Tammy and Debbie are sitting on their bench watching the kids run around.
"Tomorrow is lasagna night, wanna come over for dinner? Tom's making his famous recipe that you love oh so much. More than you love mine, your best friend."
Debbie smiled and chewed on her grape. "I can't, I have plans."
Tammy played it cool. "Oh, are you showing a house?"
"Nope."
"Grocery shopping?"
"Nope."
"What are you doing then?"
"I told you I have plans." Debbie has her poker face on. She knows Tammy wants to ask but is trying not to pry too much.
"Cut the shit, Debbie, just tell me what you're doing already."
Debbie laughs. "I have a date."
"With watch lady?!"
Debbie nods. "Her name is Lou."
"Is that short for something?"
"Maybe." Debbie says smiling to herself.
"Will you ca-"
"Yes, I'll call you and tell you all about it."
"As soon as you get home?"
"I will call you and tell you about it, but I make no promise of when that will happen."
"Debbie Ocean, are you gonna put out?"
"Your kid is digging through the trash bin. Again." Debbie points with her grape.
Tammy sprints over to where her youngest is nearly falling head first into the garbage. "No, honey! Remember Mommy said to stay out of the trash?"
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The next day Debbie gets a text just after lunch time.
Lou: Wear something comfortable tonight.
Debbie: So now you're choosing what I wear?
Lou: Not choosing, merely suggesting. In fact, if all you wear is a robe I'd definitely be fine with that.
Debbie blushes at the suggestion.
Debbie: My, my you're not shy are you?
Lou: Never said I was ;) Pick you up at 10.
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At around 10:15 pm Lou picks up Debbie.
"Tardiness is a real issue for you, isn't it?"
Lou smiles, "Hello to you too."
Debbie gets into Lou's big car and puts her seatbelt on. "Ok, so where are we going?"
"I don't remember ever promising to reveal all of my secrets."
"Oh come on, just tell me. I'm gonna find out when we get there anyway."
"Why spoil the surprise then? Consider it an exercise in patience and self control."
"Why won't you tell me?"
"I've been mentally preparing myself all day for your endless game of questions so ask all you want, I'm not telling you where we're going."
"What if I guess?"
"I'm still not telling you."
Debbie, a middle-aged woman with a mortgage and a retirement fund, pouts. And Lou can't help but find it adorable.
Lou glances over at Debbie and decides to make things fun. "Ok, if you guess correctly you get a prize."
"You're on." Lou would soon get to know Debbie's competitive side.
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"You have to give me another hint!"
"I most certainly do not. You're getting desperate and it isn't a good look."
"I am not getting desperate."
"You asked for access to my car's GPS history."
"That's not desperate. I'm just…..crafty."
Lou cuts off the engine. Without Debbie even noticing they'd arrived. Lou gets out of the car and starts towards the path that was almost overrun with weeds. When she looks back and sees Debbie in the car still she asks, "are you coming or are you gonna stay in the car the whole night?"
Debbie gets out and jogs to catch up. "Did you bring me to this abandoned… place… to murder me? Because if so, that won't work for me. I have to show a house in two days."
"I'm not gonna murder you. Not yet anyway." Lou shoulder bumps Debbie and she smiles.
"What is this place?" Debbie asks as they make their way into what appears to be a lobby of some sort. "Is it a museum? Or at least was it a museum?"
"No, not a museum. Follow me and you'll soon find out." Lou calls from a staircase.
Debbie looks around and slowly makes her way up the stairs.
Debbie was only a few feet behind Lou so she knew exactly which room to go into when she saw Lou disappear to a room on the right. "There had better not be any spiders in he-"
Her words caught in her throat. Debbie walked into a room with maybe, no definitely, a thousand candles lit. At the very least.
"Don't worry, I checked and there are no spiders here. No big and hairy ones anyway."
Debbie looks at Lou, the candlelight casting a warm glow onto her face, and smiles real big. The two share a moment where words weren't necessary. Something Debbie was beginning to like doing with Lou.
"Hope you're hungry." Lou walks over to an area covered in blankets with a picnic basket and a couple bottles of wine near it.
They sit and Lou pours them each a glass of wine.
"Should we toast?" Debbie asks.
"Sure. Um, to your florist. I'm sure she was a lovely person, but I'm very glad she left."
Debbie laughs openly. Never had anyone gone to so much trouble for a simple date for her. Not even when her ex-husband proposed did he do anything like this.
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They ate, they drank and now they sat on the blankets slightly tipsy falling into easy conversation.
"You never told me what this place was."
"Oh! Yes, right, I nearly forgot. Follow me." Lou grabs a big blanket and waits for Debbie to get up.
After nearly two bottles of wine Debbie is losing her fight with gravity and after almost getting on her feet plops back down like a sack of potatoes. She looks at Lou and can't help but laugh. It isn't long before Lou is laughing too. They try, unsuccessfully, two times and Debbie is still on the floor.
"Ok, on the count of three," Lou says with laughter still in her voice, "and I'll pull you up and you push off the floor."
"One, two, three!"
And just like that Lou lost her balance falling nearly on top of Debbie. They both laugh to the point of tears. Slowly the laughter dies and they're left in a very welcomed position.
Lou looks into Debbies eyes.
Debbie openly stares at Lou's lips and only stops when she sees her smile.
"Come on, there's something I need to show you." And finally they're able to get up.
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Lou leads Debbie down a long corridor to a door that says AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY. The stairs on the other side of the door lead up so she can only assume they're going to the roof.
Once they reach the roof, Debbie sees what appears to be an air mattress. "You really planned this whole thing out."
"That almost hurts." Lou says playfully. "I don't half ass anything." With a wink she makes her way on over to the mattress and calls Debbie over.
As they sat on the mattress surrounded in their blanket Debbie takes a good look at the sky. There were maybe a million stars. They were at least half hour outside the city so it was much easier to see them.
"It's an old planetarium."
Debbie looks at Lou and can't help but smile. She waits a few seconds to speak because she doesn't trust her voice at that moment. "This is amazing."
"I used to come here a lot with my mother. About six months after she passed they closed it. I never stopped coming though." Lou looks up and Debbie sees her eyes shine over. "Whenever I have a tough decision to make or if I miss her too much I come here. I'll sit here for hours. I don't usually like anywhere too quiet, but the silence here is special. No noise, but it's like this place speaks to me, you know?"
When Lou looks back down, Debbie is staring at her. It's breezy on the roof and Lou tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear to keep it off her face. Their ability to say so many things through one look without using a single word was something Debbie would never get tired of.
Her eyes fell to Lou's lips again and again she only looked up when she saw Lou smile. They both leaned in and very slowly their lips met. The taste of wine still lingering on both their lips. Their kiss was slow and warm. Lou snaked her hair into Debbie's hair and heard her new favorite sound when she lightly brushed her fingers on the back of Debbie's neck. Debbie in turn realized that the consistent ringing that had set up camp in her ears since the beginning of summer had stopped.
They both smiled into the kiss as they broke apart.
"If you had told me that you were going to do that when you picked me up, maybe I wouldn't have asked you all those questions."
Lou laughs and lies down. Debbie looks at her and Lou pats the spot next to her. Debbie snuggles up to her and they both lie there smiling at nothing as Lou ever so slowly runs her fingers up and down her arm and hums a tune Debbie's really starting to like.