The Caffeine Fix

CHAPTER 17

"Yeah, sure, it is. Validation from a celebrity…..of course. Oh, you were awesome in 'Beneath', by the way," Tyla suddenly remembered that she was indeed, speaking to a famous celebrity.

Patrick looked at her in a surprised manner.

"Huh?"

"You were amazing…..in 'Beneath'."

"No….oh no," Patrick looked at her in a dramatic manner which surprised her.

"What is it? I didn't say anything wrong now, did I?"

"No, no, don't do that, okay?"

"Don't do what?"

"Praise me…..no I am not used to that thing from you."

Was this guy serious? From the very first moment that they had met, the guy was craving serious attention and today, when she was finally giving him the starry attention, he was dismissing it, in an awkward manner.

"Are you serious?"

"Yeah, surprisingly, that didn't feel good at all."

"I hope you're joking. I am only giving praise where it's due. Your performance was marvellous indeed, much better than Brad Henrick, of course."

Patrick chuckled a bit.

"Now I love that comment. But still, no need to do this. No more praises from you, okay?"

"Okay, sure….weirdo," She uttered 'weirdo' softly so he could not hear and smiled.

She thought something and continued,

"You know what, you're right. I cannot do this either. You're a celebrity, but I just never felt that way talking to you. I don't know if that's just your thing or mine…..I don't even know if it's a good thing or not….but…."

"Well, it doesn't feel wrong either, does it?" He replied in a soft tone as he stared deep into her eyes. 

She gazed deeply into his eyes and felt a weird tingling inside. She looked away when the tingling got extremely uncomfortable and got engrossed in cleaning the already sparkling counters.

'Oh gosh, why does this feel so familiar?' She thought to herself.

Meanwhile, Patrick could not comprehend what he was feeling. But all he knew that he wanted to keep staring at 'the girl' no matter what she was doing. He gazed at her silently as she cleaned the counters.

"I guess I should leave now," He spoke, in an attempt to get her attention.

"Oh, of course, yeah."

As she hurried towards him and took his empty coffee mug, he looked away from her and outside the window and she blushed.

"I'll see you later…..then," Patrick spoke awkwardly as he got up to leave.

"Of…of course." 

Patrick almost sprinted towards his car which made the already awkward situation more awkward.

Back in her room, Tyla could not concentrate on anything. She tried to work on her research paper for the semester but somehow, instead of the Chemistry equations on her laptop screen, her mind kept going back to the Chemistry that she and Patrick had shared for a brief moment, if that's what it could be called. She watched Nancy who was lying comfortably and scrolling Instagram and suddenly, Nancy looked at her and asked,

"What? Everything alright?"

"Yeah…"

Nancy continued to scroll Instagram. Tyla kept staring into her laptop screen for some time and muttered,