My New Baby

Chapter 19.

A month has passed. A whole month. Avoiding Eric has been hard, especially since he's manager and I'm assistant manager. Communicating with Eric is mostly non existant. We took turns making the schedule, so when it was my turn to do the schedule I made sure to schedule us at different times. When he made the schedule, he always scheduled us together. Good thing I had friends who traded shifts with me, especially since everyone wants that morning shift. It sucks getting up early in the morning, but it's better to get it over with to have the afternoon free.

I'm starting to think that after a month Eric got the hint. The phone calls stopped, the messages that came with Isiah stopped. Surprisingly, this week even the scheduling us together stopped. My morning shift was with Paris, which was very odd. It was a Saturday, so she had no school today. Even though Paris doesn't go to school weekends, Eric and I had a deal not to schedule her first thing in th morning. No students should suffer through something like that. Maybe Paris asked for the shift.

As I got to work, I was the first one there. Figures. Paris is usually always late to shifts, but once she shows up shes a good and fast worker. I unlocked the door and entered. Even though we still haven't started to make coffee, the place still smelled like it.

I clocked in, placed my things in the break room, and started to put on my apron. The first thing I started with was the coffee pots. I needed to re fill everything, put everything in its place so it would be ready for us.

I heard the door open, and I smiled knowing it was Paris who had walked in. I turned around to look at her and my heart dropped. That wasn't Paris; it was Eric. I stayed frozen in my spot, and Eric slowly made his way around the counter.

"Can we please talk?" Eric questioned me.

My first thought was to run to him, to hug him, maybe even kiss him again. I couldn't do that though, not now not ever. This time my heart was screaming louder than my head, and that scared me. I wanted nothing more than to put this thing behind us, but I couldn't do that. There's still a part of me scared that I was just a bet to him. There's an even bigger part of me that tells me I wasn't, and I should just forgive him.

"I don't want to talk," was all I simply said.

I put the coffee I had in my hands down, and it instantly hit me. Paris was suppose to come in, not Eric.

"You tricked me!" I exclaimed to Eric. "You put Paris's name on the schedule, but you were the one coming in the whole time."

"Well what else was I suppose to do, Aaliyah?" Eric questioned. "You wouldn't answer your phone, and you traded in all your shifts with me! I just wanted to talk to you, that was all I've been wanting to do!"

"Why couldn't you just take the hint I didn't want to talk?" I questioned him angrily.

Eric shook his head, I could tell he was already getting irritated with me. I was getting irritated with him too, why couldn't he understand I didn't want to see him or talk? The hints were as clear as the sky.

"Aaliyah, what did I do? Whatever happend I want to fix, I really do. I know you saw the message with David, but you're not a bet. I can show you the messages, just how I showed Isiah." Eric started to take out his phone out of his pocket, but I shook my head at him.

"Why can't you just get the fact that whatever this was is over? I don't want to hear excuses, and I don't want to see or talk to you." I started to untie my apron.

As I held the fabric in my hand, I heard Eric huff. "It's funny, really," he started to say. "You preach and preach about how you don't want to get hurt. The only person here hurting you, is youself. Maybe I should of kept my guard up like you, don't you think?"