Hermosa

A Conversation Between Acquaintances (Part 5)

Someone's Apartment Part 3

(The light from the patio doors in the living room of this apartment has dimmed. Jules stands to switch on a lamp beside the couch. The evening news is playing on the muted television, but no one in this room is interested in election coverage. There is a cat asleep on top of a book shelf beside the tv. Another cat is pushing against someone's hand begging for attention.)

Jules: The first time that Diego and I hung out outside the mall [clears throat, which has become increasingly hoarse], he had invited me to go get pizza at this place called Coco's Italian Market because I had told him that I hadn't gotten a chance to try any of the restaurants in Nashville yet. I was really just [sniffs dryly], I was commuting in and then going home. It was like two hours on the road, so I wasn't hanging around Nashville so much. I was more just like in and out [chuckles]. I was also so broke because I was still working part-time and only making like eight bucks an hour just wasn't cutting it. But anyway um, yeah so he invited me out to pizza, and it was-it was funny because for some reason, I felt this desire to get dressed up for this dinner [voice rises to a higher pitch]. I guess because I hadn't been invited to dinner in a while, I dunno, but like I put on one of my favorite outfits – this pair of skinny jeans and this, y'know, long tunic top. At the time, I had – I'm telling you, when I say that I went a little crazy after my ex left, I mean I really did – I had shaved myself an undercut with my mom's clippers. Like, at work I always covered it up; I parted my hair so that there was long hair on both sides and you couldn't really see it [pushes hair behind right ear]. This particular day though, for whatever reason, I was like, "Ya know what? I'm actually going to style this thing." I-I did the whole blow-drying all of my long hair to one side and [swallows] putting a little bit of paste to the short pieces makin' it look good. Even though I never wear make-up, I ah-haha put on make-up this day. I put on the mascara. I did the eyeliner [straightens back]. I looked good, I did. I was pretty pumped about this dinner, and I remember the look on his face when I got there. He didn't say anything, of course, but he was surprised. I was surprised, too! I mean, he looked really nice. He usually just wore like a wrinkly t-shirt and some jeans, whatever, but this particular day he had on this nice button-up shirt. I think he might have even gotten a haircut recently because his hair looked really well kept considering that he was usually kinda messy. This day, he looked really good, too. We were a good lookin' set of people.

(Jules takes the last sip from her mug of water and sets the empty glass on the floor. The cat who craved attention wanders to the glass and pushes it with her paw until the mug tips over, spilling nothing.)

Jules: During the course of the dinner, he introduced me to a margherritta pizza which is something that I had never tried before, and I couldn't even understand it. It was mostly sauce with just these little plops of mozzarella and then these slices of tomato and whole leaves of basil on top. I had never eaten basil, or at least didn't know I was eating basil. It's mostly sauce, and that was heh bewildering to me that it wasn't just covered in cheese. Then I tried it, and it was amazing. I could tell that this guy knew a lot about food, which was going to be another good point for us because I love to eat [pauses, looks to the cat on the floor]. I couldn't tell you what we talked was about that day, either. It was too long ago. I just remember the energy. He was very enthusiastic, and I felt [looks back to the white space on the wall] nervous – I felt kinda nervous. I felt kinda flirty. I remember like, maybe like picking jokes and laughing a lot. I think we were both kinda nervous [left hand is rubbing the palm of the right hand]. It was so much fun. He was a lot of fun to spend those couple of hours with. I, so I wanted to do more of that.