"You mean..." he muttered. "I... you... we... " and started crying again. She would have slapped him out of utter annoyance, if not, at that exact moment, entered...
Howard Schulz knocked on the door and it opened slowly, apparently unlocked and slightly ajar. "Hello?" he called out, entering the room, "Hello? Do you have a telephone I can use? Hello?" he walked through the living room and entered the kitchen to see Lauren and Carlos on the ground, the girl bleeding and Carlos crying.
"Hi." He said, "I'm Howard, my car broke down and I, uh… uhm… is she okay?"
Lauren wipes her nose and chin with the back of her hand, more smearing than cleaning anything up. She gives the stranger a hard look, and then looks down at Carlos, puzzled. How could she have ever thought that she loved this wimpy guy?
"Carlos. ... Carlos. Get off me. Stop crying, you sniveling lump!" She shoves his head off of her lap and stands up, her feet crunching on the bits of broken pottery. Lauren brushes off her clothes and extends a hand to the stranger.
"How do you do, sir? Howard, is it? My name is Lauren, and I'm quite all right." She firmly shakes Howard's hand. "Oh, and that's Carlos on the floor," she says dismissively. Pointing to the cordless phone on the wall mount, she says, "There's the phone. Help yourself."
And Lauren proceeds to walk out of the room, heading toward....
Howard watched Lauren head towards what he thought was the bathroom, but he wasn't quite sure. After all, he had only been in this house less than a minute. He headed towards the phone that Lauren pointed out and dialed a number. He waited for it to ring and smiled.
"Avery... yes, it's me Howard. Yeah, my Lexus broke down. I need you to bring the Limo over and get a tow truck, ok?..." he put his hand on the reciever and looked at Carlos, "Carlos? What's the address here?"
Carlos, awash in grief and confusion, blubbers out the address to the stranger in his kitchen -- all the while the wailing in his mind going non-stop. Can it be true? Can my dear love Lauren truly hate me just for crying?? Aaaauuuggghhh!!
Meanwhile, Lauren, in the bathroom, has cleaned her face and brushed her hair and teeth, while deciding that her new life begins now.
And her first step is....
To do something she loved. As far as she was concerned she was giving Carlos too much of herself while her own life was being neglected. That had to change. She always wanted to…
See the world and what it had to offer rather than staying in one place and remaining naive about life because of one man. It was time to do what she wanted to do but still she had feelings for him so she…