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He locked the door to the diner before walking into the kitchen. His face was clouded with confussion and unsureness.
He stopped there for a while, checking if there was anything wrong that could cause problems as he was out. Having a fire at the diner would've been the worst possible outcome of that night.
He got out of the kitchen and turned off the lights. When he was content with the diner, he climbed the stairs to his apartment to get ready.
He was a simple man, he would probably describe himself that way. He loved cooking, watching baseball games and spending time on his own. And women, obviously, he loved.
And he didn't even have lots of relationships in his life. Rachel was his first girlfriend. Other than Kelly, a redhead that was flirting with him for years then, who he dated to make Rachel jealous. He and Rachel had been friends for years before they started dating. They had known each other well, they got along and they had chemistry. As a seventeen year old boy, he could see himself marrying her one day. That didn't happen though. Rachel had different dreams and different plans. And even though he would like to say that he accepted it and moved on with his life, he didn't. He pined for her a for a long time.
He was still pining for her, he knew deep down. That was the reason he was dating a lawyer. Not that Nicole was not a beautiful, smart woman. Because she was. He just didn't know if she was the one for him.
But damn it, he was getting older and every second he wasted not having a family felt like he was disappointing his parents.
He took off his green baseball hat and brushed his hair back. He didn't look so bad. He was out of his casual flannel clothes, instead he was wearing a black t-shirt and dark blue jeans. He wanted to wear a shirt, a flannel probably, on it but those were the clothes Nicole told him to wear, so he did not have so many options. They've been only dating for a month and she was already deciding what he was going to wear. The thought of what might happen in a year scared the hell out of him.
He looked at himself in the mirror for a while. He could see the wrinkles on his forehead. He could see grey strands on his hair. He was getting old. He couldn't just keep living, pining for a woman who was living her dreams. And he knew he was being selfish, he really knew that. But he just needed to try.
He left the diner and walked to his green truck to drive to Nicole's apartment. They were going to watch a stand up, Nicole told him. He was pretty sure that was not something he was going to enjoy but giving it a try wouldn't have hurted.
He'd never watched a stand up show before. But he had heard about it. It was someone standing there, making stupid jokes and people laughing at that person. He didn't even laugh at the jokes he actually thought were funny, how could he laugh at someone who was gaining money out of it. The idea of people gaining money just because they were making jokes that were probably scripted sounded stupid to him. But he also couldn't care less.
He gave Nicole a soft kiss on lips when he was in front of her door.
"Hey! You look nice. I like the t-shirt." Nicole said with a sweet tone that made him nauseous.
She was wearing a dark red dress that ended an inch over her knees. She had same color heels and her red hair was in a ponytail. She honestly looked gorgeous, he had to admit.
"Thank you," He said shyly. "You look nice too, pretty." He tried to compliment.
He walked her to his truck before taking them to the place they were going to. They would watch the show first and then go eat at a restaurant, they decided. She decided.
The ride was not the most uncomfortable one. They had some silent rides before, so this one could even be counted as intimate. Nicole told him about the cases she got and he tried to act like he didn't hate talking about these. Nicole was a lawyer so it was big possibility that she could see him faking but even if she did, she didn't seem to care. And he told her about what Taylor and Kirk did to get him angry, which she laughed as she listened.
The place was not what he expected. It wasn't some underground place where people tried to look like they were going to somewhere else. Not that he pictured it as a more... dangerous place. But his brain had his own idea.
They found their seats and sat down, ten minutes before the show started.
"Okay, so this woman is really, really popular. She talks really fast as I've heard, which is a good thing considering how much we've payed for it." Nicole told him excitedy as she placed her hand on his knee casually.
"Yeah..." He answered shortly. He didn't really care about the show or the money or the person who did the stand up. He didn't even know why he kept dating Nicole, anymore. He was pretty sure he didn't like her and was not going to have a family with her.
He looked at the redhead who sat next to him and watched people quietly with a weird emotion on her face. It could've been jealousy, envy, disgustment or any other emotion. He didn't really know. But he knew he would feel sick if he saw a woman watching him like that.
After something like twelve minutes after their arrival, show started.
A curly haired woman whose face was covered with a shadow that was probably a part of the show walked on the stage.
Voices of people clapping and cheering irritated him but he tried to act like it didn't. He clapped silently, not taking his eyes off of the woman on the stage to turn and look at Nicole.
"I had a really long walk to get here. I mean did you see that stairs? Not that I used them. Elevators are great inventions when you don't put them miles away from the stairs. I think we can count it was me walking up the stairs, right? I'll say yes." The curly haired woman spoke with a radiant tone. She was wearing a dark blue mini dress and a darker colored blazer. She was holding the microphone with her right hand as she kept moving and shaking her left hand. Nicole was right about the talking fast thing, he agreed.
There was a short pause that was filled with some giggles and lots of cheerings before she started to talk again.
"Some of you know me as Cher," She said as people looked at her expecting her to go on.
"And some of you know me as Lorelai Gilmore." The shadow on her face was gone. "Welcome everyone!"
The moment she said her last sentence was a different kind of moment, he realized. It was a room full of people who all cheered up for this woman like she was one of the founders of America.
She looked at her audience with a huge smile on her face. Her eyes kept wandering on them.
Her eyes gazed upon his face a second longer than they did with the others.
He knew it then, as he came eye to eye with the most beautiful blue eyes he'd ever seen in his whole life.
He just knew it.