First Dates and Ferret Frolics
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Samantha and Mark have been friends with my parents for years. As long as I’ve known them, they’ve been the kind of couple who are always comfortable with one another. They’ve weathered twenty years of life together: morning breath and bad moods, job troubles and raising teenage girls. They know each other as well as they know themselves.
But Samantha, who is an animated storyteller, likes to remind us that things weren’t always that way. The chance to tell the story of her first date with Mark always brings a twinkle to her eye.
Samantha and Mark had gone to high school together. But Mark was the class clown, and Sam was a serious and quiet student. Their paths didn’t cross much, and Sam lost track of Mark after graduation. She married young and moved away from her hometown, and in spite of her best efforts her wedded bliss was short-lived. By the time Samantha was in her early twenties, she was already divorced.
After her marriage ended, Samantha moved home. She took a job in a local shop and kept pretty much to herself. Gun-shy when it came to the dating scene, she avoided bars and gatherings. But one afternoon, a tall handsome blonde came to the counter at the shop. He cracked jokes as she rang up his purchases, and she recognized him as Mark, the prankster from her high school days. They chatted a bit, and before he left Mark invited her to small gathering the next evening. Surprising herself, Sam accepted his offer.
Sam spent the next day in a nervous frenzy. The party was being given by a woman named Brenda, who was another high school acquaintance. Brenda lived alone in a townhouse with her dog, cat and ferret. Samantha had never seen a ferret, but Mark described it as a furry little creature that resembled a weasel. Sam was curious, but the ferret was the farthest thing from her mind as she figured out what to wear and wondered what she’d say to her old classmates.
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