The Lunch Date

I’ll see you then.

Funny, how four little words can elicit such dread. I hadn’t seen Nicole in…could it be eight years! I’d been stretching out this e-mail dance for too long and it was finally time to commit. We’d set a lunch date. My endless excuses of upcoming this or that were played out. There was no getting around it.

I looked in the rear-view mirror of my car and could only shake my head. If the pores on my face got any bigger, I could start keeping loose change in them! And I seriously needed a hair cut. The blonde streaks were getting old, and well…they didn’t really look like streaks anymore. It looked like I had a few gnarly pieces of straw stuck in my hair.

And Nicole had always been the tall, thin, glamorous one. And here I was – chubby, hole-faced, and stuff in my hair! Oh well. Not much I could do about it now.

I pulled into the parking lot at Chili’s and sat for a moment, listening to the hum of my car idling away in a parking stall. When I turned my engine off, I grimaced at my reflection in the mirror, once more, and then exited my car. Walking the parking lot to the restaurant door was like wading through old molasses.

I opened the glass door to the restaurant and glimpsed a tall, thin, flaxen-haired beauty seated on a bench in the lobby. Here we go. Prepare for the “Oh, hello. Nice to see you,” crap and the pity hand shake.

She looked my way.

“Jen! Oh my god, it’s sooo good to see you!!” The hug she gave me sent chills down my spine.

I couldn’t help but smile, inside and out. “It’s really good to see you, too!”