The Itch

Things had gone terribly wrong in the village of Vita. The cows would not moo, the bells would not chime, and young Gertie Le Fleur was growing a flower, right out the top of her head.

No one was sure how, or even when, their misfortunes had started exactly, each remembering the sequence a little differently. The butcher would waddle out of his shop, wiping his bloodied hands across the front of his ill used apron, declaring that one morning last spring the cows had gone silently to the slaughter. He thought it might have been March.

“Lies,” chuckled the baker, shaking his head across the square. “It was the bells,” he declared. “The bells fell mute first... and that was May, at the earliest. I was pulling a pallet of walnut loaves from the oven the moment I realized that the bells had not rung me awake that morning.”

“It began with me,” stated the statue poised at the mathematical center of the square, as he wiggled one big toe, “only, no one noticed.” The villagers paid no mind to the statue’s claims. He was a lesser duke who had fought in a lesser war, after all.

For Gertie Le Fleur it all began with an itch.

“Girl, stop scratching your head,” her grandmother cried one morning as Gertie drowsily shuffled into the kitchen. “People will think you have bugs.”

“But, Baba, it itches,” Gertie mumbled, still scratching the top of her head.

“Well, you’ll only make it worse,” the rotund woman declared as she removed Gertie’s hand from her scalp. “You want sugar in your tea this morning?” she asked the girl, while quickly searching Gertie’s hair for lice.

“I don’t have bugs” Gertie huffed, slumping down in the chair closest to the oven. She was cold that morning in mid February.

“Sugar?” her grandmother repeated. Gertie shook her head. “You are the strangest child,” Baba Le Fleur declared, setting the steaming mug of milky tea in front of her granddaughter. “Whoever heard of a child who doesn’t want sugar?”

“Its too sweet,” Gertie mumbled into her mug. She had wrapped her thin hands around the mug and rested her forehead on its lip so that the steam warmed her icy nose.

“The strangest child,” Baba Le Fleur chirped, pulling Gertie’s shoulders back so that the girl was sitting up straight in the old wooden chair.

“But I’m frozen” she whined.

“Eat this. You’re too thin.”

Gertie looked suspiciously at the roll her grandmother had handed her.

“Don’t make that face at me child. You are getting too old for this petulance.”

“What is petulance?” Gertie questioned, picking apart the roll and lining up the small pieces on the table in front of her.

“That” Babe Le Fleur accused, pointing at the crumbs.

“Raisins!” cried Gertie in delight. There was a cinnamon raisin mixture hidden in the center of the roll. Raisins were not Gertie’s favorite, but they were unexpected that morning. Gertie enjoyed the unexpected.

“Stop scratching your head!”

“I didn’t know I was,” Gertie replied defensively,

Gertie was eight and in her third year of school that winter. She was the youngest of five children and the only girl. Ivan, Isaac, Irving, and Ithicus were all strong boys and big for their age. They towered over Gertie, tickled her, and tied her shoes.

“Gertie!” called Ivan, “We’re leaving without you.”

“No you’re not,” squeaked Gertie as she hopped down the battered and slightly warped stairs, boots untied. Upon reaching the bottom step she sat down, stuck her feet straight out, and began to adjust her scarf.

It was soft, the thick cotton wearing in spots from too many washings. A frayed edge strategically hidden beside Gertie’s ear always tickled. Tickled more as the day went on. This was Gertie’s favorite scarf, choked with overlapping red poppies woven into a barely visible dark green. She wore it on days she needed to be brave. Wore it on birthdays and exam days.

“You having a bad day already?” Ivan questioned as he steered Gertie out the front door.

“No” she replied reflectively, “there were raisins for breakfast, which was good, but” Gertie paused.

“But what?” Isaac asked kicking at a pile of snow.

“But something is wrong.”

The brothers nodded without hearing. Little sisters, much like lesser dukes, were more decorative than things to be taken seriously.

The snow was high that winter. It had begun falling in early October, which even for a village well aquatinted with snow was exceptional. Gertie waddled up to a snow bank pushed up against the gray stone wall bounding the brewery. A place that, by necessity needed to be bounded, to contain the smell and keep out the thieves. Many of the oldest women in the village still would not mention the brewery, or its owner, by name. The snow bank on this day reached up to Gertie’s chin. She starred into the snow, scratching her head.

“Puppy!” called Irving from up ahead. “You coming?” The brothers had taken to calling their youngest sibling Puppy the day she was born. “She looks like a new born puppy” Isaac had declared in awe.

Gertie poked at the snow, breaking off a chunk that had iced over. “Puppy,” Isaac chided “we are going to be late.” He moved her hand aside and rested his own atop her head.

“The snow, Isaac, its pink” Gertie whispered in disbelief.

Isaac chuckled at his sister’s youth even while noting that the snow did, in fact, look pink. “Its the sun Gertie. The sun makes it appear pink.”

“How?” Gertie challenged looking up into her brother’s down turned face. He had reached the age at which he was attempting his first mustache. It was not going as planned.

Isaac paused, unsure how to explain this to his sister, unsure how the sun turned snow pink. “That,” he began leaning down to Gertie’s eye level, “is an excellent question for you teacher.” He wrapped his arm around her small frame and redirected her toward the school building.

The church bells echoed off the stone houses, off the mountains surrounding the village, off the frozen pink snow. A gray kitten darted across the children’s path and scurried into a crevasses in the brewery wall.

“Why must we go to school so often?” Gertie asked her brothers as they entered the building.

Gertie was comforted by the smell of chalk and the warmth of the radiators. She hung her coat in her personal cubby at the back of the room and rubbed her head.

“Gertie, don’t” her teacher commanded, brushing Gertie’s hand aside. Gertie had long ago learned not to protest when given a command at school. She generally remained silent from the moment a brother left her by her classroom door until one collected her from the same spot at the end of the day. Gertie enjoyed silence.

“That child could frighten the devil himself” an Auntie had once declared of Gertie. She liked to watch, to examine. She found speaking an unnecessary interference. Needless to say, Gertie Le Fleur did not have many friends.

“Hey Gertie” Dom roared ramming his side into her arm. Dom was two years older than Gertie and still in her year at school. He made a point of pushing her, teasing her, poking her, and trying to force her to speak. “Why you got that stupid look on your face?” he whispered, pinning Gertie against the wall next to the cubbies.

Gertie turned her face away. His breath smelled. His breath always smelled, of garlic, onion, sour milk, and general decay.

He sniffed her. Thought of the sound of her giggle, her laughter when she talked to her brothers or grew bored during math. “Its cold,” he said to her, trying to look less mean, but not moving away. “Cold,” he repeated. “What are you looking at?” Dom turned his face to the window. “What?” he repeated moving his face closer, “your lip is bleeding. Gert, what are you looking at?”

Gertie starred out the window at the snow. The gray sky had burst open since she had arrived at school and soft heavy flakes of pink and purple ice were drifting to the ground.

“Can’t even answer a question?” Dom paused, willing her to speak. “Answer my question!” he commanded, slamming his left palm against the wall. Gertie was awoken from her reverie. She turned to look into Dom’s eyes. She scratched her head.

“What's wrong with you?” the boy whispered, releasing her.

Gertie was not really afraid of Dom, but she did not like him. Sometimes during class when he would throw bits of paper at her, she would envision a pack of wolves devouring him alive. She would hear his screams and smell his blood. Gertie cried the night her grandmother told her there were no wolves left in their village. The hunters had long ago killed them off.

“Children,” the teacher clapped at no one in particular. “Gertie, your lip is bleeding,” she reprimanded, touching her own bottom lip.

Gertie ran her tongue around her mouth. It bit like old metal, old pipes.

The day progressed as they have the habit of doing. The children were taught grammar, math, geography, and history. Gertie had not participated nor been expected too. She had drawn a cartoon about a sheep in her notebook. The sheep had wandered off and been lost in the mountains. It would never be seen again.

At break the children had gone outside to play in the snow and the teacher had fretted about the classroom getting wet upon their return. There would be puddles. Someone could fall.

Part way through a good scratch Gertie had discovered a lump on the top of her head. She poked it. Tried to feel the edges of it, gauge the size. Her hair was in the way, the scarf.

“Gertie Le Fleur,” the teacher interrupted Gertie’s medical contemplation, “do you need to see a nurse?” Gertie’s hand froze on the top of her head, mid poke. She slouched into her chair and shook her head. The entire room full of children had turned to stare at Gertie. She gulped and mourned the wolves, contemplated arsenic.

“Stop scratching yourself. Its rude,” the teacher continued before turning back to the blackboard.

Gertie slid out from her chair and tip toed out of the room, backwards. She slunk down the hall, hugging the wall. Imitating the spies in the movies her brothers loved and bought bootlegged from the neighbor's son. When Gertie reached the bathroom she closed the door behind her with warm relief. The bathroom was steamy from leaky pipes and hot radiators. It smelled slightly of mold and bleach and was painted a deep golden, for no imaginable reason. A third of the floor tiles were missing. Gertie checked that the stalls were empty before removing her scarf.

There was blood.

She tilted the top of her head toward the mirror and attempted to part the hair around the lump. Her hair was sticky. She couldn’t get a clear view. A loud noise came from outside, from the direction of the monastery. The mirror in front of Gertie shattered and fell into the sink basin. Fell like an armload of silver snow. Gertie starred into the bowl of tiny Gerties. She tilted her face from one side to the other, watching the hundred other Gertie’s mime her movements. She reached the tip of one finger into the basin and crunched in against the shards.

“Ow,” she yelped quietly. There was a tiny shard stuck in the finger, next to the nail. Great more blood, thought Gertie.

She was not frieghtened by the blood really. Having grown up with so many brothers she was accustomed to a degree of personal injury, a quantity of blood. This was different however. The semi self inflicted wound on her head was worrisome. After pulling the shard of mirror from her finger Gertie washed her hands and lip in the basin to her left. She tried to clean off some of the caked on blood from her hair, but it seemed to have little positive affect. If anything her hair looked worse, more matted.

Her scarf was ruined she noted, unfolding the weary cloth and wieghing it across her thin wrists. Though maybe not. The red poppies masked the blood well, taking it on as an additional yield.

Gertie gingerly replaced her covering, dried her hands on her thighs and made her way back to the classroom.

Some of the students at the back of the room whispered as Gertie entered, but the teacher was still teaching. Face to blackboard, back to class. Perhaps she hadn’t noticed, Gertie pondered not without a touch of disappointment. Few children want to be invisible under normal circumstances.

“Gertie Le Fleur!” roared the teacher, whipping around as Gertie’s chair creaked under her returned wieght. “We do not leave class without permission. Its r...” The teacher’s voice was cut off mid word. Her face seemed to freeze, mouth gaped open. Her shoulders shook a bit and a quiet chocking sound crept out from the back of her throat. The students began to giggle nervously. All except Gertie, who starred in horror at the consequence of her misbehaviour. The teacher clawed at her own throat in painc. Slowly, the students ceased their giggling and looked around at their commrads, uncertain what they could do.

Suddenly, there was the sound of a bursting balloon and a swarm of butterflies rushed from the teacher’s gaping mouth. Bright blue. Most of the students squealed in delight as the teacher fell to her knees gasping. Gertie remained silent, transfixed.

“Anything interesting happen at school today?” Irving asked his sister as he retrived her from the regular spot next to her classroom door. Gertie looked over her shoulder. Her teacher’s head was flat against her big desk, her face starring unseeing toward the window. Gertie shook her head. “Did you at least learn anything good?”

“Butterflies,” Gertie whispered.

“Hm?”

“Butterflies. They don’t like the snow.”

Gertie drew her stockinged feet with her onto her bed. She rested her chin on her knees, making herself very small. She was unsure what to do. She had walked home silently behind her brothers, which they had, of course, not found unusual. She has shaken her head in quiet refusal at her grandmother’s offer of a slice of honey slathered bread, which had been only slightly odd. She was hidding in her tiny room as yet not burdensom to her family, but how long could she wait before they found out? Surly the principal would call. The teacher herself eventually would arrive at the door filled to the brim with accusations. What was the appropriate punishment for her crime, Gertie fretted. Would the police drag her away or arrest her quietly in the dead of night? What would her grandmother be forced to tell the neighbors?

Gerties’ terror over the episode with her teacher had temporarily distracted her from the growth under her hair. She washed her face and sent herself to bed without supper. This did worry Baba Le Fleur, as the girl was awefully thin.

Gertie awoke the next morning to the gray predawn, a crowing rooster, and an aching head. She rubbed her face into her pillow seeking comfort. Before sitting up, Gertie gave her scalp a good scratch, despite the antisipated pain of the action. POP. The lump on her head, having grown over night, gave into the bite of her fingernails and perpetual scratching. The skin ripped open and it felt, to Gertie’s horror, as though something had trailed out. She held both hands out in front of her face, up toward the ceiling as far as her arms would take them. The offensive hands that had torn at her head. There was blood beneath her fingernails. Gertie lay very still, unwilling to move her head even slightly in any direction. She tried to breath deelply. She tried harder. Gertie could hear her grandmother in the kitchen below her making all the normal sounds of morning. She could hear her brothers rising in the rooms on either side. She lay very very still trying to think of what could unwind from the human head. She was certain that she was dying. Or already dead.

“Gertie!” her grandmother called, “I haven’t heard you yet.”

“Gertie!” Baba Le Fleur called again, louder as her voice got closer. “Are you awake?”

“I’m awake!” Gertie sqwaked too quietly to be heard. She swallowed, wetting her throat. “I’m awake!” she cried out louder as the handle on her door moved slightly.

“Good. Well, get up. You’ll be late,” her grandmother commanded from the other side of the door.

Gertie did as she was told. She slipped from beneath her covers, keeping her neck as stiff as possible. She tried not to touch anything with her hands. She hesitated at the door of her room. Pressing her ear against the door, she listened for silence in a house that rarely had any. Hearing the pounding of boys' bare feet descending the stairs, Gertie rolled open her door knob with the heels of her hands and rushed to the bathroom. She frantically locked the door behind her.

Gertie had come in search of the mirror. However, finding herself faced with the possibility of what was happening to her, she hesitated once again. She washed her hands, without looking up into the glass. She carefully cleaned beneath each finger nail, checking her cuticles, her knuckles, her palms for any residue. Finally, Gertie lifted her face. She looked pale she noted, perhaps even thin. She tilted her chin up toward the ceiling, noting the weight of the back of her head. She tilted her head to the right, noting the fall of her hair. Gertie Le Fleur hung her head forward and presented the top of her head to the mirror. She parted her hair with one hand. It was green. The lump that was not a lump any longer. There was something green and spindly trailing, as trailing was in fact the correct term for what was happing atop her head, from the wound. Gertie lifted a finger to her scalp. She poked the hair and skin around the wound, moving counter clockwise and slowly inward. When she got to the gagged skin, Gertie poked a little more forcefully, accusingly even. The spindly trail unfurled. Unfurled into a leaf. Gertie fell down in shock.

... to be continued...

What I like about Sarah Palin and other misadventures

“So I have this problem,” Ernie began over his fourth beer, “I think it might be serious, like I might be dying.” Ernie turned to his friends Dave and Ljilja for signs of concern.

“What’s wrong?” Ljilja asked, resting her hand palm down on the bar near Ernie. The three were at their regular corner place having a few drinks after work. They didn’t do this so much anymore. The place was still their “regular place” but they weren’t so much regulars these days. Not since Dave and Ljilja had gotten married.

“I think I might have diabetes, or it could be stress, I don’t know.”

“You have diabetes?” Ljilja asked, giving Dave a concerned sideways glance.

“I don’t know. I might. I read that it could be diabetes.”

“What could be?” Dave questioned.

“Is there diabetes in your family?” Ljilja asked over him.

All three were huddled together now, beers tucked in close. Dave had one hand resting on Ljilja’s lower back, Ljilja had one resting on Ernie’s elbow.

“Yeah, what, exactly, is the problem?” she continued.

Ernie looked around and leaned in closer to his friends, “I can’t come,” he whispered.

“What?” Ljilja pulled back in surprise.

“You’re so full of shit,” Dave muttered, shaking his head and leaning back on the stool.

“No really,” Ernie exclaimed, nearly standing in his enthusiasm. Ljilja started laughing. “Lil, its not funny. This is bad, something’s wrong with me!”

“I’m sorry Ernie, but...” she started laughing harder and buried her face in Dave’s shoulder. Ljilja had a world class laugh. The kind that came full force from her belly and shook her whole body.

“but,” Dave continued, “its ridiculous.”

“Its not,” Ernie countered.

“Seriously, Ernie, what’s wrong?” Dave asked, taking a drink.

“That is what’s wrong. I can’t come. I mean not with someone else,” he whispered the last part.

“So you’re impotent?” Ljilja asked, recovering from her laughter.

“Hey, hey,” Ernie looked around, gesturing for her to be quieter. “No,” he whispered, ducking his head down toward the others. “I’m not impotent. I can get hard, an erection, you know, I just can’t...” he paused, “I just can’t finish.” Dave and Ljilja looked at him for a moment. “I guess I know what those women who can’t orgasm feel like,” Ernie continued, taking a deep drink of his beer.

“Yeah, you should join a website,” Dave said sarcastically.

“I was thinking about it,” Ernie responded with excitement. He hadn’t caught the sarcasm. “I could be like ‘hey I feel your pain lets try to work on this together.’”

Dave laughed into his beer.

“Wait, so you can’t” Ljilja hesitated.

“Ejaculate” Ernie filled in.

“Right. What does Mishka think?”

“Think?”

“About this. I mean do you always have this... problem, with her?”

“More or less. I try. I mean, what can you do? I don’t know, she feels bad I think. I just keep going and going and nothing.”

“Modest,” Dave laughed under his breath.

“What?” Ernie looked at him.

“What?”

“I’m just saying its hard, cause we have sex and I really like women, but I just can’t come.”

“So its not impotency?” Ljilja asked, confused. “Its weird.”

“He’s making this up. Poor Ernie, little Duracell Bunny, just keeps going.”

“Its Energizer Bunny and you wouldn’t understand.”

Ljilja put her hand on Dave’s knee. “Now, now boys,” she tisked, “no need for any of that.”

“’Nother round?” asked the aging bartender.

“Yeah.”

“I’m good,” Ljilja shook her head, placed her hand over her glass.

“No, come on Lil. On me. Three more,” Ernie said to the bartender.

“So impotency, its, what: stress, diet, blood pressure?” listed Ljilja.

“Diabetes. Yeah. I was reading this thing online about things to do with your partner, to work up to it. Ways to sort of get used to coming with someone else.”

“So you’re not impotent solo?” Dave asked, half smiling.

“No. Wait. I’m not impotent” Ernie hissed. “And no, no, I’m fine. Alone I’m okay. That’s what they say to do, with your partner. In front of her.”

“So you do this with Mishka?” Ljilja asked nodding encouragingly at Ernie.

“No,” Ernie shook his head while taking another drink. “I just read this yesterday.”

“But you would do? With Mishka?”

“Where is the lucky lady tonight?” asked Dave.

Mishka was at a Christian women’s conference in Washington.

“What I love most about her is what a great mother she is,” stated the blonde, eighteen year old sitting next to Mishka.

Mishka wasn’t technically a Christian. She’d admit to a tinge of cultural Christianity at best, but true faith was hindered by her belief that Jesus was probably just a really nice guy. But Mishka worked as an assistant in the development department of a nonprofit and Christians could be very generous, especially the women.

Mishka was her boss’ go to girl for the Christian women’s conferences. “You pretend so well,” he’d said. She didn’t mind the conference sessions really, it was the between session coffee breaks that were difficult. But the coffee breaks were also where the money was made.

“She is such a good mom, you’re right Sarah, and so stylish. I don’t know how she finds the time.”

At this particular coffee break Mishka found herself at a table turned impromptu discussion of the merits of Sarah Palin. The women were going around, one by one, and stating what the admired most about the former governor. They were starring at Mishka, it was her turn. “Um,” she paused to think. “I guess you have to admire someone who can keep being so publicly humiliated and still continue to stand up for what she ... believes.” There was a prolonged pause.

“Very good, Mishka. Resilience. It is an essential quality for a woman,” encouraged the table’s de facto leader. The other women at the table nodded and smiled at one another, looking a bit relieved.

Resilience, thought Mishka, Truth. Mishka was feeling a bit in need of this quality herself as of late. Between her boss’ prostitution of her to the Christian Right, her on and off again relations with Ernie, and her growing fears that she was becoming a friendless hermit, Mishka was beginning to feel a bit frayed around the edges. After attending a conference with Mishka four months ago, Sonja, Mishka’s flatmate, had found Jesus and a train load of new friends.

“They’re good people,” Mishka had said to Ernie over one of their nearly nightly phone calls about a week ago.

“Judgmental.”

“No, they’re not. I mean, yeah, okay they are, but apart from that, they’re really good people, its just...”

“They’re nice people, Mish, not good people and you’ve got to get out of there. Having to deal with these people at work is bad enough, but having them around all the time? They’ll brain wash you!”

“Now who’s judgmental. Besides, Sonja’s still Sonja. I don’t want to just leave her. It’s kind of my fault she’s like this. And anyway where would I go?”

“Your fault?”

“Well, I’m the one who took her with me to that conference. I just couldn’t take three days by myself...”

“I remember the text: ‘In enemy territory, will write as soon as is safe.’”

“Right, well, I brought her with me thinking we could have a laugh at night, save my sanity a bit. And they got her. I mean, I knew she was having a hard time over her split with Jack, but...”

“Yeah, what happened with that?”

“With Jack?”

“Yeah.”

“Nothing.”

“Something happened if he changed her into a Born Again.”

“He didn’t change her. That’s what I’m saying. I changed her. Its my fault. It was the music I think, she liked the band the first day.”

“Hey, can you be a Born Again if you weren’t born already?”

“What?”

“I mean, she wasn’t a Christian before, right?”

“Exactly.”

“Exactly, what?”

“Exactly, she wasn’t a Christian before and then she was ‘reborn’ when she became a Christian.”

“Oh, that’s what it means!” Ernie exclaimed.

“What?” Mishka was confused, somehow this conversation had gotten off track.

“I always thought it was reborn, like reconverted or reverted to Christianity or something. I guess this makes more sense.”

“Anyway, I can’t just move” Mishka stated, trying to redirect the conversation.

“Sure you can. People do it all the time. I can help you look.”

“She can’t afford this place on her own.”

“Good thing she’s got a ton of new friends.”

“I can’t afford a place on my own and I don’t want to live with strangers.”

“Look, you’re just making excuses. If you want to stay, stay, but stop complaining.”

Mishka was quiet.

“Look,” Ernie started again.

“No,” she interrupted. “You’re right. You are. I’ll look around. It wont hurt. I’ll just look and then decide.”

“I’ll help,” he offered again sheepishly.

“Thanks.”

She hadn’t started looking yet, but she thought she might. When she got back from this conference. Maybe. She was comfortable with Sonja, even when they fought or didn’t get along. That was part of her problem, wasn’t it, thought Mishka, as a large woman in slacks talked about Sarah Palin’s faith, she was too contented being content.

“So what is going on with you and Mishka?” asked Ljilja over the trio’s fifth beer. She wasn’t really drinking her’s, but the guys hadn’t noticed yet.

“Nothing. You know, we’re us,” Ernie replied, avoiding eye contact.

“Right. You’re you. Like?”

“Well, son, if you are going to be masturbating in front of the girl don’t you think you should make this thing official?” Dave asked in his best Ward Cleaver voice.

“What like marry her?” Ernie cried.

“Perish the thought,” Dave laughed, hand to heart. “Maybe just start calling her your girlfriend.”

“Or stop hitting on every other woman in the room?” offered Ljilja.

“Now, honey, that he can’t help,” Dave jumped in, placing his hand on his wife’s back.

“I don’t!” Ernie declared.

“You do, but its really not your fault,” Dave reassured his friend.

“Man Boy” Ljilja said quietly into her beer.

“What? What did you call me?” Ernie asked turning to Ljilja.

“Man Boy, Erns. You are, you know. Its okay,” she said gently, patting his arm.

“Oh, god. Man Boy,” Ernie moaned resting his head on the bar.

“Man Boy The Impotent,” Dave laughed.

“I’m not impotent,” Ernie mumbled into the wood.

“You’re not really a Man Boy either. Not exactly.” Ernie’s head popped up hopefully. “Its your Aw Shucks charm that’s the problem,” Dave continued. “It’s confusing. The Aw Shucks charm sometimes makes you seem like a Man Boy, but its not actually the same thing.”

“You think?” Ljilja asked.

Dave nodded. “Its a subtle difference.”

“Man Boy?” Ernie repeated in a dazed and defeated voice.

“Its that thing you do,” Dave counseled, “you know, where you say or do something dirty and then you smile or do something goofy and the girls laugh.” Ljilja smiled. “It distracts them,” Dave stated, “disarms them. Quiet clever really.”

“Not clever,” said Ernie.

“You really are charming, sweetie,” Ljilja petted, “just adorable.”

“Adorable Man Boy The Impotent,” Ernie proclaimed. “Fabulous.”

The Hound and Horse

Jas looked naked, Will thought. She walked into The Hound and Horse, the sunlight from the doorway momentarily slicing through the pub’s perpetual dimness. Her hair was pulled back, she was wearing jeans and sneakers, no jewelry. Jas always wore jewelry. Even in the shower she had on some ring or necklace that she hadn’t thought to take off. She’d lost weight, he noted, taking inventory of her, not a lot, but enough.

They hadn’t spoken in six months. Will had counted on the calendar when he’d gotten her voicemail. Six months of nothing and then, “Hey Will, its me... Jas... Jasmine. Can we meet up? How about The Hound on friday? About six? Call me, kay?” It hadn’t ended that well, in the end. Or what he’d thought was the end. Hadn’t ended that badly, if he was honest. He’d heard worse. Will rubbed his palms over his face and looked back at her as she crossed the room. She use to strip, Will remembered, before they’d met. He raised his hand to greet her. He didn’t stand up.

“Hey,” she said somewhat hesitantly, while leaning down to kiss his cheek. She missed. Grazed his ear instead.

Will nodded at her as she slid into the booth across from him.

“How’ve you been?” she asked, tilting her head slightly to the side. Did he hear pity in her voice? Concern? Screw you, he thought.

“Great,” Will said, a little too enthusiastically.

“Oh! Great.”

Will looked away, scanned the room. The Hound and Horse, or The Hound as they’d always call it, was their place. It was a valiant attempt at a posh British pub. Dark, green walls, framed prints of nondescript paintings of horses, hounds, or both. They’d even managed to hire an older British bartender. But is was all a little rundown, a little sad. That's what Will and Jas had liked about it. Something posh gone to rot. The stools at the bar didn’t match anymore. Most of the many mirrors, put up at some point in a misguided attempt to bring in more space, were cracked.

Jas was starring at him.

“What’s on your face?”

Shit! Will thought, turning his face to the mirror next to them. Nearly giving himself whiplash. Toilet paper, he’d guessed. He’d shaved before coming, but he was tired. Tired he told himself, not nervous. He was tired and had cut himself. A few times. Nothing, he thought moving his face around. Damn crap lighting, what was she seeing?

“I don’t see anything,” he accused, turning, more slowly, back to her.

She pointed at her own eyebrow.

Will’s hand touched the bar in his eyebrow. Shit. He’d forgotten. He really did need to take that thing out, he told himself. “I like it,” he said.

She raised her shoulders, giving him a look of ‘what can I say?’

Will felt like shit. “So, you want a drink or something?”

“Yeah, um. I can get them.”

“No.” Will stated firmly, standing up. “I’ll get them.” After a few steps Will turned back. Jas was chewing on the skin around her thumb nail. “Same?” he asked.

“Yeah,” she smiled at him, sadly.

Screw you, he thought, as his stomach dropped.

“So, what do you want Jasmine?” Will asked, settling a half pint of cider down in front of her. He never called her Jasmine. Had never called her Jasmine.

“Want?” she asked, glass paused halfway between table and her mouth.

“Yeah. Want. Why am I here?”

“I wanted to see you,”

Will waited for a better answer. An answer he could do something with.

“I had heard... I’d heard you weren’t doing that well.”

“You’ve lost weight,” Will threw back at her.

“What!” Jas’ head jolted back in surprise.

“Who told you I wasn’t doing that well? I’m great. I’m doing fabulous.” Fabulous? he thought. “Who said I wasn’t?”

“I’ve lost weight?” Jas drew the words out quietly, looking down at the table. “It doesn’t matter who told me,” she replied looking into his eyes.

“Doesn’t matter to you,” Will muttered, taking a deep drink and looking away. The neon Harp sign behind the bar was on the fritz. It was blinking a little.

Jas reached out her hand, grazing her fingers against Will’s own, wrapped around his glass. She drew back sharply. As if he’d burned her.

Will swallowed. He looked over at her hands. At the fingers that had touched him. “Why does it matter?”

“I love you... loved you,” she emphasized the “d”. Duh.

Will nodded, staring at her hand. “You’ve lost weight,” he stated to her fingers.

“So have you.”

“No.” He shook his head, staring at that hand. “Ten pounds.”

“What?”

“Gained. Ten pounds,” Will said looking up at her. He smiled. Held up his glass. He’d been drinking a lot these last months. It was starting to catch up with him.

She smiled back at him. A curl was coming lose near her right ear. “I’ve lost weight.”

They both took a drink.

“What are we doing here?” he asked.

“I wanted to see you.”

“You already said that.”

She shrugged. Bit the skin near her nail.

“Don’t,” he said softly, reaching across the table, moving her hand away from her mouth.

“Its gotten worse lately,” she admitted in seeming amazement, staring down at her thumb. “It bled the other day.”

“Its gonna get infected.”

“I clean my hands a lot.”

“It’ll scar.”

“Maybe I’ll get some of that stuff.”

Will had been trying to get her to use this gel that mothers put on their children’s fingers to force them to stop chewing their nails. It tastes awful. Apparently. That was more than a year ago.

The bartender was pulling clean glasses out of the rack and stacking them behind the bar. It wasn’t the old authentic British bartender. Rod was working today. He was about twenty five and from Texas. He was humming a Modest Mouse song, Will couldn’t hear which.

“What have you been reading lately?” Jas asked.

“What?” Will hadn’t been listening. “Reading? Um. Nothing much. Why?”

“I’m just curious. I read this really good book about a guy who was born in Azerbaijan and then lived in Berlin and pretended to be a Muslim, but wasn’t.”

“That’s what it was about?”

“Yeah. Well, sort of, anyway, it was good. A journalist wrote it.”

“Hm.” Will took a drink. This was awkward, maybe he shouldn’t have come. He’d wanted to see her, but maybe it would have been better to stay home. But that would have driven him crazy too. She seemed, somehow... more.... in his head. “I just finished a book about China. Well, it was about the Cultural Revolution and the destruction of distinctive environments, pollution, endangered animals. A little slow, but interesting.”

“China? I didn’t know you were into China.”

“Well, I’m not really, I guess. But it was in the library and it looked good. I saw it, and thought about how you were always on about the environment and pollution and that, I remembered you saying someth...” Will cut off mid word. She was staring at him. Shit. He’d said too much. “I mean, it looked interesting. Anyway, it was. Interesting.”

“You miss me?”

“Jas, seriously. What am I doing here?” He looked at her for a minute, waiting for a response. A reaction. She was staring at his chest, avoiding his face. “Do you miss me?” he continued. “Is that what this is about? You’ve gotta give me something here.”

“I don’t know.”

“You don’t know?”

“I don’t know.” There was a shattering noise. Rod had dropped a glass. Some guy on one of the mismatched stools laughed and clapped. Rod told him to fuck off.

Bacon

The glitter felt gritty beneath Mai’s shoes. She stood for a moment starring down in the chaos. The tiny red metallic pieces reflected the fractured midday sun. They stuck to her sneakers, the sidewalk, the lollypop dropped disastrously moments ago. They swayed in the run off, accumulated from last nights rain, in the gutter.

“Merry Christmas!” bellowed one of the over stuffed and teetering Santas as he passed. Girls in red velvet threw more glitter from the back of a truck. “And what do you want this year, little girl?” a teenage elf asked a toddler in pigtails, while he leered at Mai.

Mai grimaced and attempted to turn around. The city was having it’s annual Christmas parade. It was December 11th.

“Jingle bell, jingle bell, jingle bell rock...” screamed a loud speaker tied atop a cider stand. ‘Hot cider $5. Waffles $3. Mulled Wine - ID Required.” the chalkboard read in red, white, and green capital letters. “Rocking around the Christmas tree...” the hamburger van’s competing loud speaking yelled back.

Mai sighed as she motivated herself to push through the crowd of young families, teenage cliques, and elderly people. What am I doing here? she thought, turning sideways, shoulder shoved high, to shimmy through an obese family unit. “Sorry, excuse me, sorry,” she muttered without conviction as she pushed, slide, and danced her way toward the hot cocoa stand.

“Merry Christmas!” sang the teenager inside the window decked out in a pointed green hat, pointed ears, and a showgirl smile. It really was amazing what orthodontists and money could do, thought Mai.

“Hi,” she smiled weakly in response, while digging around inside her messenger bag for her wallet. The corduroy monstrosity held two books, a note book, four pens and a highlighter, a small Spanish-English dictionary, a bottle of water, keys, two tubes of lip balm, two elastic hair bands, a handkerchief, a mobile phone, a camera, a bag of roasted nuts she had purchased about twenty minutes ago and not eaten, a bag to use if she needed an extra bag, and, somewhere, a wallet. “Sorry, I can never find anything in here.”

“Hot chocolate?” the Colgate commercial prompted.

“Yes, please” Mai smiled again.

“Dark, milk, or white?”

“Um, I don’t know. What’s best?”

“Best? Well, they’re all good,” she nodded slightly as though agreeing with someone else’s statement.

“Which do you like best?”

“I really wouldn’t know.”

Mai paused, her own smile was beginning to feeling a bit forced. “Milk.”

“Excellent choice. Size?”

“Medium. No whipped cream.”

“You sure? The whipped cream is really good.”

Mai tried to suppress the image of the girl eating cups of whipped cream through perfectly crafted teeth. “Positive. Thanks.” A passing frazzled mom in an out of date trench coat rammed into Mai as she was paying.

“Jimmy, I said no,” she whispered in a tone used only by mothers and cartoon villains.

“Would you like a cookie to go with your hot cocoa?” asked Colgate in a tone that sounded simultaneously mocking and propositioning. She held up a reindeer shaped, cellophane wrapped, technicolor cookie twice the size of Mai’s hand.

“Um. No, thanks” Mai smiled, grabbing for her paper cup.

“Merry Christmas!” shouted at least ten people in the crowd.

“Jesus is your savior, dear” assured an elderly woman attempting to push a Jews for Jesus pamphlet into Mai’s free hand.

Why am I here? Mai asked herself, again.

Mai had awoken that morning with no plans to attend the Christmas parade and accompanying carnival. She had awoken that morning with no plans at all. As her alarm kicked on the voices of NPR commentators, Mai had stretched her body so that her toes curled over the foot and her fingers over the head of her bed.

“Arugh,” she sighed in pleasure and buried her face further into her pillow. It was Saturday and there would be no demands on her. She scratched her head, flipped over, and rubbed her face. The commentators were talking about Pakistan, as the often did of late. Sunlight was streaming from the curtains and Mai knew that it was at least two hours past when her mother would think was a reasonable time to sleep in. Mai lived alone. In living alone Mai had no one to tend too and no one to narc on her if she failed to tend competently to herself. She wiggled her toes out from beneath the duvet and thought about coffee.

Mai’s apartment was not large. It was a one bedroom flat in a converted house. She lived in a back apartment on the ground floor. She had a small kitchen, a good sized common room, an adequately sized bathroom, and a bedroom just big enough for a bed and dresser of which the bottom two drawers really did not open. But Mai was happy with her island of “all me alone time.” She had filled her good sized common room with a hand me down couch, a large reading chair, an old desk upon which her grandfather had written dirty detective novels, and enough books to fill at least 30 boxes. Mai enjoyed a good book. Mai even enjoyed a bad book, if it was bad in the right ways.

This morning the floors of her flat were cold. Mai kept meaning to buy slippers, but with no one at home to nag her with reminders of “well, of course your feet are cold you still haven’t bought any slippers” she continually forgot.

“Cold,” she said to herself, tucking her feet up onto the rungs of her singular kitchen chair after turning on the coffee pot. Not being a morning person, Mai ground the coffee beans and filled the water tank of the coffee machine the night before so that in the morning she would only need to press “on”. Her laptop was sitting in it’s usual spot on the kitchen table.

“What is going on in the world this morning?” Mai asked the inanimate object. The screen light up with the comforting and familiar hum. As the computer was doing whatever it is that computers do in order to function properly, and truly Mai had no idea what that was, Mai braved the cold floor once again to examine the contents of her refrigerator.

Bacon.

Oh, yes, though Mai with excessive pleasure, bacon. Mai had once dated a man who was horrified to learn of Mai’s love of bacon.

“Bacon?” he questioned with incredulity.

“Bacon” she nodded, smiling.

“Really? You know how bad that is for you, right?”

“Well, sure. But its not like I eat it everyday. I mean, I would, but I don’t.”

“Bacon?”

“You don’t like bacon? A nice crisp, salty piece of bacon?”

“Sure I like it. I mean I remember liking it. But its so bad for you. And, I mean, I thought girls didn’t eat that stuff.”

“What stuff, bacon?”

“Yeah. Bacon, steak, you know... meat.”

“What?!” Mai had snorted coffee out her nose at the very idea of women not eating meat. Sure, she knew that there were some women who didn’t eat meat. There were some men who didn’t eat meat, for that matter. But all women? Where was he getting this information about women? “All of my friends eat meat,” Mai replied. “All of my friends love bacon. Well, except two, but they’ve never had it. Religious reasons. I am sure if they’d tried it they would love it too.”

“I’ve never dated a girl before who liked bacon.”

“Are you sure?” Mai questioned, the fact that he kept referring to her and all women as “girls” was, Mai thought, a conversation for another day. Mai was quickly nearing 30 and as her mother would have gladly pointed out, was no longer a spring chicken. Mai figured if you couldn’t be considered a spring chicken you, likely, could also not be considered a girl.

“Of course I’m sure.” He was getting defensive.

“I mean maybe they never ate it in front of you. Or maybe they told you they didn’t like it,” Mai drew out the word “told” to imply that his not knowing may not be his fault. He heard, ‘maybe they didn’t trust you or like you enough to be honest with you about whether or not they liked bacon’ and thus ‘maybe you are inherently flawed and bad with women’.

This relationship had fallen apart shortly after the bacon conversation.

Bacon, Mai smiled as she hopped lightly from foot to foot in her kitchen. She rubbed her stomach for good measure, as though she were trying to convince a child present that something good was about to be offered.

By the time Mai had prepared herself six strips of bacon and a large mug of milky coffee her computer had grown impatient and gone to sleep.

“And what do we have here?” Mai stated aloud, wiping her bacon greased fingers on a dish towel. There was an email from a dating web site she had recently joined.

“You have a message!” it declared joyfully.

“A message. Hm” she said to herself. Mai had become a member of three dating web sites over the last six months. Her biological clock was ticking, her mother was pushing, and her romantically available social pool was drying up. She had been asked out by a sixty year old. Enough was enough.

The web sites had proven less then God sent, but she was reluctant to give up quite yet. Plus, her membership contracts didn’t run out for another three months.

“Hi!” opened the message “My name is Brian. I am thirty nine, healthy, and laid back. I am going to be in your area for work this coming week and was wondering if you were available for a hook up. ; ) No strings attached. You wont regret it.” Mai paused before hitting the delete button. The winking smily face was what got her. It is one thing to ask a complete stranger to have sex with you over the internet, but the smily face made it seem weak and torrid. She thought he was wrong, that she would regret the hook up, and to her the smily face said he knew that too.

After reading threw the rest of her emails, two from human rights mailing list, one from her sister, one from a friend from college - “I’M PREGNANT!!!!”, Mai stretched her arms over her head and washed her dishes.

“Everybody is kung fu fightin’...” she sang, “everybody’s fast as lightin’ duh duh duh du du du duh duh duhhhh.” Mai threw in a good side kick and a butt shimmy as she scrubbed the frying pan. “Oh it was a little bit frightnin’... uh hu, everybody was kung fu fightin’.”

Mai’s mobile rang part way through a deep kick turned lunge move.

“Mai!” her mother’s voice greeted her. Her mom always sounded so excited when she picked up the phone, as though they hadn’t spoken in a long time. They spoke almost daily.

“Hey mom, dun dun duhhhh.”

“What was that?”

“Oh, nothing. Sorry. What’s up?”

“Nothing. Just calling to check in.”

“Uh hu.”

“What are you up to today? Are you busy?”

“Not really. I’ve got some laundry I should do,” Mai glanced over at the mountain of clothing, towels, and bedding that would likely amount to five loads even if she didn’t properly sort them, “and some stuff to do for work.”

“But its Saturday!” her mom objected.

“Yeah, Mom, I know. But stuff’s still got to get done.”

“I’m just saying a little fun would be good for you. You should go out. See people. Meet people. What is Macy doing today?” Macy was a good friend of Mai’s from high school. They were facebook friends and occasionally got coffee.

“No idea mom. She has kids, she’s probably doing some mom things today.”

“You should call her.”

“Uh hu,” Mai responded, while sorting through her underwear drawer for something clean and not depressingly un-sexy.

“The Christmas parade is today, you should go to that. She could bring her kids!”

“Mom, how do you know about the parade? You don’t even live in the state,”

“I have the internet. I like to know about things where you live.”

“Uh hu,” Mai nodded trying not to be annoyed. Did other people’s mother’s do this? One time when Mai’s old flat had been broken into, her mother had written a letter to the mayor complaining about his lax stance on crime. She was furious when she did not receive a reply. “Yeah Mom, maybe I’ll go. Probably not with Macy though.”

“I don’t understand, you two were so close.”

“Yeah mom, we were. Like fifteen years ago.”

“Whatever you want. Its your life. I know, I know.” But she didn’t know, of course.

Mai thought it might be nice to go to the parade. There would be the carnival and the stands. People would sell crafts and salty snacks and hot chocolate. Maybe she would go.

And, of course, she did. Wearing her least appalling pair of panties and her favorite, only slightly dirty sweater, Mai found herself at the Christmas parade, holding a cup of hot chocolate. The girl had put whipped cream on it.

Maybe living alone was starting to get to her, Mai worried. There were so many people here. Too many people. Did she not like people? Mai thought with sudden concern. She use to like people, didn’t she? A large man in a torn football jacket bumped into her, almost spilling her cocoa. Maybe not.

Some glitter had landed on the lid of her cup. “I saw Mama kissing Santa Claus...” sang a loud speaker nearby.

Yeah, thought Mai, who hasn’t. She decided to go home. She had a book to finish. And really, that laundry wasn’t going to do itself.

By Proxy

Moira was the replacement child. She feared the immaculate conception, sharks, baptism by proxy, and Fluff. The very idea of a Fluffer Nutter made her soul quake. She loved scones, high heels, and British comedies. Today, Wednesday, Moira was wearing four inch heels and a fitted gray pencil skirt. She’d had an interview that morning, it had not gone terribly well, and a date scheduled for late afternoon. Moira liked to plan late afternoon dates or ‘after work’ dates, as she liked to call them even though she wasn’t working, because they were more low pressure affairs and they got her home in time to watch her favorite shows. Tonight was Criminal Minds and her lovely ‘husband’ Matthew Gray Gubler. Mrs. Moira Gubler, Moira would mumble to herself as she settles into her armchair, hot tea in hand, she could get used to the name.

Moira trudged along the city street under the low gray sky, in her fitted pencil skirt, to her favorite cafe. The people around her were wrapped up in gray and brown scarves, gray and brown trench and puff coats, and gray and brown blankets, or so it appeared. This pulled the heaviness of the sky down to the sidewalk so that Moria, too, felt wrapped in gray and brown. Oh, great its Wednesday, Moira thought, not at all enthusiastically, as she pushed open the door. She had momentarily forgotten it was Wednesday.

Wednesdays meant Betty’s was crammed full of losers who did not want to pay full price for a scone. Moira was a full week regular and resented the intrusion. Half pricers hogged the seats, ate all the scones, and did not even have the decency to tip the workers. Moira swore that the scones were smaller on Wednesdays. They weren’t.

“Hey Kelly,” Moira greeted the lanky blonde behind the counter.

“Hey Moira. You look nice. Did you have an interview or something?”

“Yeah. Over at this architecture firm downtown.”

“How’d it go?”

Moira pulled a face.

“Well maybe it was better than you think. You don’t know how everyone else did.”

“Thanks.” Moira really did appreciate Kelly’s attempt at optimism, but she was getting a little tired of having to be appreciative. “Any new scones today?”

“We have a sour cherry. Its pretty good.”

“Great. I’ll have one and a non fat lattee, please.” Moira stuck two dollars in the tip jar while Kelly was steaming milk. She believed in over tipping, even when unemployed. She thought it was both good form and good karma.

“Here you go,” Kelly chirped, handing over the thick porcelain dishware. Moira loved that Betty’s had cups and saucers for their lattes and solid plates for their baked goods. It was one of the reasons she stuck to Betty’s. Moira was a sucker for a good plate.

“Have you seen Leo yet today?” Moira asked before turning away.

“Yeah, he was in this morning, but got all huffy cause Will was sitting at his table. He’ll probably be by later.”

“Is Will one of the Half Pricers?”

“Definitely,” Kelly laughed.

Leo was this old guy who came to Betty’s everyday. He would shuffle in wearing baggy corduroys and All Star high tops, order black coffee and a chocolate chip cookie (never a scone) and play checkers at the table by the window. The one with the chess board painted on the top. He would sometimes play for hours. Kelly, or one of the other girls, would occasionally pass by and sneak him a second cookie.

Leo was a fierce checkers player. A raze the buildings, salt the earth, take no prisoners kind of checkers player. He would laugh when he beat you. The more fully he trounced you the harder and louder he would laugh. Moira respected his enthusiasm.

She settled into Leo’s table, stuck a to go coffee sleeve under one leg to stop the wobble and took out her planner to jot down notes from the interview. Moira liked to review. She was not an architect. The job was an assistant position to the head of the firm. Emails, phone calls, dinner reservations. Moira had a Masters degree in late Tsarist Russian poetry.

The ‘stay at homers’ were out in full force today. They were not a Wednesday only group at Betty’s, but there did seem to be a few more of them today. They had circled up the buggies and taken up nearly every table. They seemed an impenetrable force to Moira. Career women who had given up their careers for late in life children. Both genetic and adopted.

“Now ladies” projected a woman in a well tailored shirt, “we are here today to learn about the available resources for nurturing our babies’ heritage.”

“Its a support group,” Kelly said, pulling the full garbage bag out of the trash bin.

Moira jumped slightly, caught unawares by Kelly’s nearness “What?”

“The women you’re starring at. They’re a support group for moms who adopted out of China. They usually come on Thursdays, but they had to reschedule.”

“Oh,” Moira paused.

“I think its kind of cool,” Kelly continued, pulling a tray of dirty dishes off the shelf, “You know, they learn about Chinese culture, food, history; that kind of stuff. Plus, apparently, there are classes on the language and play dates and stuff.”

“Huh. Which Chinese culture?”

“Um. Is there more than one?”

“I think so.”

“Probably the normal one. Anyway, I think its cool that they’re keeping the kids connected, you know.” Kelly starred at Moira, awaiting a reply.

“Um, yeah. It’s great” Moira responded in her best interviewee voice with matching smile after slightly too long of a pause. Really she was thinking, wow Kelly says “you know” a lot, is it meant to be a question?

Moira remembered a case a few years ago about a European couple sending a girl they had adopted back after seven or eight years. She remembered the couple lived in Hong Kong, but she couldn’t remember where the girl was from, or where they were sending her. Apparently, she wasn’t what they had wanted after all. Moria decided not to share this story with Kelly, it seemed inappropriate for the moment.

Moira looked down at her patterned tights. Perhaps this was where she had gone wrong. She thought the tights added a bit of personality and artistry to her otherwise professional outfit. The office had been sleek and gray in a sleek glass building. There were no plants, no posters, no pieces of framed art on the walls. No colors outside of the spectrum of shades of gray. The woman from human resources had been wearing a slightly too tight and boxy gray suit with a white blouse and what Moria suspected were shoulder pads. Moira had been surprised to see that women still wore collared white shirts to the office. Her carefully chosen wine blouse with a ruffle down the front suddenly seemed opulent and presumptive. Perhaps this is where she had gone wrong.

“So why do you want to work for Stewart, Murray, and Schmidt?”

“I respect the firm’s history of innovation in architecture and participation in the city’s urban renewal movement.” Moira had gotten that off of the web site.

Shoulder Pads nodded and wrote something down on her legal pad. “I see on your resume that you have no experience working in architecture.” She looked up at Moira. Moira looked back. It wasn’t a question.

“Um, no.”

Pause.

“Do you think any of your professional experiences are relevant to this position?”

“Well, I worked for two years in the offices of a university department as an assistant, and for over a year as the executive assistant to the Director of a nonprofit.”

“Yes.”

“... and while these were not in architecture firms, I believe that the experience in these office environments would transfer nicely to the needs of your firm. Both positions demanded the ability to multitask, interact with a variety of individuals, produce and monitor large and diverse amounts of correspondence.”

Pause.

“I kept the calendar for the Director at my last job.”

Pause.

“I type 85 words per minute.”

“Yes, I see that. It also says that this job was for Women Against the Bomb.”

“Yes, it was.”

“Can you tell me what that is?”

“Women Against the Bomb, is an pacifist women’s organization that fights against both nuclear weaponry and military action and expansion.”

“So how does this relate to architecture?”

“Well, of course the work of that organization does not directly relate to the work of your firm, but my experience working for and assisting the Director of that organization has, I believe, well prepared me to assist the head of your firm. I believe that many of the tasks and demands would be the same.”

“I also see that this position was over two years ago.”

“Well, yes.”

“What have you been doing for the last two years?”

“Ummm, well until about four months ago I was a teaching assistant.”

“A teaching assistant?”

“Yes.”

“That is not on your resume,” Shoulder Pads accused, turning over the single piece of paper as though Moira might have hidden this piece of information on the other side of the page.

“No. I didn’t really think it was relevant work experience for this position.”

“Where were you a teaching assistant?”

“NYU.”

“What?”

“NYU.”

“You were a teaching assistant at NYU?”

“Yes.”

Pause.

“In the Russian literature department....”

“I’m sorry, but I see that you have a BA here from Wellesley, but how does that qualify you to be a teaching assistant at NYU?”

“It doesn’t.”

Pause.

“I also have a Masters. In Russian literature. From NYU.”

“You have a Masters Degree?” again Shoulder Pads turned over Moira’s resume. “So you speak Russian?”

“Yes. That actually is on my resume.”

“I don’t see it.”

“At the bottom, where it says “Skills” I wrote that I speak, read, and write Russian, Serbian and French.”

“But your Masters degree...?”

“Oh, yeah. Um, I didn’t think that was relevant.” Of course, Moira had purposefully taken her degree off. After four months of futile job searches and disheartening interviews, all ending with “why do you want this job?”, Moira had deleted her degree at the recommendation of a friend who had stumbled into recruiting.

“You speak three foreign languages?”

“Yes.”

“But not Spanish?”

“No,” Moira almost sighed. “No, I do not speak Spanish.” No one really cared how many languages Moira spoke, they only cared that she did not speak Spanish.

“We really would prefer someone who speaks Spanish.”

“Yes of course, Spanish is a very useful, and lovely language, but Russian is a useful language as well.”

“Really? Have you found it useful?”

“Yes.”

“How so?”

“Well, there are quite a few Russian and Eastern European immigrants in the US now a days.”

Pause.

“And with the expansion of the EU more former Soviet nations are joining the Union, potentially becoming more active in the global economy.”

“And how would that affect the firm?”

“Well, I understand that your firm is looking to expand their international design division. As assistant to the head of the firm, I would need to speak and correspond with a growing variety of people from a growing variety of nations... Russian... and French and Serbian could be extremely usefully in ... facilitating communications... and... increasing the appearance that the firm is an international firm.”

“The firm is international.”

“Yes, of course.”

Pause.

“So do you find Serbian is useful?”

There was a woman leaning against Betty’s window talking on her mobile. She was fighting with her boyfriend. It was unclear what exactly the man had done wrong, but it had been unforgivable and disrespectful. Evidently.

Leo shuffled over to the table.

“Morning,” Leo said, in spite of the fact that it was half past three, placing his coffee mug down on the table and yanking his box of checkers pieces out of his briefcase before settling down into the chair across from Moira.

“Hey, Leo. How goes it?”

“Well, well. Can’t complain. You are red.”

Moira nodded. And so it began. There was no conversation for the next thirty minutes as Leo destroyed Moria.

“You aren’t trying,” Leo charged.

“Not a good day, Leo.”

“No reason not to try. A bad day is all the more reason to try. Winning makes the day better.”

“I was never going to bet you.”

“Well, of course you weren’t. That is not the point.”

Kelly slid another cookie onto Leo’s plate. She left the piece of wax paper on top. Leo took it off, examined it, and folded the paper carefully before sticking it into his jacket pocket.

“Your shoes are ridiculous. You are red again. But you have to try this time or you have to move. I’d rather play alone if you aren’t going to try.”

Moira sighed, hunching her shoulders, preparing to try. “Why are my shoes ridiculous?”

“The heels are too high.”

“I like them high. They make my legs look longer.”

“Make your ass look good too, but they aren’t practical. You’re too smart to be running around in those things?”

“What do my heels have to do with my intelligence?”

“Can you run in those things?”

“No. My heels have nothing to do with my intelligence.”

Leo scratched his chin.

“Why’d you shave your beard, Leo?”

Leo smiled. Menacingly. Chuckled a bit and moved his piece across the board.

“Your beard?”

“I decided I need a change.”

“I liked the beard. I think you looked distinguished.”

“Yes yes, well. You know sometimes a change is nice.”

Leo thoroughly beat Moria a second time and then hastened her away in disgust.

“Fine,” Moira threw over her shoulder as she shoved her planner back into her large purse, “I have a date anyway.”

“Come back Friday when you are more focused,” Leo shouted at her.

The two remaining Stay at Homers glanced askant at Moira as she pulled open the front door. The little bell tinkled. The women were gossiping about their husbands. One was cheating with his new high heel wearing secretary.

Out on the sidewalk once again, Moira noticed that the wind had picked up. She was regretting her choice of tights over pants. She thought the skirt would be more impressive at the interview, would make her feel more authoritative. It clearly had not worked. And really, authoritative was not what they wanted anyway. A plastic bag, caught in the wind, wrapped around Moira’s right ankle, tripping her.

“Shit,” she exclaimed under her breath as she reached out for something to catch her. Her hand grasped the lapel of a gray tweed coat.

“Hey,” cried the man inside the coat.

“Sorry, sorry, crap” Moira muttered looking up and tripping again. Maybe Leo was right and these shoes were stupid. But they were so cute. The man had grasped Moira’s elbow to steady her.

“You okay there?” he asked, ducking his head slightly in an attempt to make eye contact.

“Yeah, I’m fine. This stupid bag tripped me” Moira explained, trying to shake the bag off her foot. She didn’t want to touch the thing anymore than need be. She didn’t know where it had been.

The man in the gray tweed coat reached down and removed the bag. He balled it up and threw in into the trash bin on the other side of Moira, leaning in a little close. “I hate litters, don’t you?”

“Absolutely,” Moira, scanned the gray tweed coated man. Tall, dark, and handsome, if a little soft around the middle.

He smiled at her, partly because she was attractive, if a little frazzled at the moment, and partly because her scan was not at all subtle. “Aaron,” he stated, releasing her elbow and sticking out his hand.

“Moira,” she responded sticking out her hand in return.

“Where are you off to in such a hurry?”

“A date, actually.”

“Really?” he sounded a little disappointed.

“A first date.”

“Lucky guy.”

“Don’t worry it wont go well. Today is not a good day for a first date.”

“Do you think Friday will be a better day?” asked Aaron, a little hesitantly.

“I think it might,” Moira bit her bottom lip and glanced at her heels and patterned tights. Leo was wrong.

The low clouds started to rain.

“Fucking rain,” some guy muttered as he passed.