Potions of Love
Chapter 5
Tuesday, September 20, 2022
Kate has no idea that Josh has been watching her, trying to find out more about her relationship with Rick.
Josh followed Kate Monday after her lab and watched as Rick sat with her during her lunch. He was encouraged to see they had had a discussion that didn't go well if Rick's whipped puppy dog look was any indication. Josh feels his plan to break them up may not be as difficult as he first thought.
Josh's obsession with Kate has allowed his mind to wander and make him believe there is a serious relationship between Kate and Rick, and he is going to make sure it ends. Of course, at this point, that is an incorrect assumption.
Kate wakes up early on Tuesday morning with a throbbing headache. On top of all of the drama she had with Josh on Sunday the disheartening talk with Rick yesterday, she now remembers she hasn't eaten in over 24 hours. She feels terrible both physically and mentally.
Kate gets up, takes a shower, pops two aspirin, and heads into the kitchen. She turns on the coffeemaker and puts a bagel in the toaster. She then sits down with her head in her hands, knowing she is nowhere closer to making any significant decisions about her life than she was the night before.
Kate raises her head, looking out the kitchen window, thinking about the discussion she had with Rick. She knew it would be difficult, but she never imagined how much it would hurt to sit and watch him walk away. At that moment, she thinks,
"Maybe I need to be honest with myself? I do believe my feelings for Rick are deeper than I have been willing to admit."
Once again, she is thankful she told Josh not to contact her until the following weekend. She knows she needs this time to decide about the future of their relationship.
Kate finishes her breakfast and cleans up the kitchen before heading out to her first class. If you can call it that, one bright spot is that she and Rick do not have courses or labs together on Tuesdays. She hopes to sort out this mess that she calls her life with some time to herself.
With her head still pounding, Kate doesn't feel up to her usual morning walk to the University, so she picks up her books and coat then goes out to catch a cab. She hopes she can make it through the day with little or no interactions with people, especially Rick, which has helped to alleviate some of her earlier stress. Her last class ends at 3:30 pm, so she again hails a cab and heads home.
Once Kate gets home, she is still too keyed up to do anything around her apartment, so she heads into her bedroom, puts on her leathers, grabs her helmet, and goes out to her attached garage.
When she moved to Minnesota three-plus years ago, she refused to part with her motorcycle, so locating a place to live with indoor parking was paramount in her final decision when looking for an apartment. Her treasured Harley Davidson Softail now resides safely in the confines of the garage.
Kate leaves her home on First Street SW, making her way to N. Center St. She hangs a right and follows Center Street past several University buildings as she continues her ride through town. Then crossing Silver Lake River and passing through a small residential district, Kate's able to build up her speed as she leaves the city limits.
The feel of the warm fall breeze blowing in her face has a calming effect on the tensions she has been feeling over the past several days. Kate continues her ride and hops off Center Street at 11th Ave NE heading to First St. NE and Highway 22. She rides north until she gets to one of her favorite spots, the Quarry Hill Nature Center, a trailhead northeast of Rochester proper.
Kate parks her bike and heads toward the Quarry Ruin Trail. Of all the courses on the grounds, she enjoys this one the most as she can walk along the path, stop, and read the different markers that inform visitors about Rochester's historic state hospital grounds. It's usually quiet at this time of the day, right before the sun goes down. Kate finds a bench a little ways off of the main trail where she sits back and thinks about all of the events over the past several days.
Her wonderful evening with Rick, attending the fantastic Sammy Rose concert, having a coffee after, and the pleasant, carefree walk back to her apartment. Then Josh showed up and completely changed the tone for the entire weekend, even into this week. She also recalls the heart-to-heart conversation she had had with Lanie. Josh will be coming to see her this weekend, and she is going to have to determine how to explain her feelings to him without him going ballistic. She leans her head back and thinks out loud to herself,
"Fat chance of that happening."
The sun is just starting to set as Kate heads back to the city. So far, for September, they have been blessed with warm temperatures and little rain, which have made her evening rides very enjoyable. Kate pulls into her garage and parks her Harley in its usual spot. She removes some microfiber rags and her special cleaner/wax compound from the cleaning bucket and wipes her bike down from end to end. Kate takes a couple of steps backward, again admiring the incredible restoration job that Jake had done three years ago back in California. She loves her baby! She smiles and gently places the custom-designed cover back on the Harley, and heads into her apartment.
Kate doesn't necessarily have all of the definitive answers about her next steps, but she feels more refreshed, and her mind isn't spinning as bad as it was earlier in the day. She grabs some leftover Chinese from the fridge and sorts through her notes for Wednesday's lab. Kate realizes tomorrow will be difficult. It will be the first time she has seen Rick since their talk on Monday. She doesn't know what to expect, but she is confident that even though her decision was excruciating for both of them, Rick will be respectful and polite when they see each other in their lab.
Rick wakes up early Tuesday morning thinking to himself,
"I am right back where I was two weeks ago with Kate."
He is a wreck, and he is sure he has no chance with Kate. He drags himself out of bed to get ready to face his Tuesday. At least he has one more day to get his emotions under control before he has to face Kate in their lab together.
Rick gets dressed, feeds Neddie, and makes a peanut butter and jelly sandwich to eat on his way to the library. Since last night was a bust, and he couldn't concentrate on anything after talking with Kate, he needed to head to the library to double-check a couple of lesson points before his first lecture.
As Rick leaves the library an hour and a half later, he runs into his buddy Tom.
Tom says, "Well, thanks for standing us up Saturday night."
Rick draws a blank until Tom reminds him that they were supposed to meet at the Screaming Fox on Saturday night, and the first round was on him to make up for not hanging out with them Friday night.
Rick says, "Sorry, buddy. Let's do it tonight."
Tom waits, thinking Rick will explain why he didn't show up Saturday evening, but when Rick doesn't comment further, Tom replies, "Okay, I'll let the guys know. And since you bailed on us on Saturday, the first round is on you!"
Rick says, "Alright. Thanks, see you tonight," and walks by Tom, headed toward his first class.
Tom watches Rick, wondering what in the world has gotten into his friend. He shakes his head and pulls out his phone to call LT, Kevin, and Javi to tell them that tonight is on.
As Rick walks to his class, he thinks back to the weekend and remembers he had turned his phone off after the horrible encounter with Kate's boyfriend, and he had forgotten to turn it back on.
"Man, I was really out of it. More than I realized." He tells himself. "I moped around the apartment and ate junk food all weekend."
Rick continues his walk to class, trying to get his head in the game so he can make it through the day.
Rick gets home around 5:30 pm Tuesday, eats a quick dinner before taking a shower, and heading out to meet the guys at the bar.
When Rick walks in the door at the Screaming Fox, he sees that he is the last one to arrive. The guys give him a rough time saying, "Man Ricky, we were afraid you were going to stand us up again."
Rick is quiet for several seconds before shaking his head and simply saying, "Sorry."
The guys all give Rick a strained look, but they settle in and begin to share stories about their weekend after he orders their first-round on him.
Rick is listening to them, but most of what is said goes in one ear and out the other.
A dark shadow appears to Rick's right, and he looks up into the burning eyes of Kate's boyfriend. Josh doesn't give Rick a chance to say anything. He yells out, "We need to talk, NOW!"
Rick waits as Josh heads toward the rear of the bar. His buddy L.T., who stands 6'4", looks on and starts to stand up to support his friend, but Rick immediately rises from his chair and tells LT,
"Thanks, LT. I can handle this on my own."
Josh had turned and headed to a booth in the back of the bar, expecting Rick to follow him.
Rick purposely waits a few minutes before walking back and sliding into the booth across from Josh.
Neither says a word, and Josh continues to glare at Rick thinking he will cower under his intense presence.
Once again, Josh's arrogance surfaces, but Rick doesn't fall for his game.
Surprising even himself, Rick doesn't back down. He sits and waits for Josh's next move.
Josh is a bit surprised as he thought,
"This punk is out of his element. I'm at least four inches taller than him and probably outweigh him by 25 pounds."
But Rick doesn't give an inch. He continues to sit where he is and never breaks eye contact with Josh.
Josh finally takes a deep breath and begins railing into Rick. "Who do you think you are? You are some punk from nowhere who is trying to steal my girlfriend. Well, pal, I am here to tell you that's not going to happen. And if you don't back off, you won't be around much longer to talk about it."
Rick continues to sit in his same position, never flinching or responding, and does not take his eyes off of Josh.
Josh's temper is worsening along with his frustration level. He starts to repeat his rant and draws his fingers into tight fists, doing everything he can to stop himself from reaching across the table and slugging Rick.
Rick waits till he stops, then asks, "Are you done?"
Josh is dumbfounded as he sits and watches Rick slide out of the booth and head back toward his friends.
Josh asks himself, "What just happened here?"
Josh then stands and leaves the bar, not knowing if Rick got his point about him and Kate being together. Once Josh is outside, he decides to wait for a while and watch for Rick. If the opportunity presents itself, maybe he can come up with another "reminder" for him to stay away from Kate.
Rick returns to the table and sits down with the guys. All four of them look at him for a couple of minutes, but no one speaks. Tom buys another round, and the conversion kicks back in with their usual sports rants.
After about an hour, Javi and Kevin tell the group that they have early morning classes and need to head out. Tom & LT stay, and once Javi & Kevin are out the door,
Tom asks, "What's up with that dude?"
Rick hesitates, wishing he could blow off the question, but he knows by Tom's expression that he isn't going to let things drop. So they all order another beer, and Rick tells them the entire story.
Rick takes a deep breath and tells Tom and LT how he met Kate with a somewhat shaky voice.
"Well, you see, I met this girl in one of my labs, and we struck up a friendship. I had met her a few times over the summer, and then we got assigned to the same lab. She's super smart and so easy to talk to about anything. Things worked out in our lab, and I was bold enough to ask her to a Sammy Rose concert. To my surprise, she accepted my offer, and we met at that Sammy Rose concert last Friday night, and everything was going great. It got late, so I walked her home, and as we were saying goodnight, her boyfriend, that guy who was here, stormed out of her door, jumping to all kinds of conclusions."
Rick continues, "Kate, that's her name, played it so cool. She told me good night and thanked me for inviting her to the concert for the third time. She then turned around and headed into her apartment, and Josh, that's her boyfriend, shot dagger eyes at both of us. Well, mostly me."
"I couldn't do anything, so I headed home and didn't see her again until our lab yesterday. We talked after the lab ended, and she told me we had to cool it, even though nothing had happened between us. But she said since she's got this thing going with Josh, she can't hang out with any guys outside of class." Rick lets out a huge sigh and says, "That's about it."
The guys have a very brief moment of empathy, then Tom stands and says, "You know, we haven't done one of our late night adventures for two months. It's time to change that."
Rick's puzzled. He says to himself,
"I just spent about a half-hour spilling my guts to these guys about Kate, and Tom wants to go on an adventure? Well, they can count me out. I'm heading home."
Rick turns to Tom and, with a bit of disdain in his tone, says, "No thanks, I'm gonna head home,"
Rick turns to leave, but LT not so gently lays his hand on Rick's shoulder and says, "You ain't thinking of bugging out on us, are you?"
Rick looks up at LT, sees an intense expression on his face, and says, "Um, of course not."
LT releases Rick's shoulder, cracks a big smile, and asks Tom, "Whatz up, Chief?"
Tom smiles and only says, "Follow me."
Instead of driving one of their cars, Tom whistles down a cab and gives the driver an address, Rick has never heard of before. Rick glances at LT, who shrugs his shoulders and says, "Let's roll, guys."
The guys squeeze into the back seat, and the Taxi heads towards the edge of town.
Josh is still sitting in the parking lot, waiting for Rick to come out. He watches as Rick and his two buddies leave the bar and stand by the main door. Then a cab pulls up, and they all climb into the back seat.
"Why would they call a cab? Are they too drunk to drive?" Josh asks himself.
Checking the cab's direction, he is sure they aren't going back to their apartments, so he follows the taxi.
After a 30-minute drive, the cab enters a quiet neighborhood on the Northwest side of Rochester; it moves through the streets until it reaches a dark dead-end road and stops in front of a rather intimidating-looking house. The only lighting comes through a bay window on the south corner of the home. A wrap-around porch surrounds the house, with an entrance available only on the street side.
The guys pile out of the cab, with Tom paying the driving and requesting that he return in an hour.
The entire neighborhood is pretty dark, with a smattering of smaller homes on one side and only two other large houses on the side where Tom had the cab stop. Once the cab pulls away, Rick looks to Tom and asks,
"Where are we, and why are we so far outside of the city? And what is this place?" Rick asks.
Tom chuckles and says,
"Hang on, Holmes, we'll show you in a minute."
The three guys walk up to the front door of the daunting structure, where Tom does some crazy knock. Rick looks over to LT, who shrugs his shoulders again and nods toward Tom. Rick is getting ready to ask Tom what's happening when the door opens a small crack. Tom takes a step backward but has a big grin on his face.
The door opens wider and a beautiful black woman, dressed like a gypsy, steps out to the edge of the door's entrance. She glares at the threesome, then focuses directly on Tom, saying in a very gruff voice, "Thomas Youngblood, what in the world are you doing knocking on my door at this time of night?" She demands.
Tom pulls a boyish grin and leans in to kiss the woman on her cheek, saying, "Oh come on now, Madame V., when have you ever turned a distressed man away from your door?"
The gypsy woman looks Tom up and down and says, with a still forceful tone, "You do not look distressed to me, young man."
Tom steps to the side and, in his same boyish tone, says, "Oh, Madame V., it is not I who is distressed. It is my friend," and he points to Rick.
Madame V. turns her attention toward Rick, looking him up and down, and says, "Oh, I see what you mean."
Rick gulps and is overwhelmed by what is going on. He looks to both Tom and LT for help, and both stand where they are, with stupid grins on their faces and shake their heads.
Madame V. gets the attention of all three guys and then demands they come into her home and go into the Parlor.
Rick's eyes are practically popping out of his head, and he is almost screaming to himself,
"What in the world have I gotten myself into now?"
Rick feels a push in his back, and he finds himself at the head of the group and follows Madame V. into her home.
Josh continues watching the crazy-looking house from a few doors down. He has no idea what is going on, but he sees Rick's buddies push him toward the open door and watch as they all go inside. Josh wants to figure out who lives in the house. He pulls up Google Maps to get the address, then he searches the public access property records for Olmsted County and learns the property is held by Victoria Grimm.
Her name doesn't sound familiar, but he recalls some of the interns at Mayo talking about a fortune-teller who lives on the outskirts of the city. He looks back toward the house and now sees an orange-colored glow coming through the curtains in a bay window on the south side of the house. He says to himself,
"What's up with these guys and a fortune-teller? This entire situation makes no sense."
Josh decides to wait for a while and see if anything happens. He slides his seat back and tries to get comfortable, having no idea how long this little visit could last.