I Won't Ever Hide Alone

Ch: 20 Surprise

Julian decided to pick up an extra shift this week. The other manager had asked for Friday night off and Julian volunteered to take it. Mostly because he wanted to work with Kara. He really needed to talk with her.

Friday seemed to come by so slow. He knew Kara was spending all her time either at the restaurant or with Jared. His stomach was sick all week. He could barely concentrate. When Friday finally came, he rushed to get himself ready then he sped to work.

As soon as he got there he saw Kara already helping her customers. He saw they were going to have a busy evening. There was no chance to talk with her until things slowed down. 

All evening, as they both helped customer's coming in and out of the restaurant, Julian's mind was somewhere else. He was analyzing Kara for the first time in what seemed like forever. She looked really happy and bouncy. She seemed fine. Actually better than fine.

As the night started to slow down, he felt like it was time to prepare himself to speak with her. There was one table left in the restaurant, and it was very close to closing time. He figured this would be a good time to do this.

"Kara." Julian walked over to her as she was cleaning off of the menu's and putting some of the cracked one's in new plastics.

"Juls." Kara said as she concentrated on the menu's.

"Can I talk to you for a second?" He asked, staring at her to read her facial expressions.

"You get all the seconds. Oh! What did you think of Jared?" Kara asked. A big smile formed on her face.

Seeing this pained Julian to have to even tell her what he was about to say.

"That's exactly it, Kara. I wanted to talk with you about Jared." Julian said, feeling a little nervous.

"What about him?" She looked at Julian.

"So, he was cool. He obviously makes you very happy."

"He does!" She smiled big again.

Killing me. Julian thought. "Yeah, so uhm, I actually heard this thing. Crazy really. Uhm, So your boyfriend. Jared. Yeah, Lori knows him actually."

Kara looked confused, "That's funny. He'd never mentioned her before. When they met the other day, they didn't seem to interact as if they knew each other."

"I know. That's the funny part... Well not really funny but-" 

Kara cut him off, "Spit it out Julian." She chuckled.

"Well, he dated a girl in her class. Diana." Julian said. He watched as Kara nodded her head to that.

"Yeah. I know Diana. I mean, I don't know her, but Jared had mentioned her. They dated for a long time."

"Oh! Did he? Okay then. Well, what did he tell you about her?"

"Uhm, just that their break up was really hard on him and he couldn't deal for the longest time. He thought they were in love and she broke his heart."

"Is that what he said..." Julian was feeling sickly again.

"Yeah. That's what he said. Why?"

"Well, did he also happen to tell you that he hit her?" Julian blurted out.

Kara looked at Julian as if he just told her something absurd. "Are you serious right now?" She chuckled.

Julian blinked. "I'm sorry. What part of that was funny?"

Kara rolled her eyes and laughed again, "He didn't hurt her. She was the one who would abuse him."

Julian was seriously confused now. Then he remembered the story Lori told him.