Charisma’s sharp green eyes followed Taylor’s graceful form as he glided easily between the tables. In her fixed trance, it almost looked like his feet weren’t even touching the floor, but merely hovering above it as he maneuvered around the crowded restaurant. He had stopped and politely taken her order, just as he had done all the other times she had frequented the business in the last few weeks. Charisma knew her intensity made him uncomfortable, but that didn’t bother her in the least. It made her laugh to see him squirm in her presence. Carter had at first agreed to accompany her sister on her day out, but upon finding out she wanted to go eat at Taylor’s restaurant again and all but stalk their best friend’s boyfriend, her mind had quickly changed. She tried to convince her sister to give it up, but Charisma simply smiled deviously and told her not to worry about picking her up, that she’d find a ride herself.

And so for the past hour, she had been sitting there, watching him as she poked at her chicken alfredo, all thoughts of Jackson pushed into oblivion. She wanted Taylor, and she always got what she wanted. After wanting him for so long, it suddenly didn’t even matter to her whether she got him herself or simply succeeded in breaking them up. All she knew was that she couldn’t stand to sit back and watch him father a baby with someone who wasn’t her.

His bright blue eyes flickered over to her direction for what had to be the hundredth time, hoping this time as he had every other that she’d be gone. She smiled coyly at him, and Taylor couldn’t bring himself to smile back. He hated that she was there, and hated more that there was nothing he could do to make her stop. He couldn’t help but notice that today felt different than any other day she had been there, but he couldn’t figure out what it was. It could have been her eyes, which seemed to have a haunting glow to them that he could see even from his standpoint across the room. She’d been there too long. Her stare-at-Taylor sessions never ran more than forty-five minutes at a time. Every second longer that she remained there made Taylor more distracted and uneasy.

When he had first been told of Charisma’s crush on over a year ago, it hadn’t bothered him. Surely, he’d thought, it would pass quickly. He figured it was just a product of spending so much time together as a group. He wasn’t worried because she was a pretty girl, and she went out enough that she was sure to find someone else to be attracted to. But for some reason, Charisma had never found that person, and every day she fell deeper into her distorted version of love for him.

By the time Taylor clocked out and was heading to his car, Charisma still hadn’t left. He made his way quickly to his car in the parking lot, but stopped and resisted the urge to sigh audibly when he heard her calling, “Taylor! Taylor, wait up!” after him.

He turned back towards her, knowing his car was merely steps away. He should have pretended not to hear her, but now it was too late. “Yeah?” he asked, annoyance more than obvious in his face and in his voice.

“Ouch,” she replied jokingly.

The pout in her eyes, not the one gracing her lips, almost made him feel bad for his abrasiveness because of the sincerity in it. Almost. “Sorry, I’m just tired.” He raked his hand anxiously through his hair. “Did you need something? I’m ready to get home.” He gestured obviously to his car, hoping she’d take the hint and leave him alone.

“Well, okay, this is gonna sound lame, but is there any way I could get a ride home? I tried calling my house to get someone to come get me, but I couldn’t get anyone,” she asked, smiling innocently and looking up at him with hopeful eyes.

As much as he wanted to tell her no, to turn and walk to his car and go home, he couldn’t bring himself to leave her in the rapidly disappearing sunlight. “Yeah, I guess so,” he replied, an involuntary sigh hanging from his answer.

“You don’t have to,” she said quickly. “I can walk…”

“No, come on,” he said, forcing a smile and continuing to the car.

She followed him, scowling slightly when he unlocked the doors and made no move to open hers for her. “So how’s Jackson doing?” she asked after a few moments of silence had passed. She deftly covered the bitterness in her voice at having to bring up Jackson, knowing that if she didn’t, it would seem highly unnatural. “I haven’t seen her in awhile.”

“She’s fine,” Taylor answered. “And so is the baby.”

“Have y’all found out what it is yet?”

“No, we decided to be surprised.”

“Oh.” The silence returned, and Charisma cursed mentally. This wasn’t at all how this was supposed to be going. “So is there a reason you’re being so rude to me, or is that just how you are?” she spat out sarcastically.

“It’s not you, Charisma,” he lied. “It’s just been a long fucking day.”

“Well, a guy like you doesn’t deserve these kinds of stresses and burdens, and a baby is-”

“A baby isn’t a stress or a burden,” he interrupted. “It’s my baby, and whatever I have to do to take care of my baby, I have no problem doing.”

“Is that the reason you’re still with Jackson?” she asked. “Because you feel responsible for the baby?”

“Yeah, I feel responsible, but that’s not the only reason I’m with Jackson,” he replied angrily, knowing he didn’t need to explain himself to her, but wanting to make his point clear. “I’m with her because I love her. I don’t just go around having babies all over the place.”

“Why do I get the feeling this wasn’t such a good idea?” Charisma asked, echoing his thoughts almost verbatim. She unbuckled her seatbelt as Taylor pulled into her driveway.

“Why do I get the feeling this wasn’t about needing a ride home?” he snapped, turning a sharp gaze to her.

Charisma suddenly smiled, a smile that did little to make him feel any less uncomfortable than he already felt. It was almost as if she had been waiting for him to make that exact statement. “Because you’re not an idiot,” she whispered, leaning so close that he could feel her breath on his lips. Not even a half second later, her lips were against his, her tongue sliding between them when his mouth instinctively opened to protest. Her hand on the back of his neck was surprisingly strong; between her grip and the fact that his head was pressed against the window of the car, there was nowhere for him to go. When she pulled away, it was forcefully, letting her eyes bore into his mischievously before trailing her lips down his jaw line and whispering, “Now tell me you didn’t enjoy that…”

Forty five minutes later when Taylor arrived home well past dinner time, Jameson informed him that Jackson was in the shower. His guilt clung to him like a second skin, nearly suffocating him as he made his hurried down the hall and pushed open the bathroom door. Jackson’s surprised face popped around the shower curtain to see who had entered, but immediately relaxed into a smile when she saw it was Taylor. “Hey, baby,” she called, disappearing to the other side of the curtain again. “What took you so long getting home?”

“Umm…traffic,” he lied, raising his voice to be heard over the rush of the water. He sat down on the closed toilet seat, hoping Jackson wouldn’t notice the intense discomfort in his voice. It seemed the volume of the water was a definite aid in that. “I got here as soon as I could.”

“It’s okay,” Jackson replied, “Jameson tried to wait on you for dinner, but Joley was being her darling annoying self, complaining that she was starving. She saved a plate for you, though.” She shut off the water, and seconds later Taylor heard the pounding of more water in the tub as she squeezed out her hair. Taylor wrung his hands nervously in front of him as Jackson slid the curtain open and began toweling herself dry. “Taylor?” she said, looking at him curiously while stepping carefully out of the tub.

Taylor looked up at her, realizing as he had several times since she’d begun showing, that pregnancy made her even more beautiful than he’d ever seen her before. “Yeah?”

Jackson wrapped the long towel around her body and touched his face. “Tell me what’s wrong.”

“I…nothing’s wrong, I just…you know how much I love you, don’t you?” he said, his eyes looking into hers intensely.

“Yeah, of course I do,” she answered with a smile. “Are you having mood swings now too?”

Taylor laughed and shook his head. “No, I just wanted you to know that…”

“Taylor, really…if there’s something wrong you can tell me,” she said gently.

In his mind, he debated whether or not he should just tell her the truth about what had happened between himself and Charisma. Her smile was so open and inviting that he thought it might be better to get it over with then and not wait, but as he opened his mouth to admit what he had done, he couldn’t. “Nothing…nothing’s wrong.”

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