In Another Life

69 Colby's POV

"You can let us out here," I told the Uber driver. He pulled over, and Sam, Kat, and I piled out of the car. I saw Terra pull into a parking space as close as she could get to the beach, and we started walking towards her car. They girls got out and grabbed their bags from the trunk, then started walking towards us. I was in a weird mood. With the others leaving, it kind of made it even more obvious of how soon we would have to leave to go back home to LA. How soon I would have to leave Terra. I felt like we hadn't even scratched the surface on what we might could be, or even on who she was. I wanted to know her, like, really know her.  As we all gathered back together, we walked towards the inky black water, that was foaming up on the sand. The wind picked up, the closer we got, and I noticed that she shivered a little. "You think the water is gonna be cold?" she asked, glancing up at me. "Probably," I replied, as I swung my own bag around and unzipped it. I dug through until I found what I was looking for. I always kept a spare hoodie on me, just in case. This one was from my own personal merch collection, the koala edition. It was mint colored, with the little koala emblem on the front. I passed it too her, then zipped my bag. "Thank you," she said softly, trailing her fingers over the little koala. When she looked back up at me, I noticed that the color of the hoodie almost perfectly matched her eyes. The eyes that I was currently trapped in. "Yeah, no-" Unfortunately, being trapped in her eyes meant that I wasn't watching where I was going. I tripped over someone's cooler that they had left, a giant fucking cooler that I somehow did not see, and went sprawling across the sand, face first. "Oh my God, Colby!" I raised my head, spitting out sand, feeling the burn against my face, my palms and my knees. It felt like carpet burn, only worse. "Are you okay?" Terra asked, falling to her knees beside me. I rolled over, and rested on my elbows, to see the others had gathered around me too. "Yeah, I'm good. Don't know how I missed that big ass thing," I said, annoyed at myself as I pointed at the cooler. "You were too interested in....other things, would be my guess," Sam replied, giving me that know it all look. I clenched my jaw, wanting to tell him to fuck off, but holding back at the same time. "He was giving me a hoodie, because I was a little cold. It's my fault," Terra said. I looked back at her, and noticed she actually had a guilty look on her face as she bit her lip. I shook my head. "It's not your fault Baby girl. I just happen to be a clumsy fool sometimes. It happens." She sucked in her breath for a minute, her eyes going wide. "What?" I asked, confused. She shook her head, and glanced at her friends, who started giggling. "What's so funny? Is it because I fell on my face? I'm okay, thanks for your concern," I retorted, sitting up, then standing. I held my hand out to help Terra up, since she was still on her knees, with my hoodie in her hands. She took my hand, allowing me to pull her up, then brought the hoodie over her head. I watched as she closed her eyes, and brought her arms up covering her nose and mouth, then inhaling deeply. When she opened her eyes, and met my gaze, her face flamed up, bright pink. I didn't mention the fact that I had just caught her smelling my hoodie. I thought it was cute but I didn't want to embarrass her even more so I looked away to Sam. "Where are we going to set up?" I asked, dusting the sand from my hands onto my shorts. "Closer to the water, but not close enough for the tide to hit us." I nodded, and started walking closer to the water. I set my bag down and pulled out the blanket that I had brought. I knew that Sam had brought one too. Hopefully, both of them together would be big enough to hold all of us. I knew the girls had brought towels too, but this just seemed...cozier. Of course, the hotel probably wouldn't be too happy when they found that the extra blankets that they had left for us were covered in sand but oh well. Sam laid his out next to mine, and we all settled in. Terra sat next to me, without me forcing her too, which I thought was progress. When she finally relaxed around me, we always seemed to get interrupted and she would clam back up, getting nervous again. Maybe she was starting to get over it. Or maybe she was just realizing we didn't have enough time together for her to keep being nervous. Denise sat behind us on the blanket, while Sarah sat behind Sam and Kat. Kenzie sat right in the middle of both blankets, in between Sarah and Denise. "Did anyone bring snacks?" Kenzie asked. She started pull zip lock bags out of her own bag. Fruit chips, granola bars, Cheetos, almonds, crackers, cheese cubes..."Jesus, did you bring the entire store?" I asked, my eyes going wide at all the food. She blushed as she met my gaze, and shrugged. "There are a lot of us and I didn't know if anyone else would bring anything. We haven't eaten since Chipolte. Plus, if we swim, I know we'll get hungry. I got most of this from the hotel restaurant. I gave them Sarah's name and they fixed it up for me." "That's good thinking though. Smart. Thanks," Sam said, giving me a look. I rolled my eyes. "I wasn't being rude Kenzie. I was just surprised. It is a really good idea, so thank you." She nodded, and looked down. She was definitely a shy one. She jumped a little, then pulled her phone out. "Did the vibration scare you Kenz?" Denise asked her, laughing a little.