TANGLED HEARTS
- WAITING PERIOD.
Whoever said pain gets better with time was not lying. Amerie can attest to this because with each passing day, she feels her heartbreak become nothing more than a mere, unpleasant memory. Not too much time has passed but she feels lighter and she’s smiling again, sharing jokes with her friend and colleagues and choosing to focus on everything that she still has than what could have been. Everyday, she counts her blessings which include her family, job, best friend and good health. She knows her sister will come down heavy on her when she hears about the break up but she’s not about to stick with a cheater just because they have been together for years. Her sister is quite the opposite thinker, she believes that one can’t just give up on their relationship and that hopping from one relationship to another is just a waste of time because at the end of the day all men are the same…apparently. Also, the two of them have bonded over their challenging relationships with the men in their lives, her sister believes in endless second chances, no matter how bad the situation gets so Amerie knows that when they finally have this talk, she cannot count on her for support.
She has stopped crying and has not gotten the urge to contact Chase, which would be a dumb move on her side because why would she want to create a way in for a guy who took her heart and played with it the way that he did?
Luckily, he also got the message the time he went to beg her because she hasn’t been getting notifications about his bounced calls. She does wonder if he is seeing the girl she caught him with though, it’s only natural that her mind would wander off to the other girl and have questions about her but she’s had to remind herself that her problem in this situation was Chase, not the girl she found him with. She has deleted his number without unblocking it first and went on to block him on all her social media accounts as well and also went on to delete all their pictures together. She doesn’t want any trace of Chase anywhere near her. If she could, she would erase memories of him as well. No, that’s a lie, she needs to keep his memories so that she can always remember to not fall for the same trap again. What Chase did wounded her, maybe even scarred her emotionally because she does not see herself opening up and trusting another guy again. She does not even see herself entering a relationship again and when she said this to Leona, she was laughed at and told that she’s feeling like this because it’s still early days “One day another man will come and sweep you off your feet and you won’t even remember what whoring Chase did to you, just give it time, you’ll see,” Leona confidently said as if she had the ability to see into the future. Amerie on the other hand does not even want to think that far, she’s still good.
It’s another normal day for her, she gets up on time and prepares for work. Once she’s all dressed and her lunch is packed, she makes her way outside where she will catch a taxi to the mall of Africa. Atleast today it’s not raining, rainy days make her want to go into a car dealership and commit to a debt that will take up most of her salary, she knows that one day she will have to commit to this debt but not right now, she’s still going to enjoy the taxi drama and the bit of extra cash that she has each month after paying her bills and attending to the necessary. The only thing she always prays for when boarding a taxi is that she doesn’t sit next to someone who smells like they bathed in perfume, especially the generic ones, oh, she also prays that she never gets the front seat because that comes with a lot of responsibility.
It’s the morning rush hour so she doesn’t wait that long for the fourteen seater to be filled and soon enough, they hit the road leading to the mall of Africa, where the pharmacy that she works for is located.
The store only opens at 9 o’clock so she starts setting up with everyone else before the doors are opened and they start attending to their customers. They never know how their day is going to start, whether they will have a long que or it’s going to be an easy going day, they just see when they start working and today it looks like it might be quite a busy day.
She attends to the people that come to stand infront of her, one at a time a ticket they picked out, she greets and gets them what they need with a patience and a smile, everything seems to be going exactly the way that it always does until the person she never expected to see again stands in front of her , it is the kind yet pissed off driver who helped her that day. Now that her eyes are not covered in tears she can take a good look at this man and he sure is something to look at, an attractive, hunky silver fox…oh gosh, this is something Leona would say.
“Shane?” she says lowly, her eyes never leaving the man and she to shove back the unholy thoughts she is having right now. She may not have maintained eye contact that day but she could never forget his face or his voice, she even thought about him for a while and just seconds ago she admitted to herself that he is an attractive man and not just with the looks, there’s just something about him yet he hasn’t even spoken yet.
“Hello, Amerie,” his voice is just as she remembers it, pure music to the ears.
“Uh, hi,” She stops and chuckles “I’m sorry, I just never thought I’d see you again,” the embarrassment of that day comes back. It would be safe to say that this man is part of a memory that she is trying to bury deep.
“I can see,” He smirks while keeping his eyes on her “How have you been,”
“I’ve been good thanks and you?”
“I’ve been okay,” He turns to look back at the queue behind him “I won’t lie and treat this as a coincidence. I saw you the other day and figured that you worked here, I’m not really looking to buy anything but you can give me simple painkillers just so the ones behind me don’t feel like I came here to waste their time, ” He speaks lowly and she nods. She finds something and returns with it then starts sorting it for him.
” Why are you here then? “she avoids eye contact while working on her keyboard. She can’t help but feel a certain way from the way he is keeping his eyes on her. She doesn’t have a name for this feeling yet but it is a mixture of not wanting to lift her face to look at him and actually wanting to do it.
” To see you, to make contact. I understand that this isn’t the ideal time so I’m going to ask if you can allow me to drive you home after work and then we can talk, ”
” I don’t know you, Shane, ”
“Yet I didn’t harm you the first time I drove you home,” He makes his point. He would have taken advantage back when she was in a vulnerable state and she knows this. He takes out a piece of paper that he wrote his name and number on and slides it to her. He could have handed her one of his business cards but this right here has nothing to do with business and he doesn’t want her to think that he’s trying to lure her in using money or materialistic things. He’s aware that it might appear that he is an older man looking for a young girl to spend money on in exchange for a good time and he doesn’t want there to be a miscommunication between them.
“You could still be planning your attack, you know…getting me all comfortable so I don’t suspect a thing,” there is no hint of seriousness or fear as she says this, in-fact, a smile is playing on her lips.
“Or I could genuinely just be wanting to drive you home so I can have few minutes of your time,”
“Why do you want them?”
“So I can tell you why I came looking for you, Amerie, although you may already have an idea but I think it would be better if I verbalise it so there is no confusion,”
“I don’t know,Shane…” this time she looks up at him.
“I understand. If you decide that you are okay with me driving you home again then please call me on this number, even a text will suffice,” He tells her.
Amerie takes the note and puts it in her coat pocket then she nods and clears her throat “You’ll pay for this at the front,” she gives him the small cage with the over the counter painkillers inside and he thanks her before leaving.
The interaction leaves Amerie in a state she can’t explain, the surprise of seeing Shane and the shock from what he said. She’s not slow, she sees where this is going and she’s not sure she wants it to go there. She’s not even sure what it is that he might be looking for from her. A hookup? To genuinely know her? She’s not sure she can offer any of those things to him yet somehow, as she goes about her day, she cannot get this man out of her mind, even when she decides to catch a taxi instead of calling him.
.
.
.
It’s another evening of relaxing with her best friend. Leona brought rice and chicken take aways and they are downing it with a Sprite. Amerie hasn’t brought up her latest predicament to Leona but she’s slowly getting there judging by the looks she’s getting from her friend.
“Okay, I can’t take the suspense anymore. Out with it and don’t you dare say it’s nothing,”
“It is something,” She mumbles then bites her lower lip.
“What is it? Oh gosh, don’t tell me that whoring Chase came back and you are considering giving him another chance to grate your heart,”
“What? No, now ways. I haven’t spoken to him since that night and I have no desire to, Chase is in the past and I mean that,” she says with her full chest, she’s not going back there.
“What is it then? Or who is it?”
“Shane,”
“Girl, do you have a thing for names that sound almost the same?” Leona teases, making Amerie laugh. She hadn’t even thought about it before.
“That never crossed my mind,”
“Who is Shane and why is he occupying your mind?”
“He’s the man who gave me a ride the day I caught Chase… Anyway, he showed up at my workplace today and asked if I would allow him to come get me from work later on. He then left his number on a piece of paper,”
“Did you call him?”
“No,”
This gets Leona to stop eating and look at her friend “Why not, Amy?”
“You know why not,”
“Because of Chase and what he did? Girl, that doesn’t mean you have to stop living,”
“It’s not that… It’s just, I’m not sure if I’m ready to,”
“And you won’t know unless you try. The man was asking to give you a second ride, that’s all,”
“Oh don’t be so judgemental. My heart is still hurt and I’m not sure I want to get back into a relationship again, so soon even?” Surely it’s too soon, it hasn’t even been three weeks.
“What’s the waiting period?”
“Huh?”
“The waiting period for getting in a relationship again, what is it?”
Amerie rolls her eyes at Leona because she knows that this is rhetorical question “What if it’s too soon?”
“If it were then you wouldn’t be thinking about him right now,”
She’s got a point.
“Or I was just taken by surprise,”
“Look, I won’t force you to call this man but if you feel like you want to then you should. No one is going to judge, this is your life and you have the right to move on from whoring Chase, if anything, they say the best way to get over one guy is by getting under a new one, “She suggestively says with a wide smile.
” Of course you’d say that, “Amerie laughs” You should probably know that he’s an older man, ”
” How much older? ”
” I don’t know but he’s definitely older than me. In his early forties maybe? ”
” Oohhh, a daddy? Amerie, please call the man,” Leona says all dreamily and it rubs off of her friend. She’s not blind, from what she’s seen even if it was short amounts of time. Shane is a good looking man with a voice to match his looks, he’s older, yes and she had never imagined herself going that far but there’s just something inside her that stirs at the thought of him, something that excited her even when she won’t openly admit it, she won’t admit that the thought is quite exciting too. She starts to wonder if he’s disappointed that she didn’t call and then she reminds herself that it is completely up to her. She went as far as storing his number on her phone so it doesn’t get lost with the paper that might be easily misplaced. Now all she has to do is master up the courage to call the man and see if he’s still willing to drive her home… One day.