[ justprompts ] 10/23-11/6 (b)
Rain
One of the things that Charlotte Butler would later remember about that evening was that it had been raining.
It was their third date. Richard had showed up right at eight, and she had fortunately gotten done prepping herself before he arrived. He'd told her that he'd made reservations at some high-scale restaurant in the city (just opened), so she'd dressed accordingly (a black strapless dress, cut just above her knees, matching heels, a string of pearls on one wrist, black peacoat over her shoulders).
The smile on his face as she opened the door was worth it. (He was dressed in a neat black suit, cut perfectly, and she remembered that he was still fiddling with his tie when she saw him through the window.)
He escorted her to his car, holding an umbrella carefully over her head as they went, offering a quick, "You look gorgeous," just before he closed the passenger-side door.
---
The only thing that Charlotte would have to say negatively about the restaurant was that the servings were tiny; barely bigger than her fist.
Of course, she never said this in a terribly unhappy way: some fifteen minutes after leaving the restaurant found the couple huddled together in a booth at a diner. Both of them were soaked through and through, as Richard's umbrella had up and died (so to speak) some time between exiting the restaurant and getting to his car. However, this did nothing to diminish their mood. Both were laughing, over what they didn't know, neither able to imagine being anywhere else at that point in time. They looked terribly out of place, dressed all in black in the homely little diner, sharing a plate of pancakes and watching as the rain continued to fall outside.
It was one of the memories Charlotte would treasure even after she fell apart.
---
Another of Charlotte Blake's clearest memories was that it was raining the day she received the news that one of her daughters had died.
One of the things that Charlotte Butler would later remember about that evening was that it had been raining.
It was their third date. Richard had showed up right at eight, and she had fortunately gotten done prepping herself before he arrived. He'd told her that he'd made reservations at some high-scale restaurant in the city (just opened), so she'd dressed accordingly (a black strapless dress, cut just above her knees, matching heels, a string of pearls on one wrist, black peacoat over her shoulders).
The smile on his face as she opened the door was worth it. (He was dressed in a neat black suit, cut perfectly, and she remembered that he was still fiddling with his tie when she saw him through the window.)
He escorted her to his car, holding an umbrella carefully over her head as they went, offering a quick, "You look gorgeous," just before he closed the passenger-side door.
---
The only thing that Charlotte would have to say negatively about the restaurant was that the servings were tiny; barely bigger than her fist.
Of course, she never said this in a terribly unhappy way: some fifteen minutes after leaving the restaurant found the couple huddled together in a booth at a diner. Both of them were soaked through and through, as Richard's umbrella had up and died (so to speak) some time between exiting the restaurant and getting to his car. However, this did nothing to diminish their mood. Both were laughing, over what they didn't know, neither able to imagine being anywhere else at that point in time. They looked terribly out of place, dressed all in black in the homely little diner, sharing a plate of pancakes and watching as the rain continued to fall outside.
It was one of the memories Charlotte would treasure even after she fell apart.
---
Another of Charlotte Blake's clearest memories was that it was raining the day she received the news that one of her daughters had died.