February of Last Year
It had been four months since Mary moved back in with her parents and younger siblings and it felt embarrassing to her to admit, especially to Karen Vega, that she was a life failure at 27 years old. Karen and Mary’s Mom, Cheryl, had known each other for the last 8 years, as they attended the same church congregation. “We just love having her home, I hated having my baby so far away,” said Cheryl, “besides you kept telling me how much you hated your job anyway.” Mary glanced passed her mother’s right ear and noticed an extremely attractive dark haired man speaking to David Vega twenty feet away. Mary turned her attention back to the women, “I am glad to be home, I missed my family and I’m hoping that starting over will give me the opportunity to do something I’ve always wanted to do,” said Mary, “like, open a small boho eatery. Houston’s downtown is being revitalized and this is the time to do it.” Again, Mary glanced down at the dark haired man talking to David Vega. Mary’s focus was interrupted by Karen’s sudden question, “are you dating anyone right now?” Mary always had a short list a men she was going on dates with, but no one she was immediately interested in. “No one I’m seriously dating,” Mary said. Which was mostly true, because the one man she did talk to on a regular basis lived in Utah and they had only met the day before Mary moved home to Texas. Karen’s expression changed and she said, “Do you see that young man speaking to David?” Mary stated that she indeed had seen him and noticed that he was indeed, very attractive. “well that's Kirk Freeman, he has a great job, he’s an engineer for one of the big oil companies around here – David’s known him for years – Kirk went to school with our boys and he's still single.”
At the exact moment Karen said, “still single,” Karen began moving in the direction of her husband and Kirk saying, “you should go talk to him.” “No,” Mary said, “I don’t know him, I don’t have anything to say.” Karen just smiled and said, “that’s ok, I’ll walk over there and you can just come with me.” Karen, Cheryl and Mary moved toward David and Kirk. When the twenty feet between them had been covered, Mary said, “hello Mr. Vega,” smiled at Kirk and just kept walking, until she reached the door to the ballroom, exited and found a small water fountain in the lobby to extinguish her burned attempt at introductions.
At five feet and three inches, silky long brown hair and fair skin peppered with light freckles and large blue eyes, Mary could just about smile at any man and he would stop the world to start a conversation – about anything – and Mary was quite familiar with the routine, it got her free meals in restaurants, front row space at concerts and discounts in stores. Mary was typically a picture of cool when it came to men, never one to feel intimidated by the opposite sex – it was the opposite – Mary felt like she had some special gift of charm when it came to enchanting conversation. There is one time in the history of Mary’s world when she felt a complete loss for words around a male. It was high school and she had a crush on Brit Daley. Brit was tall, blonde, tan, a soccer guru and her dentist’s oldest son. Oh how she loved pretending she hated his guts, but she didn’t, however she sure made Brit feel like she did. Mary eventually grew up and forgot about Brit Daley, until she drank the cold water coming from the fountain.
Mary stood at the water fountain for another three or four seconds, when Kirk came out of the ballroom door, Mary stooped to take another drink as Kirk walked passed with quick steps toward the main entrance of the hotel. Mary waited until Kirk had left the immediate area before moving inside the ballroom to collect her mother and to say goodnight to Mr. and Mrs. Vegas. Why she had felt incompetent, was beyond her understanding, but unconcerned by this queer encounter Mary moved her thoughts onto her life goals. Step one: find investors for her business plans.
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