Jason watched Rico walk out of the restaurant's doors before turning his eyes to the business card that Rico had given him and feeling the sudden urge to rip it apart.
He didn't like the feeling that Rico gave off and for some reason, he felt a bit annoyed and quite uncomfortable with him, but for now, he didn't have much of a choice as he was in a bit of a hurry.
The fact that the club had told him to hurry up on his side, and also the fact that he knew that it was best for him to get all contract issues over with before COVID hit the club's pockets hard had him not wanting to waste even an extra second on signing the contract.
Only when he had put his pen to paper and was added to the team roster could he feel at ease.
'I don't plan on hiring him again anyway,' he thought to himself as he put the card into a jacket pocket before picking up the menu once again to order some food.
He felt a little hungry and the scent of delicious food was doing a good job of making him salivate.
Looking at the menu, he couldn't help but shake his head bitterly as most of the food on the menu was too greasy to be on the plate of a strict sportsman like him.
Just as he was settling on a few less greasy foods, he heard a young female voice beside him that prompted him to look up immediately to respond.
"Have you decided on what to order?" a young waitress who looked to be in her late teens appeared in Jason's view as she asked in Portuguese.
"Oh! Uhm… ahem, uh, y-yeah, I'll have the Tripas a moda do Porto, calamari with arroz de feijao, and a glass of lemonade," Jason replied in Portuguese, trying to hide his sudden involuntary stuttering and maintain his impassive face.
"Oh wow. I figured that you weren't from around here but you knew Portuguese?" the young waitress was surprised at Jason speaking Portuguese and responded in Portuguese.
"You figured right. I am not from around here," Jason had a slight smile appear on his face as he replied.
"Are you Brazilian?" she questioned with curiosity as she had noticed that Jason's Portuguese sounded quite different from hers even though they could understand and speak to each other.
"Nigerian and American," Jason said in reply.
"I don't think they speak Portuguese in any of those places?" the young waitress questioned, a bit confused.
"They don't, I learned it myself and it seems the time I spent learning it is finally paying off since I can have a conversation with a beauty like you," Jason replied, unintentionally flirting with her, and cringing internally after realizing the words that just left his mouth.
"Hey, I-I can speak English too, you know," the young waitress replied hurriedly, but by her sudden hurried tone and slight stutter, anyone could see that she was slightly rizzed up by Jason calling her a beauty.
"So, you said you'd have the Tripas a moda do Porto and calamari with arroz de feijao, right?" she asked in a hurry, while writing down Jason's order on a notepad, looking like she wanted to run off.
"And lemonade," Jason corrected,
"Ok, and a glass of lemonade… I'll go handle that," she added and began to walk off.
"What the hell was that!" Jason murmured to himself as he put his hand to his chest and felt his heart beating way faster than usual despite him not exerting himself physically.
Not to mention that he was feeling self-conscious all of a sudden and saying things that would normally never be caught dead saying to anybody.
This all started as soon as he had set his eyes on the young, beautiful waitress.
It was like he was trying to impress her… which was something he had never done in both his past life and this one… so far.
As previously mentioned, due to his mental trauma, he had a problem recognizing emotions, but no matter how emotionally unstable a person was, unless he was stupid, there was no way he wouldn't notice some particular emotions.
Jason had always known of his almost total lack of emotions and while it had not been impossible for him to develop any emotions, his total lack of empathy made him feel like it was a waste of time and energy, so he rarely bothered with things like emotions unless necessary, which happened to be too few times to count.
In his previous life, the only emotion he had felt involuntarily was the emotions he felt on the pitch and it was also the only emotion he had voluntarily chased after as he desired more of it, but now he was feeling something similar, albeit not of the same level, from a girl he had barely met.
Strangely, it didn't feel bad, but he wasn't sure if he wanted to bother with trying to develop this emotion because despite how much it felt good right now, he also knew that emotions had a good effect on clouding one's judgment.
He also knew that there were two sides to anything and everything.
If he tried to reach out and go after what he was feeling at that moment.
If he opened up to this new feeling and things ended up going the wrong way like it had previously happened with the death of his family, he wasn't sure he could handle it.
It was then that he realized that he was actually scared.
He had always been scared of losing someone again despite the low chances of it ever happening, but after he had been given another chance, he had always tried to do things differently, yet he wasn't sure if he wanted to try something as intense and dangerous as what he was feeling.
Jason was still thinking when someone brought his food over.
He almost did not remember to acknowledge that he had received his food as he was currently in an emotional dilemma that he had never thought he would experience in his life.
But with food now on the table, he shelved his emotional dilemma and focused on the more important things at hand, he'd get back to his emotional dilemma after he was done with his food.
And that was exactly what he did, he pushed all his thoughts to the side and focused on the taste of offals, shrimps and lulas, and rice and beans.
After he was done eating and sipping on his lemonade, the young waitress who was the cause of his emotional turbulence appeared before him with his bill,
"Here's your bill," she said daintily as she placed the bill on his table.
"Will you be needing anything else?" she asked as she waited while Jason was pulling out his wallet.
"... Actually, yes, I'll be needing three things," Jason said after a while as he pulled out his wallet and snapped it open.
"I'd be needing your name, your contact details, and the time you're getting off," he said, a decisive smile appearing on his face as he placed some money on the table while internally thinking,
'I might have gotten another chance, but we only live once, right?'
'...Best not to have any regrets,' he had made his decision and it was a hasty one, which was not like him at all, but well, he was trying to do things a little differently now.
"Sofia…"
"... My shift ends in an hour," Sofia said with a flirtatious smile as she put a piece of paper on the table and picked up the money before walking away, with a little sway in her hips.
Jason picked up the paper to see the words "I thought you'd never ask" as well as a string of numbers on it.