For Shelby's Sake

Chapter Four

It took them about forty-five minutes to make it to Tanya's apartment. Natalia usually made it in thirty, but tonight she was meandering the city with a handsome stranger and she was honest enough to admit she wanted to drag out every minute.

She was shaking her head as she dug out her keys to open the door. "How can you not believe there are aliens?"

"I just don't believe in little green men."

"You seriously think we're alone in the entire universe?"

He did the lip twitching thing. "No, wouldn't go that far. I just don't think they've come here."

Ben was smart, a little sarcastic at times. Later, when Tanya asked her why she'd trusted him, she told her because he didn't look like he was interested in her. He didn't look he was interested in anyone at all.

None of the girls wearing the short-shorts that showed off their bums. The girls wearing straps dresses that ended mid thigh. Girls with long hair they flipped over their shoulders when they wanted to give him a look that said, 'What the hell are you doing with her when you can come away with me?'

Natalia wondered if the circumstances were different if she'd tell any of them he was only with her because he was desperate. Maybe desperate wasn't the right word, but out of his element for a few hours. No, she wouldn't tell any of these girls they could have him, even though wasn't anybody to him. He'd leave her in another hour or so. She would hold onto this moment of walking with a guy who looked like a dream but looked as if he'd survived a nightmare.

This moment was the only thing that belonged to her and she wasn't letting anyone else have it.

He didn't say anything about himself. The only concrete thing she knew was his name. A name she liked, by the way.

They turned onto her block. It was mostly empty now, save for a few guys laughing outside a bar.

She lifted her hair off her neck for a non-existent breeze. "It's possible we might have had aliens travel here. We might have been farther along in space travel if our evolutionary history had started much earlier."

"How so?" he asks giving me a curious look.

She shrugs. "Think about it. We got a chance to evolve because dinosaurs were wiped out. What if dinosaurs never existed and we'd evolved sooner? How much farther along would we be in space travel? Medicine? Cancer would've been cured thousands of years ago."

She noticed he wasn't walking next to her anymore so she turned around. He had stopped to stare at her.

"What?" She asked.

"I thought you were just a waitress."

"Nobody's just anything, Ben.

She took in his Italian leather shoes, his navy blue pants and dark, grey wool coat. He had money. Lots of it. Money was something Abuela taught her to respect. It can come and go, she said. Don't just be happy when you have it. Then, life is only worth living when you have it.

"How will I know when I've had enough," she'd asked Abuela.

Abuela stroked her cheek. "It might never be enough."

"But how will I know when I'm happy?"

"Do you think it should be when you have a roof over your head, food on the table and clothes on your back?"

"Maybe," I said, not knowing if it was the right answer.

Abuela shrugged. "Well then, I'd want you to steal."