Andy's Nightmare

11. Being Selfish

“I believe you said your name is Andy,” he started. “I’m pleasantly surprised to see you again." He chuckled and continued, "I believe you told me that I wouldn't have to avoid you if I saw you again, and I'm happy to see you. I assume your dinner went well since you are still in our small town. Does this mean that I may have the chance for that dinner?” he asked with a pleasant, yet wicked grin.

“My stay is still up in the air,” Andy started with a shrug. She felt herself starting to blush under his gaze. She couldn’t remember feeling this way before, and she wasn’t sure what to make of it. “Dinner went well. But didn't meet with everyone that was supposed to come. I have plans for Saturday which will be the deciding factor."

He smiled and said, "I am selfishly hoping that things work out to keep you here. I would like to have time to get to know you."

The waitress brought her dinner while he was saying that and smiled at him as she placed the plate in front of Andy. Linc took that as his cue and made his way back to his own table. "I better get back to Susan and Lizzy before they think I abandoned them. Susan is my sister-in-law, and she brought Lizzy down for a visit from Ohio. Enjoy your meal, Andy. I look forward to seeing you again soon."

He was just sitting a couple tables away and he was facing her. The little girl, who she had learned was Lizzy, moved over to sit next to her uncle, while Susan had her back to me in the booth. Linc was sitting there listening to Lizzy ramble on about school and life in general. Although he was wrapped up in what she was saying, he kept stealing glances over towards Andy.

The mom, Susan, let this continue for the majority of the meal without interrupting her daughter’s exchange with him. She would say something occasionally, but it appeared that this visit was more for her daughter’s benefit. When she noticed Linc looking over at Andy more than once and that he had left them to talk with the young lady a couple of tables away when he got there, she turned back, curious to see who had gotten his attention. Susan smiled and nodded appreciatively and said something that she couldn't hear to Linc that made his smile grow even wider.

Andy finished her meal with a glass of milk to drink. She was getting full even though she’d planned on getting dessert when she first got here. They had a triple layer chocolate cake in the dessert case that looked so appetizing that it made her mouth water. She really wanted the cake, but had no room. She decided to take a slice of cake back to the hotel for later when she would take a break from her writing.

As she was leaving, she saw Lizzy climb up on Linc’s lap, laughing and smiling up at him. He nodded goodbye to her. That made Andy smile in return.

She wondered if he had any children of his own. And imagined that he would be a doting and loving father, if he did.

As she walked the short distance back to the hotel, she felt a slight chill in the air as a breeze picked up while she was at dinner. It wasn’t cold, but she wished she had worn a long sleeved dress instead of a sleeveless one, or brought a light sweater with her.

She got back to the hotel and finished the brief article that she had been working on and found that she was hungry again. She was glad that she had brought the cake back with her. She went down to the lobby and asked if she could get some milk, since they served breakfast and she knew they had it.

She knew that milk was good for the baby growing inside her, so she tried to drink lots of milk and juices to make up for the coffee that she had cut out of her diet. She still had the occasional cup, usually decaf, but the doctor told her that caffeine was not good for the baby, and she tried to take that into consideration. Even though she wasn't going to keep the baby, she wanted to give the adoptive parents a healthy child.

As Andy ate her cake, she started working on some other writing since she had already finished her article and emailed it to the magazine. Now she just had to wait for any edits that they may request from them. This was her first writing project since college, so she was nervous about it.

Andy woke and found herself looking forward to meeting with Kim and Kyle tomorrow for lunch at their place.

She would get some writing done today and explore the town later.

Maybe she would go out for some coffee or tea later this afternoon. She found herself wanting to see Linc again. There was something about seeing him with his niece and sister-in-law that made her want to get to know him better. Was he as sweet a man as he appeared? Maybe she would spend some time by the pool again, just to be outside.

She wanted to get to know him, yet wasn't sure if she could fully trust him or her reaction around him. She didn’t trust men, yet somehow she found herself wanting to learn more about Linc.

Andy decided to take her laptop to the coffee shop with her today instead of going to the pool. She would go there later. She was sitting there drinking some herbal peppermint tea and staring at a white screen on her computer, trying to decide where to begin when someone sat down in the chairs nearby. She had sat in the same area that she had the first time she was here. The chair was against a wall, so nobody could come up behind her, but it was also near a window, so she could watch what was going on outside.

She wanted to work, but she also wanted to see Linc and hoped he would come in.

She looked up from her blank screen and noticed an elderly couple getting comfortable and smiled at them. They smiled back.

Andy closed her laptop and set it down on the small table beside her. It was clear to her that she wasn't really focused on working. She realized that she was getting a little hungry so she decided to get a blueberry muffin to go with her tea.

When she came back, the couple seemed to be engrossed in their conversation, so they didn’t hear her when she sat back down.

As she ate her muffin, Andy started re-reading the notes in her notebook. She had ideas for 3 different stories, all different genres and topics. The topics were a murder mystery, a fantasy story involving werewolves and mythical creatures and a love story. Even though she had some notes for the love story, she wasn’t sure that was really the right story for her to write since she’d never been in love. Yes, she had seen the love her parents had for each other, and had read numerous romance novels, but she had never felt it.

She finally decided to start on the fantasy one. It was easy enough to do research on mythical creatures and write about them.

Even though her mother didn’t like it, she had been interested in werewolves, vampires and witches as she was growing up. But now she was learning about all different types of mythical creatures. Witches were the opposite of everything that was taught in the church as she was growing up.