What He Really Feels (He Feels Trilogy) (14 page)

The run had done nothing for my mood. I stared out at the water as I thought about the night before.

I knew why I was in a bad mood.

It looked like things were going to happen for Kelly and me, and then… I don’t know. They didn’t.

After I had taken her jeans off, as she lay in front of me, ready to take things all the way, I looked down at her. She was very pretty, and she looked sweet and innocent from my angle. And then something in my head told me that fucking her wasn’t a good idea. The whole situation suddenly felt very wrong. This girl was in town visiting, going back home the next day, so it should’ve been a free pass for me. But as I looked down at her, I realized two things. 1) She wasn’t Jules. 2) She wasn’t Gorgeous. I mean, she was beautiful, gorgeous in her own right, but she wasn’t that woman who I couldn’t get out of my mind from a week earlier. And sleeping with Kelly wouldn’t change either of those things.

So I got out of there. It wasn’t easy; Kelly was a bit of a clinger, and she couldn’t understand why I was leaving. I pretended like my phone had vibrated with a text and she was drunk enough to believe that she just hadn’t heard it. Even though, really, if I was hooking up with a girl and had the intention of sleeping with her, I never would’ve stopped to check a text. I just wasn’t that kind of guy. I preferred to focus on the woman in front of me.

“Shit,” I muttered, hoping my acting was good enough to pull it off. “I need to get back to my buddies.”

She made a whiney noise, and at that moment, I knew I had made the right decision. She stood up, walking around the room in nothing but her panties (making me question my decision all over again), and
then she sat on the bed next to me with her phone in her hand, presumably texting her friends as I put my clothes back on.

I was a bit regretful that I didn’t just go with it, but I knew someday I would look back on that moment and realize that I did the right thing. Even though all it left me with in the present was a horrible blue ache just south of TJ.

She looked up at me with the hurt of rejection. I gazed at her, wondering again why I chose this moment and this situation to take a stand. I lightly trailed my fingertips down her cheek, trying to erase that look on her face.

“I’m sorry,
Kel. You’re beautiful, and I want this. I just… can’t.”

The hurt dissolved, and she smiled a tiny smile at me. “Will you take me back to the bar?”

I nodded, and then I figured that there was no harm in kissing her one more time.

I found Dan and Craig still sitting at the same table where I had left them, and after I made sure Kelly made it back to her friends, I told them we needed to get out of there. Both slammed the rest of their beers and then we headed down the street to a different bar, where we drank for a long time while I tried to numb my thoughts so I could just forget about everything – about the woman from the week before whose name I would never know, about Julianne Becker, about Kelly, even about Tracy. The list was becoming lengthy, and I knew I had to rein it in.

A night with the guys without the complication of women sounded kind of fantastic.

After waking up with a pretty strong headache from all of the beer I had consumed, I stayed in bed for awhile. My thoughts were keeping me awake, though, and so I finally decided to get up and go for a run.

My phone buzzed with a text as I sat on my rock. I looked down, and it was from Dan.
 
Where are you?

I wrote back:
 
Beac
h
.
Twenty minutes later, he found me.

“What’s going on with you, dude?” he asked, standing next to me.

“What do you mean?”

“What happened last night?”

I stared off into the water. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?”

“Nope. Got close and then pulled the plug.”

“Why?”

“Just didn’t feel right.”

“I get that. Want to head out again tonight?”

I thought about it, and I was tired. I was hung over and cranky. I shook my head.

“Dude, you’ve got to shake off whatever’s bugging you.”

I sighed. “I’m sorry.”

“Is it Jules?” he asked, his voice lower, like it would soften the blow of hearing her name if he asked me quietly. It didn’t.

“I don’t think so.”

“Then what?”

“It’s that fucking girl from last weekend.”

“Four by two?”

“Yeah.”

“She really got to you.”

I shrugged. “Yeah. She did.”

“What was it about her? Besides the sex, I mean.”

“I’m not really sure. Maybe it’s just that she helped me see past Jules, but I think there was more to it than that. I just had a connection to her. And now it’s gone and I have no way to get it back.”

“Are you making it into something it’s not because you’ll never see her again?” Again, he spoke softly, and again, it did nothing to soften the blow.

“No,” I shook my head. “I can’t get her out of my fucking head, and I know I didn’t imagine what went on between us.”

“Have you exhausted every avenue trying to find her?”

“What can I do? It was a random girl I met in a bar.”

“Talk to the bartender. Maybe she paid with a card or something.”

“They wouldn’t just give me that information.”

“You don’t know unless you ask. You’ve got to do something. I’ve known you a long time, and I’ve never seen you like this.”

“It’s just that whole thing thrown on top of the Jules thing. You know?”

Dan nodded. “Let me take you to lunch. A burger and a beer and maybe some pool will cheer you up.”

“You’re probably right.” I stood up, ready to just hang with my buddy for awhile.

“Skips?”

I froze, thinking of Tracy.

“What?” he asked, sensing my
pause.

“Yeah, we might need to avoid Skips for awhile.”

“Why?”

“I sort of… hooked up… with Tracy.”

“The sexy blonde waitress?”

I nodded.

“I’ve been trying to get a shot at her for a year, and you come in for a week and make it happen?”

“I was actually here about twenty-four hours when I made that happen.”

“Jesus. And you didn’t bother to tell your best friend?”

I laughed as I pulled my socks and shoes back on. “It wasn’t a big deal.”

We walked in the direction of Skips since it was on the way back to our place anyway.

“What happened?”

“You want details?”

“Sex?”

I shook my head. “Some other stuff, but not sex.”

“Is it going to happen again?”

I shrugged. “Sounded like we both want casual, so maybe.”

“I vote Skips for lunch. I want to see you in action.”

“Her bedroom was all pink. Like a little girl’s room.”

“Creepy.”

“Yeah. Fiona from
Shrek
was judging me the entire time. I felt like I was being rated on my performance by animated princesses.”

Dan roared with laughter.

We found Tracy working when we walked into Skips. We were lucky enough to be seated in her section even though the place was crowded and there were at least four other waitresses working.

“Hey boys.
What can I get ya?” She grinned at me like we shared a secret, and Dan watched the two of us. I held back because I didn’t want to send out signals that I was free that night. I felt like I just needed a night off.

We placed our orders and she came by with a coke for me and a beer for Dan.

“What are you boys up to tonight?” she asked, brows raised, looking sexy as hell in jeans and a Skips logo t-shirt that she’d cut to create a deep v-neck that showed off her amazing tits.

I saw Dan open his mouth to talk, but unsure of his motives, I cut him off.
“Not sure yet.”

“I get off at eight if you’re free.” She winked at me and then left to take care of her other tables.

“What do you think about that?” Dan grinned at me. “She gets off at eight. That means you can get off by nine.”

I chuckled. “Nine? More like 8:05.”

Dan laughed.

“I think I’m in for some pool and an early night
,” I said. “Or just chilling at home.”

“Alright, dude.
Whatever you want.”

We chatted about work through the rest of lunch, and I was glad for the change of subject. I wasn’t much for expressing my emotions, and the past couple of weeks had taken their toll.

We did end up at Skips that night, and Tracy was there for awhile. She backed off when she saw me hanging with my buddy, and Dan and I called it a semi-early night.

Dan and I hung out in our home office with the
Playstation for the majority of the next day, and on Sunday evening, I got a phone call from Julianne. I didn’t feel ready to talk to her still. I was really worried that I’d fall back into familiar patterns if we spoke, and I felt like I needed to find a girl who I could really move on with before I’d be ready to handle Jules. Maybe it seemed stupid, but I felt like if I had the right girl, I could focus on my feelings for her rather than on digging up shit from the past. I just needed some more time.

Jules didn’t leave a message, and my phone was unusually quiet the rest of the night. I sent my daily text to my mom to let her know I was still alive and doing okay, and then I decided on a walk on the beach by myself.

I found the same rock that had become my favorite brooding place, and I stared out into the water as the sun was swallowed up. It wasn’t quite dark yet, but the sun was down. I had been sitting there with my thoughts for awhile when I felt a presence behind me, like someone was looking at me. I turned around, and Tracy stood there watching me.

“Hey, handsome.”

“Hey, Trace.”

“What are you doing?”

“Thinking.”

“Care to share?”

I shook my head. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

“Some little filly
break your heart?” she asked, quoting one of my all-time favorite movies,
Dumb and Dumber
.

I laughed. “You’re a pretty cool chick. You know that?”

“Yeah,” she said, perching next to me on my rock. “I know.”

We sat for awhile and just stared out at the water, and it felt nice. She seemed to be acting like we were nothing more than just friends, and I appreciated that, because in that moment, I kind of needed a friend.
An impartial friend who didn’t know Julianne, who didn’t know about my mystery woman, and who really didn’t know me.

“Julianne Becker,” I finally said.

She glanced over at me.

“The filly
who broke my heart.”

She put her arm around my shoulders, and I found myself spilling my guts to this woman I barely knew. I told her everything, from the moment I had first fallen for Jules, to our high school prom, to our occasional college hook-ups, to her crush on Nick, to the night after he had dumped her and I had declared my feelings, to her ultimately choosing him over me, and even
to the night I had shared with Gorgeous. I told Tracy about the fact that the mystery woman had helped me see that there could be life beyond Jules. She sat quietly, taking it all in.

When I finished spewing every little detail about my love life to this girl I barely knew, she was quiet as she processed.

“Have you tried to find her?” she finally asked.

I shrugged. “I don’t know how.”

“Travis, I don’t know you that well, but clearly you’re hung up on this mystery girl. Either get her out of your system and face facts that you’ll never see her again, or make some effort to find her. But don’t sit on a rock fighting yourself over what could be. That won’t get you anywhere.”

“You’re absolutely right. I just don’t have any idea how to find her.”

“Then move on.”

“You make it sound so easy.”

“It won’t be easy. But you can’t keep going like this.”

Her arm was still around my shoulder, and I slipped my arm around her waist, leaning my head on top of hers. “Thanks, Tracy.”

“I didn’t do anything.”

I pulled back to look at her. “Yes, you did. You listened. You’re a good friend.”

“With benefits?” she asked, wiggling her eyebrows.

I laughed. “You wish.”

“Yeah, you don’t seem like you’re available for that. But keep my number in case you get over this. You never know.” She grinned, and I wasn’t sure if she was serious or fucking with me.

“That night was fun, Trace. A little pleasure between friends never hurt anybody.”

“You need time, Trav.”

I nodded, because she was right. I didn’t want to admit it because the pleasure of instant gratification had TJ rearing his head down low, but I wasn’t in a position to give Tracy any part of me besides friendship.