One Step Forward and Two Steps Back

“I don’t like this,” Lauren said as she sat back with her arms crossed.

“What?” Travis asked looking across the table at her confused.

“You paying for me.”

“Are you serious? I brought you here. Shouldn’t I pay?”

“We should split it,” she said smirking at him.

“Not going to happen.”

“Yes it is.”

“No it isn’t.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“NO,” he said louder, but not loud enough for people’s attention to focus on them.

“Fine,” she said admitting defeat.

“I can see why you’re single,” he smiled while pulling a few bills from his wallet.

“I need to find a man though. Not many can handle this,” she smirked.

“You don’t need a man.”other than me.

“I don’t need one. I want one. Surprisingly, I like being in a relationship. I hate leaving for long periods of time, but once I come home and see that person… it’s just this amazing feeling inside. I can’t breathe, but I’m the happiest person,” she said as a smile crept across her lips.

Travis looked at her puzzled. “You’ve never had a serious boyfriend. How could you feel that way?”

She looked at him, dumbfounded for a few seconds. To him, she seemed to be trying to make sense of what she was going to say next.

“It’s just how I imagined it,” she said quickly and dropped her eyes from his.

Lauren never told Travis this, but she quickly forgot about him when she left for California. Things between them got weird for her. She noticed little things he did that she never had before. Like the way he looked at her. There was this desire in his eyes. Or the way he made little comments to her to make her laugh.

She also noticed him in general. Never really paying too much attention to him when he roamed around with no shirt on, she soon realized what she was missing three weeks before she left. Her best friend of nearly fifteen years had a body. There were other little things she noticed too. The way his eyes sparkled in the setting sun. The way his smiled had this power to make her insanely happy. The way his laugh always brought a smile to her face. She was falling.

She had to leave.

Being newly sponsored by Rockstar, she figured the team manager could help her out a bit. He said filming out in California with a fellow Rockstarer would be ideal for her. The same night she was packed and ready to leave the next morning. She hated breaking the news to Travis. His usual giddiness wasn’t there after she told him. She hated leaving him at the airport the most… until she saw the other person in the California airport.

Luke Parslow: Aussie BMX dirt demon with a bad boy attitude. Lauren was in heaven… until Travis came crawling back into her head about four months later. She liked Luke… as a friend. He wanted more from her, but she couldn’t. Her heart was on the other side of the country. It finally got to her a month later. She made up somebogus excuse to go home and see him. She tried her best to sound convincing when she told him that she wanted to cross back over to motocross. She honesty didn’t think he would buy it. She put her dirt bike away more than ten years ago and hasn’t touched it since. But he did. She has never heard him be so excited about something. She left California the next day, leaving Luke nothing but a note.

“So um… about the boyfriend thing,” Travis said breaking Lauren away from her thoughts. She looked up at him, waiting for him to go on. “Would you…”

He would have pushed more out if Lauren’s phone hadn’t gone off. She looked up at him apologetically while her phone was still playing Men at Work’s Land Done Under. His jealousy soon returned as he watched her disappear out the front door. He knew that ringtone. He knew whose number she had assigned that to.

“Why would he be calling her?” he thought as he sat there alone.

He wasn’t by himself for very long though. She returned within the next five minutes.

“I’m sorry. What were you going to say?” she asked nicely.

“I don’t know. I can’t remember. It must not have been very important,”he lied.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated as she looked down at her hands.

He debated whether or not to ask what Luke could possibly want, but quickly decided against it. It would probably only upset him.

“When we get home,” Lauren started as she finally looked up at him. “Do you want to ride some more?”

“No,” he said quickly, but soon wanted to take it back. Lauren’s features fell, making Travis feel bad for the way he replied. “I didn’t mean for it to come out rudely. I just had something planned for us when we got home,” he said explaining himself.

“What is it?” she asked as her face lit up.

“I can’t tell you,” he gasped acting offended.

“Sure you can,” she teased as they exited the restaurant.

All the way home, Lauren would not stop asking Travis what he had planned. He wasn’t about to tell her either. However, he did wish it was under different circumstances, but maybe something would change.