Playing for Rya

17. Decision

Song: Dangerous Woman by Ariana Grande

Rya stared at the little chunks of ice floating around in her drink as she swirled the liquid around with a small black straw.

The noisy bar, served, to distract from her thoughts which, at the moment, were swirling around in her head.

She ignored the chatter of her friends as their discussion and arguments moved from one topic to the other. All that was pertinent to her was the discussion she'd had with Derek, just hours before, and the discoveries she'd made as a result of their talk.

For one, she hadn't expected to discover that he was in a serious relationship with another woman, not that he'd said as much, but, she was no fool and whether he realized it or not, it was clear to her that he had feelings for Beverly.

It was that discovery that had led to her realization of how deeply her feelings for him ran. Until the possibility of losing him to another became clear, she'd had no idea that she had fallen so hard, so fast.

She felt numb now as she stared, unseeing, into her drink. Numb and disoriented.

Looking back, there was only one time in her life she ever remembered feeling the way she felt now and that was in the months following that one eventful summer.

But she was older now, and much wiser, so surely it wasn't possible that she'd developed feelings for him, this quickly, again?

It seemed odd to her that over the course of her life and the relationships she'd had, there hadn't been anyone, besides Derek, who had managed to impede on her general disdain for romance and relationships.

He was the only one she'd found it difficult to walk away from and yet she'd placed herself right back in a position where she would, more than likely, have to do it again.

A tap on her shoulder, broke her away from her thoughts and returned her attention to her friends who were also seated at the bar with her.

'You alright?' Jason, who was seated next to her, asked.

'Yeah,' she nodded taking a sip of her drink, 'what makes you think I'm not?'

'Uh,' he gave her an odd look, 'I don't know if you realize this, but you haven't said up to five words all evening and you've barely touched your drink.'

'Well, to be fair, she's not really a drinker,' Peter chimed in, 'can't really judge her mood by the number of drinks she's had.'

Kris scoffed, 'well, can we judge by her participation in our conversation tonight, like Jace just pointed out? Or by the expression on her face which clearly tells me that something's bothering her?'

Peter frowned, 'you're right, she was looking forward to drinks with us tonight, not to mention that this whole thing was her idea...maybe this has something to do with the guy she went off with earlier.'

Kris's eyebrows raised, 'what guy?'

'You guys realize that I'm sitting right here right?' Rya asked, deciding to put a stop to the direction their conversation was going, before it went any further.

'You look upset.' Kris stated, repeating her point in a no nonsense tone.

'I'm really not...'

'And you aren't drinking enough,' Jace said, cutting off her denial, 'or talking enough for that matter...and also, what Kris said,' he added as Kris blew out a frustrated breath and shook her head at him, 'you look like you've got something on your mind that's bothering you.'