Taylor

Jordan peered at me over her coffee with concern as she took a sip. We were sitting in a coffee shop having something to drink. After my nightmare, I'd been trying to avoid talking about it, but she wasn't letting it go. I tucked a stray piece of hair behind my ear while I stirred my sugar into my coffee.

"So are you going to tell me what your nightmare was about?" she asked as she set her coffee cup down on the table. I knew that she thought she was helping by pushing the subject, but she wasn't. I'd been through this with enough shrinks to know that some things could be 'fixed,' but some things were scarred into your soul and there was no fixing that. You just had to learn how to live with it, and I had. Most days I was fine.

People dealt with stressful events differently. What should have crushed me made me stronger, and I promised to make sure every day counted. I'd turned it around and used it to drive me to live life to the fullest. But that didn't mean that I liked to think or talk about the event that had changed my life.

"I don't want to talk about it," I replied firmly as I wrapped my hands around my cup.

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to push it," she said. "It's just that you're my friend, and I don't want you to hurt."

I reached for her hand and gave it a squeeze.

"I know that. I'm okay," I reassured her. "Most of the time I'm okay, it's just that something yesterday seemed to trigger it again."

"What happened?" she asked as she took another sip of her coffee. I bit my lip for a moment.

"Nothing, forget about it," I said, deciding that it was my overactive imagination working overtime. Her forehead creased slightly as she frowned.

"You sure?" she asked. I nodded my head at her.

"I'm surprised you haven't been at me for details of my night with Sin," I said, effectively changing the subject.

"I hadn't forgotten about that. I want details," she said, happily changing the subject.

"It was..." I paused for effect. "Earth shattering."

Her smile widened at my blushing face when I remembered how good it had been.

"He just never struck me as the type to do a virgin."

Well, in the beginning he wasn't. I still didn't know what had actually made him change his mind.

"When I first asked him he turned me down," I revealed to her.

"Really," she said, looking at me curiously. "I wonder what made him change his mind."

I shrugged. I had no idea. If I thought back to our conversation, I think it was the fact that he was scared that someone with bad intentions would do what he'd refused to. I didn't know why he'd cared. The main thing was I wasn't a virgin anymore, and the experience had been amazing. My stomach fluttered at the memories.

Later that day, I was doing laundry when I realized a couple of items of my clothes were missing.

"Have you seen my purple underwear and matching bra?" I asked Jordan when I got back to the room. I thought the missing items might have gotten mixed up with her stuff because I remembered wearing them.

"No," she said, shaking her head. She was sitting on her bed with a couple of books open doing some studying.

"You can look through my stuff if you want," she offered.

"No, it's fine. I'm sure I'll find them," I mumbled as I began to look through my clothes. A half an hour search through my stuff still didn't turn up the missing items.

Connor phoned to check up on me, and I forgot about the missing underwear. We had our usual conversation. He asked me about college and my classes, and I asked him about work and his non-existent love life.

"Come on, let's go to movies," Jordan suggested a little later that day. "I can't look at another book and I'm tired of being cooped up in the room."

I was lying on my bed reading a book. I closed it and sat up.

"Sure."

The walk to the theater wasn't far. We were walking side by side when I looked up and saw Sin. The sight of him jolted me unexpectedly. He was standing just outside a popular bar that was just down the street from the movies. It was the first time I'd seen him since we'd had sex. I couldn't stop the flutter of butterflies in my stomach at the sight of him. He was dressed in jeans and a black top that emphasized the tattoo sleeve on his arm.

The fluttering butterflies died a slow and agonizing death when I spotted him chatting to a girl. The girl had long auburn hair that nearly reached her waist. She was beautiful. I didn't know if it would make me feel any better if she weren't. It probably wouldn't. It didn't matter. Pretty or not, he was with another girl.

He was just a one-night stand, and it wasn't supposed to hurt. But against all my logical thinking, it did. I wanted to look away and pretend I never saw it, but I couldn't pull my eyes away from them. Jordan slowed down beside me. Her eyes followed mine to Sin and the girl. I knew what I was getting into when I'd suggested the one-night stand, but I hadn't planned on seeing him move on to another girl the next day. It was hard to watch. He smiled at the girl, and I felt like someone had knocked the wind out of me.

Jordan gave me a sympathetic look. They were directly in our path, and I just wanted to turn around and go back to the dorm room before he saw me. But I stopped myself.

You're not going to turn around and run, I told myself. You're going to walk past him, and you're going to say hi. And then you are going to walk away with your head held up high.

"Do you want to go back?" Jordan asked gently, and I shook my head.

I can do this. I swallowed hard, not sure I'd be able to do it without showing how hurt I felt. I took a deep breath and expelled it.

"Okay," I said before I changed my mind and ran.

We started walking again. Sin noticed me first, and he smiled at me. It was a knowing smile, that type of smile that said he knew every inch of my body. And, well, he did. I couldn't help imagining him doing the same with the redhead he was talking to, and I felt like someone had gutted me. I gave him the best smile I could muster. It was a tight one, which never reached my eyes.

"Hi," he greeted us and the girl he'd been talking to turned around to look at us. She was dressed in a short miniskirt and a crop top that showed off her firm midriff. I felt frumpy dressed in a pair of jeans and a loose shirt.

"Hi," I said, trying to keep my voice calm, but I was feeling so much I had no idea if I was actually holding it together.

Jordan never greeted him; instead, she just nodded her head at him. I think if she'd opened her mouth she would have told him off or said something she shouldn't have. I didn't want to make a scene. I was hurt enough, and I didn't want to make a fool of myself on top of that.

"Where are you guys headed?" he asked. I didn't know if he was actually interested or if he was just making conversation.

"To the movies," Jordan said.

"Well, it was nice seeing you again, Taylor," he murmured with his gaze fixed on me.

I gave him a brief nod and pulled my eyes from him. Jordan linked her arm through mine, and we walked away. I'd been through plenty of stuff in my life that had been hard, but that had been one of the most crushing experiences of my life.

Was this a taste of heartbreak? If it was, I hoped I never fell in love to ensure I never had my heart broken. This brief encounter had hurt me and bruised my ego, but I was strong enough to pick myself up and carry on. It wasn't like Sin had done anything wrong. What we shared didn't last longer than one night together. It was my fault for getting too attached to him.