Fall from Love

I’m even more determined to get my car back and get going with my plan.
    When I walk into the auto shop, I’m relieved to see that Patrick isn’t working. He seems like a nice guy, but the way he looked at me yesterday made feel uncomfortable and I don’t have Carter here with me this time. Instead, there’s an older gentlemen who’s friendly and hands me my keys without looking at me like he wants to lick me.
    Keeping up with my plan, I head to the grocery store and gather up the items I need to make my favorite food in the world… crunchy French toast. While I walk the aisles, I try to call Carter a couple times, but he doesn’t answer. Even though it’s kind of rude to just show up, I want to see him and make him breakfast for helping me out with my car yesterday. It’s the least I can do.
    There’s another reason I want to see him so badly. I want to make sure he is okay and see if he wants to talk to me about anything. I’m not sure what happened when I left him for those few minutes yesterday, but whatever it was, it upset him pretty badly. I know what keeping something locked inside can do to a person; how it can eat away at you and send you into the depths of darkness.
    When I pull up to his house, I see his car in the driveway and my heart hammers, knowing that I’ll see him soon. A couple months ago, seeing his face or hearing his voice felt like a punch in the stomach and stole the air out of my lungs, making it hard to breathe. Now, after getting over that fear and facing him, I can’t imagine not seeing him every few days or talking to him on the phone. He has become an important part of my life. If I’m being honest, it’s beginning to scare me how much I’m relying on him. If more than a few days pass and I don’t see him, my heart will ache until I see him again. There are some days when I feel like, if something happened and I didn’t have him in my life, I may slip back into that dark hole that I have worked so hard to dig myself out of.
    I grab the bag of groceries, hurry up the flagstone path and knock on the door. I see a blurry image through the frosty glass and a smile stretches across my lips. There’s some fumbling with the lock, the door pulls open, and I see a girl standing there. My smile falls and my heart crashes. Even worse, it isn’t just a girl... it’s a really, really hot girl.
    My head spins and the flashbacks of seeing the name Kelly flash across Carter’s cell phone come rushing back. So maybe he does have a girlfriend; a girlfriend that he never told me about. Why wouldn’t he tell me? Why is this bothering me? It shouldn’t matter if this hot chick standing in front of me is his girlfriend; Carter and I are just friends, right? But if we are just friends, then why the hell does it hurt so bad? Why does it feel like my chest is being squeezed by a vice grip?
    “Can I help you?” the girl asks me, pulling me from my thoughts.
    “Uh, is Carter here?” I notice my voice sounds strangled. As I look her over, I can’t help noticing that her hair is wet, like she just got out of the shower, and she’s dressed in a long shirt, probably his, and a pair of boxer shorts, again, probably his. Jealousy hits me square in the chest and a horrible feeling fills my stomach, making me feel like I’m going to be sick.
    “He’s in the shower, but you can come in and wait for him.” She opens the door wider, gesturing me inside. “I’m Kelly, by the way.”
    And there it is… the final confirmation I needed—I don’t belong here. Just then I hear his deep voice coming from somewhere inside the house. “Hey, Kelly, what do you want for breakfast? I’m not in the mood to cook. You wanna just go get something?”
    Hearing his voice sends another pain, starting with my heart, and then traveling to every nerve in my body.
    “Um, I’ve gotta go,” I mutter, turning away from the door and heading back down the sidewalk towards my car.
    Why did I just react like that? I have no right to act like a jealous, crazy girlfriend. Carter and I are just friends. I open the passenger side door and throw the bag of groceries inside, not caring as the bag tips over, spilling the groceries out on the floorboard. As I jog back over to my side of the car, I hear the front door open.
    “Holly!” Carter calls for me, but I keep my head down and continue to make my way to the other side of the car. Why couldn’t he just have taken a few more seconds to get out of the shower