Campbell's (Chris Collins)

To the Check Out Counter

Paige Dawson contentedly stretched as she awoke from her nap inside Naomi's car, rather impressed with herself that carbon monoxide poisoning hadn't came knocking at her door. It was however, a shock to find that Naomi hadn't either. She looked out the passenger seat window hoping to see a view of Naomi already paying at the counter, however her efforts were resulted to no avail.

She had no idea how to drive yet, but she knew enough to turn off the engine and detach Naomi's keys in order for her to step out and to have a look inside the convenience store herself.

She's looking for soup, thought Paige, Even I know that doesn't take this long.

As a matter of fact, it didn't.

But her conversation with Chris unexpectedly did.

It would be an understatement to say that the moment Naomi got a good look at Chris the first time, she found it hard to turn away. As he looked up at her while laughing at one of the jokes she unintentionally cracked, she noticed the blue tint in Chris's eyes and immediately, found herself wanting to take a look at them more and more. As a whole, did have to admit he was quite appealing and that she was even a little lucky to have met him thanks to her cold. But it meant a whole lot more that underneath his appeal, was that he had a positive attitude. (It certainly helped too that he had a unique way of pronouncing S's.)

As a smile came upon Naomi's face while she narrated one of her stories, Chris couldn't help but mirror the same smile, realizing how much more appealing Naomi had looked with it on. When he had initially met her and her blank expression while making her way towards the aisle with the can of soup, he had already admitted she was quite attractive. Despite the lack of make-up she had on her face that day and the rather red nose from blowing her nose too much, her smile had lit up her whole face. To add to his admiration for her was the fact she spoke about design with such passion and that her comebacks never made a dull moment within the conversation.

They came to the point where they knew they would be talking outside the means of this convenience store and decided that it was only right to exchange contact details.

"Frick, I forgot my phone in car." Frowned Chris, realizing the rectangular item in his back pocket was his wallet and not his phone.

Naomi only snickered, assuming she should take a hint from his previous statement. A little embarrassed that she'd even hoped for something as cliche like coincidentally meeting someone under the same circumstances, reaching for the same can of soup.

But what happened next took her by surprise completely.

"Maybe I can just type it in your phone?"

"That's not some kind of pick up line, is it?" smiled Naomi, making a reference to one of the videos he'd told her about. However, she handed in her phone anyway.

"Why, d'you think it would beat Crawford's?" replied Chris as he typed in his numbers, "More importantly, is it working?"

It was in that exact moment Paige had come bursting into the scene.

"Paige?" said Naomi, looking over Chris's shoulder to find Paige standing at the entrance of the convenience store with a hood over her head. Naomi's eyes widened, realizing she'd completely forgotten about the project she and Paige still had to work on.

She turned to Chris, who smiled understandingly.

"I..I..I'll let you know if it worked." smiled Naomi before heading out the door completely.

Chris only smiled, "I'll be waiting by the phone."

He didn't entirely wait next to it the whole time, but as he arrived home, he showed a sudden interest in checking both his voicemails and missed calls.

"He definitely met someone." said his younger sister, Karisma as she and Crawford gathered in the living room, only to catch Chris looking through his phone.

"Dude, why don't you just call her?" asked Crawford, knowing Chris would've been one to do that now, "And how do you even meet someone at a convenience store?"

"You don't. That's how you know it was meant to happen." smiled Chris in reply to his brother; a smile that gradually faded into a pout, "But the fact I left my phone in the car and she hasn't called could mean something too."

Naomi did, however intend to call. Her intentions at the moment were only focused on her project with Paige, which had been a project proposal for one of their classes together. Once it finished however, Paige began to pester Naomi to give him a call back knowing her habit of finding all excuses not to accomplish something she was nervous about.

"You know, if you're googling the song that played when you two met, it's obvious you're just as interested as he is." retorted Paige as Naomi came up with the excuse of searching for a certain song that played in the convenience store.

"The fact he had a way out and didn't take it means whatever it is that's going on is meant to happen."

Naomi looked up from her laptop and frowned at Paige, who she knew, was right.

Meanwhile, Chris was beginning to give up the hope that Naomi would call. Knowing she was at university, there would be no way she had time for any of this. But still, she had to consider what had just happened at the convenience store: they met under the same circumstances — being sick, they met in the same area — aisle 5 with the soups and in the same convenience store.

Was she really not going to call?

Chris emerged from the bathroom after throwing on a fresh pair of pajamas after his shower, only to hear the muffled sound of the preset ringtone of his phone. He scoured his bed, almost throwing off each one of the pillows, until he'd found it face down on the duvet. 

An unknown number was calling and before answering, he pictured between the options he had: a serial killer, a lost number or Naomi.

"Hello?"

At this point, was there really anything else to lose in betting that it would be Naomi? This day was full of best case scenarios, he was almost positive this one wasn't any different.

"Hey, so, um...I'm calling to let you know it worked."

And he was right.