Take Me by Surprise, It Will Blind Me

It was 11 AM and I was late to work. Arletta had me to print some of the designs and lists she sent me early in the morning and she was okay with me being late. When I walked into the boutique, one thing caught my attention; a vase of lilies sat on the cashier. I stopped and rested my sunglasses on top of my head.

"Is that new?", I asked Luna, who was behind the cashier. She looked up from whatever she was doing and glanced at the flowers first before nodding. 

"It's actually for you, miss. The florist dropped it off earlier when you haven't gotten here.", She explained. I narrowed my eyes and walked towards the cashier to check any identification of the sender.

There was a folded card between the flowers and when I opened it, there was a note. 'Lunch? -BS'. I had to look around the store and when I was doing a 360, my phone rang. I fished it out from my bag and tapped 'Answer' before placing it on my ear. "Hello?"

"Got the flowers?", the person on the other line asked. I could picture him smirking while asking me the question.

I rolled my eyes and went outside the boutique, not wanting Luna or anyone else eavesdropping to my conversation . "Ha ha, Brian.", I rolled my eyes again. "Are you in town?"

"Yeah. It's almost summer and I've done some of my classes before the finals, so I decided to come visit. I'm not intterupting anything, right?"

"Not at all.", I shrugged my shoulder. "Where are you now, though?"

"I'm still at the house, about to take a shower. You wanna join me? Reminiscing how we liked to shower together in Maldives... And continue...", he trailed off before chuckling.

"Jerk.", I giggled. Brian was like that, the whole sexual dirty jokes and all, but I didn't know why, he was the only one who could pull it off with me. Some of the memories in Maldives got replayed in my mind. How we liked to take a secret stroll on the beach at night, then we'd stop somewhere, he'd strip his shirt off and I'd take off my dress, leaving me only in my panties... "Dareen, are you there?", Brian asked on the phone, snapping me off from my daydream.

"Yeah, I'm here.", I said quickly. What was I thinking?! I thought I already deleted every memory from that summer. It was only a summer fling and I ignored him for good. Well, until now.

"So, lunch? I'll pick you up in an hour."

"Sure, lunch.", I smiled. This meant the old Dareen Turner came back.

Cameron

"It's not working!", I groaned and took off the headphones before stomping my way out from the recording booth. Every time I sing, Dareen always rushed into my mind and how she cried just because of me made me choked by my own saliva. 

Eric and David just looked at me when I got out and Eric rolled his eyes before leaving the studio. What was his problem? Because I almost made him broke up with Amy by my problem with Dareen? It wasn't my fault that Amy was so protective over her best friend. He had no rights to ignore me or get mad at me.

Annoyed by the situation, I followed Eric out and found him outside by the sidewalks. "What is your problem, man?", I confronted him right away.

He turned his head to me and narrowed his eyes. "You really wanna know what's my problem? Well, first off, you're a huge dick for what you did to Dareen. You know how she is with guys and relationship then you got the chance to change her but instead, you fucked up. Second, you're fucking selfish. Have you ever thought what could happen to other people because of your problems? Amy and I got into a huge fight because of you, I'm not blaming Dareen, but all the blame is on you, Cameron. You're alone. David and Wes, who clearly are now friends with her, took her side. You even hurt Wes for dating her."

"Well, I'm sorry about Wes because he's a pussy for not making a move to Dareen."

Eric's eyes widened on my words. That came out wrong. "No, I didn't mean that."

"Yeah, you actually did. Good job, Cameron.", then, he walked away, back into the studio. With that, I groaned loudly and pulled my hair out of frustration. Fuck every single person in this entire planet. I decided to take a walk to clear my mind, if that'd help.

I put on the hood of my jacket to covered my head and looked down to the ground instead of looking at people. The studio wasn't that far from downtown, so it was easy for me to go around. When I passed a crowded street, I had to stop to wait for the crossing light to turn green. A car stopped in front of me. The windows were darkly tinted but it wasn't that hard to recognize the familiar flaming red hair that I loved. "Dareen?"

It wasn't Amy's car and from what I've heard, Amy and Eric were going out for lunch, so no way she was with Amy. Could it be Feranix? I was so caught up in my mind that I didn't pay attention to the red light. It turned green and the car Dareen was in sped up. "Dareen!", I called out even though I knew it was useless.

I ran and followed the car driving down the street, turned left to the avenue and after a couple blocks, it stopped in front of a bistro. Didn't want to seem like a stalker, I stopped and crossed the street to sit in a bus stop. From my spot, I could see Dareen... And a guy?

She sat down on her chair after that Abercrombie mannequine pulled it out for her. I've never seen that guy before in my life but how could he even got a date with Dareen? Was this a date? They got into a cnversation and laughed here and then. It made my blood boiled out to see them like this, so I decided to burst Dareen's bubble.

I pulled out my phone and typed "having fun?" before texting it to Dareen. It was a matter of moment before I saw Dareen looking at her phone and do a 360 with her head. She spotted me at the bus stop and her eyes widened. Dareen excused herself from the unknown guy and rushed out, crossed the street towards me. I stood up and when she was in front of me, she pulled me to the back of the bus stop.

"What are you doing here?", she hissed. "Don't you have a life?"

"Well, yes I do, but I saw you in a car and I decided to follow you."

"That's called stalking."

"Oh, so I can't stalk the girl I love but she can have a date with another guy? Pretty classy.", I rolled my eyes. 

"Brian is just a friend, Cameron, he's Arletta's son. What do you care anyway?! We broke up, remember? And I made up my mind, I'm going to L.A and we're done! We're fucking done!", she stated. Hold on a second, did she say she was going to L.A?!

"L.A? What are you going to do in L.A?!", I asked quickly but she was already halfway crossing the street. One thing that was obvious; I lost Dareen.