Please read Only in a Dream Ch. 1 before reading this chapter.
For those of you that actually read the whole long version, this will look familiar. I broke it down into chapters and the conclusion to the long version will be chapters seven and eight.
I apologize for the epic that this story was. I just started writing what was in my head and got carried away. I was actually trying to make it longer, because I thought it wouldn't be long enough. I wanted readers to try and get to know Brad on a personal level and I went a little overboard.
In the first couple of chapters, I try to paint a picture of who Brad is and how he met Kathy. Some of the events, or memories of his come to play and will make more sense later in the story. I wanted to show what happened to lead up to the thoughts in Brad's head, and how they follow into the main theme of the story (the journal).
Please don't make judgments of any of the characters until reading the entire story. Which is complete and will be posted after some minor edits.
This time, I am dividing it into 8 (as far as I can tell) chapters. I am leaving the comments off until after the last chapter.
I wasn't sure of how long the story would actually be, once put on the site. One of the comments that I read from an author on a different story wrote that he had typed out six pages, and then his story was only about one and a half on the site, so I had that in mind. . . Sorry.
In this chapter, Brad is still sitting on his deck lost in thought. After being told about his nephew's girlfriend's infidelity, his thought's drift from worries that Kathy may have done something similar with a neighbor twenty two years ago. Then, his head is full of memories of their meeting and falling in love ten years before that. He thinks about the man that tried to keep them apart and remembers how Kathy's sister seemed to be causing trouble too. Also, thoughts of his own insecurities and all of the men over the years, trying to get close to Kathy invade his thoughts.
*
All of his life, Brad lacked self confidence and felt he wasn't good looking in any sense, he had never been popular with members of the opposite sex.
In fact, when Brad would become friends with a girl, things would be fine until she got any notion that he might like her as more than a friend, then she would avoid him. He was very, very shy and feared rejection.
He overcame that fear with Kathy, only a few minutes after meeting her. Her warm personality had made him feel at ease. The day they met, they sat and talked for a while, he then asked her if she would like go for a drive. As luck would have it, when they walked over to his car to leave, it wouldn't start, the battery was dead.
It was 1978, Kathy had recently been divorced and her big brother, Eric, had helped pull her on where he worked. Her ex husband wouldn't stop harassing her, so Eric invited her to come in and stay with him at his apartment. He lived there with his girlfriend, Layla. Eric and Kathy's younger sister, Tina, also stayed there with them.
Kathy told Brad that they could take her sister's old car and went in to ask her for the keys. Tina had been watching out of the front window as Kathy talked to Brad and thought it comical.
"Ha ha ha, your actually going somewhere with tha. . . Uh. . . Him?" she asked, and laughed a little.
Kathy just grabbed the keys out of Tina's hand and turned to leave.
"He seems like a nice guy, I kind of like him, yes, we are going for a drive," she said.
Kathy came back with the keys, and they climbed into Tina's car and they left. Brad was driving, since she didn't have her driver's license yet.
They drove around for a while and talked about their families, their beliefs, and the things they liked and didn't like. They talked about their dreams and what they wanted to do with their lives. They talked and talked and talked.
Brad had never met a girl before that he was so comfortable with. Just after a couple of hours, he was looking straight into her beautiful green eyes and felt like he had known her for years.
When he took her home, they sat for a long time in the car out in front of the apartment talking. He was staring into her eyes and he couldn't help himself, he just pulled her into his arms and kissed her. She just melted into his arms and kissed him back. Brad was hooked, it just felt so natural, like it was meant to be. He was falling hard for her.
They sat holding each other and kissing for quite a while. Then, as much as he didn't want to, he told her it was late, he had to work in the morning. Before he left, he asked if he could see her again the next evening and she told him to come on over after he got off of work.
Brad was in a daze as he walked back home. He had never in his life met a girl like this.
He was undressed for bed, when he remembered he needed to charge the battery in his car. He pulled on some pants, went back outside and hooked the battery charger up. Going back in, he said goodnight to his grandma, then went to bed. Since his car had been there, grandma just assumed he had gone with his friend, Jack.
Sleep didn't come easy for Brad that night. His mind was racing, he could still taste Kathy's kisses, feel her hand on his side and those eyes, those big green eyes.
"Was this real? Did tonight really happen?" he thought.
She was, by far, the most beautiful girl that he had ever even sat and held a conversation with, that didn't try to make excuses to slip away from him. They'd held each other and she had kissed him like she did. She was so sweet; she had the same values as him; she had morals; and he knew she hadn't slept with a bunch of guys like most of the girls he knew had. He knew it was too soon to tell, but he felt like he might be falling in love with her already.
Kathy had been a little interested in a man she worked with. Todd was a friend of her brother's and he was always coming over to her work station to talk and flirt with her. He told Kathy he was going through a divorce, that his wife had just gotten pregnant to trap him.
Todd was an exceptionally good looking man, he was also very aware of it too, he was cool with the lines and could usually get girls into bed pretty easy. Kathy was really attracted to him and he seemed very interested in her too. She thought that he was so nice, and of course, his looks attracted her too. She thought she might even want to pursue something further with him after his divorce, but not before it was final.
Kathy had always ridden to work with her bother Eric, as she didn't have a driver's license yet. A few days before she met Brad, Eric became sick at work and had to leave early. He told Kathy that Todd would give her a ride home, if she didn't mind.
She was a little anxious, because she liked him a lot and thought he was very cute. Kathy thought maybe she could maybe stake a claim on him, so to speak, and get to know him better. Maybe she would be, waiting in the wings, as it were, for him after his divorce.
"Yes, that would be fine," she said.
After Todd drove her home, he parked in front of the apartment and they sat in his car talking for a while. He told her all about the evil bitch that had trapped him and had destroyed his life. How he was finally breaking away from his mistake and was looking for a new relationship,
"With someone just like you," said Todd.
Kathy's heart raced when he said these things. Then Todd told her that he hadn't had any relations with, or even kissed his wife at all, in over a year.
"I'm really, really attracted to you," he said, as he slid over towards her, and tried to pull her in close to him.
"What! Wait a minute, wh. . . What was that last thing he said? He doesn't even know me! I've barely even spoken to him, I. . . Just some casual conversation at work, and now, HE's doing all of the talking. . . About his wife and how they haven't had sex for a long time," Kathy thought to herself.
He could barely look her in the eyes when he was speaking about his soon to be ex. And here he was, obviously trying to make moves on her. For a fleeting moment, Kathy almost gave in, she was so wanting to feel some kind of attention and affection from someone of the opposite sex. But, something about Todd didn't quite jive, there was a superficial quality to him.
It had been (truthfully) over a year since she'd had any physical contact with a man at all. That had been her ex husband, who she had despised since the very day she married him.
Kathy resisted, she pulled back away from Todd. She wanted this, but it would have to be later on, after she got to know him and after he was divorced. He was moving way too fast for her. She wanted to fall in love with someone, there was no way that she would sleep with a man this soon. Besides, this wasn't even a date,
"It's a ride home from work, for Christ's sake!!" she thought.
She told him that they should take it slow, she would really like to go out with him sometime in the future.
"Maybe next week, we can go out for supper or something like that, then we can start getting to know each other better," she told him, "Then, after your divorce. . . Well, we'll just see how it goes. . . Goodbye, thanks for the ride home," Kathy said.
She got out of the car and headed inside, as Todd sped away. He was livid,
"What the fuck?"
She was a sure thing, he had her right where he wanted her. . . Or so he thought.
"I know she wants me, I can see it in her eyes, she's just playing hard to get. Oh well, another week won't hurt, I'll get her then. Man, oh. . . Man!! I bet she's really a wild fuck!" he said to himself.
As Todd was driving off, Kathy stood on the front porch of the apartment for a few moments. She was torn.
"Did I just make a mistake?" she thought.
She really wanted to be with a man, but a relationship, not a quick roll in the sack.
"And that's all Todd wanted, anyway, that was the signal he was sending out."
At least she thought it was.
"I'll get to know him better next week," she said to herself.
"Wait a minute, I. . . We don't have to wait until next week, if I had his number. . . I cou. . .! I'll have Eric call him, shit, I forgot we're off the next four nights, maybe we can go out tomorrow night!!"
She was smiling with excitement as she unlocked the door and headed in. When Kathy walked into the apartment, it was dark.
"Where's Eric and Layla? Where's Tina? Are they all in bed?"
As she walked through to the kitchen, she noticed that the doors to their bedrooms were open and. . . Empty.
"I thought Eric was sick," Kathy said to herself.
Then she realized, this whole thing was a setup. Eric had arranged for Todd to bring her home and there was conveniently no one there. They had assumed that Todd would bring her in and take her to bed.
"Don't they know me better than that? Christ!" Kathy cried.
Kathy was a little upset with her brother and Todd, she was sure that they had arranged to get her laid. She undressed, showered and went to bed. She heard Eric, Layla and Tina come in about three hours later.
In the morning, after waking, Kathy strolled into the kitchen, where she found Eric and Tina sitting at the table with looks of anticipation on their faces. Tina turned to face Kathy.
"Welllll?" she teased.
