Page 2 of Scar

Mr. Porter is worried that someone had broken into his house in the night and switched his medicine with something poisonous. The person that warned him about that, as I said, isn't real. "Reed warned me you'd say that!" He tells me.

I let out the quietest of sighs, resting my ankle on the opposite knee so I can rest my notepad in my lap. "Would you feel safer if your medication was individually packaged? It would guarantee that nothing has been tampered with." I ask. If I had thought about that in the first place, I wouldn't be dealing with this argument right now. I don't know how I forgot something so simple.

I went to college for twelve years, and I've been practicing for the last four. I pride myself on being the best in the area, and I didn't even give myself that title. No, some uppity Houston magazine crowned me with not only the best psychiatrist in Texas but also one of the hottest 35 under 35 of Texas. Whatever the fuck that means. But when that article came out, my books were flooded with consultations for kids. I don't normally work with kids, it's not my specialty, but they didn't care. It was the hot single moms that wanted to meet me. I didn't bother giving a single one of them an appointment.

My appointment didn't get any better from there. Unfortunately Mr. Porter started to get a little hysterical, leading me to make the unfortunate decision to have him committed. I hate making that call. I remember being thrown in the psych ward when I was sixteen, it was traumatizing. Almost just as traumatizing as my childhood was, definitely not something I'd ever willingly sign someone up for.

But I don't have a better option for him, unfortunately.

My receptionist double checks my appointments for tomorrow before I leave, and I make sure that she knows to forward any emergency calls to me. I don't know why I remind her of this everyday, she's worked for me for four years and never once has let me down. She started as an assistant when I was in some small, shitty office on a bad side of town, and she stuck by me while I opened my own practice.

Now I'm the most sought after psychiatrist in all of Texas, and I personally employ four other full time psychiatrists and a few licensed therapists. I've worked harder than most people my age, also making me one of the most successful people in the area. My secretary has been by my side for all of it. She's a wonderful woman who decided retired life was boring and wanted to get out of the house and away from her husband for a few hours a day. Nobody else would hire a sixty-five year old woman who hadn't worked in over twenty years, but she's the best decision I've ever made. The best secretary I've ever had. Thankfully she's not insulted by my need to remind her, she just smiles and tells me it is all taken care of before I head out of the office.

The entire drive, I am debating whether or not I want to stop somewhere for dinner. On one hand, I don't have the energy to cook. But on the other hand, I don't have the energy to deal with people.

Fuck. I hate nights like these, I prefer to cook, I strive on cooking. I don’t keep the physique I have by eating out all the time. But when each appointment during my day seems to go wrong, I don't have the energy for anything. I wonder if I have a frozen pizza in the freezer? No, fuck, I ate that last week when one of my patients with PTSD killed herself.

Her and I hadn't gotten a single appointment in yet, she'd rescheduled me twice. It worried me that something was wrong, so I had called her and begged her to come in and see me. I even offered to do a house call if being outside scared her. She agreed, but unfortunately was triggered by someone on the way to my office, she never even made it to her appointment. Even though she was never technically my patient, I feel like I failed her. If I could've gotten to her sooner, she may have still been here. But I can't let guilt sit with me like that, not in my line of work.

I finally decided on a small cafe a few minutes from my office. It's on campus, which sucks. I hate dealing with college kids, I didn't even go to this school. I went to college in Austin, but all college kids are the same. Loud, disruptive, entitled, and naive. But the food is good, campus restaurants always have the cheapest and the most off the wall options.

I park at one of the meters and head inside. The place is packed, kids everywhere. Most of them are on their computers, typing away without a care in the world. The rest of them are sitting in groups talking, laughing and fucking off. Either my tolerance for kids is pretty high today, or they're not actually that bad right now. Whatever, I just want to get out of here. I head to the counter, waiting in a line behind at least five different people. That's fine, it gives me time to check my emails that I neglected this morning. Nothing major, a few consultation requests, a few requests for me to evaluate criminals trying to claim insanity, and a ton of spam messages. But it gives me something to focus on rather than all the young adults surrounding me or the crappy music playing a little too loudly.

I scan the menu when I am the second one in line, vowing to try something new. It's the only reason I go to places like this. They have all kinds of shit.

It seems like almost anything can go on top of macaroni and cheese or on a baked potato and everything can be made into a grilled cheese. Kids eatweird. But I guess so do I since I drove here. I end up ordering an order of pulled pork mac and cheese. It has slow roasted pulled pork, house made bbq sauce, crispy fried onions, fried jalapenos and spicy queso. I also ordered a pimento cheeseburger with bacon and onion rings on top. Not my usual menu, I prefer to eat healthy enough to maintain my physique with regular trips to the gym. But, like I said, this wasn't a regular day. This hadn't been a regular week. I want to binge out on my front porch with a few shots of bourbon.

While I wait for my food, I feel the woosh of air from the door opening. Of course it had opened about a dozen times, but this time I felt myself needing to turn around and look. I felt my body spinning to see who was coming in before I even registered why I cared. And fuck am I glad I did.

This goddess of a young woman just walked in the door. She somehow looked angelic with her honey brown hair shining from the setting sun. It was pulled back into some thick braid with a few pieces falling out and framing her perfect face. She has flawless tanned skin littered in freckles and stunning light brown eyes that I swear hold the secrets to the universe. She's thin with small breasts but these long, gorgeous legs and a tight round ass.

Fuck, she looks amazing. She looks like she doesn't belong here just as badly as me, just for a whole different reason. She's wearing a pair of ripped up jean shorts, a pair of suede ankle boots, a white tank top with some older band written on the front, and an almost bohemian style long sleeve cover that hangs down past her shorts. She looks like someone that would've been at a festival in the seventies, or like someone that you'd find in the woods, casting a spell to the moon or something. Not my usual type of woman that I like to look at. I prefer my women in formal clothes, business attire, high profile women that have to pencil you in for dates.

So why can't I stop staring at this young woman? Not only is she far too young for me, but she's not my type. She looks like she's the type of girl to grill me about eating a steak when cows suffer for our enjoyment. She looks like the type to have a house full of plants and candles, probably one that would yell at me for not driving a hybrid car. But I can't stop staring. She's captivating. Even when she's doing just about everything in her power not to make eye contact with anyone, most of the guys in this shithole are staring at her. I doubt the girl even notices that they're tracing their eyes up her mile long legs until they're practically drooling over her ass in those fucking shorts.

No surprise, this goddess of a young woman gets up to the counter while I'm still waiting for my meal. She tells the cashier something about avoiding cross contamination, I'm trying too hard not to listen in. But she orders stir fry vegetables with rice noodles, no meat, no eggs, and no gluten. She's one of those types. I knew she wasn't my type, and I wish that this deterred me. But it doesn't.

I want to talk to her, I want to ask her name and her number, or just drag her out to my car before either one of us gets the chance to eat. I want to pull out of this cafe before any other man has the chance to stare at her for too long.

Luckily, some stereotypical girl in fucking cowboy boots comes over and drags this bombshell away from me before I crack and talk to her. It's for the best, I don't need some college girl distracting me.

Chapter 3

Maeve's POV

I don't know what I was thinking coming here, I can't afford to eat off campus. That's part of the reason that I made sure my scholarship included the meal card. Campus serves three meals a day, only leaving me to have to find the funds for snacks, holidays and weekends. But with how tight my budget is, I usually just end up not eating any snacks at all. Or I sneak a couple of extra things into my bag for the day.

Last week, the gluten-free section of the cafeteria had prepared peanut butter no-bakes, I took so many of those that I swear I was sweating peanut butter days later. But the staff pretends not to notice. They know I'm one of the only students that actually deals with celiac disease rather than the few students who just prefer gluten free, but don't need it. So they don't mind if I take a little extra, they know how hard it is to avoid cross contamination outside of their well controlled cafeteria, they'd rather me take extra food than have to take days off school because I accidentally ate gluten.

The staff always calls me honey and tells me to take what I need, calling me a sweet young girl and telling me about their single sons. It's sweet, but I don't date. I've tried more times than I can count. But I don't have that attraction that I feel like I need. I want chemistry, I want fights that end in passionate sex, and I want a borderline toxic kind of love. I want to hate him, but feel like I can't possibly live without him. Iwantobsessive and crazy. I just want what I haven't gotten. I've gotten the well mannered men, the ones that don't kiss you until the end of the date, the kinds that don't have sex until months in and don't even kiss you in public. The kinds you'd take home to your parents.

That's not what I want. I want the guy that would hit anyone who looked at me wrong, the guy that wants my location at all times and slightly intimidates my mother. I want the guy that would fight anyone that looks at me wrong and looks at me like I am their entire reason for living. I’m starting to think I will never find that.

But I ordered my food, praying that they take my allergy seriously. If they don't, I'll end up having to miss all my classes tomorrow. I hope that I stressed that enough. Now I'm nervous and anxious about eating here at all. Everything I see everyone else eating is pasta, meat, cheese, and bread. But Shelby shows up at my side while I'm waiting for my meal. It turns out she's already made best friends with Carlie in the short few days since I added Shelby to our group chat. "Come on, darling. We saved you a seat!" She says excitedly.

I let her drag me away, trying not to focus on the man who was staring at me while I was ordering. He's tall and gorgeous. He has thick muscular thighs wrapped in black cigarette pants with dark gray stripes down them. He's wearing those fancy leather and suede shoes that I've never actually seen a man wear outside of movies, and he's got on a gray sweater. His dark brown hair is styled perfectly, probably held in place with mousse.

After the week that I've had, I almost want to lecture him about aerosoles being bad for the environment, but I don't want to open that wound again. He's got these piercing blue eyes, at least from what I could see. He wouldn't turn his head to the side to let me get too good of a look at him, but his jaw is sharp, his chin ending in a small point, and not a stubble in sight. This man looks like he is probably the cover model for a magazine on fashion. He looks like he could be a professor if he wasn't a model. Maybe a model who goes on the brochure for being a professor? That's not a real thing, is it? Crap, I don't know.