I nodded meaningfully, looked out to the targets, and then back over to her.
“So, you must be here with someone?” I wasn’t interested in having my balls threatened by a husband or boyfriend, even if she did have really nice tits. It’s best to find these things out quickly.
“My cousin,” she informed me. “I came to visit, and this is his idea of entertainment.”
Out-of-towner. Perfect!
“So where are you from?” I asked as I gave her a little smile.
I made a bunch of small talk with the chick, whose name was Carolyn, found the occasional reason to inadvertently brush against her, and generally got her to the point where she was smiling and laughing with me. We seemed to have a few things in common – a love of heavy metal being a big one – and talking with her was smooth and natural. Once that happened, and considering her feelings towards her cousin at that moment, it was kind of an easy hit though I was happy just hanging out with her, too.
Okay, sure, getting laid was always in the back of my head, but it wasn’t all about that.
Really!
The thing is? I like talking to women. Why? Because they like to talk. Talking to guys is freaking aggravating – it’s all the same shit – girls they’ve fucked, video games, guns, sports – it’s totally boring. Talking to women is different. For starters, women will talk about anything in the world, from books, to politics, to religion, to their menstrual cramps – nothing’s taboo. Every group you sit down with will be having a totally different conversation.
You can learn a lot listening to chicks, and I mean about all kinds of shit. If you can get yourself into a whole room of them and then get really quiet to the point where they forget there’s a guy in the room, you wouldn’t believe the kind of shit you’d hear.
Try it sometime.
Really.
My fingers brushed over her forearm with a little less subtlety, and she glanced down at the touch.
“You know, I probably shouldn’t be saying this, but you’re actually the first girl I’ve really talked to since…well, for a long time.”
“Since what?” Carolyn pressed, as I figured she would.
“Nothing,” I muttered and dropped my hand from her arm and looked down. She immediately placed hers on my bicep and bent down a bit to look me in the face.
“You were going to say something,” she insisted.
I let out a long sigh and glanced out at the range where Evan was rhythmically pulling back on the trigger, switching maga
zines, and then starting all over again. His expression never changed – he was in the zone. He was completely zoned, actually, as in being in a war-zone.
The phrase shell-shocked rattled in my head.
“It’s just…I mean, I just recently came home from the Middle East. Me and my buddy out there are Marines. We had kind of a rough time, you know? I haven’t been out much since we were brought back to the States, you know?”
Okay, so maybe half-stealing Evan’s story was a shitty thing to do, but I was on a mission.
“What happened?” she asked.
I shrugged one shoulder and leaned up against the barrier between us and the range before I looked back at her.
“You don’t want the details,” I informed her, “but Evan and I are the only ones who made it home from our unit. He doesn’t talk about it, though, so don’t ask him. He gets a little temperamental about it when people ask him questions. I kinda wish he would talk to me, but I understand why he can’t.”
“That has to be hard on you,” she said softly.
Girls always got all soft-spoken when you talked to them about tragedy.
“I miss the other guys,” I said. “Everyone else in our unit. No one else around here knew them, but he won’t talk about them.”
She reached up and placed her hand on the side of my face. I leaned a little into her palm as it caressed my cheek. The softness of her touch made my cock stir a bit and was an interesting contrast to the gunfire around me.
“That really is awful,” Carolyn said as she looked straight into my eyes.