Let Love Win

Chapter 23 - Zeek

"So are you coming over later?" I asked Hadley as we walked out of the café from out shift.

"I would, but I promised Mel I would go shopping with her for Brad's Christmas present today," she answered.

"That's fine. But just so you know, now you owe me a night where I get you all to myself."

"Uh huh, sure. And what about all those times that you and Brad ditched Mel and I for 'guys night'?"

It was true. There had been more than one occasion where Brad had decided for us that it was time for some video games and a beer, or a night on the town playing poker and pool. A few times, the girls had requested to come with us, but we left them behind. They weren't exactly pissed about it, but they definitely weren't thrilled either.

"Fine, now we're even," I bargained, which caused her to roll her eyes. A car honked behind Hadley and I looked over her shoulder to see Mel sitting in her car waiting impatiently. "Your escort is here, and it looks like she's ready to go."

"The I should probably go because it's not fun shopping with a cranky Melissa."

I wrapped my arms around her waist and leaned down to kiss her. Mel honked her horn again and I flipped her off behind Hadley's back. This only caused her to get even more mad since she just continued to honk at us form the car. Hadley pulled away and groaned. She turned around and signalled to Mel that she was coming in a second.

"Give me one reason why I shouldn't kill her today," Hadley said with her eyes closed as she tried to calm down.

"Because that I would have to deal with a mopey Brad," I suggested.

"Never mind that she's my best friend or anything, that's no reason at all. Anyways, I'm going to go because I'm already not gonna hear the end of it all afternoon."

"I'll call you later."

"See ya."

"Bye."

She walked off and slipped in the passenger seat of Mel's car. I watched as Mel reached over and slapped the back of Hadley's head in frustration. She visibly took a deep breath to calm her nerves, and told Mel to just shut up and drive. They sped out of the campus parking lot and I laughed at the two of them. A blind man could see that they were best friends.

I strode over to my car and jumped in. I decided this morning on my way in to work that I wasn't going to leave my shopping to the last minute again and I was going to get Hadley's present today as well. Thankfully for me, where I was going for her gift wasn't in town. It was a bit of a drive out of the way, but it was something that Monty told me she'd wanted for a while now, but she never had the time to go out and get it.

I started driving north of the city and pulled into the small parking lot of the Montezuma Chocolate Shop. I went into the store and instantly realized why Hadley must love this place. It smelled so heavily of the most decadent chocolate and there were colours galore covering the store from top to bottom. It was in some ways similar to a library in terms of the layout. There was a cash register to the left of the entrance and aisles upon aisles of chocolate at the back. Each shelf in the aisle as built floor to ceiling and was full of different flavours of chocolate.

I took a deep breath and tried not to overwhelm myself with all the variety in the store. I walked to the back and started at the far left aisle. I walked up and down the aisles and saw what felt like a million different flavours, most of which sounded like something Hadley would like. By the time I reached the front of the store, I was about prepared to spend almost as much as I did on her bracelet on chocolate.