Unanswered Prayers-Book 6 Of The Mad Mad World Series

Chapter 5

I walked into the Irish pub Alan had asked me to meet him at a few moments before three o'clock, remembering at the last second that I'd told him I'd meet him in the main lobby of the arena. Cursing to myself, I started back out the door only to see him standing behind me, a broad smile on his face. "I figured you'd forget. Don't feel bad, I could tell you've got a lot on your mind and thought I'd pop down here first to see if you were here. Let's get a table, I'm really wanting to hear what you've been up to."

We were seated at a table near one of the windows that faced the street; the weak sunlight that was streaming down through the dark storm clouds was warm and welcome. The waiter came and took our drink orders, mine for a glass of iced tea with red raspberry juice and Alan's for a large ginger ale. Once they'd arrived, I ordered an egg roll, fried mozzarella and fried onion appetizer plate with a salad, my stomach reminding me that I hadn't eaten yet today. Alan did the same, only with a piece of chocolate silk pie instead of the salad.

"You and your sweet tooth," I laughed, pouring the salad dressing over the mixed greens and stirring them up. "You should see the boys when they get going. They're as bad as you are."

Alan grinned, taking a forkful of the pulled pork over cheese fries part of the appetizer platter he'd ordered and waving it in my direction. "You should talk. If I remember, I got you a six-pack of Kinder eggs and didn't get one speck of candy from it."

"I was a starving student!"

"So was I. If I never see tuna fish casserole, Ramen noodles or that horrible pizza the college cafeteria used to serve ever again, I will be a happy man."

"I'm surprised we didn't have an outbreak of scurvy or food poisoning," I replied. "However, by the time I graduated I knew how to cook well enough to keep me healthy and I didn't need to rely on Ramen noodles for much of anything. I'm not that much for cooking now but every once in a while I get the urge to bake a nine layer chocolate chip cake with home-made icing."

Alan laughed and said, "I don't get as ambitious but I do know how to cook. Made my first wife really happy. So happy that she divorced me and married a four star chef that has two restaurants in Chicago!"

"Alan, that's cruel! Are you remarried?" I asked.

"Dating off and on but nothing serious. I don't have a lot of free time as it is and it would only be unfair to try to maintain a steady relationship with someone when I won't be able to spend the time I should with them," Alan said without a pause. "What about you? Anyone serious in your life?"

My hand crept up to touch my earrings; it took me a second to gather myself together and say, "Kind of. We had a nasty fight this morning so who knows?"

"Ouch. Sorry about that. I'll change the subject. Tell me what else you've been doing?" Alan said, watching me like a hawk. I knew he was trying to play it cool but there was something more, something he wanted to ask but wasn't ready to put it out for discussion. I managed to condense my work history down into the highlights with lots of amusing stories and only one moderately sad one to temper them out, making sure to not even hint that things had gone horribly pear shaped at Vis-Tek. I got around that by saying I'd quit when new management moved in and worked from home for some time before getting the call to be the band's tour doctor.

The afternoon sped by so quickly, I barely noticed that it was coming onto five o'clock. Only the slow shift of casually dressed patrons to workers from the nearby businesses in their work to date clothes alerted me. The waiter had left the checks long before; I flagged down a passing waitress and asked her to run my credit card with the apology that I needed to get going and didn't want to bother our waiter, who was all but running back and forth between tables, getting the pub ready for evening. Alan tried to talk me out of paying for both of us but I stabbed my fork at him and said, "Nein! You bought me dinner enough times when we were dating!"