Waiting

Next morning she waits until the cleaning women have been through then opens the laptop.

She creates a new document in Word and begins typing.

Why am I writing this? I am going crazy with idleness. My thoughts run wild with uncertainty, impatience and fear. They are out of control. Much the worse now that I am wide awake and clear-headed. It would have been so much the better if I'd been unable sleep last night as I expected. Instead I slept almost from when the sun set to when it poured through those curtainless windows into my eyes. I am paying the price now.

Perhaps by setting my thoughts down in text, text's lines and paragraphs forcing them into some order, perhaps I will get some clarity, some insight.

What do I think happened to Zenia? I don't know.

Just thinking about her is painful. She made love to him, it makes me feel so empty. And she was to meet him here too! I cannot now pretend that he is held up by sickness, by some natural disaster, by some upheaval. It must be by plan. To what purpose?

I can't, I won't think about that now. I will explain about David and myself.

Possibly when he comes I will show him this. Possibly it will make some difference. More likely I won't. I've never thought that he cared much for what I thought.

Here goes:

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He walked into the conference room where my interview was taking place. That was the first time I saw him. I was standing. Sun poured in through the long windows behind me. I wore a blue cotton sleeveless dress and I worried that the sun would shadow my form through the dress and I blushed. I have only an indistinct memory of him coming and shaking my hand. His was warm and firm, mine I thought must be sweaty. We sat across from each other. There was only the two of us at a table I suddenly thought must be large enough for fifty.

It was his hand I fell for. I watched his hand as it moved in the sun, jotting notes on a copy of my resume. My hand, the one he'd shaken, seemed on fire. I placed it on my knee under the table and it seemed to burn through the fabric of my dress. I felt my knee must be branded.

I tried to look up at his face, knowing that eye contact is crucial in an interview, but my eyes kept falling to that hand. It had no rings, I honestly could see nothing remarkable about it, I couldn't say if its fingers were short or long, I just felt such an urge to reach across and touch it. Just grabbing it for an instant would be worth my job prospects for that day!

I did manage to pull myself together and look up. His face was firm and long, his eyes gray and observing. Unlike the guy before, I never caught his eyes straying down over my chest or over my bare arms or down to what he could see of my narrowing waist. Whenever I looked up he was looking at my face. I couldn't tell if he liked what he saw. I thought he must be something over 50, 25 years my senior and I'd never wanted anything so much.

I kept shifting nervously, crossing and uncrossing my legs. I had a cup of water I kept sipping. Once I forgot what I was doing, I was looking at his hand resting on the table, and tipped the cup too soon. The sip landed on my dress over my right breast. I could see the dark wet spot out of the edge of my eyes for the rest of the interview.

Afterward I couldn't remember anything of what I said. When the interview was over and I was escorted out of their offices, I rushed into the ladies room by the elevator, ducked into a stall and cried as silently as I could. I was sure I'd looked a complete loser. I must've been OK though because I got the job.

More than anything I remember wanting to touch his hand as it wrote, as it rested on the table, as it moved in the sun when he spoke.

That night my boyfriend and I were in this restaurant. I looked across at him and I realized I was seeing him with my mother's eyes. Everything she'd said about him was so true. He was raw, greedy, pushy, thoughtless, and completely unattractive. I said out of the blue, "This isn't working for me. I'm so out of here." And that was that.

Of course my Mom would not've been particularly keen on what replaced him in my affections.

I only saw David occasionally. At the weekly staff meetings, sitting at the head of the long wood table, far from me, once or twice in the reception area when I was coming in or going out. Still, when he went on a business trip, out of the office for a week, I felt devastated and adrift.

During those rare encounters, I often felt his eyes on me, when I glanced at him, his face was always calm and expressionless. After each meeting I spent an amazing amount time speculating on whether he actually was aware of me and what he thought of me, finally I'd just have to shake my head, throwing my hair about, push it back struggling over my neck and get back to work.

One time I entered the staff meeting, preparing for boredom and daydreaming. He glanced over at me and frowned slightly. I sat feeling just crushed. I was wearing slacks with a heavy sweater since those conference rooms were always so icy. I felt my legs under the table and thought suddenly, "Maybe he likes seeing me in dresses." The thought made me so happy of a sudden. Then I began wondering if I was making too much of his slight frown, maybe he was thinking of something else entirely. That morning my sister had called me and gone on and on about her baby's cute smile, at 1 month I guessed it was just gas. She told me I was none too popular out in the burbs and hung up.

One evening a group of us were going out for a drink. In the reception area David and another exec joined us. As we walked down the street to the bar I contrived to stay next to him. Someone holding the door for me caused David to wind up several bodies away as we filed into the noisy space. I cursed that guy for his manners. They joined a number of little round bar tables together for us. When they were ready I all but dived head first to tackle the chair next to him. He seemed oblivious.

Sitting next to him in the noise my side seemed to flame. I concentrated on each word he spoke.

My beer came, an amber ale. I saw him glance at it with a slight frown and then go back to talking to the other exec. They were talking about a presentation David was scheduled to give to a meeting of our partners. I knew about it since my job was managing the day to day boredom of the partner relationships.

A guy I kidded around with, Joe, was sitting on the other side of me. I told him I'd changed my mind and really wanted a glass of wine. I pushed my beer over in front of him. "You've got your second round already."

When the wine came I sipped at it carefully. I didn't and don't really like wine. I glanced at David but could tell nothing. I thought it was just my luck to imagine my way out of a beer.

"Imagination," he was saying to the other guy, "is the important thing. When preparing a speech or talk, getting my ideas together, organizing them into what I'm going to say, polishing the phrasing, even practicing before a mirror, the presentation is alive and exciting, it possesses me, I feel it live in my head. When I actually go to give it, it is dead, I see it land on the disagreeable people sitting in the front row and begin to decay on the spot."

All of a sudden there were at least three things I wanted to say.

I wanted to say, "Hey, that's ridiculous, you're in such a demand as a speaker at trade shows and Republican functions! Your talks must be good. I heard you speak at the company meeting and what you said about the company's purpose and role in the world had guys working hard for at least half an hour after they got back to their cubes."

I wanted to say that I'd often thought about the difference between a work of art when it's just frozen text in the pages of a book or encoding on a dvd or chemicals on a canvas and when it plays itself in your head. Is it the same when it plays in your head as when it burned in the mind of its creator?

I wanted to say that the loved one, in the mind of the lover, has a much finer and truer existence than he does in real life.

In fact of course, I said none of those things, my face flushed and I looked down at my untouched wine, my hair flowing down like a curtain.

On the long subway ride home to my apartment I thought over everything he'd said, every expression, trying to eek out any little thing that might single me out, it was hopeless. Like my sister and her baby, there was nothing really there, it was just gas.

Also, I reminded myself for certainly the 100th time that the company handbook enumerated at least 30 different specific ways an employee could be bad and get fired. These ranged from falling asleep in one's cube, to taking new printer cartridges home, through divulging company secrets to third parties, to having affairs with fellow employees. "The only way you'll have a chance at him," I told myself, "Is to quit, then of course, you'll have no chance at all." "Good," said my Mom's voice in my head.

"It's mostly honored in the breach," I told myself, thinking of some of the goings on I knew about. "But senior execs probably have to be careful."

After maybe three months, there was a conference call with one of the partner companies. David joined to lend weight. There were the 5 of us, me, 2 technical types, a salesperson and David. The ninja weapon shaped speaker phone and our laptops cluttered the table. I managed the relationship so I ran the call. It went well I thought, I was precise, organized, and I kept thoughts of David somewhere down below my stomach, out of my mind.

I did keep glancing over at David whenever someone else was talking. I kept my legs tightly crossed under the table, containing my desire.

I had gotten over his hand, at least over his hand in particular. Everything about him pulled at me. I wore a gray skirt with a tan blouse, and a beige cardigan sweater, the conference rooms are always freezing in that building. Half of any meeting is taken up by people going "I can't believe how cold it is in here". Sometimes guys get up and monkey with the thermostats. They control nothing.

When it was over I delayed getting up, pretending to type some extra notes. The other 3 guys left, talking about baseball. I wanted him to leave as well, I didn't want to move in front of him, I couldn't stand the thought of being ignored or of being noticed either.

He stood and I stood as well, looking down at the table, watching my hands shut and pick up my laptop, they seemed to belong to someone else. He was a singularity in the room, I couldn't look where he stood, he seemed to twist the light.

"I am going to a reception at the City Museum of Modern Art after work," he said, then with only the faintest whiff of a question, "You will come with me?"

"Yes" I said, flushing and biting my lip. I couldn't believe what a dope I was. Unable to say anything more.

"There will be a cab in front at 6:30," he said.

I went back to my cube and sat stunned with happiness. I'd been going to go home at 4:30, now I just sat there. At 5, I pulled myself together, gave my hair a shake, frowned and managed to do a bit of work. At 6:15 I closed up shop, hit the ladies room and touched up what little makeup I wore. Looking in the mirror I thought I looked really good.

The cab sat by the curb waiting. I climbed in. David occupied the far side. I imagined myself tripping as I got in and sprawling onto him. There would be no pulling me away if that happened. Everything in me wanted to touch him. I sat demurely and pulled the door closed.

The cab started up, swerved then pulled up at a stoplight. I desperately searched for something to say. Something that would connect me to him. I felt half crazed with want.

He bent close to my ear. "There is something I want you to do for me," his breath brushed my hair. His hand touched my leg. All my doubts evaporated. I thought, "He wants me as I want him."

The cab's horn blew and we lurched forward.

I could hardly speak, his hand burned, "Anything," I managed.

His fingers lifted the fabric of my skirt, "It is a little thing and will amuse me." His voice was light, like he found me amusing. What he murmured next was "Lift up your skirt and remove your underwear."

I couldn't look at his face, it was the center of that singularity. I looked at his gray suit coat, his dark striped tie, the white of his shirt. The white of his hand. I felt myself suddenly teetering on an edge, my expectations shattering in my head.

I could imagine my voice croaking "No way! Hey! I'm getting out!" I could imagine myself jumping out before the cab was even fully stopped, cutting in front of honking cars and screeching brakes.

The knowledge of what I would do to stay close to that hand, that knee, that unseeable face, dried my mouth, took my breath.

I lifted my skirt, lifted my bottom and pulled my panties down over my thighs, knees, ankles. I bent and eased them over my pumps. My hand was trembling. I didn't dare look up. My face was so hot I wondered it didn't singe the strands of my hair where it brushed my cheek, obscuring my face from him.

I started to hand him the panties but he just pointed to my bag.

"Above as well" he murmured. He reached out, brushed my hair and touched my shoulder, calming my trembling. Tears started in my eyes. Where his fingers touched, they left a burning memory in my skin, even beneath the sweater and blouse.

I squirmed a bit and pulled my blouse out of my skirt and reached up behind to undo the bra's strap.

The taxidriver looked in his mirror and said. "Hey! Not in my cab you don't!"

Silently David passed up twenty dollars.

"OK then, but you gotta be quick 'cause we're almost there less you want me to drive 'round a bit."

"Stop at the museum please," said David calmly.

In my flustered state I hadn't realized that I was going to be unable to get the shoulder straps down with my blouse on. My breath came short. I undid the buttons and pulled the blouse and the sweater down and off my arms. They hung in a chaos about my stomach. The bra, thank goodness, was in good shape, white, clean and simple. I pulled it off. My breasts swung free. I shivered in the air-conditioning. I hoped that he would touch them. I remembered his fingers in my hair.

"We're almost there," he said.

I started buttoning my blouse, my nipples brushing against the material. Suddenly I froze. It dawned me that I would be in a room full of people. I looked down where my breasts were half covered. They were so damn big. It was going to be so obvious. I did the last 3 buttons. The cab turned into the museum parking lot.

He was watching me with some amusement. "David, may I wear my sweater, buttoned up?" It was, I believe the first time I'd used his name. What would I have done if he said no?

"Seven and a quarter", said the cab driver.

"Sure," he said lightly, handing a ten forward and opening the door, then he added, "You're clear in my mind's eye."

I slipped out after him. Hurriedly I tucked my blouse in and smoothed my skirt, bending so the tops of my breasts were clear to him through the open collar, imagination is all very well I thought. "You're mind's eye could see what it wanted even if I wasn't naked under my skirt and blouse," I grumbled. I pulled the sweater on and as we climbed the museum steps I buttoned it to my neck, even though it had to be ninety out there.

"But it wouldn't be the same for you."

I tried to take his hand as we walked to the revolving doors, but he frowned and I let mine fall back to my side.

Some time later I stood in front of a colorful horror trying to look faintly appreciative. David stood a way off, a glass in hand, talking calmly to several men of his age. A slim young woman came up to me, blond, dressed in black slacks and a white turtleneck. "Hi," she said, offering me her hand, "I'm Celeste, David's daughter."

I blushed and stammered something.

She grinned, mistaking the reason for my awkwardness, and said "Don't worry, I've gotten used to David's girlfriends being younger than me. You're closer than some have been! It doesn't stop me from seeing quite a lot of them."

I smiled, stupidly glad to be assigned girlfriend status, and said I was glad to meet her. To say something, I asked if she had other brothers and sisters.

"A brother in law school. My mom's a VP at ----, she's almost as high powered as Dad."

There was a pause. She was good looking enough I thought, though her face, which was long the way David's was complete with a replica of his bony chin, would not be called pretty. I so admired her slimness.

She looked at me quietly with a half smile about her lips, the memory of my state of attire rushed back upon me. Being some distance from David, I'd forgotten it. Did she know? I blushed again and would've shifted to make it less obvious if I could've figured out what showed.

"Do you like the show?" she asked.

"Not so much," I said waving at the colorful swirl of splotches before me, "They don't look like anything. That one's complete crap."

She laughed, "I work here you know."

"Oops," I said blushing again, "Should've opted for politeness."

"That's OK. Say whatever you please. I'm in PR so I pay no attention to what anyone thinks. And since you don't like this, perhaps there's something you do like?"

I'd taken some art in school, would've taken more but it doesn't lead to work. "I like contemporary realism, like Jack Vettriano or Scott Prior or Sergey Surikov."

Celeste made a slight face but took my arm and led me through an arch. Two galleries down, deserted because the food and wine were distant, the walls were covered with paintings of real looking people and landscapes. I smiled. "I love that painting." I said, pointing to one. It was of a young woman, sitting on the porch of an old fashioned small town house, wearing a check dressing gown, a golden retriever or lab at her feet. She looked so content. I had a sudden flash that it was David looking at me sitting on that chair, that art was far away, that it was our house and he had just come out to join me in the cool of a weekend morning. I felt warm and happy.

Then I realized that the man who had the girl he was with remove her panties and bra and wander about a museum without was unlikely to be the man with that girl in that ordinary neighborhood.

I sighed. My breath seemed hard to come by. I wanted to be back near him. I felt so sad and desperate.

"These're not really my cup of tea," said Celeste, "I don't like artists who take so much control over what I see. Come on, I have to get back."

"Are you close to your father?" I asked as we made our way back.

"A lot more now than I used to be. When I was a kid, visiting him was a real drag. All my friends and stuff were at my Mom's. Now we've gotten to be friends. How 'bout you and your Dad?"

"Not so much. He and Mom are still together. He never says anything. He's just there in the background like an ornament. I think Mom dusts him now and then."

We were back in the main gallery. Celeste put her hand on my shoulder and murmured. "Have to mix, I'm sure I'll see more of you."

I stood at David's side and took a determined couple of sips of my wine, just to look busy I guess. My shoulder next to him burned, I wished to slip my hand through his arm but didn't dare. Every now and then he'd glance at me, looking at my face as always. The other men in the group kept glancing lower and though with the sweater I looked no different I felt exposed and hot.

And I just felt so sad and forlorn. Air moved up my thighs when I shifted. My blouse rubbed against my nipples, my breasts amplifying my every movement.

What was I to him, I wondered. Before in my relationships with men sex had been there of course, but I'd always behaved as if we were both human. I dumped a guy if he didn't behave as if he felt more or less the same about me, most of the time at least, I did try to cut the poor guys some slack. When they're crazed with lust, you can't expect too much. What I valued though was the friendship, the interaction, the play of minds.