Soccer Girl

Chapter 18

She searched him up and read through multiple articles. She found one that was written the day before and she read it thoroughly.

Three weeks until release.

Skylars heart pounded. She didn't know how to take on this information. A tear was slipping from her redened eyes and she quickly wiped it away with the startle of another presence in the room. She kept her head down because she didn't want them to see that she was about to cry, about to show fear and sorrow that the one she was in love with was being released from prison. Its not very typical for someone to feel sad about it but when the person you love wanted to truthfully kill you, then being scared and worried is usually on the top of your list.

Skylar felt a calming hand placed on her back, rubbing her smoothly.

"It's going to be alright, I'm never going to let anyone hurt you," she heard Mark say.

She spun herself around to give him a huge embrace to find herself swinging her arms around thin air and just wrapping her arms around herself.

Puzzled.

'Why do i keep doing this?' she thought, ' I keep imagining him here, hearing him, feeling his warm touch...its probably just me missing him so much, I need some sleep,'

      *****

A week went by and she finally had her first shift back after the fight happened. 

Skylar walked up to Maggie's from the parking lot where she had left her car. She spun her backpack around from her back to her stomach and rummaged through it for keys. She grabbed them and swung her bag back around. She looked up towards the doors and noticed someone leaning against the wall, right beside the door. She just ignored him and opened the door. 

     As she walked in, he followed. She walked straight to her locker and he found himself a booth in the far corner. She emerged from the lockers as quick as she could, and stood up at the front, waiting for customers as she starred at the door. She soon realized that there was already a customer sitting at the booth, positioned so he was directly facing Skylar. Skylar  grabbed a menu and walked over to the table as his eyes locked on her. She placed the menu down.

"hi, welcome to Maggie's, is there anything i can get for you?" she asked with a smile, which faded after noticing the look he was giving her. So judging as he starred into her eyes, then down at the menu as he quickly scanned it, and then back up to her eyes. He slowly shook his head no with his gaze not leaving Skylar. She spun around and returned back to the front. She served her customers, and throughout, he just sat there, watching her. Even when other waiters asked if he'd like anything, when he shook his head he kept his eyes watching Skylar.

Her shift ended and everyone already went home, so she had to lock up. She was about to go to the lockers when she realized that he was still sitting there, still watching her. She turned to him, "don't you dare try anything," she said sternly. She ran to the lockers, grabbing her stuff and hurried right back out, not even bothering to change. She looked to the corner when she saw he was gone.

The first thing she did was check the cash register. She opened it up and she counted the money. It was all there, "huh.." she said to herself. She starred at the empty table where he was sitting and just traded off into wonder. She soon grabbed her stuff and headed out the door and locked up. This happened after every shift she had, except she started to just expect him not to steal anything and became less surprised when he didn't, and gave him even more trust as it went on. It became routine that he would wait at the door for Skylar to open up, follow her in, take a seat at the exact same table in the exact same spot, and just watch her without ordering, and without causing any trouble whatsoever.

One day, when no one was coming in right away, she went and took a seat across the table from him.

     "so, what's your deal.." she said and took a pause, "you come in here every shift I have, maybe even other times, but I don't know, and you stay from opening until closing, and never order a thing," 

    He continued to only stare at her.

         "okayy.." she said awkwardly, thinking of a new approach, She quickly thought about asking a pretty obvious question, "so, whats your name?" 

     With his eyes still locked on hers, his raspy voice spoke up, "Bandit," he said. He said it as he formed a smirk on his rugged face in such a way Skylar was almost hypnotized. Chills flew up her spine and Bandit just sat there, starring deeper into her eyes as he had his arms folded over his chest.

The same thing happened throughout that shift and the next one after that, but the third one after was different.

That day, he didn't show up. She walked to the doors, expecting him to be there, waiting, but he wasn't. She unlocked it and went inside. She went to the lockers, set down her stuff and returned back to the front as fast as she could. 

She unlocked the cash register and as she did, she lifted her head to peek at the back table which had an absence. It felt to her that something was missing with Bandit not being there. 

She soon went around and wiped down all the tables before people started coming in. When she reached the far booth, she noticed something different about this one than the rest of the other tables. This one had a sticky note on it. A yellow sticky note with black pen writing on it.