"Hey, have you seen your news guy anymore?" Angela’s friend grilled her about Chris over lunch.
"No; he was real nice to check in on me though; he even went out of his way and brought me home from the hospital a few weeks ago." Angela paused, staring at her glass, before continuing. "That’s pretty much it. I don’t think he’s into me; he was just being nice I suppose," she concluded.
"So, you just give up? Just like that??" Her friend pressed.
"Well, I’m not sure that’s called giving up," Angela defended. "It’s called being a realist. He’s not Florence Nightingale, he just brought me home and checked in on me a couple of times," she reasoned.
"Girl, it’s OK now to ask a guy out," her friend assured.
"I will not be asking him out; if he wants to go out he has my number."
"Oh, OK," Angela’s friend wryly dismissed. "So, using your logic, maybe if you sit here long enough he’ll make an excuse to call?"
"Maybe," Angela half hearted replied.
Across town, Chris was at the car wash vacuuming dog hair from the seats as Bailey sat nearby, tongue wagging; she intently watched Chris' every move, pausing periodically to play with a bug that crawled at paws length.
"That’s it Bailey! I’m taking you to the groomer and have them shave you completely! Jesus!"
Just as Chris completed his sentence, Bailey jumped through the passenger door onto the seat; she stared straight ahead as if to be announcing that she was ready to go for a ride, looking to Chris with eagerness in her big eyes.
"Oh, you think you’re funny don’t you??"
Something under the seat caught Chris’ attention. Straining to reach the object, Chris was finally able to scrape it to the side within reach. What could it be? He wondered.
"Shit!" He exclaimed, pulling a watch from beneath the floor mat.
He figured that it must have fallen out of Angela’s hospital bag when he brought her home a few weeks previous.
"What do you mean I gotta fucking call her???" Chris asked Marie in a panic.
Chris immediately drove to Marie’s house in order to devise a benign method in which he might return the time piece to Angela.
"You gotta call her, you gotta get the watch back to her," Marie insisted.
"Ooh no, no, no, no, NO. It’s your watch now," Chris extended his hand to Marie.
"Chris!!" Marie shoved his arm.
"Then you take it back to her," he snapped.
"Me? Why me?"
"Because, you love me and you’d like to see as little stress in my life as possible," Chris insisted.
"Nice try chicken shittle," Marie laughed.
Noticing how jumpy Chris appeared, Marie utilized this fortuitous event to have some fun at Chris' expense.
"You know, I bet she left it there on purpose too," Marie jabbed."
"Are you trying to give me a fucking heart attack Marie?" Chris exploded as Marie laughed.
"God, you are sooo easy to fuck with," she said.
"Stop it! I've been fucked with enough...going all the way back to first grade," Chris demanded.
After a moment or two of silence, Chris sheepishly asked: "So, you don’t think she left it on purpose, do you?"
"Oh yeah, I think she absolutely left it on purpose," Marie answered, matter of factly.
"I KNEW it! She used to pull that shit when we first started goin' out; always some excuse for us to meet up."
"That was good, right?
"Yeah, back then," Chris snapped. "I’m trying to keep her at a distance now Marie."
"You gotta return the watch Chris."
A sense of frustration washed through Chris' mind at the mere thought of making contact with Angela right now. After all, he and Erin were getting along quite famously; they’d been casually dating for a while..."and now this!" Chris fretted.
He didn’t want to place himself back in a familiar situation. Even though he still cared a lot for Angela, he didn’t want her to get mixed up with him again. He wanted her to live her life while he lived his. After all, what good is a second chance, he reasoned, if he didn't exhaust every action possible to do things differently? No one gets hurt this time around.
Back at lunch, Angela’s cell phone rang. She looked at her friend with a “cat that ate the canary” smile.
"Hello? Oh, hey Chris. Oh good! I’ve wondered what happened to it; it must have fallen from my hospital bag."
Hearing the one-sided phone call, Angela’s friend donned a knowing smile.
"Well," Angela continued, "I’m not gonna be home till around 6...is that OK? Great, I’ll see you then."
"Looks like he thought of a reason to call," Angela’s friend sarcastically noted.
A moment of silence passed as Angela's friend stared, waiting for a devious confession.
"What?" Angela asked.
"It fell out of your bag huh?" Her friend smiled.
"Sort of," Angela nonchalantly replied. "It was in my bag and somehow wasn’t in there when I got home; I don’t know how it happened."
Chris tapped on the front door at Angela’s place. After 3 seconds, he turned away.
"She’s not home; excellent! I’ll drop it in the mailbox," he resolved.
"Hey there," a cheerful voice came from the front door.
"Oh, hey Angela; here’s your watch, sorry I just noticed it."
"No problem, would you like to come in?" She invited.
"Oh, uh, nah, I really need to get goin‘ but thanks anyway," Chris nervously fidgeted.
"I never gave you anything to say thank you for your help after the accident," Angela announced.
"Oh, don’t worry about that, I didn’t mind," Chris quickly dismissed.
"Well, I picked up a bottle of wine for you but I didn’t know if it was OK to call; come on in and let me get it for you," she insisted.
Chris reluctantly walked back to the porch and went inside.
"Make yourself comfortable," Angela pointed to the sofa as she headed to the kitchen for the bottle of wine.
While she was gone, Chris surveyed the room. He noticed that she still had the same tastes. He was quite impressed that, though she was in a tiny place, she had somehow managed to make it look like home; it was quite charming.
Surveying the decor reminded him of their first house; he smiled as he reminisced about the early days of their relationship.
"Would you like a glass of wine?" Angela yelled from the kitchen. Chris sighed to himself.
"Sure, I suppose." He reluctantly agreed. "Shit!" He thought to himself. "OK, one glass of wine and I’m outta here," he resolved.
Angela returned a few moments later with two glasses of wine and a bottle of unopened wine for Chris.
"Wow! Great wine, I love Cab," Chris complimented.
"It’s nice outside, let’s sit on the porch," she insisted.
Two glasses of wine later, Chris had loosened up and actually found the conversation between he and Angela unexpectedly enjoyable.
"Are you trying to get me drunk?" He joked.
"Not at all. Just enjoying the company," she smiled.
"Me too," he replied.
Chris' mind raced after his last comment..."Wait! What??? Me too?? Why the fuck did I say that? No more wine for me," he repeatedly admonished himself.
"Would you like one more glass," Angela offered, holding up the bottle.
"Sure!" Unable to stop the words from escaping his mouth, Chris agreed.
"Jesus Christ, SURE? Why did I say sure??? Why am I drinking wine??" Chris held a heated argument within the confines of his conflicted mind.
"So," Angela began, "how long have you been a reporter?"
"Too long."
"How’s that?" She laughed.
"Well, for starters, my job tends to make one jaded after a while," he explained. "I mean, I have a front row seat to government waste and corruption, I get to watch people sift through their homes, destroyed by storms or fire, kids senselessly killed on the streets...all for the sake of ratings. The sad motto in a news room is If it bleeds...It leads."
"Why do you do it?" Angela pried.
"Because someone has to document it, and I do enjoy it, deep down." Chris paused before revealing a lighter side to his job. "Plus, once in a while, I get to cover a story of a guy who just created the world’s largest Muffaletta or shrimp po-boy."
"Nice!" Angela cheered, taking another sip of wine.
"How’d you end up in New Orleans?" She quizzed.
"A long, winding and bumpy road," Chris quickly replied.
"Hmmm, sounds like a girl was involved, Angela smirked.
"You could say that," he affirmed, staring at his glass.
"She still around?"
"Yeah, somewhat, I don’t know…I’ll have to get back with you on that one...it’s complicated," Chris dismissed.
"You ever been married?" Angela casually asked, taking a sip of wine.
"Once, Chris answered. "How bout you?"
"Yeah, once for me too," Angela replied.
"What happened?" Chris pressed.
Angela stared at the floor for a moment before answering:
"We both became different people; we wanted different things and it pretty much drove us apart."
"How bout now," Chris asked.
"What?" Angela didn’t understand the question.
"I mean, do you think you’re both different people?
"I don’t know; I know I am, but sometimes I’m not sure that we gave it a fair shot toward the end. I mean, I dated someone seriously for a while but…" Angela paused before continuing, searching her words carefully. " I suppose that I wonder what it could have been like if we’d tried harder, but I don’t think he wanted that. It was a different time for us both," she continued.
Angela turned the subject back around to Chris. "Do you still talk with your ex wife?"
"For a while I did, not anymore. I did talk with her today," Chris smiled.
"You think she’s OK?"
"I’m not so sure now," Chris solemnly replied.
Angela changed the subject to a lighter tone. "I know this might sound forward, but, would you care to grab dinner sometime next week? My treat."
Chris stared at the porch rail for a moment. He didn’t want a relationship, but he did enjoy Angela‘s company; perhaps dinner would be harmless.
"Sure, that would be nice; as long as I drive, I’ve seen your driving skills in action."
"Great! How about Thursday night?" She laughed.
"Sounds good."
Chris glanced at his watch. "Hey, I should get goin’."
"Yeah, OK; thanks for sticking around for a bit and I’m glad you found my watch."
"No problem, I’ll call you on Thursday after work before I stop by."
Later that evening Chris and Thomas got together on Thomas’ porch for a couple of beers.
"I don’t know bro, I think you need to watch ya’ self with the ex wife. Why the fuck did you agree to dinner dawg??
"I don’t know Thomas," Chris snapped, clearly frustrated. "She and I had a conversation a couple of weeks before this weird shit started with me. She seemed happy, her relationship was goin’ OK, my shit was totally fucked up and I didn’t want to tell her. She and I really began admitting our wrongs and she seemed genuinely concerned for me, not in a romantic way, in a way after knowing someone for so long. We were accepting of the past and the mistakes from both sides…it was something we needed to do. But, it seems now like she’s not doin’ too well, like she was keeping something from me."
"So what? You not with her anymore and you don't wanna be with her C."
" That's got nothin; to do with it Thomas; I do still have concern for her as a person. Does that make sense?
"Yeah, I can understand to a degree," Thomas sympathized. "You just need to be careful. Look here..I care bout’ a couple of my ex girls but I ain’t gonna go get dinner with em’ and start sendin' Christmas cards and shit. Sounds like ya' girl may be diggin’ on you and you gonna have to be straight wit' her so you’re not back where you started."
Chris absorbed Thomas' logic, trying to find a logical rebuttal...he couldn't.
"How’s it goin’ with Erin?"
"Great," Chris’ face brightened. "We’ve been seein’ a lot of one another; it’s been nice getting to know her without the stress and baggage that we once had between us."
"Yeah?" Thomas warned, "you better not let her catch yo’ ass hangin’ round with another girl or it’s lights out…she’ll end up hangin’ with the boy down the hall in her house. I’m not real sure bout’ how this shit works, this situation you’re in with starting over," Thomas continued, "but it’s sounding like it’s headin’ down a real familiar path."
"No! Not a chance! I won’t let it get there," Chris interrupted.
"Yeah, well I didn’t wanna have a child seven years ago but it happened," Thomas laughed. "Sometimes shit just comes at ya’ and ya’ gotta keep your eyes open that’s all I'm sayin' doc."
Three men entered the front gate while Thomas and Chris talked.
"Aw, these are my boys," Thomas announced.
Chris looked at Thomas with a hint of disappointment; he knew who these guys were.
"Thomas?" Chris asked with concern.
"Hey bro, they cool C; I gotta go do some quick shit tonight, nothin’ bad Chris, it’s just a thing. I’m straight."
Chris stood up, looking Thomas in the eyes. "You need to get away from this shit, completely, and you know it," Chris warned. "Thanks for the beer Thomas."
Chris paused and again studied Thomas‘ face before leaving the porch. He looked back from the bottom step with a plea, "Behave Thomas, please?"
copyright, Pontchartrain Press 2008
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