Finally Soulmates

Chapter one

Tara looked at the band on her wrist, twenty years old and nothing yet, she's heard since she was seventeen that all her best friends had found their soulmates, their bands were at zero. Hers was at two months, three weeks, five days, twenty one hours, seven minutes and now one second.

Zero.

How slow could this be? Tara was too impatient to withstand this. She looked up from her timer on the band on her wrist and saw that the waitress was waiting for her to order. When Tara looked at this woman she knew all too well, she noticed the ring on her left ring finger, still jealous. At least she didn't have to wait for a long time, Tara thought. They must be happy.

"Are you still waiting?" The waitress asked.

"Yeah, I'll take that coffee to go," Tara said, quickly changing the subject so as not to keep on this unhappy topic.

"Alrighty, Dear, I hope it's soon," She winked at Tara who merely glared back.

"If two months and some odd other long measurements of time counts as short," Tara said, "I get it, Belle, you want me to be happy, but it's not going to happen anytime soon."

"Tara, I don't just want you to be happy, I want you to stop obsessing over time, it'll come, just focus on something new and then it'll pass like a flash," Belle said.

"Just shut up, Belle, I've got my mind on stuff, I'm looking at colleges again," Tara said.

"So, back to education, have you got the money?" Belle asked.

"I've been working at my father's restaurant to save up the money, I'm almost there, for four years at State, I think that's enough to get my bachelor's in theatre," Tara said.

"Oh, I've known actors and actresses, they usually end up with other jobs to provide for themselves, your soulmate had better prove himself useful," Belle said.

"Enough with the soulmates! All this world cares about is soulmates this and soulmates that, well, what about Jimmy over there? Huh, Belle? His died in a car wreck right before his eyes when he was fifteen! Maybe I don't want a soulmate, maybe I'll leave this to rest like my mother in her grave!" Tara exclaimed.

"Now, Tara," Belle took on a scolding tone.

"Don't you 'Now, Tara' me! Just  drop it! Someday all of you are going to have a life so stop wasting it on gossip," Tara said. She took her coffee aggressively and, leaving money and a tip behind, rushed out the door.

Pulling on her winter jacket, hat and gloves, Tara walked in the snow that everyone was inside hiding from and to the park, where an empty bench stood. Although an inanimate object, she decided that it looked lonely and needed someone to sit on it.

"So, Mr. Bench," she snorted embarrassingly, "I don't talk to objects much but you and I are lonely. Heaven's sakes, I'm starting to sound like them. Anyways, they act like everyone needs a soulmate to be happy. I don't need one! You don't either. I just need an education, maybe find my soulmate later on down the road. Do you have any solutions?" Tara knew it couldn't respond, it's a bench after all. She must have lost her sanity, talking to a bench, and whatever was left of it had gone out the window to whoever needed it when she asked it a question. Yet, luck was in her favor, there was an answer that she hadn't considered. It was a band after all, she could just cut it off.

Like in the movies, an icicle glinted as she looked around. Tara broke it off of the bottom of the bench and, while setting her wrist on the bench, she started to saw and stab to get it off. Like a pocket knife, it seemed to work, and then the band just slipped off. The time stopped. Frozen at two months, three weeks, five days, twenty hours, twenty five minutes and thirty nine seconds.