Although he didn’t look at her, but continued to study the menu, she noticed what looked like strain on his face. “My my, you look exhausted.”
He continued to look over the menu.
“I know the look because I’m exhausted myself,” Joy continued talking. “I’ve been on my feet for eleven straight hours already. I’m working double shift today.”
Still no reaction or response.
“A regular chatterbox you are,” Joy said teasingly, but that got nothing from William either. She exhaled.One of those, she thought. “Okay then! What would you like to drink, sir?”
That got his attention. He never responded to waitresses small-talking him because he knew they were only doing it for the tip. He removed his glasses and finally looked at her. But as soon as he saw her cheerful, expressive face, an odd feeling rushed over him. As if there was something familiar about her. But he’d never seen her before in his life.
Or had he?
Joy found his sudden pause odd too. And the way he was looking at her as if she owed him money made her damn uncomfortable. “Sir?”
William quickly realized he was probably scaring the young lady with his sudden stare. He broke it. “What do you have to drink exactly? I haven’t gotten around to the drink portion of the menu yet.”
The drink portion of the menu. What a way to put it. This guy was so bougie, Joy thought. “Well, sir, we have tea. Our root beer is really good. Better than most. We have sodas of all kinds, including diet. We have regular beer. And we have the old tried and true water.”
What he wanted was a glass of wine! “Water will do,” he said.
“Sure thing.”
“And I’m ready to order,” he added, as he closed the menu.
Joy smiled. “Decisive. I like that.” But that only made him look at her even harder than he had the first time. Damn. What was wrong with this guy? She pulled out her order pad. “What are you having, sir?”
“I’ll try the grilled salmon.”
Before Joy realized it, she blurted outugh!
What was wrong with this girl, William thought. “Excuse me?”
“Between you and me and the sky and the sea, our salmon is crap. I’m sorry, but it is.” She looked around to see if the manager was lurking about. When she didn’t see her, she sat down on the booth seat beside William, which shocked him. They were so close that her small arm was touching and overlapping his big arm. “Let me show you what’s worth a darn and what isn’t. That way you can make an informed decision since it’s obvious you aren’t from around here.”
William didn’t know what to make of her brazenness. Who was this girl?
As she opened back up his menu, he found himself staring at her for a different reason altogether. Before, he was staring because something inside of him reacted to her presence. But now he was questioning her sanity. Because nobody on the face of this earth got thispersonalwith him. Nobody!
“Do you see these so-called healthy choice items over here?” she asked as she pointed out the grilled items on the menu.
He put back on his glasses and looked. “Yes,” a still shocked William responded.
“They’re all crap. I’m sorry, but they’re pure crap. And they call it healthy? It’s healthy alright. Customers have been throwing that shit up left and right.”
That caught William’s attention. He leaned back and looked at her. “Really?”
“I’m not a liar,” she said and looked dead into his eyes for the first time. And when they locked eyes, it affected both of them in a very visceral way.
For William, it was that enormous spark in her extra-large, greenish-brown eyes. It was as if her eyes were glistening. They seemed so pure and so filled with cheerfulness that they were strikingly beautiful. And her face was so smooth and brown that it reminded him of the silkiness of satin. Her face was so filled with warmth and so inviting that he found himself inwardly exhaling, as if he was on to something when he wasn’t on to anything at all! But her face was quite unusual. He’d never seen eyes so positively positive like that before in his life.
For Joy, it was how deeply blue his eyes were. And they were so soft for a man who came off so hard. It was that contradiction that threw her. But only for a second. She quickly recovered. “I wouldn’t tell you a lie, is what I mean. It’s thetruth. Customers have been throwing up after eating that so-called healthy food every time I turn around. Now if you want a case of the heebie-jeebies, or best-case scenario diarrhea, then eat away. But you’ve been warned.”
William felt blown away by her presence.Who is this girl??? “What do you recommend?” he asked her. He could not take his eyes off of her.
“It’s not healthy,” Joy said, “but you can’t go wrong with a max burger or the chicken tenders. We do food that’s bad for you real good.”
William actually smiled.
