Page 5 of vKissed By the Bartender

“Do you remember where this baby came from?” He asks me, pointing to the scar, and I recall the entire event.

His eyebrow scar has always made me smile. I was with him the night he got it. He was fighting for my honour when he caught a few seniors looking up my skirt at homecoming. It made him even sexier if you ask me.

We laugh and talk so much about high school and the time before that. But it’s the what-has-happened-since-leaving-Wildvale conversation that I am not sure I am ready for.

“So, you know my story. Graduated from high school then went straight to bartender classes, and I’ve been here for the past six years,” he says.

What about you?” he asks, shoving the question I wanted to avoid in my face. “What happened to you since leaving Wildvale? What have you been up to?”

“It’s a long story,” I say.

“As it so happens, I am good at listening to long stories. They don’t call me Doctor Bartender for nothing,” he says. He goes up to the bar and gets two mugs of beer.

I can’t keep my eyes off him as I feel my core heat up once again. I fear this feeling might never go away unless I did something about it… unless we did something about it.

Finally, he walks over and puts down the beers.

“They do not call you doctor bartender, do they?” I ask with a laugh.

“They do,” he says, as he takes a swig. “Now, the doc is in. Let’s hear it,” he says with a laugh, and I can’t help but want to spill it all.

I take a long drag of my beer and hope it will help.

His foot brushes against mine and I wonder if it was on purpose. I don’t know if I should return the gesture. Or was it an accident? No, it must have been on purpose. There it goes again.

I risk it as I swish my foot beside his. But then he sticks his feet behind his chair. I’ve read too much into it and now I didn’t know what to do… or did I?

I don’t know if giving it all up would mean anything.

But what are the odds?

He didn’t want me then, and now he moved his feet away from mine.

“Oh hell, you’re so stupid, Candice!” I blush as I realise that I just blurted out my thoughts out loud.

I stare at the table, embarrassed.

Suddenly, his hand slips into mine. With a finger on my chin, he pulls my face up. Now I am staring into his emerald eyes.

“What do you have stuck in that pretty little head of yours?” He asks, his eyes softening. Lightning cracks behind him through the window, his eyes glowing soft.

“I haven’t talked to a soul about this yet…” I begin.

“I’m here now, Candice There isn’t anyone else around here, and you will get wet… or fried if you leave now. Now, what is it?”

He moves around and takes my hand, pulling me over to a sofa on the far side of the bar.

It's a very manly-looking sofa, but it’s comfy.

“I only have a month before I have to decide on something that will make or break my life and career,” I say quickly, as if ripping off the band-aid.

“And if you choose one way, you will let everyone down. But if you choose the other, you will be letting yourself down?” He says. My mouth gapes open in shock.

“How did you…?” I begin to ask.

“It’s written all over your face, Candice,” he says, as he turns towards me and gives me his undivided attention.

“In a month when I have my concert here in town, I have to tell the executives whether I want to renew my contract and go worldwide, or if I want to drop it and stay small scale, perhaps even move back here,” I say.

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