Hurts Don't It

A man proposes

“I dunno, Lou. Some got it. I don’t.”

“I’m hearin’ ya Charlie. Hurts, don’t it. Kinda like when my old lady snuck off with that jerk, Watkins. I ain’t shopped at that store since. Shame, too, they got the best deals in town. No way, I’m helpin’ keep a guy what stole my old lady, in a job. Ya know what I’m saying?”

“Course I do, Lou. Rotten business, that’s what it is. We do everything we can to make ‘em happy and they like blows us off for a guy with maybe a little more cash or a little more class. How’re we supposed to know?

Lou finished wiping the counter by Charlie, got the guy at the end of the bar another beer, then returned to Charlie.

“Guy down there says you ought to find somebody else. I think he’s right.”

“Maybe, but I put six years into Carlene. Woulda been good hearin’ people saying, ‘Here comes Charlie and Carlene.’” You know, it’s got a nice ring to it.”

“It does, that it does, Charlie. Real nice ring.”

“It was a nice ring, too, Lou. Three thousand smackers. She picked it out, too, ya know. We was just strolling around the Mall and I stops in front of a window at the Jewelry store…”

“The one right in the middle of the Mall?”

“Yeah, that’s the one. There’s a couple men’s watches in the window, so I points to one of ‘em and says, ‘Nice watch,’ real casual like. She agrees it’s a nice watch, but I can tell she was wishing I was pointing at a ring. So, I says, ‘Let’s go inside. I wanna take a look.’”

“So you goes inside?”

“Right, and while I’m looking at the watches, she’s looking at the rings. I walks over and says, ‘See anything you like?’”

“Of course she does.”

“The ladies will always find some rings they like,” the guy at the end of the bar chimes in.

“Of course she does. ‘That one right there is real pretty,’ she says pointing to one with a nice rock in the middle and four little ones,  two on either side of the big one. So I make a mental note of where it is and just what it looks like. I say real casual like, ‘I guess it’s nice, but looks kinda expensive to me.’ She says, ‘Of course.’ Sounding like she thinks I’m a cheap b*****d, but she’s sorta stuck with me.”

“So, it was still there last week?”

“Of course it was, Lou. I went in there two days later on a Monday and put a couple hundred down to hold it. Then I paid it off last week.”

“So, what’re ya gonna do now?”

“Thought I'd come in here and get two thousand smackers worth of drunk, but now I'm thinkin' maybe it's a good time to start looking for somebody else.”

“Six years you’re together and she turned you down?” the guy at the end of the bar asks.

“Hell no! I turned her down. One second I was on my knee with the ring in my hand, the next I was saying 'Forget it,' and walking out the door with the ring in my pocket.”

“Hurts don’t it?” 

“’Course it does, Lou, but no way am I giving a ring to any woman who, before she even says yes or no or even maybe says, ‘Did you keep the receipt?’ You know, like what’s she really sayin’ there?”

Author's Note

Does this end too abruptly? Does the dialogue seem natural?

Reviews

[Marie]

This is eally funny. You have a light touch with your work that I like. No, it doesn't end too abruptly. The ending says everything the reader needs to know. Your dialogue is f=great, and I don't know why you didn't get any other reviews.

[terranova]

Thank you, Marie. It took me this long (two weeks) to figure out how to comment on comments.