Still at the restaurant

[NaNoWriMo Day 6]

[Warning: This is poorly written and completely unedited. I just want to get a novel written soon.]

"Should I bring the bill, dai," the waitress Raul had been looking at Raul asked, shaking him out from his reverie.

"No no, not now, I'm waiting for friends. I'm probably going to be here till quite late," he said, "Oh, and you don't need to call me dai."

"Ohh. Okay. What should I call you then? Should I call your Sir? Everyone who comes here likes being called Sir," she said raising her eyebrows.

"It hasn't been much since you started working here hai? I've always been coming here, and I hadn't seen you before," he said, suddenly.

"About two months. Studying Master's is too expensive, so I had to find a way to pay for it," she said.

"That's very good. Hardworking for a degree. I'm glad! What where are you studying?" he said.

"I'm doing an MBA. At KUSOM. I should go now yeah? They might shout at me," she said.

"Oh, okay. My name's Raul. You should call me Raul, I come here all the time. Would it be difficult if I asked for your number?" he said.

She smiled. "Do you have facebook?" she said.

"Call me timi. I'm not that much older than you are," he said.

"They say all the men who tease the servers here are married men with children," she said, puffing her cheeks.

"Add me on Facebook. Here, add yourself on my Facebook," he said, handing her his phone. "You'll find out if I'm married or not that way," he said. "And besides, I haven't even said anything yet, so at this point you don't even need to know if you need to find out if I'm unmarried," he said, with a wink, just as she was handing back his phone.

"Message me nah. I should go now, customers are going to get mad," she said stepping back.

"I'll message, we'll talk later hai?" he said.

"We'll see," she said, smiling, as she headed to the kitchen.

Raul checked his phone. Her profile was mostly empty. The only photos she had were of her in the village, with her family and the family goats. Her father with his white-and-black local dress, her mother's with her large nose ring and earrings, both unsure where to look. The goats were staring intently at the camera, almost in a creepy way. In a photo taken more recently, she stood with her mother's sister, her aunt with large sunglasses, staring outside the frame while she held her hands straight stiff, her palms grasped together into a two-hand fist.

Raul ordered another quarter and bucket of ice. It was ten. Any minute now, he thought. The server was putting on her casual cloths at the reception. She looked at him, smiled, and waved. Raul gestured that he'd get her on the phone. She gave him a thumbs up, waved again, and headed out. I'm drunk, Raul said to himelf, I'm drunk, I don't know what I want, and oh god, I don't want to get myself into the troubles again. He liked her, though. She was good-looking, and clearly not pretentious, intelligent, obviously hard-working. He had known people who had attended KUSOM, and the stuck-ups who went there expected the highest end of the payscale right out of college. She seemed down to earth. She was studying with the stuck-ups, and willing to work as a server at a second-rate drinking establishment. That was quite something.

Something had been bothering Raul recently. He couldn't put his fingers on what it was, but seeing younger women made him irrationally anxious. He couldn't talk to them as confidently anymore. He was quite popular with women in their mid-twenties -- more popular than he had ever been. Older women -- they were more mature, and knowing: confidence was not a reasonable word to use for them because they just _knew_. Younger women were babies -- so to speak -- they were pliable and lovable, and happy and open to learn. Women in their mid-twenties were confident, but to him, seemingly without anything to back it up. And yet, they were somehow insecure. They were in a secret rush to find a man they liked before they were before a man that their families liked was forced upon them. Better a loser that I lke than a loser my mother likes. Raul snorted. It was jarring for him: they would say they weren't looking for anything serious, and then drop into a different conversation how they should probably find a man before anyone else did. So am I the man you're looking for, or am I the bedwarmer till you find him, he would wonder. He wanted to say, why don't we stop this, and you tell me exactly what you want, and we'll figure out the rest. He never dared.

Raul finished his drink in one gulp. It was time to stop. He needed to be sober to meet everyone. This was an important meeting, careerwise. There was time to find a partner, but this was a once-in-a-time opportunity. A unique combination of circumstances had led to this opening, and anything similar was unlikely to come by again. There is no hurry, he thought to himself. Besides, how great would it be if I got married officially as the Prime Minister. That had been Raul's most secret and greatest desires since he had been back for good. Love, power, intrigue: it would be an incredible event. He would get gifts from Kings and Presidents, and he would have a personal connection to any country that mattered. Raul was surprised he was thinking these thoughts. He needed to stop. They weren't supposed to pop into his head before important meetings. They were to be suppressed in the deepest depths of his psyche till the end. It would make a wrong impression otherwise. I need to sober up, he thought. He ordered two bottles of mineral water and two orders of pork sausages. Pork sausages sobered him up.