joe, tell him thanks and maybe next time to bring it himself.”

“Kiara he likes to sit in the office all day and watch the cameras.” He says giggling and walking away leaving me confused. I suddenly remember that Riley is standing behind me, I take a deep breathe in and let it out and as I turn around I see him towering over me.

He didn’t know what to say at first but eventually, he breaks the awkward silence between us, “Hi Kiara, I didn’t think you would be here.”

“Why not? You know I always come here with them!” I snap at him without the intention but seeing him just brings back all of my emotions I thought I left at home.

It’s been three months and we haven’t spoken since the day we walked away from one another, I’m slowly getting over him, seeing him at school just about every day is hard but having him here is much more difficult.

“I don’t know, I see someone new with them so I thought it might be his girlfriend, I didn’t think you would want to go out.”

“Should I rather sit alone at home feeling sorry for myself? I’ve been doing that for the past few weeks so I think it’s time I move on.”

“I didn’t say that and how many times do I have to apologize to you for everything?”

“You can apologize a million times and it still won’t be enough!”

“Kiara you are going to need to get over it.”

I just glare at him not knowing what to say, that hurt and it hurt real bad like a knife was gutted into me.

“Kiara, why do you have to be so angry at me all of the time, I’ve said I’m sorry!”

“Riley…” Before I can finish my sentence, Travis stands up and looks Riley in the eyes.

“Hi, dude.”

“Oh hey, Travis.” Riley says, they know one another as they sit next to each other in Journalism. “What are you doing here?”

“I live just up the road and I’ve heard this is the place to go and luckily I found these three here,” Travis says gesturing to us. “I also owe the ladies a drink, they really helped me a lot this week.” Travis says and I can see Riley beginning to get annoyed.

“It was nothing.” Elise replies.

“It helped me a lot, Kiara really was a huge help.” Travis says smiling at me and I can’t help but smile back.

“She’s a very helpful person, I’ve got to get going as the guys are waiting.” He says noticing a few guys from our school including my brother Blake and his best friends Joshua and Dwade. “You all enjoy your evening.” Riley says and storms off and I know that he is possibly angry that someone else is maybe making their move on me but it’s all his fault and no-one else’s.

Riley is my ex-boyfriend, we broke up a couple of weeks ago due to unforeseen circumstances; I couldn't carry on living with.

Our relationship started out with a feeling of exhilaration just like any other but I was the only one putting anything into the relationship and he carried on with life like we were nothing more than friends and it broke my heart little by little every day and I didn't want to be in a relationship like that any longer, it's been tough on me and it’s affected me more than I imagined it would and more than I let on.

I met Riley two years ago at a Halloween party of one of my mother's friends. Riley and I became friends straight away and after that night we spoke on a daily basis, we would take walks along the beach, go swimming in the ocean on a warm day, he stayed close by, him and Jake became good friends so they would go surfing while Elise and I watch the sunset disappearing over the horizon and on the weekends we would tan while they surfed. We became extremely close and even decided on attending the same college and now it's nothing but a faded memory.

I watch Riley walk away to his group of friends, he catches me watching him but we both look away quickly.

“Kiara, are you okay?” I hear Elise ask, I look in her direction and nod a yes as I can’t find the words to say how I’m feeling right now.

“Kiara, do you want to take a walk down by the water and we can maybe get to know each other better?” Travis asks standing up and holding his hand out for me. “Let’s just stay here, I’m feeling too lazy to walk.” I say feeling uneasy of being alone with him.

“Kiara it will be nice on this warm night to put your feet in the water. I need to talk to Elise about something important anyway.” Jake says and I know he doesn’t need to talk to Elise, he just wants to play cupid like always.

I take Travis’s hand and stand up, he puts his arm around my shoulder and we walk through the crowds and down the stairs from the deck down onto the beach, I can see Riley watching us but it is time to let him go and move on, I deserve to be happy.

“Hey, Kiara.” Joshua says as we walk past him and Dwade.

“Hey, guys.” I say and follow Travis down onto the beach.

“Who was that?” he asks.

“My brother’s friends.” I reply as we step down onto the sand. “I’m sure you’ve seen Dwade around campus, he studies Mechanical engineering.”

“I don’t think I have.” he replies.

“What would you like to know?” I ask changing the subject and suddenly feeling a little more confident around Travis as the liquor is starting to take over. I take my shoes off and feel the cool sand between my toes.

“What do you enjoy doing in your spare time, like what are your hobbies?”

“I love to write and I help put together the school magazine which is available once a month online.”

“That's really cool; what exactly do you do?”

“I help a lot with updating the website as well as capturing images for certain articles and I have my own column, it's a heap of laborious work which can be a great deal of fun but also very exhausting.”

“It must be hard to think up of different columns to write to keep the students reading it every month.”

“It is but once my mind starts thinking about a short story or article it becomes easy and it has become easier over the past year.”

“I'm sure that you are an inspiration to a lot of people, I don’t think much people can do what you do.”

“I doubt that, I’m sure there are people who do better than me, like J.K Rowling or Sara Shepard who write novels but anyways, what do you like to do?”

“I like to go for morning runs on the beach and I have written a few short stories on blogs, it really is fun like you say.”

“It is, it's like you’re in another world for a while creating a different one to the one we are in.”

“It is a fantastic feeling to make up things you wish were true.” He replies and silence falls over us for a short while. “How long have Jake and Elise been dating?”

“They have been dating for three years, I personally think that they will last forever and end up getting married one day, but that's just my opinion.”

“Why do you say it like you want them too but you don’t think they will?”

“We don't live in a fairy tale world, not everything is a happily ever after as they say or make you believe in the movies.”

“You don't believe in true love?” he asks and we stop walking to let the water kiss our toes.

“It's not that I don't believe in it, I just don't know if everyone gets to experience it the way everyone thinks you should, you can love someone with all of your heart but that doesn't mean that it's true love, true love is also very different from your first love.”

“What do you mean by the way they show it in the movies?”

“First love is just love, it’s young and innocent but true love is a whole different story and it’s very rare that you experience both of these loves with the same person like they show us in the movies.”

“How different?”

“First love is sometimes just a figment of our imagination, we try and see the best in that one special person but underneath all of that it might not be what we think or what we want to think, but true love is where you know who that person is, it’s the person you know will be there for you until your last day, it’s the person who you will fight for, no matter what neither of you will give up on each other, no matter how big or serious an argument is, you will just end up loving each other more and not less.”

“You are very different to what I expected you to be when I first saw you in class.”

Smiling to myself I ask, “Why do you say that?”

“When I walked into class this morning, I saw the empty seat and then you looked up and caught my attention you seemed like a shy girl who keeps to herself and hasn't had her heart broken, but from what I can tell you have had it broken and it was hard for you.”

“I just get passionate about certain things and this subject is one of them.”

“Who is he?” he asks suddenly realizing I’m talking from experience.

“It doesn’t matter.”

“How long ago?”

“Three months.”

“I'm glad that you can open up to me even though we only met a couple of days ago.”

“It doesn't happen very often, you’re just really easy to talk to.” I say with a giggle and I carry on walking alongside the water. “You also were really sweet just now.”

“There is something about you that I can't figure out, something that makes me want to know more about you.” Travis says walking beside me with his shoes in his hands.

“What more would you like to know?” I ask ending the Riley conversation for now.

“I don't know, you’re different from the other girls that I’ve met at college and at my previous college.”

“In what way do you think I’m different?” I ask stopping to look at him.

“I feel like I can talk to you for hours and the conversation won't end, you’re honest about how you feel about stuff and I like that.”

“I feel the same way, I feel like I’ve known you for longer than a week.”

“Do you have any other siblings besides a brother?” He asks.

“It’s just me and my brother, he is in his last year at school, what about you?” I ask walking away from the water as my toes are feeling wrinkly.

“I have two younger step brothers sixteen and thirteen and an older sister who is twenty-three. Do you want to sit down?” he asks gesturing towards a slope.

“Sure.” We sit down and end up talking for hours about all kinds of stuff getting to know one another and going back to have a few drinks with Jake and Elise until it is time to go home and that’s when I have dreams of Riley and our time together which I thought was long gone.