Truth - The Balance

Chapter 4 - The scar

The white cavalier sat in the parking lot outside of Walmart. The sky was still dark, purple clouds dancing with the black backdrop of the sky in the early morning hours of the day.

Natalie locked her car by hand and walked across the empty parking lot, her heels clicking on the pavement. She had an hour before she needed to be at work, it was only a five minute drive from here and she always preferred having enough time to shop around.

The automatic sliding doors slid open and a rush of cold air hit Natalie's body, making her shiver. The store was pretty much empty and only two check out lanes were open. She was just here to buy a new cell phone. Thank God she had a warranty on the last soaking wet expensive android phone that lied dead in the bottom of her purse.

Walking down the isles towards the electronic center, Natalie felt those cold eyes boring into her again. She didn't even attempt to find them, scared of what might happen. 'I need to see a shrink,' Natalie thought with a frown forming on her face.

She saw the shadow silhouette and silver eyes watching her from behind a rack of movies. Natalie quickly looked down at her feet and twisted the end of her side swept fishtail braid nervously.

Her pace quickened, her mind set on getting the phone as quickly as she could and getting the hell out of here.

She only glanced up through her eyelashes a few times to make sure she was heading the right way and kept her head hung low.

Her body collided fast and hard with what felt like a brick wall. Heart pounding, she stumbled back.

Picking her head up to see what she had ran into, she let out a relieved and embarrassed breath with a smile when she recognized him.

Al looked down at her from his gigantic height. His eyes danced with amusement. "Natalie Young." She swallowed the lump in her throat and nodded. "Yeah."

"Are you alright?" He asked. Natalie smiled and nodded again, trying not to look like complete looney bin material. "Yeah, just here to buy a new phone. It took a swim with me last night." Natalie looked into his eyes. Blue danced around the edges of the grey.

Al wore a white plaid shirt that had the top three buttons undone, exposing the top of his magnificent chest. Natalie admired the way his blue jeans fit snug in all the right places. Never before had she wanted to jump a man's bones so badly before. It just wasn't natural for her to have this kind of reaction; that was Janice's thing, not hers.

Her fingers played with the necklace that hung from her neck and she looked down at it, remembering her dream.

"Have we met before?" Al's eyebrows furrowed and he let out a chuckle. "You really don't remember?" Al shook his head and frowned at her blank expression. "We used to be friends for years as kids. Until you moved when you were ten."

Natalie remembered moving from Ocala up to Destin, FL when she was ten. But no matter how much she racked her mind, she couldn't remember anything about him other than her dream. Al looked disappointed. "I didn't recognize you last night, and then it hit me later on who you were... You sure have grown up." He said in a suggestive way. "I gave you that necklace. I can't believe you still wear it."

Natalie smiled, "I remember you giving it to me. It was the day we met on the beach, but that's all I can remember." Natalie sighed and looked down at her feet, upset she couldn't remember the beautiful man who stood in front of her.

"When I was fifteen, my mom and I got into a wreck on highway 98." Natalie felt the need to explain to him. It was the only explanation that made enough sense to her why she couldn't remember. "I had a bad concussion and lost part of my memory. Sometimes I can remember and other times it's just...nothing."