A Familiar Face

Promptly at eight I arrived at the Tea Room. All afternoon I had been wondering why Faith would ask me to meet her there. As far as I knew, she thought the place was too swanky. Now I was beginning to get nervous. Maybe it wasn't her after all. I had on a pair of old jeans and a t-shirt and some sneakers. I should have known that it wasn't appropriate dress for a place like this.

I took a deep breath and opened the heavy oak door. The Tea Room was a pretty nice spot. It was actually in an old bar that had been re-decorated and refurbished after the second world war. The entire length of it was done in a dark wood paneling that was complimented by its low lighting and maroon walls. To the right, when you stepped through the door, were huge overstuffed chairs with a chintz print. In front of each pair of chairs sat dark walnut coffee tables with big candle holders with sweet smelling candles in them. There was an enormous fire place at the very front of the room that was lit and burning. A white sheep skin rug sat before the fire, giving the place the feel of a cozy log cabin. To the left of the room were small tables, each with white linen table cloths and china place settings. There was a bar at the very back of the room that ran the entire length of the wall. Huge mirrors loomed all around, giving the appearance that it was larger than it actually was.

Sarah's father had left it to her in his will. She had grown up here, helping her mother serve tea and cakes to the rich ladies who frequently came in to spend their husband's money and catch up on all the latest gossip.

I'd never set foot in the place before I'd met Sarah. It was an upscale place and there was nothing upscale about me. On the contrary, I was more happy sitting at my ma's bar, listening to her drone on and on about nothing. At least I felt at home. I grew up in that bar, watching my ma serve old, useless drunks every day and put up with their abuse. It was no different at home. Sarah's parents took her on vacation in Vermont and they summered in Maine. We had been raised very differently.

I always felt uncomfortable in the Tea Room. Like everyone was looking at me and wondering why I was sitting at their tables, drinking their beverages, when I clearly should have been elsewhere. The whole atmosphere made me feel like the low class bum my father always told me I was.

The truth was that I only went there for Sarah. I didn't have the heart to tell her just how different our backgrounds were. She had yet to meet my mother or my little brother. She always asked to meet them but how could I bring her to that? Bring her to my drunk ma's bar? Let her meet my alcoholic/drug addict brother? It wasn't likely to happen any time soon.

But Sarah always did her best to make me feel like I belonged. Like I was just as good as those old biddies who came in wearing their fur coats and jewellery. She made me want to be a better man, and in doing so, made me confront my own worst fear? Could I be that man?

I was no Harvard graduate. I didn't 'summer'anywhere or have any inclinations to do so. Even though she tried, I still had the feeling that I was meant to be somewhere else. With someone else.

She felt so right but it seemed that there was still something missing from my life. It's just that there were certain things she didn't get about me. Small things that would be trivial to someone else but not to me. Like the way that I hated lettuce on my cheeseburgers and I only ate turkey once a year and wanted to keep it that way. She didn't understand why I didn't want to go to the zoo, but that I loved animals. She didn't get that I just didn't want to move to the richest part of town into a new condo. I liked where I lived. There were other things that she didn't understand about me, too. Like how I hated Wednesdays and why I couldn't watch movies that had a lot of women being beat up. Granted, I never told her about my past, but sometimes the questions got to me. I wasn't one to talk about my feelings all the time. Why do women always want to talk about feelings?

These were things that only one person knew and I wasn't sure if I wanted to share them with anyone else. Faith was the only person to ever see me cry. She was the only one who held me when I cried and never brought it up again. She was the only one who knew what my dad used to do to my ma and Mikey and I. The only one who understood why I became a cop and why I had to do some of the things I did.

These things had become special to me. Things that were a secret between us. We had an unspoken bond that stretched from her to me, like an invisible link that held us securely in place. We had our ups and downs from time to time, but we never stayed angry at one another for too long. Accept this time. I didn't know how I was going to work through this, but I knew I'd have to face her tomorrow. If not tomorrow, then the next day. I couldn't call in sick forever.

Even in the silences that fell between us, we still felt comfortable to say anything and to always let the other know how we were feeling. The bickering and bantering was a constant between us, but even in that, we knew that it was just our way. Our way of communicating that we had something stronger than anyone else had. At least I thought that way. I never told her, but she knew. I know she knew.

I just didn't know how I was going to trust her now. Trust was always the biggest issue with me and she was the only person I trusted. I was still hurt and I knew that this wasn't going to go away. Still, something made me feel melancholy, like I was missing her. It almost made me want to forgive her. Almost.

I looked around the dimly lit room to see if I could recognize anyone. I didn't. But then I heard my name being called. It was a voice I'd know anywhere and it was a voice I didn't like. It was coming from behind me at a table in the corner. I turned around, hoping that it wasn't who I thought it was. My fears were futile. It was Jimmy Dorhety.