For Want of a Child

Almost any man would have given her the courtesy of a smile, but few would have commented on her beauty or her body. Angela McBride was just an average looking woman in an average skirt and blouse sitting in the chair across from Harry, and was displaying all the signs of nervousness that he'd seen many times before. In some ways, he was pleased that she wasn't exceptionally pretty, and was even more pleased that she was rather on the thin side. He had experienced a trying six months with a beautiful, buxom assistant who spent more time flirting with every man in the office than she did at her assigned tasks. Orbitron was very cautious in the termination of it's employees, and it had taken five months of counseling and progressive disciplinary actions before he could finally tell her to pack her lipstick and hand lotion and leave. He had warned the personnel manager about hiring any other women on the basis of their looks, but Rich was a lecherous old man, and Harry assumed he wouldn't listen. When Rich had escorted Angela into his office, Harry had been genuinely surprised.

"Well, Angela, tell me a little about yourself."

"You mean my past jobs, or personal stuff, or what?"

"No personal things, unless you feel they have a bearing on your qualifications. I just want to know what things you've done, and what you liked about those jobs."

She lowered her eyes. Harry sighed and was immediately sorry, because she looked up at him, and he saw the little twitch at the corners of her mouth. Damn, if Rich couldn't send him a whore, he'd send him a stupid broad with no experience.

"I-I haven't worked outside the home for about five years. Before that, I worked for a small retailer doing inventory control."

She'd stuttered a little. Damn! He was making her more nervous than she was at the start of the interview. When interviewing someone, Harry remembered, you're supposed to put them at ease, so you can find out what kind of worker they are likely to be. I'll go with this, he thought; most people like to talk about their work. Maybe she'll relax a little. His smile received a small grin in return.

"Well, tell me more about that, it sounds interesting. In the engineering world, we don't have to worry much about inventory except to make sure that we have enough plotter pens. Why don't you tell me a little about your responsibilities and what you did?"

"Well...I put things on the shelf..., and I counted them every day, and...." Her eyes searched his for some indication of understanding, and found what she had feared. She sniffed and stood as a tear streamed down her cheek. "I'm sorry for wasting your time, Mr. Rand. I was just a store clerk. The woman at the employment agency told me to say I worked in inventory control. She said it sounded more professional than clerk. I feel really bad about this, and I think I'll just leave."

Harry suddenly felt something for her, although had he been asked, he wouldn't have been able to explain the feeling. It just occurred to him that he wanted her to succeed in landing this job. Maybe it was that slut Sandy. Her qualifications had been excellent, and her interview was textbook, but she had cost him more in lost time than the view had been worth. At least Angela didn't want to misrepresent her ability.

"Now, now, Angela. Don't rush off so soon. You don't even know what type of person I'm looking for, do you? No? I thought not."

Angela produced a tissue from her purse and dabbed at her eyes. "I'm so sorry. I don't usually cry so easily, but I really need a job, and this is the fifth interview I've had. All the rest turned me down and hired younger girls. I didn't think thirty-one was that old, but I can't compete with their looks, and I don't have much experience."

"Legally, I shouldn't tell you this, but I've just fired one of those girls you say you can't compete with, and I'm not looking to hire another. As for experience, you haven't told me much about your last job. Please..., sit down, and forget everything what's-her-name told you. Just talk to me. Tell me why your job was important."

"Well, I always thought it was pretty important, even though it didn't pay much. I had to keep track of all the hosiery in the store and make sure all the sizes were on display, and that everything was kept neat. The manager told me once that their sales went up right after they hired me, and I felt pretty good about that." Angela looked at Harry and grinned. "I even caught a shop lifter, and they gave me a fifty dollar bonus."

"You caught a shoplifter?"

"She was taking the pantyhose out of those little eggs and stuffing them in her bra." Angela giggled. "By the time I saw her, she was starting to look pretty lopsided, if you know what I mean. She was right-handed, so she stuffed them all in the left side. I called security, and the next month, I had to testify in her trial."

From that point, Harry enjoyed the interview. Angela had little relevant education or experience, but seemed to him to be intelligent and willing to take on any task. He shook her hand and walked her out of the building, and then called Rich and told him to hire her.

The first couple weeks were a little rough, but Angela learned quickly. He started looking forward to seeing her every morning and hearing her cheery, "Good morning, Mr. Rand." After a month, he informed her that he wasn't Mr. Rand; he was Harry, and would prefer to be addressed in that manner. After that, the formal greeting gave way to "Hi, Harry", followed by her flashing smile and sparkling eyes. He began to feel as if she made it her business to anticipate his every need, because he seldom asked for anything without receiving the reply, "I noticed we were out, so I ordered some yesterday, and it'll be here this afternoon. You signed the requisition, remember?" As usual, he'd been too busy to notice everything he signed, and had stopped worrying about her purchases anyway. That she was finding her role in the position was proven the day he asked her to find out what flights were available for his trip to Detroit.

"Your schedule says your meeting is at nine in the morning, and there aren't any flights that will get you there the same day, so I booked a flight for three this afternoon. You have a rental car waiting and you're staying at the Daybrook Inn on Ten Mile. You should arrive about five, so you'll have plenty of time to eat and rest up before your meeting." She beamed a smile when he gave her the look of astonishment, and then quickly turned and walked out of his office.

The months that followed went well for both Harry and Angela. She was proving to be the type of assistant he had always wanted, and Angela, although she was a bit of a loner, she was becoming friendly with Rich's secretary, Bess. After a couple of months, Angela volunteered to handle some of Bess' work on overtime, and according to Rich, she was doing excellent work in this task also. Harry often congratulated himself on his wisdom in hiring the little, small busted, brunette.

As in most places of employment, a constant stream of gossip flowed through the office from cubicle to cubicle. Usually, the tasty bits of rumor were nothing more than mis-connection of unrelated small facts and didn't warrant much attention, but Harry's ears pricked one day as he and Kevin were having lunch. Kevin actively followed the flow of supposition and shaky conclusions that made up the stuff of whispered conversations, and gained much of his information from female employees. Although Kevin was married, Harry often wondered if he was gay, because women would tell him things they kept guarded even from their closest female friends.

"I really feel sorry for Angela, don't you?"

"Why. She's a great employee, always on time, and can always stay late if I need her to. On top of that, she seems to know exactly what I need, at exactly the moment I need it. She dresses conservatively and she doesn't stick her boobs out at every guy who walks by like Sandy did. She's doing great."

"I'm not talking about here and now, I'm talking about before."

"OK, I'll bite. Explain yourself."

"Well, Rita, down on Five, knows Angela's cousin. Angela's been divorced twice in the last five years."

"So, that's not all that uncommon anymore."

"The first asshole left her with a baby girl, and drove off to Vegas with some nineteen year old."

"I didn't know she had a daughter."

"She doesn't, not anymore at least. The little girl caught one of those childhood diseases, measles, I think..., yeah that was it, but somehow, it turned into rheumatic fever. They didn't identify it in time, and the little girl died. The cousin told Rita that it took a long time for Angela to come to grips with the loss, and that she spent some time in therapy. That was a little less than two years ago."

"Shit, I had no idea. I can't imagine what that must have felt like. It kind of makes me glad I not married with a couple of kids. I think it would kill me to lose a child."

"Yeah, that's the worst part, but her second husband hurt her too. She married him and then found out he was impotent. Seems like the guy always did lots of kissing and hugging, but told her they should wait until they were married. He confessed on the honeymoon. She actually had the marriage annulled, I guess, instead of divorcing him. Her cousin's still not sure she's over all that. You might watch, just in case."

Angela didn't show the pain she must have felt, and even though Harry watched closely for any signs of instability, her performance only continued to improve. After a month, he chalked the worry up to Kevin's imagination, and forgot about the conversation.

Orbitron landed a huge contract for design work on the rebuild of the Duluth shipping docks, and the contract became a once in a lifetime opportunity for Harry. The hours of calculations and specification writing stretched late into the night for weeks on end. Angela stayed late when he needed her, and she always had plenty of the coffee that kept him going. On the nights when he forgot the time, Angela would appear in his office at about seven with dinner from some carryout place, and the two of them would take a break to eat. Her assistance proved invaluable, because she had developed the ability to decode his indecipherable script and turn it into the dry, boring statements of work, and descriptions of materials and construction methods of which design specifications are constructed. At first, he tried to proofread each typewritten page, but soon learned this was a waste of his time. She never made mistakes, always corrected his spelling, and upon more than one occasion, she had found inconsistencies between two documents.

On a Friday, a week before the proposal was due, Angela brought the last page to his office. He only glanced at it before adding it to the binder. On Monday, Angela would send the binder to be duplicated, and on Wednesday, he would fly to Duluth for the presentation. Angela, in her usual efficient manner, had already booked the flight, car and room.

"Angela, were finally finished. I couldn't have done it without you."

She blushed. "Thanks, but I really didn't do all that much. It was all your ideas and figures. I just did the typing and collating."

"Nonsense. We're a team, and unless I miss my guess, this team just hit a home run. If this goes as I expect, we're going to celebrate when I get back."

"OK, if you insist, but right now, I'm starving. How 'bout I treat you to a real dinner instead of more Chinese or Mexican? It'll be on me, this time, instead of on the company. Think of it as my way of saying thanks for giving me a chance. Uh, one thing though. I ride the bus to work, so would you mind driving?" She directed him to a quiet little Italian restaurant called Rene's.

Rene's not only had wonderful cuisine, it had a decent wine list and a small dance floor. It was almost nine when they finished dinner and were sipping espresso. A jazz trio had set up next to the dance floor, and were playing just under the hum of conversation in the restaurant. Out of the blue, Angela asked Harry if he wanted to dance.

"Well, it's not really appropriate is it? I mean, you're my employee, and -"

"Oh, don't worry, I won't sue you or anything later. I just feel like dancing. Come on. It'll be fun."

He held her at the distance he judged acceptable for a friendly dance, and they clumsily moved through the first song.

"You know what? I could dance better if I was closer to you. I can't feel the way you want me to go." She grinned up at his face. "Honestly, Harry, I think you're afraid of me. I won't bite, I promise."

She snuggled to him and laid her cheek on his chest.

"Now that feels much better, doesn't it?"

Harry wasn't sure if this much body contact would be considered acceptable should they be seen by someone else in the organization. Most companies frowned on that sort of thing out of a fear of litigation, and Orbitron was no exception. Every employee in a supervisory position had mandatory training each year on avoiding exactly what he and Angela were doing. Still, she did feel nice pressing against him, and the wine had warmed him just enough to keep his paranoia somewhat at bay. He slipped his arm under her left shoulder, pulled her right hand to his chest, and they danced the second song. When the hands of the clock had crept past ten, both Harry and Angela had given up all pretense of being boss and employee, and were just two people enjoying each other's company. Their conversation between dances was of their likes and dislikes, of their youth, and of their future plans. Harry noticed that Angela artfully steered the conversation away from herself if it threatened to encompass the last five years, but he didn't mind. It was just great being able to talk to a woman without having to worry about work, laws, and how much he was impressing her.

Harry had never had much luck with women in a romantic sense. The intricacies of the courtship ritual were too illogical and complicated for his technical mind. There seemed to be no definite timetable or sequence of events that should take place, and without this structure he felt somewhat lost. Buying gifts for women was extremely difficult, because, although he understood the aspects of civil engineering better than most of his peers, he was completely baffled by what women wanted and needed. Harry also found it difficult to make casual conversation with most women, because he usually couldn't decide to believe the words or the body language he got in response to his statements. Angela seemed so different, so unassuming, and so undemanding, and as they talked, he realized just how relaxed he had become, and how much he enjoyed being with her.

At a little past eleven, Angela looked at her watch, touched her chest with an open palm, and exclaimed, "God, look at the time. It's a good thing we don't have to work tomorrow. We'd both be dead on our feet." She smiled at Harry.

"Thank you for a wonderful evening, Harry. You're quite a guy, once a girl gets to know you. Uh- oh, you're not gonna to fire me for that remark, are you? I remember what you said about Sandy." She laughed.

"No, I'll take that as a compliment. You're pretty special yourself."

"Well, Miss Special has to get herself home and into bed, or she won't wake up 'til noon. Could I impose on you to drive me home. I can take the bus, but it gets kinda scary at this time of night."

The apartment was half of a duplex at the end of a cul-de-sac in an older subdivision. He stopped the car in the drive and walked her to the step.

"Well, Angela, I've delivered you safe and sound to your door, and didn't have to defend your honor even once. Thanks again, for all your help...and for tonight."

Her voice was almost a plea. "Would you like to come in for some more coffee? I need to unwind a little before I'll be able to sleep, and I enjoy talking with you." Harry couldn't say no.

She unlocked the door, stepped inside and slipped off her heels, said "There's a bath down the hall", and trotted upstairs. Harry sighed in relief as he drained his bladder. The urge had caught him midway between the restaurant and her apartment, and he hadn't known how to gracefully bring up the subject. He rinsed his hands in the pristine sink, dried them on the peach towel, and remembered to lower the seat.

He walked back down the hall to the living room, and stopped short at the sight. The room was covered with framed pictures. There were photos hanging on the walls, sitting on the coffee and end tables that framed the overstuffed couch and chairs, and a few large ones sat on the mantle of the cobblestone fireplace. Some were of Angela, but most were of a baby girl, or of Angela with the baby girl. He noticed a few had been carefully trimmed from the standard photo print dimensions, and surmised the missing portion had contained the image of her ex-husband. She called from the kitchen and startled him.

"Harry, would you like regular, or chocolate-hazelnut?"

"Oh, regular is fine. I never got into flavored coffees all that much."

The baby girl was a sweet little tow-headed cutie with an open, toothless smile. Angela shone in her eyes and nose. Probably in a few years, she would have had her mother's dark brown tresses. In the sleeping pictures, she looked like one of the little angels that decorate Christmas cards. The photographs seemed to be a chronological record of this little girl from the red, wrinkled, squinting little face in the standard hospital issue cap and mittens to the toddler taking her first tentative steps into Angela's outstretched arms.

"Becky would have been three in a month. You probably think I'm crazy, too, don't you? I've overheard the women at work in the restroom. My cousin talks too much for my own good."

Angela stood beside him with a tray of cups, cream and sugar, and the coffee carafe.

"Well...no, I don't think you're crazy. I couldn't judge that because I've never lost...well, nothing like that has ever happened to me. I don't know what I'd do."

"The shrink said I needed to try to remember the good times, and to put her death behind me. That's easy for him to say. He didn't carry her for nine months, and feel every move she made. He didn't feel the pain of giving birth leave for the thrill of holding a tiny new person that was made in my body. He didn't feel her little mouth when she first nursed, and he didn't feel her little fingers squeezing my breast. I know he meant well, but he didn't help much. I think I had to figure this out by myself, and these pictures are my way. When I sit here at night, it's almost like she's still here with me. I know she's a little baby angel now, and I'm happy for her, but I still find comfort in her pictures. Please don't think I'm off my rocker. It's just my way of coping. I hope you understand."

He started to say something comforting, but fumbled trying to find the words. Angela seemed to sense this.

"You don't have to say anything, Harry. Anyway, the coffee's ready." She sat the tray on the coffee table and filled the two cups.

He hadn't really looked at Angela until now. His mind had been occupied at first with the pictures, and then with her explanation. The Angela standing in front of him was a different woman than the Angela of the office. The white silk loose jacket over the white silk pajama pants was stunning against the brown of her long hair and tanned face. The jacket had no fastening other than the sash that kept the front wrapped around her torso, and the overlap kept gaping open enticingly when she moved. The deep, v-shaped opening revealed only more white silk, but was still deeply erotic. She had evidently removed her bra, because her small breasts moved sensuously under the shimmering material. Her toes peeked out of small white slippers.