Dinner Date

                                    

                                          
Tonight was the night. Dinner with Cedric at some fancy Italian place he'd booked, just on the outskirts of town. Honestly, it felt like a bad deja vu. I was already feeling the tension creep up my spine as I rummaged through my closet, desperately searching for something—anything—to distract myself from the ball of dread lodged in my stomach. After much internal debate, I finally settled on a red dress. It was a splash of color, a stark contrast to the dull ache growing in my chest.
When I walked into the restaurant, there he was—Cedric—waiting at the table with a practiced smile plastered on his face. We both slid into the plush wooden chairs across from each other, a painfully polite silence settling in between us. I could almost hear the awkwardness hanging in the air like a thick fog.
"So," I said, forcing some cheer I didn't feel, "what's all this about, Dric? We both know it's over. Just not working out, right?"
Cedric reached for my hand, and ugh, I could feel a weird jolt of revulsion shoot up my arm at his touch. "This is for you, Alexis. I know your dad's been on your case. I just want to... give you your freedom."
His words felt about as genuine as a cheap knockoff watch—empty promises, meant to fill the silence and nothing else. Or maybe it was just me, my mood, my mind spiraling as usual.
I let my gaze wander around the room, desperate for anything to break the tension. And then it landed on her—just behind Cedric, sitting at a nearby table. She was partially masked, but those eyes... God, they were so familiar, like déjà vu but with a twist. I couldn't place them, but they were locked on me, a silent observer, and it felt like something deeper was at play.
My gaze drifted down, almost against my will—to her lips. There was a shimmer of gloss catching the soft light, and a familiar curve that sent a jolt through me. It was like a punch to the gut—those lips, that smile, the warmth of her touch, the echo of her laugh... It all hit me like a flood.
My gaze lingered a bit too long, and I caught myself absentmindedly chewing on the corner of my lip. Great. Now I was doing the stupid things I used to do when I was thinking about her—Kim. The warmth of her kiss still lingered, like a ghost that refused to leave. It was the kind of warmth that tingled all the way to my core, and I couldn't shake the taste of her—the sweetness of it, with a hint of something warm and spicy, like cinnamon.
The weight of her gaze, still burning into me, only intensified the suffocating tension of my forced dinner with Cedric. A dinner that felt more like a chore than anything else. Freedom? Yeah, that's what I was after—but not like this. I was craving something more real, something I couldn't find in Cedric's rehearsed smiles and Dad's manipulative schemes. What I really wanted was a connection. Something genuine. Something that felt like the warmth of her touch, the laughter we shared—things Cedric would never understand.
"Freedom through marriage to you, Dric?" I scoffed, finally breaking the silence. "Yeah, that's not exactly my idea of a 'happily ever after.' Look, I don't feel that way about you. We're friends, okay? That's it."
Cedric's expression faltered, but he quickly recovered, trying to soothe the situation. "Don't be so hard on yourself, Alexis. You know you can't defy your father forever."
I rolled my eyes at that. As if that was ever the issue. But the words settled uneasily in my chest, like an itch I couldn't scratch.
Suddenly, I couldn't shake the feeling of being watched. I glanced up and saw her again—her—just behind Cedric. Leather jacket, hair spilling down her back, and the ever-present flash of grey from under the mask. She wasn't being subtle about it, either—darting glances in my direction like she was trying to figure out just how much trouble she could stir up.