Right Here Waiting

It is just another day in the life of mine. I have to get up and get ready to go work as the manager for a high end restaurant downtown Tucson. The skies are blue and the sun is beating down without the humidity of the Midwest states so a tshirt and a button up is all I will need today. The drive was safe but now I’m at work and I have to get busy. Break time has finally come around so I will turn the lights off and lock everything up for a couple hours since we close from 2:30-4:30. As manager I am in charge of hiring and I have been struggling to find some good hosts. We have a couple male hosts and I think a couple female hosts would bring a good balance to the work environment. Oh, I know! I’ll go get lunch and while I’m on my break I can visit some retail stores to see if there are any employees looking for another job or to replace their current place of employment. I think I’ll start off at my favorite barbecue joint and am going to get whole slab of ribs. Their ribs are absolutely to die for! The workers behind the counter are nice, but there weren’t any that fit my criteria to be a host. No luck there so I’m going to hop on over to this small bakery in the same strip mall for dessert. I am ordering this pastry called a bear claw and it has pecans, cinnamon, as well as icing on it. I just looked up after my third bite or so and noticed what looked to be a beautiful smiling face under her mask. I am now eating my pasty as fast as humanly possible in order to get the chance to talk to her before she gets in line to order her food. “Hi, my name is Robert” is what I managed to muster up to say to this stranger. She just looked up at me and with her welcoming eyes said, “Hi. I really like your hair!” I thanked her for her compliment and informed her about my goal to hire a few more hostesses at my restaurant, but she kindly let me know that she was happy with her current position which just so happened to be at my favorite bbq joint. I gave her the card to the restaurant and my phone number just in case she knew someone looking for a job. It has been about 30 minutes since I met that girl at the bakery and I received a text saying, “Hey, it’s me from the bakery and I just wanted to let you know that I really appreciated your job offer and that I thought you were really nice as well.” I thanked her and went back to work without thinking much of it. Finally, I’m off work and back home and something came over me to text her again. After about thirty minutes of conversation I realized that this girl is really really cool so I asked to FaceTime her and she agreed, reluctantly. We ended up talking for nearly 3 hours with ease! Just got off the phone with her and it’s nearly 3 in the morning. I don’t know how to feel, because I have never met a woman like this in my life before that shows interest in me. I figured it’s best for me to not overthink anything and just hit the hay.

The sun is rising and I woke up with a smile on my face. I usually just wake up and I’m not happy or sad but this time I am happy to be waking up. I am taking the first bite of my breakfast when I notice a text from her. I could not help myself so I replied and we had a good morning conversation. At the end of our conversation I asked her to join me for lunch today. Luckily, she was able to meet me for lunch. Since I’m the manager of the restaurant I had the chefs cook up a nice meal for two right before we closed from 2:30-4:30. It is now 3 o’clock and she just pulled into the parking lot. My nerves just kicked in. She doesn’t even know that we are about to have lunch just the two of us in an upper class restaurant. She’s wearing her uniform for work and still manages to be stunning. “Good afternoon Natalie” is how I greeted this beautiful young woman at the door. I walked her inside and sat her down at the table I had prepared for two. We both had a full meal, a water, and a glass of Merlot. We sat down and I prayed for the both of us and mentioned how grateful I was for the food at our table. We raised our glasses of Merlot and made a cheers to our first date. We shared a short but absolutely beautiful meal and at the end of it I told her to wait a second because I had something for her. I am on my way to the iPad to turn on “Right Here Waiting” by Richard Marx because she had told me the night before through texting that it was on her bucket list to randomly slow dance somewhere. As I turned the corner and saw her sitting at the table my stomach got butterflies because I know what I have to do. I made it to the table, extended out my hand, and asked; “May I have this dance?” She reached her hand out and we slow danced with our foreheads on one another. Towards the end of the song I lifted my head and looked into her eyes. She slightly looked down and then looked back into my eyes. At that moment I leaned in and we shared our first kiss. Love at first sight is real and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.