Chapter Three
“Are you alright?” Julia asked when she heard me gasp.
“I’m okay,” I managed to bite out. The waiter came back then and asked us if we’d ever been there before and what would we like to drink. I asked Julia as nicely as possible to order whatever she wanted and I excused myself to go to the men’s room.
I was thankful that no one was in it. “What the hell is she doing there?” if I had any more reason to hate Shelley’s, I had one then. I was glad that Julia had absolutely no idea who Elizabeth was, but I knew that Elizabeth would understand right away that the person that I was with was Julia.
I turned the faucet on and quickly splashed water into my face. I had to calm myself down; it wasn’t as if I was doing anything wrong. I just didn’t want Julia and Elizabeth to be in the same place at the same time. I finally was able to compose myself and I went back to Julia. She looked at me in confusion.
“Are you feeling okay, Michael? Do you really hate being here that much?” I shook my head. Of course I couldn’t tell Julia the real reason why I was disheveled, but I came up with a response that was close enough to the truth.
“No, I thought I saw something gross which freaked me out.” I quickly changed the subject. “So what did you order?” Julia gave me a sheepish smile.
“I ordered Macon Blanc. I hear it’s a pretty good wine.” I knew that the wine varied in prices and I inhaled sharply. ‘I’m doing this for her so swallow your pride’ I thought to myself. “And I know how much you hate trying something new so I ordered something that had chicken inside of it. You really need to try different things.”
“I’m working on that every day.” That wasn’t a complete lie; I was working on things about myself that would entice Julia to come back to me. I looked around trying to see if Elizabeth was near us, but I couldn’t find her. Maybe they weren’t seated as close as I thought they were.
“Do forgive me if I am not as adventurous as you.” I said sarcastically and Julia smiled a sincere smile. She was quite adventurous with her appearance. She had long hair one day and would cut it short the next day. Julia was an artist and she looked at her body as a canvass presented to her from God to create new and beautiful things with.
“I can tell,” she said as a frown plastered onto her beautiful face. “I hate to admit it but I really do miss you.” I could see now that she was thinking about me as much as I was thinking about her. She chewed on her glossed lips and breaking one of her rules I reached my hand out to her. She hesitated to take it, but her small hand enclosed into my larger one.
“I know that I hurt you and that you don’t trust me,” I said clearing my throat. “But I need you to understand that if I didn’t truly love you, I wouldn’t have told you what I did.” I knew that didn’t make the situation better, it wasn’t like she caught me with Elizabeth but I told her and that had to count for something. “We can take it slow and start over new,” Julia stared into my eyes with an unreadable expression on her face so I continued.
“Let me make this right, I can earn your trust again and I can be the man that you want me to be.” I didn’t feel like a real man at the moment begging for Julia’s forgiveness, but it had to be done. She thought long and hard before she responded.
“Ok”, she said as the waiter brought us our food and poured the wine into our glasses. My heart leapt for joy and I completely ignored the rancid food that the waiter placed down in front of me. “This doesn’t mean that we’re back together. I’m not ready for that yet, but we can start over fresh.”
“I’ll take it” I said as I released her hand and I picked up my glass. “Let’s make a toast.” I said and she quickly picked up her glass as well. “A toast to new beginnings,” Our glasses touched and I downed my wine, I needed to be a little buzzed before I ate the “food”.
“Thank you for bringing me here” Julia said and began eating her food.
Julia and I laughed and told each other about what happened the week that we hadn’t seen each other and I was surprised that her week was just as awful as mine. She excused herself to go to the lady’s room after a while and I exhaled with relief about how well the night was going and that’s when she approached our table.
“So that’s her?” Elizabeth said and a frown formed on my face.
“Please, Elizabeth. I’m asking you nicely to leave us alone, please do not cause a scene.” I could tell that she was drunk because she wasn’t as collected as she normally was.
“She’s cute,” she continued, disregarding my pleas for her to just leave me alone. “If you’re into little girls I suppose.”
“She’s the same age as me” I said irritated. Elizabeth chuckled and her eyes rested unfocused onto mine.
“And does she drive you wild with desire like I did?” I could feel my face burning up. An image of her naked body flashed in my mind.
“You’re drunk, Elizabeth.” I said looking around making sure that Julia wasn’t coming back. I saw her walking towards the table looking into the hand held mirror she always kept with her. Elizabeth followed my glance and grinned.
“I guess I’ll let you go back to the little girl, at least for the time being.” Elizabeth grinned and stumbled back in the direction of her table. When Julia sat back down, she looked after Elizabeth in confusion.
“Do you know her?” she asked returning her attention back to me.
“No,” I lied. “She was just a drunk woman that thought she knew me”. I didn’t want to tell Julia that she was my co-worker. Julia was smart; she would have put two and two together and figured out that she was the woman that I cheated on her with.
“She’s pretty,” I hated that Julia said that and I definitely was not going to agree with her about it.
“I guess if someone’s into that type of woman. You’re more beautiful.” Julia flashed me that brilliant smile and continued eating.
When we arrived back at her place, she was completely back to her carefree self and not the cold woman that avoided me for a whole week. “I really had fun tonight. Thank you.” It was completely dark outside now, but I could see her eyes glittering.
“Thank you for coming out with me, I meant everything I said tonight.” I was about to cut the engine and walk her to the door when she stopped me with a hand on my hand. I looked at her and she smiled just before kissing me gently on the lips. I cupped her face with my hands and pressed my tongue inside of her mouth. She was sweet and her mouth was warm and when we pulled apart I could faintly see the blush on her cheeks.
“See you later” she said before she exited my car. I waited until she was safely in the house before I pulled off. I was so happy at that moment that I had completely forgotten running into Elizabeth. The way that Julia kissed me just then proved to me that she still loved me. I really felt like I had another chance with her and I just had to remain on my best behavior and she’d eventually come back home.
“This is looking good,” I said as I made my way onto the ramp for the freeway. A few more dates like this and she’d definitely open her heart to me again. I thought about calling Jacob and letting him know how the date went, but I knew that he wasn’t going to appreciate it since it didn’t end with us “in the sack”. I drove that freeway in deep happy thoughts feeling like I had acquired the world.