The Girl With the Pink Bat
Copyright© 2025 by DB86
Chapter 7
After our talk, Ray and I tiptoed around each other for a few weeks. Very slowly, Ray started moving on with his life. It was a bit tough at first, but he reached out and reconnected with some old friends from high school. Over the next two months, he got a job in Olympia and insisted on helping me out financially, paying some rent and giving me money for food. He also bought a used car to drive back and forth from work.
People in town stopped talking about us and moved on to the next gossip target.
Ray’s social life grew more and more. I started getting messages from him saying that he wouldn’t make it for dinner because he was going out to the bar after work.
We still got together as friends to go out, have dinner, and watch an action movie together. Over the next few weeks and months, we talked everything out. We didn’t just talk about when we were teens, and our college years, but we also talked about politics, the economy, and global warming. We talked about our jobs and our dreams for the future. Of course, we went together to the Apple Harvesting Festival much to my mother’s delight. We were best friends again and that was how it was going to stay. There was no use dragging out my hopes any longer.
My mother came to terms with the fact that Ray was living with me, and started dropping not-so-subtle hints about Ray and me, “He is a keeper, Kara, the kind you shouldn’t let get away.”
I was genuinely happy for all the positive changes in Ray’s life, but I still wanted to be more than “just a friend”. The renewed friendship that I had expected to develop into a steady relationship wasn’t happening.
I was disappointed, but I couldn’t be mad at him because Ray had a mind of his own and I totally understood him. He was doing exactly what he told me he needed: take a step back and reevaluate his life.
One evening, I was at the bar, drinking some beers with the guys after work when I caught sight of Ray through the window striding toward the entrance.
He was with a group of friends from high school. They were joking and laughing.
Ray looked up and saw me as I was watching him. He grinned as his eyes caught mine, and waved at me across the room. I returned Ray’s smile and nodded over to him, but then he and his friends walked over to another table.
I was about to join them when Floyd Leland ruined it all. The brainless moron opened his big mouth and started talking. He immediately started complaining about his old lady.
“Martha and I are having trouble in the bedroom,” he said. The status of their relationship was not clear even to them. “Martha says I am boring in bed. She says I’m not fun and adventuresome. Now, I can be just as adventurous as the next guy,” he whined, sipping his beer.
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