CHAPTER THREE: HIT OR MISS

"Hey, I saw that you called earlier. What's up?" Carissa asked, balancing her cell phone between her ear and shoulder while she attempted to eat lunch.

She shoveled another forkful of salad into her mouth, managing to drop a piece of dressing-soaked cucumber into her lap in the process. Zac smirked from across the table at her, and she shot him a frown in response.

"I have exciting news!" Jackie announced across the line.

Carissa waited for her friend to elaborate, wondering if her enthusiasm was in any way related to wedding plans. She was shocked by how seldom she talked about her upcoming wedding. Jackie was the first of her close friends to get engaged, but Carissa always assumed that once the ring was placed on the girl's finger, the wedding would grow to overshadow normal daily conversation. But despite her ridiculously wild side, Jackie was very practical and grounded when she needed to be. She rarely changed her mind once she made a decision, and from what Carissa could tell, most of the wedding arrangements had already been set in stone.

Jackie was a handful on even her best days, giving Carissa reason to fear that her engagement would turn her into the worst sort of "bridezilla" imaginable. But her friend handled everything with astonishing poise and composure. Carissa had a sneaking suspicion that her friend's reluctance to go into detail about her wedding had a lot to do with her fairly recent breakup with Cody. Still, she was surprised that the big day was only a few months away and Jackie barely mentioned it.

"We're going to a Saint Patrick's Day party!" Jackie finished excitedly.

"We are?" Carissa adjusted her cell phone in its precarious position and took another bite of her lunch, careful not to spill anything on herself this time.

"Yeah. My coworker is throwing a party at his house on Wednesday night. I work until 8:00, but I was thinking you could swing by Roundhouse, wait for my shift to end, and then we could go to the party together. Sound good?"

"I don't know, Jack..."

Carissa chewed on her lip while she pondered the invitation. She wasn't a huge fan of parties, particularly when the hosts (and nearly all of the guests) were complete strangers. But glancing across the table at Zac made her change her mind. Yes, the old, predictable Carissa would've stayed at home rather than wander into unknown territory, but she was determined to prove him wrong. And she knew that attending a wild Saint Patrick's Day party would bring her one step closer to her goal.

"You know what? That sounds like fun," she said. "I'll see you on Wednesday."

After ending the call and tossing her phone back into her work bag, Carissa finished her lunch in silence. Mondays were particularly dull and boring at the bookstore, and it wasn't uncommon for each passing minute to feel like an hour. She was ready for the work day to be over, and judging from the dazed look on Zac's face and his slouched frame, her roommate felt the exact same way.

"So, you have a hot date on Wednesday?" Zac's voice was barely more than monotone, but his eyes flickered with interest.

"Jackie invited me to a party her coworker is having at his place," she said. "I'm sure you can tag along if you want to."

His eyes darkened so much that Carissa nearly gasped out loud. The transformation from brown to deep coal-black was almost frightening. Did he really hate Jackie that much? But as they continued to stare at each other, his gaze softened and he seemed to return to normal again.

"Sorry, I can't," he said.

"Plans with Seth?"

"Actually..." Zac lowered his eyes and picked mindlessly at the label on his water bottle. He had a habit of peeling things that drove Carissa nuts. "I'm going out with Cody on Wednesday night."

Now it was Carissa's turn to mask the emotions that were threatening to undo her. She'd made it clear to Zac that she had absolutely no problem with him maintaining a friendship with her ex-boyfriend. In fact, she even insisted that they continue hanging out. But she'd be lying to herself if she didn't admit to feeling the wind get knocked out of her whenever she heard his name.

"Cool," she finally forced herself to say with the smallest of smiles, realizing that an awkward silence had lapsed between them and Zac suddenly looked regretful that he'd spoken.

"Are you really cool with it, Reese?" His tone was soft and sympathetic as his hand reached across the table to find hers.

"Absolutely," she said, but her voice didn't sound nearly as confident as she wanted it to. She drew her hand away, not in the mood for any sort of physical contact.

"Okay," he nodded slowly. "But if you feel uncomfortable about us hanging out, or if you ever want to talk about what's on your mind - you can come to me. I'm friends with you first, and Cody second. You know that, right?"

He started playing with his water bottle again, a thick lock of sandy hair shielding his eyes.

"I know," she said quietly.

"I mean it," Zac insisted. "I know you think that all I do is hook up with random girls, but I'm not as much of a stranger to relationships and heartache as you might think..."

Carissa stared at him questioningly, waiting for him to elaborate, but he ripped the remainder of the label off of the water bottle with a loud finality that let her know that he wasn't willing to say anything more. The wheels turned inside of her head as she was once again hit with the feeling that she didn't know Zac nearly as well as she wanted to. He was such a mystery; he obviously wanted to appear very simple and straightforward, but she knew there were many more layers to him that she was dying to peel away. But she didn't want to force him into talking about anything that made him uncomfortable, so she put the topic to rest, tucking it into the corner of her mind that was reserved for unanswered questions.

"Are we still on for trivia tonight?" she asked.

He shrugged. "Sounds good to me. We may be the only ones there, though. I talked to Justin this morning, and he and Beth won't be able to make it."

Monday night trivia was a tradition that had formed months ago. After a particularly mind-numbing work day, Carissa and Zac had gone out to a local pub for happy hour with a few coworkers and decided to play bar trivia to pass the time while they drank. They ended up winning $100 that evening, and they found the game so enjoyable that they made it a weekly ritual. It was one of the only things that Carissa looked forward to on Mondays.

"Well, that just means more money for us if we end up winning tonight," she said with a grin.

But her smile quickly dissolved when she realized that her lunch break was over and it was time to return to her desk. She gathered up the remainders of her lunch and dumped them into the trash can with a sigh. Five o'clock really couldn't come soon enough.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

"Dammit." Zac slammed his empty beer glass onto the table.

It was almost an hour into the trivia game, and Carissa and Zac's two-man team was losing badly. She wasn't sure how they'd managed to fall so far behind, but out of the fifteen teams competing, they were swiftly approaching last place. It was always hit or miss, though. Carissa knew that skill and intelligence had very little to do with playing this particular game; whenever they won, it seemed to be based entirely on luck. She didn't retain knowledge the way that some people did. Each week, she prayed that the questions would involve topics that she was familiar with, such as her favorite bands, or books that she'd read, or random news stories that she'd happened to remember the details of. But that evening, the questions covered such a wide range of categories and were so obscure and difficult that they were almost laughable. Who the hell knew how many days Paris Hilton was originally sentenced to jail for driving with a suspended license? Or who in 2009 became the oldest person to have an album on the UK charts?

Yet every week, without fail, someone always managed to know the answers to these off-the-wall questions. Carissa had to wonder if these people actually had lives, or if they simply sat around all day watching Jeopardy and memorizing every single Wikipedia entry on every single subject under the sun.

She didn't mind that they were losing, but Zac was a completely different story. He kept his competitive nature in check most of the time, but when it came out, it was a force to be reckoned with. It was at once amusing and a little bit frightening to see him get so worked up over a trivia game. His eyebrows knitted together in intense concentration as he struggled to answer the NFL-related question that the announcer had just asked. He spun the pen around on the table and looked up at her, but she just shrugged helplessly; she'd all but tuned the question out. Her knowledge of sports was narrow and pathetic, and she had absolutely nothing of substance to offer.

She sipped on her beer and watched as Zac scribbled furiously on the scrap of paper. He crossed his answer out, chewed on the end of the pen while he got lost in thought, and then started writing again. When he finally came up with an answer that seemed to satisfy him, he handed in the answer slip and returned to the booth, lifting his glass as if expecting to find it magically refilled in his absence.

"I'm gonna get another," he announced. "Do you want anything?"

"I'm good," she said, holding up her glass that was still mostly full.

But as soon as Zac slid out of the booth to order his refill, he seized up and fell back into his seat quickly. His entire body was rendered motionless, his eyes glazed over, his arms pinned rigidly against his sides. She wondered if he was even breathing; he didn't appear to be.

"Zac?"

Carissa set her glass down, her curiosity morphing into genuine concern when he failed to respond to her. She followed his frozen line of vision and her eyes landed on a tall brunette with a striking figure and a smooth, olive complexion occupying a stool by the bar. Her back was to them as she engaged in light conversation with the bartender. Carissa had never seen her before, but from the look on Zac's face, he had and was clearly stunned by her presence.

"ZACHARY!"

She pounded on the table with her fist, the sudden loud motion finally jarring him out of his disturbing trance. He lowered his eyes to his lap and drew in several deep breaths without speaking.

"What was that about?" Carissa asked.

"Nothing," he muttered. "I need to go."

"But the game isn't even over yet," she protested.

"You can stay if you want to," he snapped, his tone so bitingly harsh that she actually flinched in response to it. "But I'm leaving."

He hastily tossed a wad of bills onto the table - covering much more than what they owed - and walked outside without looking back. Carissa took one last, long drink from her unfinished beer and stole a final glance at the mysterious girl by the bar before following him outside.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Wednesday arrived too quickly for Carissa's liking. In fact, she was entirely unprepared for the party and regretted having accepted Jackie's invitation on such a sudden whim. But she knew that once she promised something to her best friend, there wasn't a chance in hell that she would be allowed to back out of it. So she rushed to the mall after work in search of an outfit.

Her wardrobe was boring and bland at best. Carissa liked to be comfortable, so she rarely drifted away from jeans, t-shirts, and well-worn hoodies. And since she'd managed to land a job with a practically nonexistent dress code, she didn't have any real reason to own fancy clothes.

She sighed as she sifted through the racks inside of Forever 21, finding it depressing that while she definitely wasn't twenty-one any longer, she still resorted to shopping there on occasion due to a lack of better options. Everything was so trendy, the clothes on the mannequins screaming a sense of fashion that she didn't in any way possess. Despite finding most of their selection ridiculous, she managed to gather an armload of items that she thought might possibly look good on her, but each outfit was a complete disaster when modeled in front of the 3-way mirror. She hated those mirrors. They accentuated all of the body parts she had issues with and hid the pieces of herself that she actually didn't mind so much. With a groan of frustration, she handed the unsuccessful articles of clothing to the store clerk and walked back into the mall to continue her tiring journey.

Just as she was about to call Jackie and beg her friend to let her raid her closet for something to wear, an outfit in a store window caught her eye. She paused in front of Express and studied the teal off-shoulder tunic for several long moments before stepping inside. It wasn't a store she typically went into, but it was even more rare for a piece of clothing to call out to her in such a way. She tried on the top and was surprisingly pleased by how well it fit, how sophisticated yet sexy it looked on her. Paired with some skinny jeans and her favorite leather flats, she had a halfway decent outfit to wear to the party that night. Flipping the price tag over, her excitement rose to a whole new level when she realized that the shirt was on sale.

But her good mood fell to pieces the moment she arrived at her condo and saw a familiar car in the parking lot. The sight of Cody's Jeep in the spot beside Zac's twisted into her heart like someone had driven a knife through her chest. She glanced up at the rearview mirror and was slightly horrified by her own reflection. Her trip to the mall had been so rushed and stressful that she now looked completely flustered, her hair messy, her cheeks flushed, her eyes red-rimmed and hollow. She dreaded having to face her ex-boyfriend in such a disheveled state.

She was suddenly angry with Zac for apparently inviting him over. Yes, she'd told him she was fine with them spending time together, but she figured he would have enough sense to hang out with Cody elsewhere, anywhere other than the house she used to share with him. At the very least, he could've given her a heads-up to warn her that Cody was coming over, but he hadn't even done that.

In fact, Zac had barely spoken to her at all over the last couple of days. If she didn't know any better, she would have thought that he was avoiding her. Ever since his odd little outburst at the bar on Monday night, he'd been much more reserved than usual, diving into his projects at work rather than spending his breaks with her, holing up in his bedroom during the evening hours instead of claiming his usual position on the living room couch. They'd even driven separate cars to work the last two days, whereas they usually carpooled to cut the cost of gas. But Carissa knew that she'd given Zac no reason to be mad at her, so she chalked it up to moodiness or the slim possibility that she was making an issue out of nothing in her head.

Sighing, she slung her shopping bag over her wrist and approached the apartment. She opened the door and braced herself for the inevitable sight of her ex-boyfriend sitting in the living room, but was shocked to find it empty. She walked down the hall and finally heard low voices coming from Zac's bedroom. The door to his room was partially open, but she wasn't in the mood to stop by and greet him while she passed, so she continued to the end of the hall in silence and let out the deep breath she'd been holding only when she was safely behind her closed bedroom door.

She jumped when she heard a knock at the door, followed by Zac stepping into her bedroom without even waiting for an invitation.

"I thought I heard the front door slam," he said with a knowing smile.

"I didn't slam anything," she replied.

She pulled her newly-purchased tunic from the bag and unfolded it carefully, draping it across the bed to prevent it from wrinkling.

"Hot shirt," Zac remarked.

"Thanks," she said dryly.

If he wanted to play this sarcastic little game, then bring it on.

"Look," he began, his voice dropping its mocking tone and becoming suddenly serious. "Cody wanted to borrow a few of my CDs, so I told him he could stop by before we went out tonight. I honestly didn't know you'd be coming home."

He lifted his eyes to hers, looking sincerely remorseful.

"It's fine, Zac," she said. "I know you two are friends, and like I've said before, I'm not going to get in the way of that. This period of awkwardness will pass eventually, I promise."

"But you can't control the way you feel about these things, Reese, nor can you control how long it takes to get over them," he said gently. "Believe me, I know how badly it sucks to have to be forced to see someone when you're not ready."

And there it was again: the allusion to a side of Zac that she'd never been allowed to really see. Instead of holding back and biting her tongue like she'd been doing for the last several days, she found herself blurting out exactly what was on her mind.

"Does what you just said have anything to do with the girl from the bar the other night? The one you couldn't stop looking at? The one you seemed to be running away from?" she asked.

Zac's eyes narrowed and his face lost all traces of sympathy; his mask was on again. Carissa knew better than to press the issue, but now her interest was piqued even more than before.

"I just came in here to say that I hope you have fun at the party tonight," he said.

"Thanks...and hey, Zac?" she called as he turned to leave her bedroom.

"Yeah?"

"What you said to me the other day about being there if I ever need to talk - the same goes for you, okay?" She grabbed his eyes with her own although they kept trying to escape her searching gaze. "You can tell me anything. I promise I won't judge you. And I'm a damn good listener, if I do say so myself."

"I'll keep that in mind," he said, before walking out of the room and closing the door softly behind him.


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