“I’ll have to let my roommate know that I’m going out, but okay. When did you want to leave?”

He smiled. “How about now?”

###

Juan sipped his iced tea and took in the strange surroundings of the restaurant. It had a Polynesian style, decorated with palm fronds and tiki statues. Live on-stage entertainment involved hula dancers and fiery swords, and the waitresses were all in island dress. If he didn’t know better, he’d have thought he was somewhere in the Hawaiian Islands.

Their seat gave them a poor view of the stage, but that was fine by Juan. He’d much rather have an excuse to keep looking at the stunning coed.

“So,” he said. “You’re twenty-five, a former singer, and a now a freshman at college. There’s got to be a good story behind that. How’d you end up at Georgetown?”

Keeping her gaze on her drink, Kathy swirled her soda with a straw and shrugged. “To be honest, college was never something I’d planned. I mean, I was always good at school, but the only thing I had in mind during my senior year in high school was to get away from home.”

Juan’s mind raced to likely causes. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to—”

“Oh, no, nothing like that,” Kathy said quickly, looking up from her drink. “Don’t get me wrong—my parents are awesome and I love them to death. But they live on a small ranch in Nevada, and I hated it. I knew that if I stuck around, I’d never get out of there. I wanted to see the world a bit, and I figured I probably had a good enough voice for singing at bars and stuff, so I left.”

“And what made you give up that dream for college?”

Kathy cocked her head.

Even though the lighting in the large restaurant was purposefully dim, Juan felt mesmerized by her green-eyed gaze.

“You’re making fun of me. Nobody in their right mind would think singing in a bar is anyone’s dream.”

“I wasn’t…” Juan paused as he replayed in his mind what he’d said. “Sorry, I guess that came off as sarcastic, but I didn’t mean it that way. Being able to travel and do what you like seems pretty awesome.”

Kathy gave the slightest hint of a frown. “You think waiting on tables and singing at bars is awesome? Come on, I didn’t exactly just fall off a turnip truck. You’re a doctor at a big pharmaceutical company.”

Juan smiled. “I guess that’s maybe how others see me, but on the inside, I’m still that kid born in the slums of East LA I had an infinitely higher chance of dealing drugs or working at some dead-end job than becoming a doctor. I’m lucky that I had a very strong-willed mother who pushed me to be better than that.”