Believing Again

Chapter Ten

Gunner pulled up to a restaurants that was only a couple minutes away from the garage. The ride here was utterly silent. There wasn't a word spoken, he didn't even turn on the radio, I couldn't feel the vibrations under my feet. I got out of the car as Gunner watched me go before getting out himself. He held the door to the little restaurant open for me. The hostess smiled at us as her eyes drifted over to Gunner more than me. "Afternoon, table for two?" She asked, almost seductively, at Gunner. He gave a curt nod to her, his facade of a bad boy back up. There was no gentleness like there was only five minutes ago.

She put us at a small table in the back, running her hand over Gunner's shoulder before leaving. I sat down comfortably with my leg under me. I picked up the menu and studied it. I took a quick glance at Gunner to find him staring at me again. I waited for him to say something. "My Uncle owns the place." I nodded softly to him pulling my eyes from him back to the menu in front of me. There are so many choices I don't even know what to pick.

A waitress came over and gave the two of us a tight fake smile with a harsh glare. "What can I get you two?" I looked at Gunner.

"Two Cokes." I looked back at the girl as she gave me another glare before walking away without saying another word. I looked at Gunner was he ran a hand through his shaggy hair, messing it up from the flatness it had before. I raised my eyebrow at him. "What?" He grunted looking down at the menu not meeting my eyes. Ah, I see. I smiled to myself finally deciding on a chicken salad.

"She doesn't like me, okay?" He said curtly when I put my menu down and looked at him. I gave a smirk, knowing exactly what was going on. I could feel the knot in my stomach tighten at the fact Gunner slept with her. "So we're back to the silent treatment again?" He said coping my raised eyebrow expression. I shook my head, still not answering.

"Well, I knew you could talk. Why do you stay silent if you can talk?" I shrugged at him, but the look in his eyes told me he wanted a real answer, one with words.

"Until lately, I never had the desire to. I stopped talking a little after I became deaf." He gave a slow nod, taking in what I was saying.

"You weren't always deaf?" I shook my head.

"I was a normal kid till I was about 6. I went deaf a little before my 6th birthday." The waitress came back slowly, wanting to spend as little time with us as possible, giving herself a peptalk on dealing with the man in front of me. I pointed to the food I wanted. He rolled his eyes at me and looked to the girl that I could tell was getting on his nerves. It amuses me. He really didn't like her.

"What do you want?" She said shortly putting out drinks down. He clenched his jaw tightly, the nerves twitching at the pressure.

"A double Washington, and a salad with chicken, ranch dressing." He said shortly taking my menu and giving the two of them back to her. "Make it speedy, we're hungry." He grunted looking away from her, not giving her time to answer. It was her turn to clench her jaw to stop the flow of profanity from coming out. She walked away, putting more pressure on her feet to make her footsteps louder. It reminds me of a child not getting their way.

"That wasn't very nice." I said shaking my head at him. He gave me a glare.

"She wasn't being nice so why should I be?" He gave a grunt of disapproval picking up his drink and chugging half of it.

"Why doesn't she like you?" I asked him playing with the straw in my drink. He stared at me for a good minute before shrugging.

"We had a fling, she wanted more, I didn't." I looked over to the girl standing by her coworker talking quickly, looking our way. I looked back at Gunner. "Don't worry about her. She's all bark and no bite." I distracted myself with a sip of soda.