Ruben or August

Chapter 7

Ruben had picked me up at 7. I had been nervously waiting for him in a nice dress in the lounge. Whilst I waited for him I had cleaned up the whole kitchen keeping my mind busy and trying not to worry on our third date.

'You look beautiful.' He said breaking the silence of the car. 'Thank you.' I answered quietly looking out of the window at the streets going by. 'Are... are we nearly there?' I asked looking up at him for the first time. 'We are.' He simply said nodding. I sat there feeling more and more relaxed at his driving and feeling less panicked and stressed.

I soon discovered that we were going out for dinner, and the restaurant looked rather posh. He had booked a table and I couldn't help but have mixed feelings at the thought of trying new food. I decided to go for a simple salad trying not to cause a situation where I could feel stressed out.

'It's lovely.' I said when the waiter had gone. The place was nicely decorated and the food did look nice. I had to admit that even though I hated trying new foods. 'So... who is the doctor...?' I asked trying to get some answers out of him. 'Look. It's... complicated. I'd rather not talk about the doctor now.' He said looking down at his cutlery. I didn't answer feeling slightly annoyed that he didn't want to tell me.

'Hey...' he said catching my hand. 'He's just a friend. And you... don't have to worry.' He said trying to reassure me. 'Okay.' I simply answered not wanting to ruing this moment.

'So. Does... you brother like... the dog?' I asked amongst our dinner talks. 'Yeah. He keeps sending me photos.' He answered chuckling. 'So do you work with animals because you feel more at ease with them than with humans?' he asked. I nodded and tried to explain to him about how animals make me feel more at ease, and how I have always felt safe talking to them and stroking them. I explained to him how animals can calm my anxiety and stress and working with them reassures me because I then know that if the amount of people in the shop is too much or if something triggers me, then I can take a puppy or a kitten and stroke it. That's one of the things that helped me after my accident.

'It calms me down.' I added. 'So why don't you have one at home.' He asked eating away. 'I... it's a long story.' I said looking down and trying not to remember about the incident. 'Oh... is... is it related to... your fear of cars?' he asked a bit timidly. I looked up at him for a few seconds and he must have seen the fright in my eyes. 'It's okay.' He simply said and I knew that he understood that I wasn't ready to talk to him about it. 'Can... can we go to the pier maybe?' I asked wanting to get my mind of things.

'Sure. We could even have an ice-cream.' He said looking like a child at Christmas. We quickly finished our dinner and he drove us down to the pier.

'Look.' He said running towards the penny game machines. 'Let's try and win some tickets.' He added pointing down at the game. I nodded and couldn't help but smile at his excitement. He looked like a kid, he looked like me when I used to come and play down here before the incident, before it changed my life forever.

We spent several hours just putting 2p coins in the machines. By the time I had run out of coins we already had over 300 tickets. 'I'm going to get some coins.' I said, and he barely answered to busy trying to win even more tickets. I wondered off through the games looking at what other people were doing and amazed at the amount of tickets some people had won. I stopped a few times getting distracted and thinking about the amount of money the game managers must be earning. Before I returned to see Ruben, I had decided to go outside for a little fresh hair. And that was when my date was about to go wrong.