CHAPTER THREE - KAMI

Sunday mornings were for family, so Aunt Helen always cooked a big breakfast and insisted that Rain and I be around to eat it. I’d gotten up early and was ready to go down in plenty of time to help her finish cooking.

I walked into her bright living room, where the sun was shining in through the windows shadowing the couch beneath and blinding me.

Then Devin’s unsettling voice brought me around. “Morning, Kam-Kam.”

I whirled around as he sat up shirtless, clearly seeking attention. “What the hell are you doing here?”

Rain walked up behind me from the kitchen. “He was too drunk to drive home last night, and I was too tired to take him. Aunt Hel insisted he crash here.”

“Whatever. Don’t call me Kam-Kam.” I hadn’t minded the nick-name when we were together, but since the breakup, he’d only used it as a way to annoy me.

“I would have gone home with my girl, but we broke up. It was time for a change anyway. I’ve got plenty of girls barking at the bit.”

I wanted to say, “Seems fitting for a dog like you,” but I didn’t want him to think I cared enough. So I turned to go into the kitchen and help Aunt Helen. She lined a pan with bread, and I took over by getting the butter out of the fridge and buttering each piece.

“Thanks,” she said, wiping her brow. She took a load off while I popped the pan into the oven to make our toast. “You’re down early today.”

Rain joined her aunt at the table. “You’ve also been pulling doubles a lot lately. You should slow down.”

“I’m glad to have the extra work. It helps with the bills, and I’ve been enjoying this new phase of cleaning out unneeded trash and clutter.” I fought off the urge to say: ‘Devin being the first and biggest.’, but I stopped myself.

“I’m about to change the apartment up a bit. Maybe I’ll paint it and get a new couch. The ones I have now are too old.”

The truth was I couldn’t wait to move out of the apartment and had Devin’s nuisance to thank for that. Though, I couldn’t afford the rent in the area. At least for now I could enjoy my space for however long I was going to be here.

“Those couches are ancient, honey. I had them when I moved into this place forty years ago,” Aunt Helen said.

“It’s great furniture, but it’s time to die.”

Devin came into the kitchen and grabbed a mug before helping himself to a cup of coffee.

“I’m going to take this on the road.” He raised his mug and took a sip as she waved her hand dismissively.

“You go on ahead. Bring my mug back, though. You can’t find anything with Iggy on it anymore.”

The oven timer went off, and I got up to take a peek at the bread that was ready. As usual, there was way too much, and Aunt Helen stopped Devin.

“Come back here, honey, and get you some toast for the road.” She grabbed a paper towel and wrapped a few pieces up for him to take, which he gladly did.

“Thanks, Hel. Rain.” He gave my friend a nod and then met my eyes with a smirk.

I felt my blood boiling. Why did he have to hang around like an unwanted rag doll? He brought out the worst in me.

Once the door was shut, Rain giggled. “Wow, you could cut the tension in here with a knife. It’s one thing to have hard feelings, but you waste way too much emotion hating him, Kam.”

“Uh, hello? Can you blame me? He did nothing but put me down for months and cheat on me. Am I supposed to kiss his feet just because he’s a good guitar player?” I asked her.

I loved Rain, and knew that she had my back in most things, but I was still a little pissed that she stayed connected to Devin knowing how much he’d hurt me. I didn’t want to start a fight with my best friend, so I instead excused myself and made my way to my apartment.

As I walked in and threw myself on my coach, I heard Rain’s footsteps up the steps. She entered my living room with a concerned look on her face.

“You look like you’ve got a lot on your mind. I’m sorry Devin was here. I know it’s not easy, but I couldn’t let him drive home.”

“You did the right thing. I just wish he’d have the decency to at least try not to show his face around me. He’s always in my space and says things that only annoy me even more.”

Rain sat down next to me in the couch. “I wanted to tell you about something. Samantha at work was telling me about this dating site. I don’t know if you’ve ever considered that sort of thing, but this one is based locally, and it matches people based on your interests. Who knows you may find your perfect man and baby daddy. It’s called Matched Solid. She’s had a good experience with it so far.”

“I’ve never thought of using a dating site. I hear they can be dangerous if you’re not careful, and the last thing I need is a stalker.”

“This one is supposed to have security features in place, and you’re only sharing the information that you allow to share. It’s not like you rush into anything. If you find someone, you can call them and say hi through their chat and online call feature. That way, you’re not giving these men your numbers.” Rain shrugged, and I had to admit, it’d sounded different from anything else I’d heard of.

Rain’s concern was warranted. My life was beginning to feel like complete hell. And every time I had a run in with Devin, all my anger and resentment stirred back up. How the hell was I going to move on with my life like this? I needed something other than work as a distraction, because I was slowly going mad.

“So how much does this thing cost?” I knew there had to be some catch and I didn’t want to spend all my hard-earned tip money paying monthly fees.

Rain took out her phone. “Here, let’s look it up.” She sent her thumbs moving across the screen and put the phone in front of us. I leaned in close to get a better look.

“They have an introductory special. It’s a one-time fee of fourteen-ninety-nine. You can’t beat that. You get access to their forums and have your own profile page that you can add pictures to.”

I leaned in over her shoulder. “It’s kind of like the Facebook of romance. I guess it has algorithms that suggest people based on their interests. I guess I could try it.”

“We can’t look at the profiles unless we have an account. Do you want to set one up?” Rain smile widened as she bounced in her seat.

“I guess we could. My laptop is in my bedroom.”

As if we were kids again, we gave each other mischievous looks and raced to my room. We opened it, and it lit up, the screen coming to life to reveal my lock screen. I typed in my password, and I let Rain take to the keys.

She typed in the web address, and soon the site popped up. “OK, let’s see how to sign you up.” Rain filled in the appropriate information and only had to ask me a few questions to get me started. Once it went to the payment part, she turned the computer around, and I punched in my numbers, giving Matched Solid my fifteen-dollar entry.

I kept the computer in front of me. “We can look at the profiles now.” I let out a deep breath and scrolled down through the gallery of profiles, each of which had a picture and a brief description. There was a search feature, and it had options to search for specific interests, but I glanced over several profiles on the page. The entire group was filled with attractive people, and even if someone wasn’t to my personal attraction, there weren’t any who looked like they belonged in prison.

That’s a win.

Rain whistled. “Nice looking bunch. I’ve heard when people pay to be on a site; it usually means they are going to put their best face forward, but then again, this site could be doing the same thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, the site probably puts their more attractive people on the front pages.” She lifted her shoulder casually and leaned in closer.

“I guess I can see why they’d do that. Let’s dig around a bit.” I went halfway into the profiles and found that the further back into the pages, the less “apple pie” the people looked. Rain was right.

“Dang, he’s fine.” Rain practically pushed me aside and leaned in to get a better look. “Hellooo, Daddy.” She fanned herself as I giggled.

“You’re terrible. He is hot, though. It’s good to see a few rugged guys here and there, for a minute I thought we’d stepped into an ivy league yearbook.” I hit like, and she smiled.

“Yeah, but look at this guy. If he contacts you, I’ll be so jealous. He’s even making my ovaries boil. I think you better turn the page before we become pregnant by osmosis.”

“If only it were that easy.” I nudged her and scrolled further into the list.

“Wow, he’s got some serious hair.” I gave her a look and shook my head. “I think we better keep going.” We scrolled through all the pages, making comments and hitting the like button when necessary. We laughed at a few until we cried and couldn’t believe what some were putting in their profiles.

“I think you need to do your profile. We could spend hours here.”

“We have. I don’t know what to put. Do you think you could help me write it? I noticed many of them were written in the third person.”

“I’ll do what I can. We’ll have them lining up in no time.”

I wasn’t sure I wanted them lining up, but I had to get started somehow.

“First things first. Let’s add a profile picture.”

After we got my profile all set up and Rain left to go to work, I sat and scrolled through the guys one more time.

I sat and looked through the photos of all the “eligible bachelors near me.” I couldn’t help but wonder which one of them might make a good dad.