Beautiful Tragedy (A Standalone Romance Novel) (6 page)

“Molly! Two orders waiting!”

It was Cassie, and I was disappointing my teacher.

“Okay,
Meggs
. I have to get
back to work. I’ll go tonight, now scoot before I lose my job.”

Megan grinned, “Thanks Molly! You’ll have a great
time, I promise.”

“Yeah, yeah…Get out!” I told her with a smile.

I made it through the day with only screwing up one
order. Cassie was trying to be supportive, while telling me what I needed to do
better at the same time. I was trying to keep a straight face. Maybe she wasn’t
just an English major; maybe she was going to be an English teacher. At the end
of her speech she said, “I can show you the basics, but you’ll have to find
your own rhythm.” What I saw was a blind Chinese man, who said, “I can only
point the way, Grasshopper. You must walk the path yourself.” Well, it would be
funny if you had grown up with your grandmother who still watched old re-runs
of Kung-Fu every weekend.

Megan had left me a note telling me she had gone to
get Jake when I got home. She said that they were going to eat and then would
pick me up around eight. It gave me time to shower and get dressed. It was
funny, or sad, that I put on the first outfit I picked out and left it on
tonight when I was going to the club, yet for a football game I changed three
times. Could the difference be Brock, perhaps?
Shut-up Molly!

I was ready to go by the time Megan got there. As I
climbed in the backseat, Jake looked back at me and said, “Why won’t you go out
with Brock?”

Megan closed the car door and said, “Jake, leave her
alone.”

“
It’s
okay, Meg. I can handle
him,” I told her. “I don’t want to go out with him.” So there. I gave myself
points for not sticking out my tongue.

“What’s wrong with him?” Jake said.

“Jake really, Leave her alone.”

“There’s nothing wrong with him,” I said. “I just
don’t want to go out with anyone right now. What’s wrong with that?”

“Nothing, Molly,” he said it with a sigh. “I just
think you’d really like him.”

“Maybe you should go out with him,” I told him with a
grin. In true, girl-got-my-back form, Megan said, “Well, they do already live
together.” Then we both laughed and Jake pouted the rest of the way to the
club.

I had heard about this place; the college crowd really
loved it. I’m not a big fan of clubs. I don’t drink; I can’t really because of
my meds, and I’m not a big crowd girl anyway. I prefer smaller, more intimate
settings. I know I really should be thirty-five instead of nineteen. My grandma
used to tell me that all the time and Megan does still. From the outside it
looked like fun. It was the inside of a converted warehouse that was red brick
and still had an original old wrought-iron fire escape running up the side. The
Aqua sign was blue neon and there was also a giant neon martini glass with a
giant green olive stuck in it.

We paid our cover and got our hands stamped and went
inside. The place was huge, and the first floor had a massive sunken dance
floor and a separate drinking and dining room. People were dressed really nice.
I looked down at my little black dress with the light blue skirt and hoped I
was dressed okay. Megan saw me looking at myself and said, “You look great,
Molly. I wish you knew how pretty you are. Everyone thinks so.” I smiled at
her, because what else was I going to say to that?

“Thanks, Meg,” I told her. Megan took me by the hand
and said, “Dance with me Molly!”

 
I looked out
towards the dance floor where there were about a bazillion people, and then
back at Jake.

“Isn’t that your job, Jake?” I asked him.

“She asked you first. I’m going to get something to
drink. You girls want anything?”

We both told him no, and Megan continued pulling on my
arm until we made it to the dance floor. There was a hip hop song playing, one
that Megan and I used to dance to on our sleepovers and when she’d come stay
with me when I was too sick to go to school. For a few minutes I forgot
everything, except for just being with my best friend and having fun. For a few
minutes…that was when I saw him. I looked back at Megan and she was grinning
from ear to ear. Damn them! I’d been set up. Brock strode in the door like he
owned the place. I would have sworn every female head turned to look at him as
he did. He walked up to where Jake sat and they did their stupid boy bump
thing. Jake wasn’t surprised to see him, and neither was Megan. I looked at her
accusingly, but she pretended she didn’t notice. She just kept dancing.

CHAPTER
SIX

BROCK

I saw her as soon as I walked in. Two hundred people,
most of them women, and she still stuck out. Damn, I’ve got it bad. She was
dancing with Megan, and for a minute, I just stood watching her from the
doorway. I liked the way her hair moved while she danced. I liked the way she
moved her body, and giggled with Megan. She looked happy, and that gave her a
glow that only added to how pretty she was.

When I went over to say hello to Jake, I could tell
she saw me. She gave Jake and Megan both a reproachful look. They had set her
up; the poor girl didn’t know I was coming. I wondered again why she didn’t
want to go out with me. I wasn’t a bad-looking guy. As a matter of fact, I’ve
been told that I’m rather good-looking. I shower every day and I usually smell
really good….I shouldn’t blow my own horn though, I have had one girl tell me
that I was in love with myself. Okay…more than one. But I’m not in love with
myself, really. I just have a good self-image. There’s nothing wrong with that,
right?

“Hey man,” I asked Jake. “You didn’t tell me Molly
would be here.”

“Is that a problem?” he asked. I could tell he was
almost more upset that she wouldn’t go out with me than I was.

“No,” I said, “I like Molly.”

“She likes you too,” he said.

“I know,” I told him with a grin. “Why wouldn’t she?”

Jake laughed; he knew I was full of shit…kind of. “I’m
going to cut in on your girl and dance with her.”

“You’re going to dance with Megan?” he said. Molly was
right; his head was stuffed with fluff.

“No, dork, with Molly,” I told him, shaking my head.
He was a great guy, but he’d never win a sharp-crayon contest.

I could see the panic in Molly’s eyes as I approached.
It was amusing and hurtful at the same time.

“Hey ladies,” I said when I was close enough for them
to hear me over the screeching loud music.

“Hi Brock!” Megan said, “Hey look Molly. It’s Brock.”
Megan and Jake were really, really bad at this.

Molly grinned; she thought they were as bad at this as
I did. “Hi Brock,” she said, and then to Megan, with an admirable amount of
sarcasm she said, “Hey Megan, I see him.”

I tried to bump Megan aside, but she just moved over
to allow me in, so now we were all three dancing together. Girls were so weird.
You’d never see two guys dancing at a club…I mean at a straight club. Guys
wouldn’t even be comfortable dancing two guys and one girl. Maybe it was the
guys that were weird and not the girls.

The music ended, and as we were walking away from the
dance floor and towards the table that Jake had gotten for us I suddenly
blurted out, “So, we’ve shared a dance, now will you go out with me?”

Before Molly could open her mouth, Megan said, “She’d
love to.”

Molly looked at her, and Megan grinned. I couldn’t see
Molly’s face, and I couldn’t tell from behind if she was grimacing or not. When
we got to the table, still trying to prove I was a gentleman I said, “Molly, do
you want something to drink?”

“Sure, I’ll have water, if you don’t mind.”

Water? A girl after my own heart. The last few girls
I’d gone out with could drink me under the table. That was…if I drank.
 
I got our waters, and noticed her looking at
me when I turned back around. Was she checking out my butt? The commercial
about these jeans wasn’t lying.

“Here you go,” I told her.

“Thanks Brock,” she said with a smile. She was so
damned cute.

I sat down and suddenly, Jake and Megan had the urge
to dance. Once they were gone she shook her head and said, “They’re
ridiculous.”

I smiled, “Yes, they are,” I agreed. “You don’t have
to keep the date Megan volunteered you for,” I told her. “I understand.”

“What are we going to do?” she asked.

“When?” I said, proving that Jake wasn’t the only one
with a head full of fluff.

She laughed and said, “On our date. What were you
thinking we would do?”

“Oh um, see a movie, maybe?”

“Okay,” she said. Just like that, we had a date.

“Tomorrow night?” I asked.

“Okay,” she said again.

“Pick you up on Suzie at eight?” She opened her mouth,
I think she was going to say okay again, but then processed what I said.

“No,” she said, “I don’t do motorcycles.”

I smiled at her. “It would be a lot of fun,” I said.

“Yeah, I’m sure it would be,” she said, again with the
sarcasm. “Too much fun for me.”

“How will we get to the movies?” I said.

“The bus goes there.”

 
I waited for
the grin, to tell me she was kidding, but she was dead serious.

“Okay then.”

What else could I say?

I asked her to dance three times before I finally got
a yes. I was beginning to wonder if she just liked messing with me. As we were
dancing I said, “This music is crap. No wonder they’re looking for a band.”

She smiled and said, “From what I heard at your
concert the other day, you’re much better than this.”

I think she meant it, so I said, “Thanks.” Something
about this girl made me lose my vocabulary.

When we got back to the table, Jake and Megan left
again. Molly leaned over and looked at my right arm and said, “You have a
cancer symbol on your arm.”

I have tattoo sleeves. In the middle of a lotus
flower, next to a lily pad with a lime green frog on it, I had the artist slip
in a yellow ribbon. Most people never even notice it.

“Yeah,” I said. “I thought it was cool. You know, to
show my support.”

“Yeah,” she said. “That is cool. Did they hurt?”

“You don’t have any?” I asked her.

“Not a one. I’m not a fan of needles.”

I laughed. “Who is?” I asked her. “It’s not the same
as getting a shot, or getting blood drawn,” I told her. “It’s more of a scratching
sensation.”

“Oh,” she said. Then she added, “I’m not really a fan
of scratching either.”

I laughed; she looked like she was serious. All in
all, it was a great night, and I was so glad that I went.

The next day, I woke up with a knot of excitement in
my belly. I couldn’t wait to see her. As I mixed my juice and took my meds that
morning, it suddenly dawned on me that today was day four. Not a great day to
be going out on a first date. I thought about the movies and popcorn. Not that
I planned on eating any, but the butter smell was going to be enough to put me
over the top while we’re sitting there in that dark theater looking up at a
huge screen. I almost had to run to the bathroom and throw up just thinking
about it. Damn it! What was I going to do? I wasn’t going to cancel our date.

As I was thinking about it, I walked over to the
window and noticed that it was raining. I smiled suddenly as I realized that
was my out. “Thank you God,” I said it out loud and smiled. I grabbed my phone
and called Molly.

“Hello?”

The sound of her voice made my stomach do a
somersault. Jeez, I was a mess.

“Hey Molly. I was wondering if you minded terribly if
we changed up the date a little.”

“Okay,” she said. “What did you want to do instead?”

“I was just thinking, since our options were the bike
or the bus and it’s raining…maybe you would want to come to the apartment and
we could cook dinner and watch a movie here?”

She was suddenly silent. Shit, I blew it. She was
going to cancel now. She wouldn’t agree to it again, either. I should have just
risked it.

“Okay,” she said in the middle of my self-lashing.

“Okay…okay, great!” I said. I am astounding myself
with my words lately.

“I’ll ask Megan to drop me off,” she said. I couldn’t
stop smiling. I had to clean house, and go to the store and hide my
medications. Jake came out of his room then, doing that sleepy shuffle walk he
does every morning.

“Hey,” he said.

“Hey,” I told him as I went back to making my juice
drink. “Do you mind not being home for a while tonight?”

Jake grinned then. “You bringing Molly here?” he asked.

“Yes, but stop grinning like a pervert. I remembered
that it’s day four of my meds. I don’t want to be puking at the movies.”