[ neunzenh ]
It had been after quite some insistence from the Bayern footballer that Lolita finally agreed to go to dinner with him. She was hungry after all and didn't want to bother the staff back home to make dinner for only one person.
The place was on the way to the plaza that was a ways away from her family's ranch, and Thomas parked in a dirt lot, behind a grand house by the edge of town. When Lolita looked at the building with curiosity, he explained to her, "This was the house of very important people in the area." He said to Lolita with a smile. Both of them got out of the car and he led her towards the house building. "When they died, they had no heirs, so they decided to donate it to the local Catholic church. But there was one condition." He gestured to the row of trees nearby that seemed to go on for miles. "They wrote in their will that the church had to take care of the squirrels that lived in the trees back there. The church later turned this place into a restaurant, but the squirrels remain as the main residents of this place."
Lolita smiled at the story. "That's lovely, Thomas."
"If you like it, we could come and celebrate on your birthday." He said, smiling nervously. Her smile made his heart race when it was directed to him. "You're not a little girl anymore." He commented on that fact, since she would be turning eighteen the next time her birthday came around.
The seventeen year old followed her twenty four year old step-father into the restaurant. At the entrance was a young woman who smiled bright at them. "Table for you and your girlfriend, sir?" She asked Thomas. With the same knowing smile, she added a suggestion. "I can get you two a very romantic place to share the evening by candle light. Its private and really quite lovely."
Lolita felt her cheeks burning with embarrassment. Of course she thought it was normal that people would get confused and think they were an item, since she wasn't very much younger than him. What made the situation awkward was the fact that Thomas was her mother's husband.
The footballer shook his head and laughed it off nervously. "She's not my girlfriend. She's my wife's daughter."
Now the hostess was the one going red in the face with embarrassment. Her eyes darted to Thomas' hand where she spotted a ring around his finger. "Oh, I'm so sorry about that. I thought--" She stopped herself before she could say anything to get herself even more knee deep in trouble. "Nevermind. If you'll just follow me, I'll lead you to your table." She immediately grabbed two menu's off the hostess podium and gestured for them to follow her further into the restaurant.
Lolita and Thomas stole glances at each other on the way to their table, both of them stifling laughs.
-
Their dinner together was brief, but it was a time they both enjoyed together. Thomas found himself overjoyed that all the arguing and fighting was in the past, and that Lolita didn't hate him anymore. She was back to actually enjoying his company like she did when she was a little girl and he would comfort her like an older brother. Though this was a new cycle in their lives in which he was her step-father and he had to act the part for her, now that her father had been dead for some time.
They returned to the ranch as the run as setting behind the horizon and Lolita disappeared to her bedroom to shower. As soon as she left him, Thomas found himself crazing her attention. Like he wanted to spend every moment around her.
He waited in the living room, watching the television to keep himself distracted when she emerged from her bedroom freshly showered almost an hour later. She was now dressed in black pajama bottoms with colorful confetti polka dots on them and an old Spanish national team jersey that had belonged to her father.
