After closing the store, Sandi rushed home and pulled her most feminine dress out of the closet. Lavender with clear crystals adorning the sweetheart neckline. The last time she had worn it was to a friend’s wedding.
Nick the Beautiful did come and pick her up. He was dressed in starched and pressed Wranglers and a blue-and-white tiny check shirt with a red Cinch logo below the pocket. The blue checks matched his eye color.
He looked her up and down and told her she was beautiful, which left her giddy as a teenager. He drove them to Tag Freeman’s Double Kicker Barbecue & Beer restaurant. “I don’t get to Tag Freeman’s very often,” she said.
“You don’t like ribs?”
She laughed. “I love ribs, but I’d never eat them on a date. Too messy. I get barbecue sauce all over my face.”
He laughed, too. “Well, lady, I’ve seen you with worse than barbecue sauce all over your face.”
Going through the buffet line, they both ordered something safe—sliced brisket and French fries. He found them seats at the end of one of the long tables.
“Holy cow. A whole table to ourselves. Wonder where the customers are.”
“Slow weeknight maybe. I’m glad. We can talk.”
Without Waffle, what would they talk about? She unwrapped the cloth napkin holding her silverware and spread the napkin on her lap. “An evening of conversation, huh?”
He, too, spread his napkin, then looked her in the eye. “I want you to know I feel bad about all that’s happened. I want us to be able to be friends.”
Oh. Phooey. That was all he wanted? She felt a letdown. “Don’t worry about it. I’m getting over it. I believe Waffle really is Buster and he really is your dog. You were right all along. That judge’s ruling was silly. We don’t have to stick to it.”
“But what if I’d like to stick to it?”
“Why would you?”
“I don’t know about you, but I’ve crossed some thresholds in this whole thing. I’ve experienced several firsts.”
“What firsts?”
“Well, I’ve never sued anybody before. And if I’d ever thought about it, I wouldn’t have thought it’d be over a dog. I know a lawsuit is a hostile thing, but I didn’t mean it that way. I got too far into it to back out.”
She shrugged, picked up her knife and fork and sliced bites of brisket. “We all survived. What was it Nietzsche said? What doesn’t kill you makes you stronger? That’s probably true.”
“I confess I didn’t read a lot of Nietzsche in school.” He tucked into his food.
“Probably wasn’t part of the football playbook, huh? You were itemizing your firsts. I’m listening.”
“You’re the first woman I’ve ever seen Harry attack.”
“Huh. I should probably get a medal of some kind for that one. He never spit on your neighbor’s wife?”
“The neighbor didn’t have a wife. He was too hard to get along with. No wife would put up with him.”
“Ah, I see.”
“You’re the first and only one I’ve had out to my house before and for sure, the first one to spend the night. You’re the first and only one besides me to sleep in my bed. I’ve never wanted any of the women I know getting that close.”
Her interest piqued. “Really? Why is that?”
“I have trust issues. It goes back a long way. I don’t mean this to be a feel-sorry-for-me-story, but my mom split when I was about ten and to this day, I don’t know why.”
...I practically raised my two little sisters...
Sandi frowned, trying to picture a young boy taking care of two small girls. “Oh, no.”
“No, no. Don’t say ‘oh no.’ I know you’ve got a soft heart, but I honestly don’t want you to feel sorry. I’m just trying to explain something to you and make a point. I’ve always had trust issues with women and I think my mom leaving is why. All through high school, I never had a steady girlfriend. Didn’t have one in college either. Even if I liked some girl and she liked me back, I feared the day she would leave me. So I dealt with it by keeping my distance.
“Until I met my ex-wife. We married after I graduated. I was sappy-in-love. Or at least I thought I was. I thought she was, too, but not too long after we got married, she took off to California with my best friend, a guy I’d known all my life.”
Oh, my God. No wonder he has trust issues. “Oh, Nick, I’m so sorry.”
He stopped eating and looked at her. “The point I’m trying to make is this. After she left, there was no chance I was ever again going to find myself in a position to be left. So since then, I haven’t had a close attachment to any woman.”
Sandi, too, stopped eating. “But you sleep with Sylvia. Isn’t that close?”
“No. Being a woman, I know you don’t understand, but Sylvia and I don’t share anything. We just...” He sighed.
“Have sex. In my book, that’s pretty close.”
“But it really isn’t. Not in the way I think about being close. And I told you. I haven’t been with her in a while.”
“So what’s the point of this heart-to-heart between you and me?”
“After two divorces, I know you’re bound to have trust issues, too. I’m wondering if two scared people like us could take a risk and make a go of it.”
Sandi’s head began to spin. This was the last thing she expected to hear him say. She couldn’t deny the part about trust issues. Dare she take a risk? “Well, I don’t know. I have a lot to overcome.”
“No more than I do, I betcha. I’ll tell you something about me that maybe you haven’t had a chance to figure out. If I say I’m gonna do something, I always do it. No matter what, I always do it. If I say I’m gonna be somewhere, I’m always there and on time. I always help a friend if I can. And this might be important to you. If I see somebody abusing one of God’s helpless creatures, I always fly to the rescue.”
She doubted none of what he had just said. Besides that, he made her whole system tingle. “Well, I, uh, I suppose we could try. But I warn you, I won’t give up my animals.”