Blue Eyes

Chapter Four

As soon as DeShawn approached the car, Eric stepped out and made sure to open the car door for her. He then gave her a quick kiss on the cheek as she shyly thanked him. Christopher, on the other hand, remained in the backseat and didn’t even make an attempt to open the door for Torria from within the inside. He continued to look at his cell phone and didn’t look up at all. Being the gentleman that he was, Eric also opened Torria’s car door. As soon as she got into the car, Torria turned to face Christopher and immediately addressed him.

“Thanks for opening the door for me,” Torria said with much sarcasm.

“My bad. If I would have known that you looked this good then I would have been waiting for you at the door,” Christopher explained while his eyes roamed over the thickness of Torria’s curvy body.

“I guess you’re forgiven but that’s definitely strike one,” Torria stated while trying to hide her smile as Christopher flirted with her.

DeShawn just rolled her eyes at their interaction while Eric quietly laughed to himself. For some reason, she already felt that Christopher wasn’t worth her best friend just from his lack of respect. She hated that Torria always felt that rude guys were intriguing. Torria had this theory that she could reach any guy’s full potential and make him better if she wanted to invest her time and energy. Clearly, DeShawn strongly disagreed, especially since Torria hadn’t “found the right guy” to test her theory on.

As her thoughts consumed her mind, Eric drove around their hometown of Brookwillow. They decided to go to a popular sports bar that was located downtown. Time-Out Sports Bar was known for selling alcohol to underage minors so it was always heavily visited by those under the legal drinking age of twenty-one. The bar was a hole in the wall with dim lighting but the ambiance was always energetically charged, filled with those wanting to be socially interactive.

Even though DeShawn and Torria were not huge fans of drinking alcohol, they both enjoyed letting loose and partying if the vibe was right. Luckily, they were both wearing jeans and felt comfortable playing pool while they drank a mixture of Vodka and an energy drink. Both Eric and Christopher preferred brown liquor over ice and continued to drink one after the other. They were all having fun while Christopher and Torria seemed to be getting along nicely. Since none of them were really any good at playing pool, it didn’t matter who was winning, especially when they kept hitting each other’s balls. Eric took any opportunity to gently touch and lightly kiss her and she definitely wasn’t complaining. DeShawn was shocked at how much she enjoyed that Eric was showing PDA. She never cared for it when Bobby tried but with Eric, it felt different such as in a caring manner and not possessively.

After realizing that they were all fully intoxicated, Eric made the suggestion that they should eat some food to sober up for the drive back home. They all agreed then moved to the dining area where the smell of cigarettes was still fresh in the air and ordered a pizza. As Eric and Christopher sat across from her and Torria in the booth, DeShawn had time to study Christopher’s face under the brighter lights. Even though they were cousins, Christopher Marks showed no family resemblance to Eric. He had blazing honey-colored eyes with delicate long eyelashes. Such a waste for a man to have beautiful eyes, DeShawn thought to herself.  He was attractive in his own way but admitting that to herself made her realize that she was indeed drunk. There was no way that her sober self would ever fathom that rude and annoying Christopher was anything other than just another average guy that obviously peaked in high school.

According to Eric, Christopher was one year older than him and lived with their grandmama. He once attended Ste B. on a track and field scholarship but was kicked out of school for selling drugs out of his dorm room. He now worked at Green’s Sports Shop but didn’t even own a car. Outside of his day job, he seemed to only want to party and retell the stories of his past glory days. To DeShawn, he seemed like a bum and she wanted him to stop talking about things that happened years ago. Since she and Torria had more than enough alcohol in their systems and were feeling the effects; DeShawn decided to stop drinking. Torria kept giggling and openly flirting with Christopher while DeShawn just wanted to close her eyes and go to sleep. Even as they refused additional alcoholic beverages, Eric and Christopher kept drinking.