The Returned

I was more than a little surprised to see her coming at me. When she came to a stop I noticed she wasn’t her usual confident self, but looked a little shaken.

I was too upset with her to care so I didn’t even ask her what she wanted, why she’d followed me. I started to climb into the car and leave, no longer in the mood to deal with her, but she stopped me.

“You didn’t…you didn’t finish your salad.” She sounded close to tears, which made no sense at all. I didn’t say anything, just stood in the open door of my car and looked down at her.

I’d never noticed before how much shorter than me she is. She barely reached my chest. “I wasn’t hungry.” Why was she wringing her hands and staring at the ground?

She didn’t say anything more and I continued getting into the car. “No wait. Look, I’m sorry, it’s just…it’s not easy for me to open up to people. I don’t…I’m no good at this.”

She looked everywhere but at me and I finally picked up on the fact that my leaving the way I did had done something to her. If I’d known that’s all it took I would’ve done that shit a long time ago.

“Good at what? Pick your head up and look at me.” Her face was red as a her hair when she finally found the courage to obey me. Still she didn’t focus on me, but looked at a point somewhere over my shoulder.

If she wrung her hands any harder she’d break them in half. She was nervous that much was clear. This was so unlike her, this show of insecurity.

I’d never seen this side of her before, didn’t know it existed. But I was catching on to what was going on with her. Pain in the ass. “I asked you a question, good at what?”

“Dating stuff.” She looked down at the ground and back towards the restaurant. She was probably putting her job on the line being out here like this. I felt the anger of a few minutes ago drift away just like that.

“I promise I won’t bite Zandi. I just want to take you out somewhere for a nice dinner or a movie if you’d like, your choice.” She studied me as if trying to see into my head.

Was her heart beating as fast as mine was? Did she feel that same sense of inevitability that I did? I knew that if she agreed to the first date with me, it would be the beginning of something more for the both of us.

But she didn’t need to know my intentions this early in the game. I held still as she studied me, finally understanding that this was a huge step for her. Now that she was standing in front of me like this, I felt almost honored.

I knew what it meant for her to be standing here like this, for her to have run after me. I knew that she truly and sincerely didn’t want to get entangled in anything meaningless. So she must want something more.

She took her sweet time studying me making me more and more nervous as I withstood her scrutiny. Whatever she saw seemed to be enough because she pulled her pad and pen from her apron and started writing.

“This is my number. I’m off from work and school on the weekends.” Why was she so shy all of a sudden? I found that cute too.

I felt a new excitement start to grow at the thought of getting to know all of her instead of pilfering information from outside sources. Fuck me I’ve reverted back to my teenage years.

“This weekend then, Saturday. I’ll call you and set it up.” We shared a smile, our first genuine one, before she turned and walked away.

I watched until she entered the restaurant before getting into the car. I sat there for a minute until my heart stopped beating me to death and then drove off feeling the way I had when I closed my first deal. Like I’d won the lottery.

I wore a big ass grin on my face all the way back to the office and felt that high for the rest of the day. She never left my mind all that day no matter what I was doing. I had it bad.

I found myself making plans in my head of all the things I wanted to share with her. The places I wanted to take her, the things I wanted us to see together.

I did everything but doodle our names in hearts like a teenage girl. I must’ve looked at her number a hundred times before I caught myself and put a stop to the madness.

My mind strayed time and again to getting her in my bed, but I was surprised to find that fucking her wasn’t and hadn’t been foremost on my mind these last few weeks.