Here and Now

Chapter 9

Can you say awkward? Because that's how the rest of the day went. Even when they showed up at the restaurant, it was so awkward. Roman sat there awkwardly as the movements and actions that we had all seen as a normality for Gemma, became an obvious flirting. She constantly stared at him. She constantly found ways to touch his arms or hands or something. Roman was sitting like there was a gun pointed at his head. His back was straight and stiff and he had barley said two words. His eyes were wide and scared. I had never seen him like this before. He was a deer caught in the headlights. I felt bad for him, honestly. And, I couldn't exactly save him, I was still working and going and serving other tables. Every time I went over there, Roman sent me a look of agony; Gemma only briefly paid attention to me, she only had eyes for one person at the table; and Casey was looking very confused. I wondered if Casey knew she liked him. I'm sure he didn't. Especially since a few moments later he came up to me while I was at the bar.

"What's the problem with Roman . It's like he's scared or something." He laughed but eyed me curiously. I just shrugged; My usual response for questions like that. I- unlike Roman- know how to act normal in situations like these. Roman's go-to move is just to freak out and avoid contact. Good job, Roman. "Somethings' up with him." I nodded in agreement. I could tell Casey wanted an actual reply and that he was getting frustrated with my wordless responses so I suggested he asked Roman what the problem was.

I watched in mild humor as Roman's  back got even more straight and rigid as Casey spoke quietly to him and Gemma's eyebrows furrowed in worry. I only had about 15 more minutes until I got off and could join my friends so I went to the back to start cleaning up and prepare myself a drink. Once I finished all that, it was time to clock out so I did so and walked over to the round table where my friends sat.

"CJ! Great! You're off, sit here!" Roman exclaimed rather too excitedly pulling out the chair to the right of his. Gemma was on his left and Casey to the left of her. I sat in the seat in between Casey and Roman and looked up at the group. Roman seemed extremely happy that I came to "rescue" him. Gemma and Casey seemed pleased to see me, but certainly not as much as Roman. I decided to break the awkwardness, because none of them were making any moves to and they had been staring at me for the past 30 seconds, silently.

"Casey, Jordan called today. Said something about you two hanging out." I saw a slight blush crawl up his cheeks at my words, but I also saw an excitement in his eyes.

"Really?" He asked happily.

I nodded. "She said you guys have been texting quite a bit lately. How did you even get her number?" He turned away from me, looking at some imaginary picture on the table.

"Uh, I got it from your phone." He winced, afraid of my reaction. He knew how much I hated people going through my phone. Boy, I hated it. I suddenly got really angry.

"You did what?" I said very lowly. I adored Casey, I did, but I hate when people get on my phone. I've had the same phone for a few years now, because it had a lot of important stuff on it that I could not replace. Text messages. Pictures. Notes made by someone else. I couldn't afford to lose that stuff. If my phone were to break because someone broke it or something, I could never replace that stuff. And also, I didn't want anyone else to see that stuff. Those things were private.

"I really needed to talk to her about something and you were busy so I- I just- Im so sorry CJ." He looked at me with a pleading face. I was furious. I looked over at the clock on the wall and turned away from him to grab my stuff and walked out of the restaurant. I head someone come after me and expected it to be Casey, but was surprised when I was stopped on the sidewalk by Roman instead.

"Hey, what happened? Are you okay?" He looked at my angry face with a face of concern. I felt a stab in my chest. I had lived a moment similar to this before. The April before, I had just walked out of a date with my boyfriend of 1 month. I walked up to the table to find lipstick smeared over his face including his lips. And it just so happens that our waitress happened to have the same color of lipstick on. Needless to say, I walked out of that restaurant single. Well it just so happens, Cayden had been "coincidentally" at that restaurant on a "date" as well. Date my butt! He was there to spy like he had been on every other date I had prior, and he just thought I didn't know he was there. Anyways, he followed me out and asked the same exact question, in the same tone, with the same face. Cayden.