Hello everyone! Thanks for coming back to another chapter. I will warn you, that I was extremely unmotivated to write this chapter so it is a bit... boring? I apologize in advance but I promise you that the next few chapters will be better! Thanks for your continued support to this story, as always!
Name: Gwen Richards
Location: Movie Theatre
Time: 9 pm
"I need another order of fries, Bridge!" I call out to the back of the house. I hear a "got it!" and the sizzling of fries being dropped in a fryer.
It was rush hour at the movie theatre, and luckily for us, the last rush before we had to close up for the night. I sigh and read more of the orders coming through onto our screen.
Pretzel bites, a wrap, 2 slices of pepperoni pizza, and a poutine... Got it.
I start working away at the orders with ease and I see Bridgette bring out some fresh pretzel bites as well as the fries for the poutine. I give her a smile and continue to work away.
"So" Bridgette piped up while grabbing the 2 slices of pizza and clearing the order off the screen. "Do you think that you and Trent will have another date together?"
I give a small chuckle and give the customer their order of pretzel bites. "I don't know yet, Bridge. I don't want to look like a gold digger now that I know he has money in his family." She rolls her eyes and finishes making the poutine and hands it over to me.
"You can't be a gold digger if no one knows that he's rich, Gwen! The only people who know are you, me, Leshawna, and him. Besides, I heard some whisperings throughout the movie theatre that Trent is thinking about going out with you again."
Damn, word goes around fast here
"Damn, word goes around fast here" I repeat out loud. Bridgette laughs
"Well duh Gwen! This is the most exciting thing that's happened here since Eva went on a date with that beggar on the street who's always on the corner of Furpool and Rodney! And you know how THAT story ended"
I laugh and give out the wrap to the last waiting customer, "I totally forgot about that! Why did you remind me of that horrible day?" she laughs as well.
"Sorry but if I have to remember that horrible memory then you have to, too!"
"Remember what?" DJ asks while leaning over the counter.
"Uh DJ? Your elbow is in a pool of gravy" Bridgette points out while laughing a bit. DJ makes a sour face and lifts his arm, drops of gravy come off of his elbow.
"URGH! Nasty! And THIS is why I will NEVER work on prod!" I grab some paper towel and give it to him while laughing.
"Here you go" he grabs it and wipes the gravy away.
"This is so nasty... Anyways! What are we remembering?" DJ asks while dropping the gravy cover paper towel in the garbage.
"Oh! Remember that time that Eva went on a date with that street beggar?"
"The one that was always on the corner of Furpool and Rodney?!" DJ exclaims, "Holy shit do I ever! That was SO funny! I couldn't believe my eyes when Geoff pointed it out to me!" he starts to laugh, "Oh man, I totally forgot that happened until just now! That was so iconic for the WRONG reasons!"
"DJ!" a yell echoes across the hallway. We all look to see Eva giving a glare that could put you 6 feet under in a heartbeat. DJ stops laughing immediately and mumbles.
"I guess I'm going back to work..." and with that he scurries away.
Bridgette and I watch DJ leave before looking at Eva, her glare still shooting daggers at us. With that cue, we decided to hurry to the back of the house and prepare to close for the night.
Name: Gwen Richards
Location: Movie Theatre
Time: 11 pm
"As always. I am impressed at how efficient you two are at closing for the night" Chef says while finishing up our walk through. I see Heather scowl in my peripheral vision as she continues to scoop up and throw away popcorn from the popcorn machine while barking at the other people who were working on the tills that night to work faster. I give Bridgette a smirk and she returns it.
"Thanks Chef" we both say in unison.
"You two are dismissed for the night. I hope you two work together again soon so I can keep my sanity." Chef says while rubbing his temples. "Almost everyone in here is incompetent except maybe 5 of you... it's embarrassing at how low our bar is these days for our youth". Bridgette and I look at each other questionably, shrug, and head our way to the staff room.
"So, about my question earlier..." Bridgette starts while we enter the staff room and grab our things.
"Which one?" I ask, trying to play dumb.
"Oh please Gwen, spare me the time and just tell me! Would you and Trent go on another date if the opportunity arises?"
I shrug in response and Bridgette groans in annoyance. "Fine. Keep your secrets from me. I'll find out eventually"
"Whatever Bridge" I chuckle, "hurry up and get ready so we can leave together!"
She mutters in response and starts to change her clothes. I sit on a chair and start scrolling through Instagram stories.
Geoff's story comes up with a classic video of him at a club with the caption: Party time baby!
I roll my eyes.
Leshawna's story is her and her sister about to eat a charcuterie board, captioned: Sister bonding time with amazing food!
I start to swipe over the stories that I didn't care about until I come upon Duncan's story. My finger immediately stops and I feel my heart hurt a little bit. The picture was a selfie with him, Courtney, and their dog. It wasn't the picture that hurt me, but the caption: I couldn't imagine a life without CourtneyCIT. I love you baby!
"Ew. Talk about SAPPY!" I jump from the chair and spin around to see Bridgette looming over me and looking at the story from over my shoulder.
"AH! BRIDGE!"
"What?! It IS!"
"You scared the SHIT out of me!"
"Oh. Sorry" she said unapologetically and shrugged. "But I AM correct that that is super sappy, right? I wouldn't have guessed that Duncan had a soft side"
"Yeah... Strange how that works, huh?" I say quietly, still a little hurt.
"Okay let's go home. I want to take a shower and go to sleep" Bridgette says. I stand up and grab my bag.
"Honestly... Same. Let's go."
Name: Gwen Richards
Location: Bedroom
Time: 12:15 am
I lay in my bed and snuggle deep into the sheets.
"Man... What a long ass day..." I mumble before closing my eyes and trying to fall asleep.
Couldn't imagine a life... I love you baby... CourtneyCIT...
"Fuck"
I grab my phone and go to Instagram to find Duncan's story again. After finding it, I stare at the photo of Duncan and Courtney for 10 seconds... then 30... then 1 minute goes by... then 2 minutes. The more I looked at it, the more envious I got. The more I looked at it, the more my heart hurt. The more I looked at it, I knew that what I wanted and what was reality were not possible.
"Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!" I mumble to myself before turning off my phone and burying myself deep into my covers. "Stop it, Gwen! He was never yours to begin with! Whatever fantasy you want with him will never be! Stop pretending! Stop!" I groan and curse my heart and my brain for thinking that Duncan liked me the way I liked him or even creating the idea that he may, possibly, feel some kind of attraction for me.
With that, I fall into a deep sleep.
Name: Gwen Richards
Location: Mclean College
Time: 10 am
"Absolutely not" I reply. Crossing my arms.
"Aw come on, Gwen! Live a little" Leshawna pouts while pushing a water gun towards me.
At the college there was a "Wet and Wild" event to boost the morale of the students and give them a break from studying for exams. I groan and take the water gun from Leshawna.
"Fine. But if I do this then you two will have to leave me alone for 2 weeks while I study for my exams!" Leshawna and Bridgette both nod in agreement and grab their own water guns.
"Deal! Now..." Leshawna smirks while raising her water gun. "Let's spray some poor suckers!"
"Um... Wording!" I say while preparing for the water gun fight of my life. We open the student union doors and see almost 40 other students running around and being sprayed with water.
"Okay" Bridgette says, taking aim. "Let's do this!"
Name: Gwen Richards
Location: Mclean College
Time: 11 am
Panting and being completely soaked, I lay on the grass where the sun was shining the brightest on the field. I throw my water gun to the side and close my eyes.
"Now THAT!" Leshawna exclaims while lying down beside me, also soaked to the bone. "Was the most fun I've had in MONTHS! We gotta do this again!"
"Okay fine... it was... actually pretty fun." I give a smile and nudge Leshawna in the shoulder. She smiles at me and nudges me back.
"I knew you would enjoy that, girl. Now smile!"
I give a genuine smile as Leshawna takes a picture of us lying on the field, soaked.
"That's going on my Instagram story" she says.
Bridgette sits down beside Leshawna and gives out a huge sigh.
"Oh man! That was crazy! Did you see that guy totally gunning for me the whole time?!" she laughs. "But I sure showed him! I got him in the eyes a few times"
We laugh and I hear a ding coming from my phone. I look down and see that Leshawn's story had been posted and that she had tagged me in it. I smile and re-post it on my story as well.
"There! Re-posted your story so it looks like I actually have a social life."
"Girl, everyone knows that you definitely DO NOT have a social life" I roll my eyes with a smile in response.
"Whatever"
I hear another ding and I look down again. My heart did a little flip as I saw who commented on the story.
Duncan replied to your story: Looking good. I especially like that I can see your bra in this picture
I feel my face get hot but quickly remember my little self-deprecating talk I had last night and my face went back to normal.
"Well I'm hungry" I hear Bridgette say, "Let's get something to eat at Joe's before class"
I smile and stand up. "Okay deal. As long as we change first"
"Oh of course we're going to change first, Gwen! I don't want to stay in these wet clothes anymore" Bridgette says, standing with me.
"Same" Leshawna agreed while also standing up, "let's go girls!".
Name: Gwen Richards
Location: Movie Theatre
Time: 6pm
"And this guy was TOTALLY aiming for me the whole time so I shot him in the eyes a few times. I was pretty sure he was flirting with me" Bridgette laughed.
Myself, Bridgette, Trent, Harold, and Geoff were all in the candy room, talking about the water gun fight earlier today.
"HEY!" Heather yells from the entrance of the room, "I would like it if people would actually do their JOBS and help prepare for the rush instead of gossip about stupid things" Harold scoffs in response.
"Says the one who's known for gossiping about literally everything"
"HEY! I resent that comment!" Heather growls, "well whatever. I'm telling Chef about how you're all SLACKERS and don't deserve to be here. You should all be FIRED" and with that, she storms away.
"Aw man... Okay Heather is kind of right... Let's go back to work for now and then when we're done the rush we can come back here and resume our stories." Geoff groans. We all nod in agreement and start to disperse. As I start to leave the room, I feel a hand lightly touch my shoulder.
"Hey" Trent smiles, his piercing green eyes looking straight at me. "About that date the other night... I really enjoyed my time with you." I smile back.
"I really enjoyed my time with you, too" I see his smile go even brighter and I knew what was coming next.
"That's great!" he gives a small frown and whispers, "so... you don't care about the fact that I'm... you know.."
I shake my head, "absolutely not. I think that it's pretty cool that you've been working here for so long and no one knows about it" he smiles again and takes my hand. My face immediately goes hot.
"So... If I asked you to go on another date with me... would you say yes?"
"I-I- ummm... W-well..." I stammer. "Trent-"
"TRENT!" Heather screams from the front of the bar, "GET YOUR LAZY ASS OUT HERE!" he groans in response and lets go of my hand.
"I'll let you think about it, okay?" I give him a sincere smile.
"Okay... Thanks, Trent" he nods at me and walks away, yelling at Heather about how annoying she is.
I need to remember that Duncan has a girlfriend and that I can be with whoever I want! I'm single for god's sake! Just because Duncan and I fuck each other on the rare occasion doesn't mean that we're dating... even though I wish we were...
I hustle my way back to work and prepare for the rush while thinking about what I would say to Trent. I remember about how amazing the date with him was. The food. The company. The amazing conversations we had together. Everything with Trent just felt... right.
Come on Gwen! Just say yes! If you enjoyed your time with Trent so much then it's a no brainer that you should go on another date with him! Screw Duncan! He has a girlfriend and he truly does love her, no matter how much sex we have with each other. They even have a dog together! You know what? Screw it. I need to take chances and actually put myself out there!
I pour the gravy that was freshly heated in the microwave into a metal container and then confidently walk over to Trent who was wiping down the counters. He stares at me questioningly.
"Uhhhh yes? May I help you?" I smile at him.
"I've decided. I want to go on another date with you" Trent's eyes light up with excitement.
"Really?!" I nod my head in response.
"Yes. Absolutely" I feel my heart beating fast in my chest.
"Well, that's great! I'll text you later tonight then!"
"Sounds good! Um... you do realize that we're going to be working together for another 4 ish hours... right?" I remind him with a slight smirk. He chuckles.
"Right. Then I'll see you around" I smile.
"See you around"
I turn to walk away and feel something strange tugging at my heart, my ankles, my neck. I turn around to look at Trent, happily humming to himself while cleaning the counters. Even though I feel just as happy as he does, knowing that there is a chance for us to be together. I also feel chains are starting to form around me. Around my heart, ankles, and neck, which are then connected to Trent. The chains of commitment slowly presenting themselves. The chains that I cannot break if Trent and I were ever to be together as a real couple. The chains that are slowly starting to show that I will no longer be able to sleep with Duncan ever again. And that realization. Was a painful one.