A Romance With Scars - Kaitlyn Rose Hathaway (best business books of all time txt) 📗

She didn't know if she is going to reach him before everything is going to be too late, but she ran. Thank god, she reached him and at that very moment the window smashed on the floor. Pieces of glass scratched her skin and blood flew.

2 years later
She didn't want to go to the beach, but she still couldn't refuse her two best friends Kaitlyn and Claire. Both of them were sun bathing at the very moment, but Riley was wearing long jeans and a long arm shirt, so nobody could see the scars on her leg and the scar on the inside of her forearm. Even her short brown hair was held so that people shouldn't be able to see the scar on her left cheek, but somehow her hair never cooperated, so everybody could see the disgusting scar of her or at least it was what she thought.
She was walking down the street at the beach when she saw a little girl ran and fell down. She immediately started to cry. Riley waited for the mother to come but after a while she couldn't help but go to the child.
"It's okay, you don't have to cry. It's just a little scratch."
The girl stopped crying and the mother came. Saw Riley's face and shouted: "Let go of my daughter! Do you want to scare her to death or what?"
She took her daughter and went away really quick as if Riley had an incurable illness.
"My pleasure." Riley muttered.
It was always like this, so she was already used to it, but she just couldn't help but want to help people. She sighed and went into a nearby beach café where she sat down by the counter. Without looking up she ordered a cola. The guy behind the counter gave her one glass and said: "That one is on me."
Riley sighed, looked up and put her hair aside, so that the scar could be seen. While saying in an annoyed voice: "I have a big disgusting scar. Still hitting on me?"
The guy laughed. "I think you misunderstood something. I am not hitting on you, even though you are quite pretty even with the scar. I saw you helping the little girl and since the mother wasn't thankful at all, I thought that I could help the kid saying thanks."
He smiled and went to a bunch of girls who were calling for him. Riley wanted to thank him, but he was quite busy, so she just let a note and went away.

Thanks for the coke ツ
Riley

Kyle tried to get away, but the girls went on talking, so the girl with the scar got away. Then while washing her glass he noticed a little note. He smiles, but then said: "You couldn't have write down your mobile phone number, could you, Riley?" With which he got some strange looks from the customers, but he didn't care.

Meanwhile Riley returned to the hotel where her friends were already waiting for her.
"Where have you been? Do you know how worried we were when you didn't answer your phone? We were about to call the police!"
"Sorry, I forgot the time in that beach café and when I wanted to call you guys I realized that my batterie ran out."
Kaitlyn wasn't stisfied at all and wanted to know more: "A beach café? What was so special about it?"
Claire said amused: "Maybe there was an hot guy." And laughed. Also Kait started to laugh, but Riley blushed. They saw her blush and stopped laughing. Both were speechless. It had been so long since Riley had shown any interest in a guy. well, she didn't even talk to them if it wasn't necessary. Her brother Adrian and her best friend Sam were exceptions. But what Riley didn't know was that Sam was secretly in love with her. Of course Kaitlyn and Claire knew it, but they had to swear to never tell her, because he didn't want to destroy their friendship.
It was silent. Then Claire spoke: "There really was a guy that made you blush like this, wasn't there? Oh my god, what was his name? What did you talk about and the most important question when are you going to meet again?"
Riley's expression saddened. "I am not going to see him again. I don't even know his name. He was one of those popular guys. I am sure he already forgot about me."
Totally confused Kait asked: "Just another popular guy? Definitely not! If he really was one of them we wouldn't be talking about him right now. You're not that kind of girl, Riley. You never were."
"I am not sure about that myself."
It was clear that Riley was disappointed, so they didn't ask any further questions.

It was night. The ocean and the sand of the beach looked so beautiful in the light of the moon.
Kyle still wasn't sure how he could see her again. As soon as he saw the note he called the friend who helped out in the café and told him that he should his job himself and thus Kyle ran out searching for Riley, but he hadn't found her. The beach was empty. Or at least he thought it was. But
then he saw someone swimming. He was fascinated by the person in the water who definitely was a girl. The way the moon was reflected by her skin. She was beautiful.
Suddenly she came back to the beach really quick and held her stomach. She was in pain. He ran to help her and then recognized her. It was Riley!
"Hey, are you alright?" Kyle asked.
Her head turned around. She was surprised for a moment then said with a voice filled with pain: "Yeah, I think so. It was just a jellyfish which I didn't see."
Kyle was furious. Without her permission he carried her to the next bench. She was startled. "It's okay. The hotel I am staying in is nearby. I will go back and put some creme on it and it will be alright."
But he didn't listen anymore. Instead he carried her like a princess while she tried to get down, but his strength made it impossible.
Claire and Kaitlyn who were sitting at the lobby bar came running at them.
"What happened?"
"Jellyfish. Which roomnumber?" Kyle responsed.
Then he carried her all the way up into her bed. Afterwards Claire pushed him away and said: "I'm going to take form here." And thus Kait pushed him out, but in the light he saw something her didn't noticed before. He could see all her scars. Every single one. Kait went outside with him after seeing his expression and closed the dorr behind her.
She sighed. "You saw them." It wasn't wasn't a question. It was a statement.
"What happened? That definitely wasn't caused by the jellyfish."
She sighed again and suddenly looked tired.
"Let's sit down first. It's not gong to be easy to tell the story even though it was much more painful to see it actually happen."
They sit down on a nearby bench and Kaitlyn stayed quiet a while, thinking how to begin.
"I think it's better to go back two years when everything began. But first a question to be sure. By the expression she made I conclude that you're the guy from then beach café, am I right?"
Kyle nodded. She gaved him a little smile.
"I am quite sure that she wasn't nice to you when you met, am I right?"
He smiles. "She was more annoyed and thought I wanted to hit on her, so she show me her scar on her left cheek."
"I thought so. But you have to know that she wasn't always like that. She was beautiful, well she still is but she was scarless. And the most important thing is that she was more cheerful and thus really popular..."

“… Nearly every guy in our grade had a crush on her, even many older ones had, but she wasn’t interested. She had that totally stupid but cute idea that somewhere out there is a person who is fated to be her partner. But not only the boys liked her. She was loved by anyone. The teachers were fascinated by her and the girls had her as their model. But one day on her way home a window of a new built building fell down. It would have smashed that kid when Riley didn’t pushed him aside and somehow covered him up. Well, she wasn’t in real danger, so she could leave hospital on the following day, but that incident left scars which changed her forever.”
Kaitlyn paused. Her body was in the hotel sitting right beside Kyle, but her mind was far away.
“Of course she somehow hated the scars, but she was still herself. It were the people who made her change. After the first day back in school her whole personality changed. She didn’t dare to look into a mirror anymore, just wore long jeans and shirts and wasn’t as cheerful as in the past. But don’t get it wrong, she was happy that she could help the child. It’s just that she couldn’t bear how the people looked at her.