Unideal Romance

Chapter Ten.

"You look great!" Rose sounded enthusiastic as Rissa approached her dressed casually, a black pants and a brown sneakers with a fitted white blouse and her furry coat hanging on her arm.

She smiled. "Thanks" She said.

A knock came in and Rose went over while Rissa was behind her. "Hi" She greeted with bright smiles.

"Hi" He also seemed filled with all the happiness in the world.

Her dad still looked fit and strong, he was always crazy about fitness. He never joked with his morning jogs and weekend workouts which he took Rissa along and she felt really lucky having such a strong dad, he would be there to protect her anytime but she had been wrong and life didn't work that way.

"Hi" He said turning to her. "Ready?" He kept a keen smile.

"Sure" She smiled back. "Bye mom" She kissed her cheek and walked out while Steve shut the door behind them.

  Rose felt really pleased with this new development and according to Rissa, it was all Luke's doing. She owed it all to him.

They had arrived at the park and only a few people were out, probably because the weather wasn't warm which was understandable but the few people who were there seemed to be enjoying themselves.

  "Let's go get some hot dogs first" He suggested.

"Sure" They walked over to the hot dog stand and got one each and a can of soda each to go with the snack.

They found an empty bench just right close to the little lake where the swans were feeding on the treats the children were offering to them.

"Been a while here" She let the breeze sweep beneath her nose and around the park, Rissa put on her coat noticing how everyone seemed to be well covered because of the chills. "I never came here alone" She said again.

"Yeah" He nodded looking at her, he was really happy right now. "I stopped coming here for so long" He added while taking a bite of the hot dog.

She smiled and also bit into her hot dog then popped the can and drank the sizzling can of Pepsi. "We always came here, just the both of us because mom wasn't a park person"

"Who wasn't?" He laughed. "Everyone loves the park" He watched the swans flap together and the children giggled.

"Buh--why?" Her mood changed. "You both looked in love? Why did you get separated?" She asked because she had been meaning to get an answer from her dad.

He sighed sorely as he thought about it. "We only pretended that we were so in love whenever you were around but when you aren't, it's chaos --" He gulped in his soda. "We were basically always arguing".

"Why is that? What went wrong?" She didn't know they were pretending all this while she was around.

"The attraction didn't take us longer than that anymore like we thought it would. I didn't marry Rose because I loved her.." He stated.

"Then why?" So why did they get married if they had not been in love.

"It was a match made marriage by our parents. Rose's father and mine were close friends, so somehow when I was still schooling in the UK, my father had arranged for Rose and I to meet and get to know each other and to be candid. I felt attracted to her immediately, so did she, our parents made us get married after our schooling." He smiled, he didn't seem to regret it though. "It was an early marriage for both of us, I think I was only twenty-three and she was two years younger. Poor us, we didn't know much.." He had explained with a large bite and a mouthful of soda.