Heartbeats Away From Disaster

I watched as Craig took a bite of his sandwich and then chew it thoughtfully before he nodded his head. Wiping his mouth with a napkin, he swallowed what he had in his mouth and then offered his sandwich over to me.

"You should try mine, it's pretty good." He said, practically shoving the sandwich into my face.

"Craig, stop." I laughed. "I have the exact same sandwich as you, and I mean exact."

"Mine's better." He mumbled before he took another bite.

I rolled my eyes as I unwrapped my own sandwich (which was actually the other half to Craig's sandwich). As I began to eat my own meal, I turned my gaze from Craig and instead let my eyes take in the sights of the park around us. The cloudy weather we had had for the past week or so finally decided to give us a break, and the result was nothing but a beautiful blue sky, complete with a high of seventy-eight degrees, and a slight breeze passing through every so often.

"Babe, can you hand me my water please?" Craig's soft voice grabbed my attention, and I turned my eyes from the cloudless sky, glancing down at the plastic bag that contained our lunch.

I reached inside and pulled out a bottle of water, handing it over to Craig before I reached back in and pulled out my Mountain Dew; we were saving our cheap beer for later on. I opened my drink and took a sip before I replaced the cap and set it down beside me.

"So, how's work been, Mitz?" Craig asked through a mouthful of chips.

I nodded my head as I thought about my job as an event planner for a local chain of restaurants. I work with different organizations and charities in the city who are interested in renting out our restaurants for parties or events, contracting to use our chefs and catering of course. "It's been going good." I said. "Things get a little hectic from time to time, but, it's been going good."

"Anything exciting going on? Any big parties you guys got planned?"

"Well, right now we're working on the grand opening of the main restaurant." I explained. "Justin, the owner, sold a couple of his smaller buildings and invested on a bigger place. He's been renovating it for the past couple of months and it'll be finished within the next couple of days."

"Cool." Craig mumbled as he pulled a couple of slices of salami out of his sandwich, and stuck them in his mouth. He chewed on them a bit before he asked, "what kind of stuff do you have planned for that?"

"Well, I'm trying to get some of the big shots up in the elective offices to come on over and hang out because Justin is going to donate so much of the nights profits to the education system and stuff." I sighed. "I'm not too sure what else we're going to do, I haven't really thought it out too clearly yet." I admitted.

"Well, you'd better jump on that, missy." Craig teased. "This Justin Giovanni certainly does pay you a lot of big bucks to plan this shit out for him, it'd be a shame if you started slacking off now."

"Shush." I grinned. "It's not as easy as it sounds."

"Oh come on," Craig laughed, "Not even."

"Well, okay, if you're convinced it's so easy, why don't you throw out some ideas as to what we're going to do for the grand opening?"

"Easy," he smirked, "hire a rockin' live band and get them to entertain everybody."

I rolled my eyes, suppressing a smile. "It’s a restaurant, Craig, where the owner will be donating half of his profit. Mostly upper class people are going to be there, dinning, enjoying the evening mingling with other rich snobs, congratulating each other as to how wealthy they've all become."

Craig made a face at me and then wrinkled his nose. "Well in that case, I got nothin'." He mumbled.

Laughing softly, I shook my head and took another drink of my Mountain Dew. I licked my lips as I replaced the lid on my bottle and then let my eyes sweep around the rest of the park. Surprisingly there weren't as many people out as I thought there would be, what with the beautiful day and all. A family or two out with their kids, a couple of other people basking in the sunlight.

They all seemed so far away, though, that Craig and I might as well have been alone in the entire park. It's not saying much though, seeing as how when I'm with Craig, I always seem to be off in my own little world with him. I highly doubted that that's how he felt around me, though.

"My water tastes funny." Craig muttered.

"What's it taste like?" I asked, glancing back to him.

He took a tiny sip and then made a funny face. "I don't know," he replied before handing the water over to me, "taste it."

Eyeing him momentarily, I took a little drink. "It tastes perfectly fine to me." I insisted.

"I don't know," he frowned, "wanna trade drinks?"

"No."

Craig put on a fake pout, and leaned toward me. "Please?"

"You're such a baby." I grinned, handing my Mountain Dew over to him.

Instantly, his fake pout faded away and was replaced by a shy smile. "You didn't have to trade me, you know. I was only joking."

"Oh no, you weren't." I teased. "The pout might have been fake, but that look you gave me suggested you were totally serious."

Craig didn't say anything in response, but rather closed the short distance between us and pressed his lips softly to mine. Slow and gentle, it reminded me of our first kiss we had ever shared together. It seemed like such a long time ago when he stood out on my porch in the middle of the night, kissing me tenderly as if he were afraid I'd fall apart at his mere touch. It seemed so long since that night, when he touched me shyly and hesitantly like he were a little freshman boy still wasn't too sure how to touch a girl. In all reality it was just three and a half years ago ... not that long at all, compared to how long Craig and I have known each other.

Sighing quietly, Craig broke the kiss and pulled away from me, but scooted his body closer to me so that we weren't sitting so far away.

"That was nice." He admitted.

"Yeah, it was." I agreed.

He leaned over once more and kissed my forehead quickly before he went back to his food. We ate the rest of our lunch in silence save for the random comments here and there about whatever it was that would catch our attention at the moment. After we finished our food, Craig collected our garbage and put it back into the plastic bag, carrying it in one hand while he used his other to help pull me to my feet.

Holding tightly to my hand, he led me slowly through the park and back to the parking lot. Craig tossed our trash away in a garbage can we passed and then released my hand to wrap an arm protectively around my shoulders.

"You want to go home now?" He asked.

I wrinkled my nose, thinking about all the chores and laundry that was waiting for me there. "No," I mumbled, "not just yet."

"You wanna go to the arcade?" He suggested. "It shouldn't be too busy, it's a weekday and all the little high schoolers will be busy in school."

"Okay." I said and with that, Craig changed our direction and began to lead us toward the pizza and arcade place that was located a couple of blocks down the street from the park.

Within a few minutes time, Craig and I walked into the building to be greeted by the familiar smell of pepperoni pizza, and the stale smell of cigarettes.

"Mitz, can you get us some drinks while I get us some change?" Craig asked, handing me a ten dollar bill.

"What do you want?"

"Whatever you get." He said as he headed across the room to the change machine.

I walked up to the food line and asked the worker for two root beers. As he went off to get the drinks, I was approached by a guy who I recognized to be one of the bartenders at the restaurant. His name was Lyle, and he was the same age as Craig and I.

"Hey Mitzi." He smiled. "What are you doing here?"

"I didn't want to go home and do laundry just yet so we decided to stop by here." I replied, returning a soft smile.

"We?" He asked.

I motioned to where Craig was grabbing the quarters from the change machine. Lyle glanced at Craig before looking back to me. "Boyfriend?" He asked curiously.

Slowly, I shook my head. "Just friend." I clarified.

"I see." Lyle said quietly. "So, how's the planning going for the big grand opening?"

"Lousy." I frowned. "It's seriously been kicking my ass, I don't really know what to do for it."

"Well, maybe when you have some free time, you and I can get together and think of some stuff." He suggested shyly. "I mean, I've been kinda thinking about it too, but, maybe we can sort of bounce some ideas off of one another."

"That sounds good." I smiled. "I - "

I was forced to cut myself short Craig stepped in front of me, cutting Lyle clear out of my sight. "I think our drinks are ready." He said simply, pointing to the two large cups sitting on the counter top just behind me.

"Craig - "

"Come on," he said, shrugging off the fact that he had just interrupted me in the middle of a conversation, "I got our change, let's go play our Star Wars game." He said, handing me my drink before grabbing his own. Wrapping his arm around my shoulders once again, he steered me off to one of our favorite arcade games, leaving Lyle speechless beside the counter.

When we approached the game, I shrugged Craig's arm off meanly and glared up at him.

"What?" He asked, seeing the look on my face.

"You just rudely cut me off in the middle of my conversation with one of my friends." I stated. "You didn't even excuse yourself or apologize to him."

Craig's clueless look turned sour as he dropped his oblivious act. "I don't like how he was looking at you." He insisted. "So I wanted to get you away from him."

"For fucks sake, Craig, we were just talking." I mumbled. "About work of all things."

I watched as he pulled some quarters out of his pocket and jammed them into the coin slots. The game's music started up, indicating that we now had enough credits to play. "Didn't sound like it when he suggested that you two get together sometime." He muttered, turning to the screen.

"Whatever." I mumbled under my breath, turning to the screen as well.

I knew arguing with Craig wasn't going to get my anywhere, it never did. The only thing I accomplished while arguing with him, was making myself feel even more crappier than I did when I first decided to argue with him.

We played our game in silence for a good five minutes before Craig started to talk crap about me and the game, so I was forced to shoot a few slick comments back his way. The gloomy mood our little argument had set upon us drifted away as we laughed and joked around about who was the better player, and soon it was as if I had never been mad at him in the first place.

One thing about Craig, for whatever reason it was, I was never able to stay mad at the boy for long.

Some time later, after we had run out of quarters to continue playing, Craig jumped up and started back toward the change machine.

"Don't go anywhere," he called back to me, "save our spot, I'll be right back."

I nodded to him and then watched as he went to the change machine and fed his dollar bills into it. From across the room, I heard the quarters clang loudly as they fell to the little tray and Craig leaned over, scooping them into his hand. He made a move to come back, but stopped himself short when two very pretty girls called his name.

At that moment, as he turned his gaze in their direction, it's highly probable that any thoughts of me he had in his mind drifted away as he gave the girls his full attention. I frowned to myself as I felt that familiar sting of jealously stab me I the pit of my stomach and I looked away before I would witness him flirting with them. Short skirts and low cut tops; girls like that never did come with good intentions.

As I turned my attention away from Craig, I noticed that there were a couple of people hanging out by me, giving me a hesitant look.

"Do you guys want to play this game?" I asked.

"Oh, no, that's okay if you're still playing it." One spoke up.

"No, I'm done." I said simply as I stood up and grabbed my drink, making my way toward Craig.

To get his attention I had to tap him on the shoulder because he was still completely engrossed in his conversation with the girls.

Craig glanced over his shoulder and gave me a strange look when he realized it was me. "Mitz," he mumbled, "what are you doing here? I told you to save our spots."

I rolled my eyes as I motioned over my shoulder. "I couldn't wait forever, Craig; other people wanted to play it too."

"Oh, well, here." He said, handing me some quarters. "Go ahead and grab us another game somewhere, I'll join you in a few minutes."

I frowned at the quarters and then shoved them back into his hand. "I don't feel like playing anymore." I mumbled. "I wanna go home now." I said stubbornly.

"In a few minutes." He insisted.

"Whatever," I muttered, "I'll meet you back at the car."

With that, I shoved my way past Craig and his two 'fans', and walked out the door.

"Fucking hypocrite." I mumbled angrily to myself. "He can stand around talking to two people he don't even know, but I can't even talk about work to my friend? Douche bag."

Muttering a few more choice words, and calling Craig a bunch of inappropriate names, I walked back to the park alone, all the while, hoping deep down in side that Craig would ditch the girls and come running after me.

That wasn't the case though; that was only a guarantee at night time, when Craig wanted to get into my pants. We were out in broad daylight, though, where Craig's actions were never predictable.

"Mitzi, you gotta talk to him." I said aloud to myself. "That's all there is to it. If you don't, the damn boy is gonna drive you insane."