What you want to hear

1214 words

Peter walked into the poorly lit bar. He smelled the scent he knew so well. The scent that reminded him it was Thursday again. Every Thursday he met up here with his old university buddies, Jimmeny and Ronald. Or Jim and Ron, as they were known to him. He sat down at the table which he chose every time. The employees of the bar knew it was theirs this day of the week. When he just sat down the waitress walked over to him and put a beer in from of him on the table. She smiled at without saying anything. Peter looked at her and smiled back. The girl worked at the bar for half a year now, more or less. From the first day she walked up to their table Peter was lost.

She was way to young for him, but his friends said every week that he should give it a shot. When they were with him, there was too much pressure from them to say something. This week he was a lot earlier to have a chance at a conversation with her. The girl who stole his heart. She was already walking back to the bar.

Peter took a deep breath and opened his mouth. ‘Hey.’ He squealed. She turned around and her gorgeous dark brown hair danced around her face. She put her deep grey eyes on him and smiled again. The girl walked back over and Peter started to panic. He could only think “What did I do?”. The panic roared in his chest and took away his voice.

‘Hi.’ She said. She waited for him to say something, but he couldn’t. ‘I am Kim.’ She said and looked straight at Peter. Peter could only smile back while forcing himself to say something. He could not find the words. ‘What’s your name?’ She asked, her voice was even softer and sweeter than he ever imagined. He knew this one, he was able to answer. ‘Peter.’ He said.

‘Nice to meet you Peter.’ She responded and he felt his guts turn. She was everything he expected and even more that that. ‘I have to go back to work now.’ She stood up and touched his arm swiftly before she walked back to the bar.

Peter took a big sip from his beer and took a few deep breaths. That went better he expected. What he didn’t know was that Kim was already waiting weeks for him to talk to her. “he is even more handsome in close up”, she thought.

Peter was already halfway his second beer when Jimmeny showed up. He sat down across from Peter and took off his jacket. Kim put a beer in front of him and Jimmeny thanked her. She looked at Peter and smiled.

‘Well, Pete.’ Jimmeny said. ‘How’s life?’ A wave of happiness flushed over Peter, this felt just like old times again. He smiled. ‘Same old, same old.’ Jimmeny laughed. ‘Just like every week.’ Het took another sip of his beer. ‘I, however, do have some news.’ Peter looked at his friend. ‘Yeah, Pete. I picked her op last week, so she is finally home.’ Peter dug in his brain to what Jimmeny was talking about. ‘Who?’ he asked. ‘Daisy of course. You didn’t forget about her, did you. I have been talking about her for weeks, Pete’ Peter remembered the name now. His friend was indeed talking about this girl for weeks. ‘I remember now. How is she in real life, Jim?’ Jim smiled wider than Peter ever saw him do before. ‘She is amazing.’ Jimmeny cheered. ‘She has only been with me a few days now, so she is still exploring the house. Still have to keep the windows shut.’ He smiled again. Peter didn’t understand that joke. But this wasn’t the first time so he acted like always, he laughed. ‘Yeah, I get that.’ He said. ‘I still need to learn her how to talk, of course. But so far she is really doing well, adjusting fast.’ Jimmeny looked like he saw the woman in front of him. Peter could never understand how someone could date a woman who didn’t speak your language. The attraction had to be only physical then. He never had that with a woman. He had dated pretty women before, but when he was a few dates in they where always stupid. he had never found a smart one. He asked himself how you could know if the girl was stupid when she didn’t even speak the same language as you did. He looked over to the bar. Kim was rinsing glasses, she was different. He could just see that she was smart. She looked up to him and smiled, he smiled back.

‘When are you going to talk to her?’ he heard from the other side of the table. ‘I did.’ Peter responded. ‘Just before you came in.’ Jimmeny looked at Peter. ‘Sure.’ He said ‘You know what I really like about Daisy?’ Peter didn’t respond, he didn’t agree with the choices of his friend and he knew Jimmeny would start rambling anyways. ‘She is so pretty, even more gorgeous than she was in the pictures. She is more grown up too.’ He didn’t look straight at Peter, but a bit off to the side and his eyes were twinkling dreamily.

‘That’s great.’ Peter said struggling to hide the disapproval in his voice. How could you get someone to live in your house that you have never seen in real life. That isn’t a small responsibility, and probably one for the rest of your time. ‘She did have a hard time when I had to go to work yesterday. She tried to keep me in the house, that was so cute.’ Jimmeny chattered on. Peter saw a creepy side smile appear on his face. ‘She almost succeeded.’ He said in a voice that gave Peter shivers down his spine. The girl was only with him for less than a week. In a strange county, in a strange house and with a strange man. And he was already doing those things to her. Peter started to feel angry and took a sip of his beer to keep his mouth shut. This wasn’t his life, his friend was an adult and he should make his own choices.

‘It is quite bad that she can lay me like that already.’ Peter needed to say something. Something, anything or his head would explode. He was talking about a woman. A real life woman and he met her less than a week ago. ‘I wished I could have taken her with me tonight, but she is just not adapted enough yet.’

All kinds of words formed in Peter’s head and they got louder and louder with everything Jimmeny said. He had to say something, scream. Peter closed his eyes to focus on anything nice to say.

‘Hey Jim, wanker, how is you parrot?’ Peter heard the familiar voice of Ronald. ‘Ron.’ Jimmeny was clearly happy to see his friend. ‘I was just telling Pete, she is amazing. Way more than I could ever have imagined.’

Peter felt his heart drop. He had a parrot. Daisy was a parrot and it made more sense than Peter liked to admit.