Let me tell the story this way, with what I know of that night and the names changed to amuse myself. This is the brief and uneventful tale of Joe and May. Consider it a two-minute mystery.
May is a waitress at a billiards club. Joe is a guy from out of town. He and a group of friends enter the club to shoot some pool.
Joe goes up to May to reserve a table. She asks for his name and says she will call him when the next one is available.
A few minutes later, she sets them up at a table by the DJ near the front door. The group plays for a couple of hours and when they finish, Joe and two others go to the register to pay.
As May hands back his driver's license, she smiles and says, "Thank you, Joe." The other two guys give him a look. Joe shrugs and mouths, "What?"
Back around the table, the group hangs out a few minutes longer. May passes by one last time and when Joe spots her, she smiles. The others rib him on and tell him that she is sending him signals. He replies that she is only being friendly and nothing more.
They try coaxing him into talking with her, but Joe doesn't believe them and dismisses the notion. With the hour growing late, the group finally leaves the club.
Who read the signals correctly, Joe or his friends? Was Joe being realistic or a clueless shmoe? More importantly, can anyone really tell anything from a two-hundred word story?
Given the details provided, Joe read the situation correctly, if that was all that May did and said. More importantly, if Joe was interested in May, he should have lingered and tried chatting with her more.
I'm with Joe on this one too. Seems to me May was being a good waitress, friendly to her customers. I've noticed that a lot of men don't seem to understand "friendly" and take every positive interaction as flirting.
You should have talked with her David (I mean Joe :-). Smiles and calling you by your first name and the walk-by...maybe it was her being friendly, but if you had acted a bit friendly in return you could have found out.
Just my take on it.