Another Day

Chapter 21

They discharged me a couple days later. Linda helped me get home. She’d been nice enough to drop me off before she went to work. It had been a while since she’d shown up at the diner and we both thought it would be best for her to go before Ruth started giving away all her shifts.

Since my small epiphany a couple nights before I hadn’t said much, I just kept thinking about it. About how I had never thought about why I loved Danny, about how easily I had accepted spending my life with him without really thinking about it. We’d spent two years together, and I was nineteen. Maybe we were young, but I’d never find someone who’d be willing to settle down with me.

But did I want to settle down?

Linda didn’t push me to talk. She was good like that, she could tell when I was thinking and needed to be left alone.

My head was spinning with thoughts and options and I kept trying to imagine what would happen if Danny didn’t want me anymore after I told him about George. Of course, there was no way to peep into the future, but I still worried.

“Would you quit thinking so much?” Linda said suddenly. “Why don’t you just wing it and see what happens?”

“What do you mean?” I asked defensively.

She sighed. “Well, why don’t you just follow your gut and see where it leads you? I don’t understand why you’re so keen to settle down with a man when you’re not even twenty yet.”

I hesitated. “I just figured it’d be easier to find someone now than it would ten years from now.”

Linda smiled a little. “This isn’t 1890 anymore Donna.”

I bit my lip and didn’t reply. I just wasn’t sure about anything anymore, and that made me nervous.

A part of me wasn’t happy with Danny…anymore. Before all this stuff with George I had been, but now I wasn’t. And really, settling down gave me more of a queasy feeling than a content one. Maybe Linda was right. Maybe I should just do what my gut told me.

I wanted George. George wanted me. It should be that simple, shouldn’t it?

Linda slid to a stop in front of my flat. I climbed out, my mind in a whirlwind. I turned to shut the door behind me and she reached for my wrist.

“Be careful now, think it over.” She said.

I nodded, said goodbye, and turned to go inside. She sped away, heading for the diner.

As I climbed the stairs, I started thinking again. When laid out, it was simple: I didn’t want Danny, I wanted George. But really, it was much more complicated than that. I couldn’t just think of myself in this situation, I had to think of Danny as well.

I fumbled with my keys a bit before unlocking my door. My head was spinning as I opened the door and stepped inside.

I stopped just inside the door and gaped at what I saw.

Life just got a whole lot simpler.