A Christian Romance II

Chapter 18 - Tensions

It was almost twelve when Michael entered the restaurant at the Quay. Weeks of receiving contempt from a woman he was supposed to have feelings for have begun to break him, making his self-esteem and self-image deteriorate a bit, but the blatant interest that a beautiful woman like Chloe showed toward him, helped him regain some of that self-appreciation back. There was a confident walk in Michael as he entered the restaurant for lunch, approaching Brian and Ferdinand. The latter two were talking about matters of the heart - as usual.

"Hello, fellas!" He chanted, interrupting the conversation taking place at the bar at the time.

Ferdinand and Brian eyed him with suspicion.

"So, how are things going around here?"

Ferdinand was downcast, with his hand holding his head. "I was telling Brian about my breakup with Corinne."

"That's unfortunate." Michael acknowledged. "But she was turning you into her slave." He added, casually.

Brian raised his brows, looking at Michael, wondering how he had had the guts to be so blatant about his opinion.

"I guess." Ferdinand agreed, although it was hard to admit.

"In the past months, all you did was live to please her. You were barely the Ferdinand I knew."

Ferdinand realized that what Michael was saying wasn't a lie. "I guess you're right. But at the same time, looks like I know no other life anymore. We've been together for years."

"Too many years with the wrong person." Michael acknowledged, dismissively, trying to end the topic. "Anyway, have you managed to convince Miriam to come here on Sunday?"

Brian slid the flute of rosé in Michael's direction perplexed by his lack of focus. He even turned his head to Ferdinand, as if trying to highlight the situation.

"Do you mean, Saturday?"

"Saturday." He noticed that he had mentioned the wrong date. "Exactly." He seemed more lightheaded than usual.

In that instant, Michael's phone rang with a notification. He looked at his phone, quickly drifting away from the other two men just to attend to this notification. The excitement on his face didn't go unnoticed.

"That's a woman, isn't it, Michael?" Ferdinand knew very well how secretive Michael tried to be about women, and how he redundantly failed to hide his secret affairs from him.

"Just someone I met yesterday." He tried to be casual about it.

"Where did you meet her?"

"At a," Michael opened his mouth to say church but relented. "Gathering."

"Is she pretty?" Ferdinand wondered, but in his opinion, Michael had weak taste in women.

"Very." He replied.

"Do you have a picture, maybe her online profile or something...?"

"Yeah, but..." Michael didn't like to expose his personal life like that.

"Can't you show us?!" Ferdinand insisted.

Michael rolled his eyes first and then began searching for her online profile. "There!" He quickly showed them a picture of the woman who was texting him.

"Wow!" Ferdinand was impressed with Michael's taste, maybe not so weak this time. "She's very attractive!"

Michael was proud to have the approval of his mates.

"Do you think she's a potential Spencer?" Ferdinand wondered.

Brian shook his head. With his life story, he would never advise a man to unite with a woman in holy matrimony. For him, it was just: a paper, a party, and a show. All the money invested beautiful vows, for an even more costly divorce later. He loathed that type of tie, supposed to be for a lifetime when in reality, it worked only until it was inconvenient.