Community Involvement Ch. 10 - Sex Stories

Community Involvement Ch. 10

... after the first five to ten minutes, you get the understanding that due to age and the wealth of experience (and the dollars that goes with it) that I ‘will be a hard person to place’… blah, blah, blah. “Do you want coffee or anything?” Abby asked as she pulled out her file mark ‘Ray’ and placed it on the table in front of her. “I might go tea this time. I just had a coffee, thanks.” She ordered for us both and then opened her file and started asking the usual questions to get up to date with what I was doing, interviews I had been to and the like. I answered fully, not wanting to completely waste her expertise, while she nodded and made notes. As this part of the meeting unfolded the cafe quickly began to fill with groups of mothers with prams, out for a morning coffee with the girls after dropping older siblings at school or pre-school, or older couples grabbing an early morning tea before heading to the banks or grocery shopping. The steady rise and fall of numerous conversations together with the chink of cutlery and cups on saucers all served to make a pleasant back drop to what felt like an arduous task for me. “Are you okay?” She asked, noticing my attention was starting to drift. “Yep.” I answered, a little more abruptly than I would have liked. “You seem preoccupied.” She probed. Our order had arrived which acted as a brief circuit breaker. “I’m good…and thank you for the tea, by the way.” I milked and sugared my tea and drank deeply. “You don’t seem it?” She ...

... insisted. “You don’t seem to be in a co-operative frame of mind?” I bristled at that despite not wanting to. The whole cycle of professional rejection and words blowing in the wind had taken more of a toll on me than I cared to admit. “What? I have answered all your questions, given you all the information you require to ‘get up to date’…what more am I supposed to do or tell you? Are you expecting me to give you wild embellishments just so that these chats become more interesting?” “No, of course not.” she replied evenly. “You’re being rather immature about this though. I asked you here, after reluctantly agreeing to take a break from our original weekly meetings, to help you move on but you seem reluctant to embrace this opportunity in a professional manner…” “Excuse me!” I accidentally raised my voice, but it was enough for the elderly couple two tables away to turn and look in our direction. I could feel my blood beginning to boil and took deliberate deep breaths in an attempt to quell the fire. “I did not come here to be insulted. I always act in a professional manner in these situations. How dare you cast judgement. You do not even know me.” “I am sorry if I offended you.” Her voice was slightly hushed. I took it as her attempt to ease the tension and quieten the tone. “Ray, I have to give you my advice as I see it, that is my job. If it means I have to tell you things which you do not want to hear, I can not apologise for that.” “Abby,” I looked hard into her face, “I came ...