Take Me by Surprise, It Will Blind Me

The store was quiet with only a few customers browsing through the racks of dresses and gowns that were hanging against the beige walls of the boutique. Some of the other shop attendants were serving the brides-to-be looking for their dream gowns and I just sat behind my desk in the back of the boutique. Being the manager of a bridal boutique when I didn’t believe in love was a bit ironic, but it was the fashion that made me interested to take this job two years ago.

It made me cringed to see all the girls that came here everyday with their moms and their friends to look for the gown that they would wear in the most special day of their lives. If I wasn’t scared on being fired and being homeless, I’d say something like ‘What if your groom left you at the altar because he found someone else on his way to the chapel?’ and such things.

Why didn’t I believe in love? Well, That was pretty simple looking at how my mom’s love life went. She and my dad got divorced when I was 5 years old because he cheated, then, she got re-married for 10 years until my step dad died in a car accident and mom found out he had another child that was 9 years old, so he cheated on her all those years, now, she was living her life alone. Without anymore explanation, I believed that true love doesn’t exist. It was just a stupid crap that people make to keep their little girls happy.

I was an only child, so it was pretty easy for me to open up to people, but to guys, I was the ice queen. Through out middle school and high school, I dated some guys but just for fun. I didn’t let them too deep nor too far to my heart or my mind, and I was the one who dumped them all along. It gave me a bad reputation, but I saw school as just a stop before the real world begins, so it wasn’t a huge deal to me.

When I was looking over to the new catalog that needed my approval, Amelia, my roommate and friend, burst into my office with a wide grin speared on her face. I looked over to the desk calendar and groaned on the note that she made herself when she did the routine of picking me up from work a month ago. It said ‘Jammin’ Java!’

“Do we really need to go?”, I asked her after slumping back onto my seat.

She still at the doorway without wiping that grin off her face. “Yup, and you don’t have any reason to not go.”

“What if I told you that I have a lot of work, I’m not up to get trashed afterwards, and I don’t wanna meet guys?”

“I could deal with the first and the second one, but Dareen, you’re a girl! A 20 year old, I might add, and you need a guy.”, she insisted as she walked over to the love seat I had against one side of the wall. Amy sat down and just looked at me hopefully. “Please.”

I sighed. “Fine, but I’m not up to go to the after party with the band.”, I rolled my eyes.

Amy jumped off from her seat and squealed. “I love you! Now, get your things done, I’ll wait in the car.”

With a nod, she left my office and I exhaled heavily. What did I just get myself into? Amy, and our other roommate, Feranix, had been trying to get me into guys seriously ever since we met in high school. They knew what happened to my mom, but they assured me that doesn’t mean it would happen to me. Even Amy had her line of ‘Divorce isn’t a disease’.

After I shoved all of my belongings into my bag, I stood up and slung it on my shoulder. As I walked out from the boutique, I locked my office and said bye to the others. It was already 7.30 PM, and the Virginia night was already taking over. It wasn’t that chilly but I just couldn’t wait for the heated air of the car.

“Ready?”, Amy asked enthusiastically when I slid into the passenger seat and buckled up my safety belt. She drove off the parking of the boutique strips where the shop was located. She worked at a music store a couple stores down, so it was a routine that she’d pick me up from work then we both would pick up Feranix at her work place, which was Jammin’ Java, because she worked as a barista.

“Who’s playing there anyway?”, I asked when we stopped at a red light. I looked over to Amy and she was just still grinning. “Amy… who’s there?”

“Well… Do you remember Eric from high school?”, she started.

I turned my mind around to find which Eric she was talking about. “Eric… as in…?”

She groaned and rolled her eyes in annoyance. It was an ‘Amy thing’ to do when she wanted me to know at the first guess, but I couldn’t. “Eric Jones… his band really made it.”

“Oh! Yeah…. Wait, hold on, wasn’t he your crush back then?”, I narrowed my eyes at Amy. She smiled slyly and I could see the pink bursts that appeared on her cheeks that lightened by the red light. “You’re dragging me as a third wheel?”

“Oh, no!”, she gushed and when the green light lit, she drove off. “I’m bringing you because… there are his friends, and plus, it’s Friday night, do you really think I’d let you rot in the apartment alone? Feranix would agree with me.”

I rolled my eyes and leaned my head onto the window. “You guys always agree with each other, especially when it comes to hooking me up with guys.”

We reached the parking lot of Jammin’ Java and I could feel the misery starting to take over. I had a lot of escape plans in my head, like going out from the back door or the window of the bathroom, or even get myself wasted so Amy had to bring me home.

“Now, Dareen.”, Amy looked over to me, deeply to my eyes, like she knew all of my escape plans. “I want you to be on your girl behavior in front of the guys inside.”

“Okay, mom.”, I scoffed and we got out from the car. The inside of the café wasn’t that crowded, only a couple groups of people that were scattered all over the seats. We spotted the brunette girl behind the cashier as Feranix as she served a guy.

I decided to just sit down on one of the armchairs that surrounded one small table near the windows as Amy walked over to Feranix. From afar, I widened my eyes when she hugged the guy that Feranix was serving. A moment later, I figured it was Eric that she talked about earlier.

Feranix finished her shift and took of her apron before walking over to me with two glass of ice coffee. “Thought you needed this.”, she smiled as she placed them on the table.

“Well thought.”, I nodded slightly and leaned over the drink to take a sip through the straw. She sat down across me and leaned back to her seat. “Is that Eric?”, I motioned to the guy Amy was still talking with.

“Yeah.”, Feranix nodded. “Apparently, he and his band are the hometown heroes over here.”

“I don’t get it how Amy could like one guy all of these years, better yet, I don’t get it how you guys could like a guy.”

“Here we go again.”, she rolled her eyes. They always did that every time I go into my rant about how guys could break our hearts unexpectedly. “Dareen, you gotta try to believe in guys, or you’ll live in paranoia all your life.”

I was in no mood to argue with her about that. It would be an hour long argument and we were in a public place. Taking my stare off Amy and Eric, I decided to let my eyes wander around the place. Somehow, they ended up at a group of guys who were laughing at something one of them saying.

One of them noticed me and smiled. Me, being the anti-guy self, just looked away, ignoring his smile.