Chapter 1

“Hello my name is Ralph.”

I really have no idea why I said that when I met her. It just popped out of my mouth. One of those moments that you can’t get back. Even if you explained the lie in the next sentence, that moment. The first moment, was done. The opportunity was lost.

“Hi, Ralph,” she answered.

I sort of stared at her toes. She had black toenail polish on one foot. Green on the other. I’d find out later, that was what she did all the time. It never changed. No red. No blue. Not even purple, which was her favorite color. Always one foot black -- the right foot, and one foot green -- the left foot.

“Is that really your name?” she continued after my foot staring turned into eye staring.

“No. I just wanted to see if you would wince when I told you that. And you didn’t. Excellent thing, I must say.”

I noticed something else. She had a pendant around her neck. It was made of gold, but really oddly shaped. Not any kind of pattern or design. Just clumps of gold that seemed almost haphazardly melted together.

“So, what is your name?” I asked.

“Tara,” she said.

“Cool. I dig that name, always have.”

“I’m still waiting for your real name,” she said with a little bit of anger. Not hard core jarheads seeing a middle easterner in the airport ahead of him in line at McDonald’s getting the last batch of chicken mcnuggets mad. Just playfully, but not completely playfully mad.

“It’s Randy.”

“That fits you.”

That never really made sense to me. It fits what? My nose? My feet? My too-long and shaggy goatee?

Right at that moment of pondering, someone walked up to us…

“Tara? Are you coming or not?” a guy with a North Face fleece pullover said. The kind of pullover without sleeves. Not the kind with zippered off sleeves. That would have been even worse.

“Ummm…I’ll be there in a second honey,” she said.

My heart sunk. Just a little bit. Usually my heartbreak will come weeks, months or years after I fall for a gal. This one took less than three minutes.

North Face turned an walked over to a very large flat screen television. He looked at the screen and it had a rerun of the Ultimate Fighter on. He started boxing with the image on the screen. An image on a television screen that was still five times stronger than he was.

Two girls from the bar started looking at him. One of them got up and came over to her. I tried to watch what happened, but a voice stopped me.

“Randy, I probably shouldn’t do this, after what you just saw and all …”

She must be talking about the whole “honey” stuff with North Face.

“Huh? Shouldn’t or should?” I said, not really understanding what she was talking about, but hoping for one thing, not another.

“I shouldn’t give you this,” she said with a slight but oh-so-beautiful smile.

She reached into her pocket and gave me her … business card. It read “Tara’s Balloons…For ANY occasion!!!”

“Three exclamation points?” I asked, and immediately thought better of it.

She frowned a bit.

I started to panic.

“Thanks,” I meekly said.

“You don’t even know what it is, do you?” she said.

“It’s your business card. You are some kind of balloon person? Guess you figured I needed balloons for every occasion…”

That was supposed to be funny. But it wasn’t.

“No, stupid. Look on the back,” she said, grabbing it back from me and flipping it over and then pushing it right into my eyes.”

Call me. 252-349-1190. And then she took it right back.

At that moment I caught in the corner of my eye, North Face boy doing almost the exact same thing to one of the girls from the bar. She grabbed the card back quickly and stuffed it in her bra.

“Classy,” I thought. Not putting any of this together.

Tara took my hand and placed the card in my now sweaty palm.

“I’ve got to go. I live in Uptown. Maybe I’ll see you around. Or …”

A delightful pause. One in which I noticed her dyed blonde hair with red streaks in it. And the smell of the homeless guy coming up to us with a Styrofoam cup in his hand.

“Got any change, buddy?” he asked.

“Sure,” I said, taking out a couple of quarters, plunking them into the dirty cup.

“Thanks, bro,” he said, tipping his hat and standing up just a little straighter. I kind of reminded me of the scene from Barfly when the bum gets to light a cigarette for Henry and Wanda. My favorite movie is about a drunk who falls in love with the wrong woman.

“You’ll give me a call?” she finally continued.

“I will. If you answer one question for me.”

She looked me up and down, again with her little crinkled up frown that made her nose twitch just a little bit. She had a little freckle there too.

“Ok, shoot,” she said.

“What color is your hair, really?”

“Red.”

And then she walked away with North Face.