The Chase, Amber Riel [learn to read books TXT] 📗

Running Errands

          Bright sunlight shone through the sliding glass doors from the balcony of my apartment, waking me from my sleep.  I sat up the lonely queen size bed made for two and looked around the quiet depressing room as I took a deep breath and memories plagued my thoughts as I blinked a couple of times to wake up.  It had been a couple of years since I lost everything…. At least a part of me was gone.  The ghost still filling the room with sadness from the few pictures I had of her.  Christy, I miss you more and more as the days go on, why did you have to leave me so soon?

          I stood up and walked over to the long black dresser I had let her pick out when she was a live.  I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of any of her things because of the fact that if I did then I would have felt like I was telling her good bye for good and that was something I wouldn’t aloud myself.  I opened the drawer and pulled out a grey tank top which I had cut the sleeves off because of the fact it was old and the sleeves had been falling apart anyways and slid it over my head and slid my arms in it.

          Riiing…. Riiing…. Riiing.  I walked over to my cordless phone which sat on the little round end table next to my bed and looked at the caller id.  It read: Williams Ron.  I figured that it was either Ron or his wife Annastia who everyone calls Annie for short.  I had a feeling it was Annastia because she had kept reminding me that her sister was supposed to be arriving from America and she wouldn’t leave me alone about it for nothing.  I hit the talk button and placed the phone up to my ear.  “Hello?” I asked.

          “Hey, Louis,” Annastia’s soft kind voice spoke over the phone.

          I knew it.

          “Um…. Look I was wondering if you could go to the airport this afternoon to pick my sister up….”

          “Why?  I thought Ron was going to do that?”

          “Yea but he had to rush to work for a meeting and I’m kind of busy with Lainie right now…. Please?”

          I rolled my eyes.  I knew what she was hoping for but it wasn’t going to happen.  “I don’t know, Annie,” I replied.

          “Come on, please?  It’ll do you both some good and she’s single.”

          “I don’t care if she’s single.”

          “Louis, please?”

          I sighed.  “Your sister?  She’s the one who was your maid of honor at the wedding right?”

          “Yea.”

          “Fine but all I’m doing is picking her up from the airport and dropping her off…. Nothing more than that…. I don’t need a relationship right now…. Christy would---”

          “It’s been a couple of years, Louis…. She would want you to move on,” Annie’s voice had dropped to a sad sympathetic tone.  “I know how much you love her but she’s gone now and you should start to move on with your life…. It’s not your fault she’s gone and I know that you’re never fully going to get over her but you need to move on.”

          I sighed because I didn’t want to argue with Annie.  She was a good friend and meant well.  “I’m going to pick up your sister and drop her off…. That’s all…. I’m not going to try to get to know her and fall in love even though that’s what you want.”

          I heard Annie’s breath as she sighed.  “Okay.  Thank you, Louis.”

          “Sure.”

          “Which airport do I need to go to?”

 

          I climbed into my small black Renault Clio with dark tinted windows and placed the car into the ignition as I started the engine.  The car was my baby.  When I first laid eyes on her at the dealership, I knew she was meant for me and no one else.  She had one door on each side and a small backseat but the only way to actually get to the backseat was by pushing on of the two seats forward into the dash board.  Her black metal skin shined through the sun and with the air conditioning didn’t let the heat in as easily.

          Working on cars was a hobby of mine and when I was going to the university, I had an engineering job to help me pay off the loans before they grew and ruined my life for good.  I knew which cars were best to have and which were the worst to have and when I had found mine I knew it would be worth it.

          Now, let’s get this over with.

 

          I stood holding a sign in my hand, waiting and watching for Samantha Moore the one woman I could care less to see.  I had remembered her from the wedding.  She was kind of clumsy in her high heels she had been wearing and I had to catch her as we walked down the aisle after Annie and Ron left the building.  As I waited I had placed dark sunglasses over my eyes even though I was getting disturbing looks from other people as they had walked past.  I could have cared less.  It wasn’t the place I wanted to be.

          I looked over and noticed a woman with dark brown almost black hair tied in a ponytail as she worked her way searching for someone.  I recognized her at first glance.  Damn, it’s worse than I thought…. She’s even more beautiful now than she was then, I thought to myself.  I wasn’t going to let her know that though.

          She had looked around for a few more moments until she finally spotted me.  Clearly, she hadn’t seemed to recognize me which made me feel good at the moment.  I watched her as she made her way over to me.

“I’m Samantha Moore,” she told me.

I surveyed her with my eyes, remembering her beautiful pale skin and dark brown eyes which made me feel lost and hopeless.  I took a moment and nodded.  “I’m Louis Matthews,” I replied.

“I have some luggage that I need to get before leaving.”

“Whatever.”  I knew it was rude but I wasn’t going to break my barriers for some woman who I had met once before.  It was pointless to me and her beauty hadn’t meant that much to me.

“I’ll be back,” she replied and I could tell by her tone that she had acted like she hadn’t noticed my tone.

 “Okay.”  I knew it was obvious that I didn’t want to be there but I didn’t care.

She didn’t respond, instead she turned around and left.

 

          I waited for Samantha to return with her luggage which had seem to take a little while.  What is she doing?  How much luggage does this woman have?  I mean seriously…. It shouldn’t take this damn long to grab luggage.

          A heavy set dark skinned man walked over to me.  He had black curly hair and dark brown eyes.  He seemed to be a tourist with an open blue American button up shirt with flowers and a white tank top underneath.  His shorts were long and dark brown with a black fanny pack?

          What kind of man wears a fanny pack?

          A black camera with a match black strap was hanging around his neck.

          Tourists are strange.

          “Excuse me, sir,” the man’s low deep voice asked as he approached me, “me and my wife….”

          Good he has a wife…. Good sign…. I hope….

          “Were wondering can you tell us where the nearest hotel is from here?”

          I nodded.  “If you go three miles,” I began as I pointed in the directions for them, “down the main road you should be able to spot a nice little inn on the corner…. Mind you, you must make a right when you leave from here and just keep going straight for three miles and you will find it.”

          “Thank you, sir…. And don’t let my wife hear you talk because she has a thing for accents, especially British accents,” the man joked as he began to walk away.

          I kind of smiled and sighed as I watched him  leave with a woman who was about twice his size.  One ugly looking woman, I thought.  I normally don’t judge by looks but she had to have been the ugliest looking woman in the world.  I guessed that was what people meant when they said love was blind.

          I looked around some more when I spotted this odd looking guy who had seemed kind of suspicious to me.  He was skinny with dark colored skin almost making him look like an Indian.  His face had seemed as if his cheeks were being sucked in from the inside of his mouth.  I knew something was off about him but I had no clue what.

          “Okay.  I’m ready to go now,” Samantha’s voice had broken my train of thought which had kind of ticked me off.  I looked at her and noticed she had three other bags of luggage with aside from the one she had when she first found me.

          “Took you long enough.”  I snatched the luggage out of her hands and began to walk out of the building.  I didn’t bother to ask her what had taken so long because I was just ready to leave finally.

 

          We arrived at my car and I knew she was probably thinking some kind of ridiculous thought about me.  I dropped her luggage on the ground, kind of throwing them down.

          I watched as her mouth dropped with anger.  “Be careful with those they have some breakable things that are important to me.”

          I looked at her and shook my head.  I was shooting her the dirtiest look imaginable.  “Important….” I kind of laughed, snottily.  “Whatever.”  I unlocked the trunk of my car and lifted the back.  I picked up the woman’s luggage and tossed them into the trunk one by one.  I didn’t care if there were breakables or not so I just tossed them in careless because they were probably pointless anyway.

          She just shook her head out of anger.  I watched as she went to reach for the handle on the driver’s side of the car…. My side of the car.

          “What are you doing?” I asked as I closed the trunk and locked it.

          “I’m getting into the car.”

          “That’s the driver’s side…. The passenger side is on the right.”  I didn’t have to look to know that she shot a dirty look at me.  I didn’t want an American woman trying to take over my car.  I had no clue what she was thinking but I didn’t care.  It was my car.

Samantha slid down on the black leather seat of the car as I climbed into it and lightly closed the door.  Samantha, on the other hand, slammed it which ticked me off.

          “Don’t slam the door.”

          “Too late.”

          “Stupid damn American,” I muttered under my breath.

          “Excuse me?” Samantha asked, I knew she was kind of ticked off and insulted but I didn’t care.

“Nothing.”  I placed the key into the ignition and cranked the car.

The air conditioner had popped on and slowly cool air began to fill the little car.  It was quiet for a while.  The cool air had filled a long, awkward silence which I didn’t mind.  Neither of us had bothered to say a word to one another.

 

The silence didn’t bother me even though we had been driving for a few hours.  The only thing that bothered me had been the woman who I didn’t exactly want in my