Good days

5.7 Linda West

Summer 1996, The Mudhole

"Hey, what's your name? I didn't see you here so far, or I think I would have remembered!"

The stranger's voice caught Linda by surprise.

"Huh? I'm Linda", she said without realizing it.

"And why do you think you would have remembered", she said, gaining back her composure.

She was not in the mood for bad pick up lines, but she was still curious what he had to say.

"Well, you have short hair. None of the girls that are usually around here, have", the man said with a serious, but friendly face.

She didn't expect this, and cracked up.

"This is the weirdest way someone was trying to hit on me!" she broke out.

"...I wasn't... just... tryin' to be nice because you sit here like someone forgot you...", he said, looking somewhat befuddled.

Oh, so that was it. Linda felt sorry for being impolite.

"Okay, I guess you can talk to me then", she said, trying to be nice. "But don't pay me any compliments please."

Now he chuckled.

"How generous of you. And you're most likely anyhow getting to many, if you complain about being hit on so much", he said in a mocking, but kind tone.

Linda wasn't sure how to answer to it.

"Want a beer?" he asked her with a smile.

"Uhm.. I don't know, I never tried it", Linda said, glad she didn't have to find a reply after all.

"How could you never have tried beer?", the man burst out in laughing disbelief. "What planet are you from?"

"They told me it's earth", she chuckled now too, "but sometimes I'm not sure about it."

"They lied", he said with a wink.

It was easy to talk to him, she found.

For a while she forgot that her sister had left her sitting here.