Chapter 4

Abbey and Anne just finish dinner when there is a knock at the door, followed by someone letting themselves in. It is Abbey’s cousin Melissa, for some much needed girl bonding time. Melissa is short and pudgy and adorable. She runs over to her grandmother and into her arms, as if they never see each other.  Abbey leaves Melissa with their grandmother and runs into her room to change. She puts on a cute skirt and tight tank top and some makeup and looks in the mirror, “single girl on the prowl….” She says aloud to herself.

Melissa runs in and they hug each other “HEYY! Oh we have so much to catch up on!”

“Yeah, we do… just from the last week or so! Let’s hope my fake ID works. I need a drink.”

“This is Florida, it will work. I promise. Most likely the bouncer will be too damn stupid to know otherwise” Even though Melissa lives in Florida now, she is from NY and took the attitude down there with her. “By the way; abs, you look hot!”

“Really? I think I look silly in skirts… ha-ha but thanks” Melissa and Abbey say goodbye to their grandmother and head out.  “So, where are we going?”

“To this beach bar, tons of hot guys every time I go”

“Sweet, def what I need”

“So fill me in quick, cliff notes version we will be there soon”

“Okay, so I got in a major fight with Shaun, and we finally got to a good point in our friendship, and Ricky and I realized what we had, and we made love a few nights ago.”

“Well it’s about damn time you and Rick gets together. Wait so why do you want to meet other guys? What about Ricky?”

“He won’t talk to me; he said some nonsense about wanting me to make up my mind before I speak to him again. And just last night we had another fight he said none of it was special.”

“Make up your mind about what?”

“Your guess is as good as mine! He told me to have my head screwed on straight when I talk to him again. What an a*s right? All I know is that I want to forget about him, and meet some southern hottie to take up my time here!” They pull into “The Tikibar” and get in without a problem.

“Told you! I knew your ID will work, ha-ha!”

“Yeah, well let’s head to the bar.” As they are walking to the bar, Abbey locks eyes with a tall tan blond hottie over by the bar. She quickly looks away and lets Mel lead her to the bar, just happens to be right next to him.

“Come here often?” Abbey is taken aback, not realizing that southern guys actually say that still.          

She turns to him, “huh? Oh me? Um actually; no, I don’t… not from around here”

“Where are you from?”

“New York” Melissa jumps in and says she is from Florida; he looks at her, and then looks back at Abbey.

“So, New York… what’s your name??”

Abbey is having a hard time forming sentences, for some reason this random guy has her more nervous than both Ricky and Shaun ever have. “Abbey, you?”

“Tristan, so are you shy or just nervous?” he flashes his picture perfect smile and Abbey can feel her face turning red.

“I am shy and nervous... Ha-ha” Abbey giggles and looks down at the ground.

“And very cute” Tristan takes his finger and lifts her chin, and asks “what you drinking tonight sweetie?”

“Bud light, please” Abbey figures she might as well get a free drink out of this hottie, little did she know it was going to be more than just a drink.

Melissa sees that she is becoming the third wheel, so she decides to go to the other side of the bar to some of her friends, leaving Abbey to fend for herself.

Tristan keeps her drinks coming, and they talk for hours. Abbey is impressed with Tristan, not only is he older but he has a good head on his shoulders and he is incredibly sexy. Not the typical guy you meet at a bar.

“Well, New York, this has been fun, I’m thinking’ we should do it again sometime?”

Abbey nudges him a little and smiles “Are you going to call me New York all the time? Or do you just not remember my name?”               

Tristan takes his phone out of his pocket, types something and hands it to her. “Here, Abbey. Put your number in here”

Abbey takes his phone and types her number in and calls herself. “Here, I called myself so I have your number.” Abbey takes her phone out of her bag to save his number when she sees she has a few missed messages. She decides to ignore them, and save Tristan’s number and quickly put it away.

Melissa makes her way over to her cousin and puts an arm around her. “You ready girl?”

“Yeah, let’s go. Nice meeting you Tristan”

“You too sweetie, and you definitely will be hearing from me soon, I will miss that smile” Tristan reaches to Abbey and hugs her “Mm vanilla, my favorite scent” Tristan kisses her neck and she pulls away quickly.

“Good night, Tristan” Abbey smiles and walks out of the bar.

 

“Well, I think it’s safe to say that Ricky is soon to be history?”

“Tristan is definitely going to make Florida more fun, but Ricky will never be history to me. I really love him Mel, I didn’t realize how much until I feel like I have lost him. I don’t understand why he is angry at me. It makes no sense at all. He keeps saying I need to make up my mind. That is what confuses me the most. I DID make up my mind, when we made love!”

“Okay, well maybe something else happened that you are not remembering, so start at the beginning of the party, you were drinking right? Ha-ha”

“Yeah, I was… okay so I was hanging out at Matt’s house before the party, Ricky came by and we ate breakfast and watched TV for a while. We decided to go out for a swim, and when I came out of the bathroom Ricky was standing there only in his suit... Mel, I don’t know how I never saw it before, but damn Ricky is gorgeous!”

“Ha-ha! You never noticed that before? I only met him that one time, a few years back, Abs he is not only gorgeous but he is a great guy, you don’t see that often”

“Yeah, thanks for rubbing it in Mel. Anyways, I tripped over air and dropped everything in my hands… hah! What can I say; it hit me hard how drop dead gorgeous he is. It’s funny, I have seen him shirtless before but I never really looked…” Abbey stops for a second and closes her eyes and pictures Ricky and feels a tear falling. She quickly opens her eyes and continues the story.

“Anyways, so we were in the pool and he tried asking me what happened inside but I ignored him. I was hoping he didn’t notice it ha-ha. Shaun walked in and we talked for a minute, and Ricky came over all overbearing and jealous”

“And that’s different from any other time, how?”

“Okay so Ricky might do that, all the time but this time it was more boyfriend like than before.”

“Okay, continue”

“So we decided to go for a swim, and I dove in and swam to the shallow end and quickly swam back because Ricky looked so f*****g sexy at the other end. And we almost kissed when Shaun jumped in”

“Oh yeah, Shaun is REAL good at being friends, huh”

“Yeah, well “ Abbey was going to defend Shaun when she realized it wasn’t her job to defend him anymore.  “After that we went our separate ways and I went to drink with the girls and I drank a lot and stumbled over to…” Abbey stops mid sentence when she realizes this is where her memory from that night starts to get fuzzy.

“Over to? Who? Ricky?”

Abbey starts to get a bad feeling in her gut, “I think it was Ricky? I wanted it to be Ricky”

“Abbey, what the f**k is that supposed to mean? Was it or was it not Ricky?”

“I, I uh... I don’t know.”

“Well what happened next?”

“I woke up in a bedroom, and we started making out and we had sex”

“Who is ‘we’ Abbey?!”

“It had to be Ricky, why would Shaun have sex with me?”

“It’s not like you and Ricky were regulars at it either, Abs. You need to figure out who you went to bed with. This could explain why Ricky isn’t talking to you. Maybe it wasn’t him after all”

“So what, should I ask him if it was him I fucked at Matt’s party? All of this explains why he doesn’t think it was special… maybe it wasn’t him in the first place. What should I do???”

“I don’t know, Abs… just give him time maybe?”

“Ugh, well I am going to go inside and get some sleep. Good night Mel, see you tomorrow?”

“Yeah, sure. Good night Abs…”

Abbey walks inside and slides into bed and hugs her bear. “What did I get myself into?” she says aloud and starts crying into her bear, again.

The next morning, Matt is pacing back and forth in his room holding his phone. “I have to tell her, she deserves to know what really happened that night.” Matt searches for Abbey’s name and hits ‘send’

Abbey is lying awake in bed when her phone rings, seeing it is Matt she answers “Hey! I am sorry for bolting the other day without saying goodbye, I was out of it”

“Hey, nah it is cool don’t worry about it. Look, Abs I need to talk to you”

“What’s up?”

“You know, Shaun is one of my best friends and normally I take his secrets to the grave, but…”

“Matt, to be honest I don’t really care about Shaun at this point. His issues are the furthest from my mind. Right now all I am thinking about is Ricky and wondering why he will not talk to me” Abbey realizes that she is actually telling Matt something that is bothering her, and smiles that she is finally letting him in.

Matt is enjoying having Abbey confide in him and plays along as if he doesn’t know anything. “Ricky isn’t talking to you?”

“No, you saw us in the pool right? We almost kissed, and Shaun ruined it. Then Ricky took me to bed, after I passed out on his lap and we ended up making love. It wasn’t just sex, I swear, it was so much more than that. I guess only to me, because Ricky said none of that night was special and he basically told me to leave him alone. What should I do, Matt?”

“I would wait it out, Abs. You know how Ricky is and how he has felt about you for the past few years; I doubt that he is mad at you, especially after sleeping with you. He probably wants you to enjoy your summer away from everything and enjoy being single before he steals you away in the fall.”

“I never thought of it that way, he did say that I really needed to get away and have fun in Florida. Maybe that is what he meant!”

“Prolly”

“Thanks, Matt. You have no idea how much you calmed me down. That is totally something Ricky would do. It explains everything. He wants me to take the summer to be free and single and knows that when I get back I will have my mind made up to be with him…” Abbey smiles to herself and then realizes that Matt called her and obviously had something to tell her. “So, what did Shaun do this time?”

“Oh, um nothing, never mind. I got to go. I’ll talk to you later Abs.

“Okay? Bye Matt.” Abbey looks at her phone and remembers she had some missed messages earlier.

She lets out a loud shriek when she sees one is from Ricky.

“Hey, Abs… I just heard ‘Walking in Memphis’ on the radio and you popped into my head. I hope you are having fun in Florida. Love you”

Abbey is so excited to get a normal message from Ricky. She starts to think that maybe they need to just forget about that night. They have been best friends for such a long time it might be impossible to be more. “I hope you sang along to it at the top of your lungs for me! Ha-ha. Love you too”

Abbey didn’t realize how late it was, and realizes she needs to get some sleep considering her Grandmother will be in to wake her up for Church in just a few hours.