𝙙𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙢 𝙘𝙤𝙢𝙚 𝙩𝙧𝙪𝙚 [𝙧𝙞𝙣𝙞 𝙖𝙪]

Chapter Nine

Nini walks into the diner, constantly looking behind her, in the direction that she came from. She keeps her eyes glued to the window as she sits down at the bar of the diner.

"Neens, are you okay?" Kourtney asks, approaching her.

"Yea, there was just this creepy guy staring at me near the park. It was weird," Nini responds.

"Oh? Who was it?"

"I don't know, I've never seen him before. He looked about our age, curly hair...cute," she mumbles the last bit. "It was so awkward, I avoided eye contact with him but it was like I was in a scene from You and he was Joe Goldberg."

Kourtney chuckles, "Maybe he thinks he knows you."

"But he didn't come up to me, he just stopped walking and stared at me."

"He was probably scared, you are kind of intimidating."

"Am not," The brunette took offence. She looked at her friend who just stared at her, "am i?"

"No comment," Kourtney responds.

"Wow okay," Nini breathed out, "well, doesn't matter, I'm probably never going to see him again."

The two girls caught up and chatted about their first day of school before Kourtney had to go back to work, leaving Nini sitting in the bar alone, dreading going home so she wouldn't have to see her Joe Goldberg again.

+

LATER THAT NIGHT, IN RICKY'S DREAM:

Ricky waited impatiently in the diner, sitting in the booth where him and the girl usually sat, for what felt like never ending hours. He was nervous to see the girl again, maybe he was hallucinating and the girl he saw near the park wasn't actually the girl from his dream. All he wondered was maybe the girl had answers as to what actually happened.

Then he heard it. The bell that rang every night in his dream. The bell that signified the girl walking into the diner. He looked up and saw the girl standing there, smiling at him.

He stared at her for what felt like a couple minutes, waiting for her to sit down in front of him, but she didn't.

Ricky watched as the girl, who was in every dream, sat and talked to him every night in the same booth, walked in the opposite direction, and slid into another booth.

To say he was confused was an understatement. He had no idea what was happening, or what to do. This has never happened before.

He tried getting up to talk to her, but he couldn't. He was stuck, sitting in the booth, alone. It was torture.

After struggling to get up for a while, he watched as the girl got up from her booth and started walking out the door.

It took everything out of him to finally get up and chase after her. When he finally caught up to her, he reached out and grabbed her arm, making her turn around to face him.

"Hey," she said, with a wide smile.

"Why were you sitting so far from me just now?" Ricky asked, tears starting to form in his eyes. He was crying, but he didn't know why. He didn't know the girl, but why did it feel like she was leaving him.

"Oh Ricky, we weren't far at all," at this, Ricky looked at her, with his watery eyes, in confusion. "We're actually closer than you think." She let go of his grip and started walking away.

The next thing he knew, she was miles away in the distance, and all he saw was her silhouette. He was left alone, standing outside the diner with nothing but the light coming from the sign.

He woke up with tears in his eyes, unsure of what to feel. Why was he left alone? Why did she leave? She's never left him, she would never leave him.

And with that, he stayed in his room the whole day, no contact with anyone, not even his family who were just a floor away from him. He was just alone, drowning in his own thoughts and questions.