Changing Seasons

Six

She answered his call on the first ring. She had her hair up in a loose bun, wearing thin-frame glasses and a plain white tee.

"I didn't know you wore glasses," Krist remarked, leaning his head back on the wall behind him.

"Yeahhhh," she smiled, "Old age."

Krist grinned, "You're so old."

"Hey! I'm halfway to being a senior citizen!" They both got a chuckle, "How was your day? Any fun plans for Thanksgiving?"

"It was alright, pretty busy but not bad. I'm just gonna go to my mom's for Thanksgiving, nothing special though."

"Aw, how's your mom doing?"

"She's doing good. She retired last year, so she's been really into crafts and baking," he told her.

"That's great. I would totally be happy to do crafts and bake all day," she smiled.

"I can see you doing that," Krist chuckled, "What about you? What do you got planned for Thanksgiving, going to your parents?"

Atira wrinkled her nose, "Yeah, no," she laughed, "My friend Jillian is doing this, like, Friendsgiving potluck thing, so I am going to that." She added air quotations when she said the word "Friendsgiving."

"That sounds cool. A bunch of people go or just a few?"

She thought for a moment, "Eh, last year there were probably twenty or so? Give or take."

"Nice," Krist replied, "You looking forward to it?"

"I guess? I don't know. It's probably going to be awkward. A lot of the people there are mutual friends of Kevin and I that I haven't really seen since we broke up," she sighed, "Honestly, I'm dreading it. Breakups are weird when you have all the same friends."

Krist felt a twinge in his stomach, jealousy. Jealous that Kevin's friends could encourage a reconciliation or that Kevin could attend. He wanted to ask if Kevin would be there but decided against it. He didn't want to scare her off.

"I've been pretty lucky, and my friends normally didn't like my girlfriends," Krist laughed. He said it like he was kidding, but yeah, his friends were generally not too fond of the women Krist had in his life.

"Even me?" Atira pretended to look wounded.

"I think you were the exception," he told her truthfully, "The rest, Jesus fucking Christ."

Atira looked intrigued, "That bad? Like crazy or drama or what?"

He puffed his cheeks, letting the air out, "A little bit of all that. Like I'm sure they could probably say the same about me too, though," he admitted, immediately regretting that he'd said that.

"I can't see you being crazy or dramatic," she replied.

"Not really, I guess with them, they weren't really either," he backpedaled a little, "It was more or less just us being immature and not compatible." He wasn't lying.

"Have you had a lot of girlfriends since high school, Mr. Heartbreaker," Atira teased.

"Not really."

"How many?" She inquired.

"Since you? Three," he admitted. However, if she asked how many girls he'd slept with, he was damn well going to lie about that number.

"Were you serious about any of them?" Atira asked softly.

Krist thought for a moment, "Yeah, at the time, I guess I was."

"All of them?"

"No, I was with the girl I was with after you and I guess with the girl after her," he paused, "The third girl, I liked, but...after a few months, I just couldn't see anything coming out of that. It was pretty much a rebound thing if that's what you could call it. Lainey and I broke up-"