Lady in the Rain

I was sitting at my desk fighting to stay awake when the loud thud of another falling stack of manila folders snapped me to full consciousness. It took me a second to remember precisely where I was, and when the realization hit I sighed bitterly in the back of my throat.

"Everything o.k. Mr. Moran?"

The pimply face of our summer intern, James, filled my vision momentarily before I glanced away and down at what he had brought me.

"Fine, James, just fine..." I replied in a voice devoid of enthusiasm.

"Perk up! It's almost Friday."

I couldn't form a reply before he was gone, pushing his steel cart stacked high with more matching folders down the long row of cubicles that stretched away from mine.

This hadn't been what I had been expecting when I was recruited right of college three years before by the consulting firm of Hathaway and Norris. The young executive I had interviewed with had promised me rapid advancement, and challenging assignments abroad bringing the latest technological innovations to our customers. Though I had fully expected to have to earn my stripes, I had imagined the apprenticeship period wouldn't last too long, and I would be on my way to doing truly meaningful work. That was before it became clear that what the company was really interested in was burying folks like me in a rat warren of identical cubbyholes, awash in the daily tedium of inputting old paper files into a fancy new data tracking system they called Icarus One.

The promises made to us new hires had faded into obscurity as the months rolled past. I kept the faith at first, figuring this was just a weaning out period, and that once they saw who was committed to being here, they would lift me out of this world of dull data entry, and start asking me to use the skills I had spent four years of university study accruing. That had yet to happen, and so far I had no reason to believe it ever would. The more I watched and learned the more it seemed the only people getting moved up were the ones that had the good fortune to attend a prestigious college, Ivy league for instance, while those of us that had to muddle through in a state school were ignored.

My phone rang, and I jolted back in my seat in surprise. I could count on one hand the number of phone calls I had received so far that week, and two of them had been wrong numbers.

"Hello? This is Peter Moran," I said trying to put some life into my voice.

"Moran! I need to see you. Come to my office."

The authoritative voice on the other end of the line belonged to my current supervisor, Mr. Jackson Clarke. In the past three years, I had reported to four different leads; all of them just treading water until they were tabbed for bigger and better things. Mr. Clarke was no different from the ones that had come before; his level of interest in those of us under him primarily focused on making sure we stayed busy and didn't make any waves. Still, he had never asked to see me before, so a small, hopeful flame ignited in my heart that maybe this time I was going to be given something of substance to do.

Mr. Clarke's office was in the far corner of the floor. I knocked once, and he called for me to enter in his usual grumpy tone.

"You wanted to see me, Mr. Clarke?"

"Sit down, Moran."

I dropped into the guest chair on the opposite side of the disorganized trash heap that Mr. Clarke called a desk. I swear, it was piled so high with paper stacks I could barely find an aisle between them to look my boss in the face.

"I have a special assignment for you, Moran," he began.

My heart sped up in my chest. Perhaps this was it! The culmination of years of patience finally paying off.

"Whatever I can do to help, Boss."

He scowled at me for interrupting, his florid face going even redder than usual as his bushy, dark eyebrows knit together in a frown.

"Listen, Moran. This is very simple. You know tonight is Bob Ryan's retirement party at the Four Seasons right?"

Bob Ryan had been our division head when I arrived, a twenty-five-year company man, he had supposedly been one of the first people hired when the company had been founded.

"Yes, Sir. I bought a new suit just for the event," I said, throwing in that last bit to make it appear that I was excited about going. In reality, I had never spoken to Bob Ryan other than he grunted at me in the hallway once when I wished him a Merry Christmas my first year. I could have cared less about his retirement.

Again, Mr. Clarke just stared at me like I was speaking a foreign language and pressed on.

I should have known by now that he was from the "Employee's are to be seen and not heard from school."

"Anyway. We had a special commemorative plaque done up for him that arrived today, but the frame was cracked in shipment, and there is no time to order a replacement. I need you to run to Warners and pick up a new frame. You can draw money from petty cash to pay for it, Bob Johnson down in accounting knows you're coming."

I tried not to let my face fall.

This was not the break I was hoping for, instead of climbing on a plane to take on a challenging assignment at a high-end client I was being turned into a glorified errand boy.

"You can run over there on your lunch hour," he added as an afterthought.

"Mr. Clarke? Warners is quite a ways from here it would take me more than an hour to drive there and another to get back," I pointed out.

He had started to look back down at his desk in a dismissive gesture, but my small objection drew his attention back to me for a brief moment.

Sighing and rubbing his jaw he finally answered, "Fine, you can have the rest of the afternoon off, but that plaque better be at the banquet tonight shining like a new penny."

I left his office with the heavy wood box containing the plaque with the broken frame under my arm and trudged back to my cubicle. Kirby Wannamaker, another of the low-level employees in my section, was sitting in my guest chair when I arrived reading mail on his phone.

"Hey, Kirby."

"Just the man I wanted to see! What's that? Mr. Clarke give you a present?"

"Not hardly. It's the retirement plaque for Bob Ryan's shindig tonight. The frames busted, and they want me to go to Warners and get a new one."

"Warners? Fancy place...It's like an antique gift shop for the upper crust. I'm amazed they will let your happy ass in the front door."

"What did you need, Kirby?"

"I was hoping I could get a lift to the banquet tonight? My cars in the shop."

"I suppose," I said, "Just you or are you bringing a date?"

"I'm purely stag tonight. Will you be bringing Lucille with you?"

"No, she is out of town...again," I replied.

I had met Lucille Smith my senior year at the university. A red-headed firecracker with a bit of a temper we had started dating after being thrown together on a class project. She could be a handful, but I eventually learned how to steer clear of subjects that would set her off. I would call her a high maintenance girlfriend, but her abilities between the sheets had kept me coming back for more despite the inherent problems. We had remained together after graduation more out of a sort of relationship inertia than any other reason. I think we were both so busy trying to chart out careers that it just seemed like too much trouble to break up or date someone else.

In spite of how things had started, I did eventually begin growing more attached to her. There was something to be said for having a girlfriend who was driven to succeed. I decided I could learn from her example, and strive to be more ambitious. That was one of the reasons I had jumped at the chance to join Hathaway and Norris, a prestigious firm that seemed to offer a road to advancement. Sadly, I had ended up spinning my wheels while my girlfriend's career had taken off. She was making sales for some international pharmaceutical company and routinely traveled overseas. We had seen a lot less of each other recently, and I found myself missing her.

Well, what I was probably missing was sex, but her too.

"O.K. Well I'll see you tonight."

"Sure, Kirby."

Thinking of Lucille, I pulled out my phone. I had texted her that morning but hadn't received a reply. She was somewhere in Europe, Germany I thought. I wasn't sure what the time difference was or whether I should be worried that I hadn't heard from her today. When she was busy, she often forgot anything else in the world existed except her job.

I sent her another text, adding a few hearts on the end of the message in a hokey attempt at showing my devotion.

It was getting close to lunchtime anyway so I shut down my computer and left by the back stairs to avoid the lunch rush at the elevator bank. My car was parked in a spot at the far side of the lot away from all the spaces reserved for the executives. I guess they didn't want the attractiveness of their high priced luxury automobiles being dragged down by my used Volvo. The old girl wasn't pretty, but she still had heart and fired up on the first try.

You might be wondering at this point why I was still working for Hathaway and Norris if the job was so miserable. I sometimes wondered that myself, but the sad truth is I'm up to my nose in student loan debt that I can't defer any longer, and it's hard to get any good paying job without experience. I figured at the very least I was getting that to put on my resume, and reasoned that if things didn't turn for me soon, I could, hopefully, parlay that experience into a job elsewhere. Truthfully, I wasn't too hopeful on that score the job market had been in a downturn for some time now.

My destination for lunch was Wayman's Diner on 5th Street, a favorite of my Dad's for many years and the place he had invited me to dine with him today. Leaving the box with the plaque in my trunk I went into the diner spotting my Dad immediately.

There are plenty of people that say we look alike, but I don't see it. My Dad was a tall guy, close to six-foot-four-inches with steel gray hair cut tight to his scalp. His thick, bushy mustache was still dark giving him a bit of a military air. It fit since he had spent four years in the Marines before he got out and met my mom. By contrast, I was an inch shy of six-foot and more wiry like the men on my mother's side of the family. I did have the kind of dark brunette hair that matched the color of my dads in his youth, but mine hung longer, down past my collar. In the face, I suppose we bore a passing resemblance sharing the same hazel green eye color, and narrow cheekbones. I had my mom's more full lips though whereas my Dad's were thin, firm, and nearly always downturned.

"Hey, Dad. I hope I didn't keep you waiting."

"No more than usual. I did say 12:15 for lunch."

A stickler for punctuality, that was my father, a trait I imagine he learned in the Marines.

"Sorry. My boss called me in to talk to me, and that delayed my getting out of the office."

He raised an eyebrow at that revelation.

"Good news?" he asked.

"I was hoping it would be, but they just needed me to do a small side project. It might be a step to bigger things though," I replied exaggerating my assignment.

"Susie called this morning. She got the promotion to Senior Analyst, so I guess her move to Dubai will be permanent."

"Oh...Well. I should call and congratulate her."

Susie was my older sister by four years and the real success story in the family. I had felt for a long time that I was slowly getting more and more lost in her shadow though my parents had never characterized it that way. Still, I could see by my Dad's expression that this was mixed news. He loved to see his firstborn rack up another success, but he and Susie were two peas in a pod, and I knew being apart from her would not be a happy situation for him.

The waitress arrived to take our order with Dad having his usual lunch of grilled chicken and rice, while I ordered a plate of chicken fingers.

"You still eat like a twelve-year-old," he observed disapprovingly when my food was delivered to the table.

"I like chicken fingers."

"Susie has her body fat down to 20%. You should ask her for her diet when you call."

"I'm not fat, Dad," I replied a little irritated that he was implying I wasn't in good shape. It was true I wasn't about to be recruited for the U.S. Olympic squad, but I still played tennis fairly regularly, and in spite of a diet that included the occasional plate of chicken fingers I was doing o.k.

"I didn't say you were fat, but eating like that will catch up to you sooner rather than later."

I decided to ignore that comment.

"When are you and Lucille going to get over to the house again? Your Mom and I haven't seen you two together for a while is everything o.k.?"

"It's all good, Dad. She's just been traveling a lot for business."

"She does have a good business head on her shoulders, reminds me of Susie in that regard. You might want to take some pointers from your girlfriend."

"I have a handle on my career. I'm just playing it cool waiting for the right moment to make my move."

"People make their own breaks, Kid. You wait for one to come to you and you'll be waiting for a long time."

"I wish you had half the confidence in me you do in Susie," I mumbled around a bite of chicken.

"What was that?"

"Nothing, Dad."

"If I were you I would put a ring on that Lucille before a more discerning fellow comes along and snakes her right out from under you."

"Is this coming from you or Mom?"

They both thought I should marry Lucille. Mom because she was dying for grandchildren and figured Susie was too career-orientated to go in that direction anytime soon, and Dad...Well, I honestly thought Dad was pushing for it hoping that more proximity to Lucille would ignite my ambitions, sort of success by osmosis.

"We want you to be happy, Son. Susie and I were talking the other day about how good Lucille is for you."

I wasn't surprised, Susie and Lucille were cut from the same cloth.

"We'll see. Maybe I will talk to her about it when she gets back from her European trip."

"How are things around your apartment? You going to be able to make rent this month?"

I couldn't help but wince at that one, even if the truth was that given my current financial situation my expenses since my loans had kicked in had shot up considerably. Sadly, I had been forced to borrow money from my parents a couple of times in the last year.

"I'm doing fine, Dad. Don't worry about me."

"It's a parents prerogative to worry over their kids."

"You ever worry about Susie not making her rent?"

"That was different. She always had a head for finance. Why I remember when she was ten..."

I tuned out while my Dad regaled me once again with a story I had heard a dozen times before about how my sister once ran the most successful lemonade stand in the history of our home town.

I glanced at my watch.

"Sorry, Dad, I need to run. I have this project to finish, and I have to get ready to go to a company dinner tonight. Give Mom my love, O.K.?"

"Sure...and let us know about dinner?"

"Right."

The traffic was light as I got back on the road picking up the expressway that would take me out to the suburbs where Warners was located. I sighed with relief at getting away from my Dad before he launched into any more stories about my uber-successful sister. As much as I loved Susie, there was only so much a guy could take before it started to hurt the old ego. The exit I was looking for came up right about the time my phone began to buzz, and I picked it up while slowing down to cut over.

"Hello?"

"Peter? It's Lucille."

"Oh! Hey, Babe! I've been texting you all day. How is it going over there?"

"Everything is fine. It's been a long trip, but I think I've made more than my quota."

"That's good news. I miss you. Are you heading back this way soon?"

"Look, Peter, that's why I called. The head of my companies division over here thinks I could be a real asset to the operation. He offered me a permanent position on his staff."

"Wait! What? Hang on a second, Lucille."

I got off the expressway and maneuvered into a gas station pulling up to a median near the pumps.

"Say that again. They offered you a job?"

"Yeah...Chris...Um...I mean Mr. Bartolo thinks I have the potential to be an account executive with the right mentoring situation."

"So...What? You're thinking about taking it?"

"I already told him I would."

My jaw suddenly felt like it weighed fifty pounds as it fell open, and I seemed incapable of moving it to speak.

"Peter? Are you still there?"

"You didn't even bother to call me first? What about us? Doesn't my opinion matter here?"

"Peter, I care a lot about you, but I think we both know this relationship has just been treading water for a long time now. This is a decision that I have to make for me."

"I'm not trying to hold back your career, Lucille, but...I thought we meant something to each other...That what we had was important."

"It is, Peter, but...(stop it!) I think this will be better for both of us in the long run (cut it out!)"

It started to dawn on me that she wasn't alone, that there was someone with her listening to the conversation, and that someone was making her giggle under her breath as she tried to talk to me. I may not be the sharpest crayon in the box when it comes to relationships, but even I could see what was going on here.

"Is that your new boss?"

"What are you talking about, Peter? I'm at my hotel by myself."

A man's voice in the background laughed, and I thought I faintly heard something about the champagne getting warm.

"Peter I have to go I'm meeting a client for dinner. I'm sorry. We can talk later if you want."

"Yeah...Sure...Lucille I."

She had already broken the connection before I could say anything else. I sat in that parking lot for quite a while just starring out the front window of my car. This day was turning into a nice shit heap. First this crappy errand job, then a nice lunch with my Dad where I'm once again reminded that I don't measure up to my sister, and now my girlfriend breaks up with me long distance. Given what I had heard in the background, I was pretty sure that her new job included riding her bosses dick.

"This day just keeps getting better and better..." I cursed to the empty car.

The sky was starting to cloud up by the time I made the parking lot at Warners. I grabbed my umbrella as I got out of the car, and headed into the store with the box containing the plaque under my arm. Warners, as Kirby had alluded to earlier, was a high-end antique and gift shop that catered mostly to the more affluent folks who lived in our fair city. This was only the third time I had ever set foot in the place, the first two being when I was just a kid and consisting mostly of my mom yelling at me not to touch anything, and to "Be aware of my body!" whatever that was supposed to mean.

The store was quiet on a lazy Thursday afternoon, and I made my way slowly toward the gift area in the back. I figured I would have to find a clerk to help me select a new frame since I knew nothing about what constituted a good one from a bad one. I assumed it had to do with the quality of wood, but I was no aficionado when it came to that subject.

"They would have been better off sending a Woodpecker," I thought. It was a silly joke, but I laughed at it anyway. My Dad used to say that people that laugh at their own jokes are never funny. I wondered if Susie ever did that.

I walked through the antique section admiring furniture that cost more than everything I owned and stopped short when I realized that what I thought was a fake bird in an old cage was, in fact, a live parrot.

The bird was busy preening its feathers as I crept closer stopping a few feet in front of it. A small sign read "Oscar" and was attached to the front of the cage.