"May I join you?" The voice was deeply sensual and best of all it came from a woman. "You looked so deep in thought that I decided to come and brighten you up, if that's okay with you."
"Please yourself, although I warn you that you'll probably find yourself bored shitless." I was deliberately rude because the last thing I needed right now was company. I looked at her, all cheerful and happy, and decided that I should maybe have a closer look. It only took a second to take it all in. She was almost as tall as I am, 5'10", she was not skinny nor was she fat, she wore a white blouse that was open far enough for me to catch a glimpse of a well rounded breast, her waist was smaller than average and she wore a black skirt that had a slit up almost to her hips and through this I could see black stockings.
Like I said it only took a second to take all this in and another second to decide that maybe, just maybe, I should have second thoughts about my rudeness. "I'm sorry for my rudeness, can we start again? I would love for you to join me."
"May I refresh your drink?"
"Thank you, I'll have a glass of Sauvignon Blanc."
She signalled the barman and ordered two glasses of wine. "I don't usually barge into someone's personal space like this but you looked terribly worried and I just felt like I might be able to take your mind off what's bothering you for a short while. Would you like to talk about it, you don't have to if you don't want to, I won't mind. My name is Frances by the way, my friends call me Fran"
"My name is Hugh and you can't really shorten that. My problem is with your lot. I thought I had it made, a good job that I like, a wife and three great kids, I play sport, have dinner parties with friends, enjoying the odd chuckle juice in the process. It was pretty good until a couple of weeks ago when the wheels fell off big time. I lost my wife and family, my job has changed to the point where I'm no longer getting any sort of satisfaction, and due to an old injury that has come back to haunt me I'm no longer enjoying my sport."
"And how does my lot, and I assume that you mean women, get to be responsible for all of your problems?"
"They're not responsible for all of them, just the ones closest to home. My lovely wife has had several affairs during the twenty odd years we'd been married and I've always been there for her when they ended, I wasn't overjoyed about this but I was convinced that my love for her would withstand all of this."
"So what happened to change this?"
"Her latest fling did the unforgivable and left his wife, he then pressured her into kicking me out so that he could move in. It was then that I realised that the rest of my life wasn't all that great either, my job requires me to comply with procedures that I don't like and that don't work, I've tried to change things but that has got me into hot water with management. I'm in constant pain from this injury and the operation to fix the problem is not guaranteed to ease the pain, in fact in most cases the pain is exacerbated."
"You really do need cheering up."
"I did warn you."
"Don't apologise, not everyone has a perfect life."
"Like you?"
"My life is by no means perfect. I can empathise with your problem with your wife, my husband left me for a new improved model but that didn't last. He wanted to come back but I refused because it wasn't the first time for him either, and it won't be the last. I just wasn't prepared to go through that again. So I got on with my life and every now and then I go out on my own looking for someone like you so that I can try to bring a little joy into his life."
"Are you some sort of amateur psychologist?"
"By no means, I'm just someone who has experienced life's highs and lows and use that experience to help others."
"Do you charge for this service or do you do it for the love of it?"
"That you'll have to find out for yourself."