Nothing to Lose

4

More than 'Justs'

Viviana ran to her room as soon as she got home, yelling out a 'thank you' to her parents as she rounded the staircase up to the top. She shut the door behind her and let out a shaky breath. She paced around her room a few times, trying to grasp why this boy had suddenly overridden her thoughts. She barely knew him. Nothing but a name, really.

She glanced in her vanity mirror from afar. She looked at herself in this dress. She held her arm out slightly, feeling embarrassed at how vividly she remembered his fingers tracing her forearm until they connected with her hand. She turned a bit, grazing the zipper on her back with her finger. His once touched there, too.

Stupid, she thought, It's stupid. She felt abashed even in her solitary.

She was eighteen, not a young girl. She had felt infatuation before, or so she thought. She felt as if she shouldn't be unraveling in this way.

He was just a boy.

As much as she tried to downsize her feelings, they were overwhelming. She finally changed out of the dress, after embracing the night in it a few more times. She put on a baggy crew neck and comfy socks. Maybe being out of the outfit would allow her to think clearly again.

It didn't.

She couldn't think of anything but him. Every time she closed her eyes, the black of her eyelids would unveil him. Before she could object to her own notion, she got up and grabbed her shoes, slipping them on swiftly and heading out of her window.

She knew he must've lived just blocks from her. She recalled their truck coming from the left of her house when he had first asked for her name, so she walked in that direction.

Eventually, after a bit of walking, she felt foolish. How would she even know which house was his? What would she do when she got there? Knock on the door?

She chuckled to herself at the idea of it. She went to turn around but just as she did, she peered through a bush over a stone wall and saw a truck. A black truck. The same one that they had been driving.

She thought of it once again. How dumb this might seem.

Who am I kidding? She thought, He already jumped out of a car and pulled me from dinner. This can't look much worse.

She stuck her foot in a small crack midway through the wall and lifted her leg over. She hit the ground on the other side and began to walk across the lawn, praying that the sprinklers weren't due to go off anytime soon. She wasn't going to go up to the front door. She couldn't withstand the humiliation. This was already impulsive enough. Instead, she walked around the house, seeing if she could find his window to knock on.

Most of the rooms on the first floor were dark, so she counted them out. Finally, on the far right side of the house, a light was on. She hopped a little, trying to see if she could see whose it was. She couldn't make out a thing.

She sighed and picked up a rock.

Please don't be his Dad, she thought, Please be him.

•••••

Rafe got home and went to his room as quickly as he could to avoid further conversation about what had went down at dinner. He was also still fairly angry at Rose's comment. If he had heard her mutter one more thing, he feared he might lash out. He didn't have the energy for that right now. His mind was elsewhere.

He shuffled through the drawer, remembering that he had hid the bag from Ward earlier this morning. He found it and took it out, the smooth feeling of the plastic bag feeling like a scapegoat. He didn't think he'd have another hit for a while, and especially not tonight after seeing Viviana. But, with Rose's comment and his short fume, he needed something to take the edge off.