The Woman In The Red Dress

14- Not-so Perfect

I think I actually genuinely like her. Not in a friendly way, no. More of a romantic like. I've known her for a while now, but I feel some sort of connection to her. A connection like I was meant to meet her again and be together. It's like that soulmate thing I hear about. I'm at the age where they say I would meet my soulmate. This can't be just a coincidence. True fate.

The idea of asking her out came to my mind recently. I do enjoy that idea. There must be something between us with how our interactions are.

I start to wonder how I should approach this if I'm actually doing it ? Romantically ? A dinner date ? I pondered. A perfect night... with well-lit candles, no distractions of any kind, just her and me. Sounded doable in a way.

I leaned back on the couch, thinking of the idea more. Dinner dates always seem to be a good strategy to ask another out. Many romance movies do it. I know movies aren't a reality, but it's worth a shot.

I should at least get the supplies in order to make this work. I got up and searched the many drawers I have in my house for any candles. I did find some, but they're pretty stubby and already used. I sigh in inconvenience. Put candles on the list then; Good candles.

More ideas came to mind. If a dinner date is the way then I should have a nicer table cloth. Red would fit perfectly. I can imagine it now. Red, silky cloth with a soothing, possibly scented, candle in the center. Looking within her rich, brown eyes and going for it. What could go wrong with that ?

I do know I don't have most of those materials, so they would go on the list as well. I'll go buy them soon.

Now I should tell her about it. I decided to ring her up on her phone. Doing it as a call seems more preferable. I just need her to quickly pick it up. So I punched in her number and waited. It rang a few times and after the fourth, it ended as she answered it.

"Ada," I say.

"Yes ?"

"Are you busy later on ?"

She stayed silent for a few seconds. "Hmm. No. What's the occasion ?"

I move my hair away from my face. "Nothing much. I'm only curious if you'd like to have dinner over at my place."

"Dinner ?" she repeats.

"Yeah. Perhaps at 7PM ?"

I could hear her hum, thinking of my offer. Soon she said she agreed. My heart nearly jumped. I explained a bit further with my offer. After that, the call ended. Felt like a large weight came off of my chest. I should prepare.

I quickly dressed myself in decent clothing so I could head out and buy the stuff I needed. I headed towards the nearest store to find what I needed. It was more of an in-and-out. Quickly buy the stuff and then leave to set it up. Don't get distracted by anything, focus on what is only needed.

Thankfully, I followed what I told myself and only lasted at most fifteen minutes. Once home, I instantly started to set things up. I draped the scarlet tablecloth over and luckily, it fit nicely. It covered the whole table and had no noticeable wrinkles. I placed candles around the dining area where I thought fit. The candles were in the shape of flowers. Romantic, isn't it ? I won't light them up yet.

A red rose held within my palm. It's a real rose and not one of those plastic ones. Cheap plastics aren't appealing with the feel that this is supposed to have. I placed it into a vase that had a deep blue bow tightly wrapped around the base. I filled the vase up with water so it could live there comfortably.

Now comes the food. Earlier I looked up any fancy food that could impress her. Italian is fancy enough. I already knew how to cook some Italian meals, so this shouldn't be so bad. I went with some basics with seasoned meat, some variety of pastas, curry with rice, all that. This is going to take some time to cook.