by Claire Adams
As she searched YouTube for songs to play, a creeping feeling of guilt and doubt started digging its claws into me, probing and pulling beneath my skin. What was I doing? Why was I doing this? Was it some cheap, petty attempt at revenge after being ditched by Lilah? Despite how physically beautiful the woman next to me was, I wasn’t attracted to her in any way other than the most basic of levels. Try as I might, I could not get thoughts of Lilah out of my mind most of the night. I’d been trying to fool myself, but continuing with this farce was pointless.
A quick assessment of the road ahead confirmed that it was empty aside from us. Without warning, I yanked up the handbrake and spun the car around in a 180 degree turn, smoking and screaming the tires, and throwing Angeline violently back into her seat.
“Oh my God!” she shrieked, the blood draining from her face with shock. “What the hell did you do that for?!”
“Sorry,” I said calmly and flatly. “I've just remembered something extremely urgent at work that I absolutely have to get back to. There's no way I can put it off any longer. Sorry for cutting the evening off so quickly, but I have to do this.”
“I, uh . . . Well, all right then,” she said, clearly upset.
We drove the remainder of the distance to her apartment in silence. When I dropped her off, all she said was a listlessly mumbled, “Bye.”
I didn't care. I shut the door behind her and roared off toward home.
***
A dry, sticky mouth and a splitting headache aren’t exactly the most pleasant ways to wake up. Drinking a ridiculous amount of whiskey after I returning from my failed attempt at a revenge date hadn’t been the smartest idea I’d ever had. It had, however, calmed me down and temporarily quieted all the warring thoughts in my mind.
I heaved myself out of bed and started to mentally prepare for the morning's rigorous workout, after which I would head in to the office. It was Saturday, yes, but I wanted to work. It would keep my mind sharp, focused—and off certain things. A certain person, I suppose I should have said.
I spent the morning working out and sweating my hangover away, although, try as I might with exercise, nutrition, and rehydration, the headache wouldn't go away. I hated taking medication and would only do it as a last resort, but at the moment it seemed as if popping a few pills was the only way I'd be able to get any respite from the dull, persistent throbbing in my skull.
I asked my chauffeur to drive me to the office as I was in no mood to deal with the city traffic myself. Once there, I immediately started getting to work on the new campaign for VIV Perfume—the project I'd met with Anton about in France. This was going to be a challenge, as it would require a lot of in-depth research into French markets and consumer behaviors in the fields we were trying to market the perfume to. Luckily, exhaustive and obsessive research was my thing—there was nothing like a good challenge to get me going and get my mind mentally focused.
I managed to get several hours of solid research in before my concentration started to falter. I stood from my desk, did a few stretches, and then stood at the windows looking out over the expansive view of the city that stretched to the edge of the horizon. The sun was sinking low in the sky, but there were still a few hours of daylight left. I decided to go for a walk and get a quick bite to eat before returning to the office.
As I was walking out of the building, my phone buzzed. I took it out of my pocket and was surprised to see a message from Lilah. I opened it and read it with eager eyes.
Hi, Asher. I just wanted to apologize about last night. I'm sorry if I came off as a bit defensive or standoffish. I just wasn't feeling too great. However, I'm actually feeling a bit better now. What are you up to?
A broad smile crept over my face. Maybe she wasn’t as disinterested as I’d thought. Maybe she really had been feeling bad the night before and I jumped to conclusions. Maybe. Only one way to find out. I typed out a reply.
No worries. I'm glad to hear you're feeling better. I'm actually at the office working on a new campaign, the one for the French company VIV Perfume. You don't happen to know much about the French perfume market, do you? I've been researching all afternoon and trying to brainstorm ideas. Let me know if you have anything that might help save my brain. Hope you're enjoying your Saturday!
I strolled along the bustling streets, enjoying the hustle bustle of weekend pedestrian traffic; it was strangely calming, this moving sea of strangers. After a few minutes, I got a reply from Lilah.
As it so happens, one of my college friends has been living in Paris for the last five years, and she works in the fashion industry. I'm sure there's a good crossover with the perfume market somewhere in there—I could arrange a Skype conference call with her, if you'd like? We could pick her brain and probably gain some valuable insight into the market. What do you think? I can come in to the office later; I don't have any plans.
My smile broadened as I read her reply. Hopeful optimism, coupled with inspiration, began spreading throughout my body.
“Well, suddenly this weekend isn't looking so bad after all,” I said to myself. “Not looking too bad at all.”
I responded with:
I'll be at the office all afternoon and evening. Come on in whenever you're ready. See you later :)
Chapter Twelve
Lilah
Some of the guilt I'd been feeling since the previous evening began to alleviate. Even though I’d tried, I couldn’t shake the feeling that I had acted, quite frankly, a little selfish and had let my own fears get in the way the night before—characteristics that were usually alien to me.
I'd made assumptions about Asher's motivation for taking me out to celebrate. It was an immature move and after some thought and an evening of beating myself up over it, I decided I had been too harsh on him. I mean, did I really expect him to buy the lame ass excuse about not feeling well?
My guilty conscience was wreaking havoc on me. I had to not only make it up to him, but give him a chance to prove that his wanting to spend time with me was not solely motivated by a desire to replay the drunken evening that ended with more than a handshake between colleagues. He deserved the chance to prove me wrong out of professional respect, and as a friend.
Of course, I couldn't deny the chemistry was there between us—but to reduce his desire to spend time with me to solely that, seemed like I had been blowing things a little out of proportion.
So I texted him and opened up the option to spend time with him—with the pretext being that of a professional context. Although it wouldn’t be a typical day at the office if we'd be the only ones there.
He'd come across as rather eager to follow up on my suggestion of Skyping my friend Alicia in Paris so, as soon as I finished reading his reply, I sent her a message asking if she was available to chat in a couple of hours. When she responded that she was, I got ready to go in to the office.
***
It was late in the evening when I walked into the building. It was weird being there on a weekend. The space which was normally bustling with activity and crowded with people was empty and most of the lights were out. It was almost like being in an entirely different building. I went straight through to Asher's office and knocked on the door.
“Lilah?” came a muffled but familiar voice from within.
I pushed the door open a little and stuck my head in. “Hi, Asher,” I replied.
“Come on in,” he insisted.
I complied. Asher was sitting in his chair, leaning back with his hands behind his head and his feet up on his desk. I couldn't help but laugh.
“Hard at work or hardly working?” I asked with a cheeky grin.
“Hey, I'm not a machine,” he replied, “even though I'm not far off from one! I've gotta kick back sometime, you know.”
“I see this. The man isn’t quite the myth the buzz around town makes you out to be, huh?” I chuckled. “I'm just kidding.”
“I know, I know. Come on in, have a seat.”
I walked in and took a
seat across from him, staring over his huge desk at him for a few moments before speaking. The subtle light of his office only enhanced how attractive he was. I was finding it hard to keep my eyes off of him.
“So, your friend in Paris is ready to have a chat with us, right?”
“She is. She's waiting for us right now, actually.”
“Well, then, let's not keep her waiting any longer, shall we? Let me fire up the projector and the quadrophonic sound system. You brought your notebook, right?” he said, eyeing the carrying case I had placed in my lap. “Just hook it up to these cables, and we can get things rolling.”
We proceeded to make the call and chatted with Alicia for nearly an hour, taking notes as she responded to our questions. At the end of the call, Asher asked her for her address.
“I'm going to arrange a little something to be sent to you as a thank you gift for everything you've helped us with,” he said.
“Thanks so much! That’s very kind of you,” Alicia replied after giving him her address. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Mr. Sinclair, and it was great to catch up with you, Lilah,” she said to me. “Call me soon. You still need to come visit!”
“I will do that. Thanks again for your help, Ali. Bye,” I said, and then we cut off the call.
“Well, well, well,” Asher gushed. “That was some excellent insight into the market there. I think we've got a lot we can work with—although plenty of research is still going to have to be done to really get into the meat and bones of this. Still, we've got plenty of time to work on it. I'm hoping you'll be able to do as stellar a job on this project as you managed to do on the last one.”
“I'm hoping so, too.”
“All right, well, let's type up all the info we got from your very helpful friend. I'll create a Google Doc so that we can both edit it in real time from anywhere. We can add whatever other pointers we pick up from our research and keep fleshing it out over the next couple of days.”
“I don't know about you, since you’ve apparently been here most of the day, but I've still got plenty of energy left. I feel up to doing a little research right now, actually.”
He smiled. “Wow. Someone who can match me step for step in the race, huh? Sure, if you're inspired, I am, too. Let's get on this then.”
We got stuck in and researched the markets on our respective computers for the next couple of hours. Eventually, we were both running low on energy. Asher was the first to call it quits.
“Well, that's about it for my evening, I think,” he commented. “We've got a ton of data now.”
I stood and stretched.
“That was a productive session,” I said. “I'm already getting some pretty solid ideas on what I can do with this.”
“Excellent! But for now, let's forget about it for a while. I mean, it's already after 9:00 on a Saturday evening, and here we are sitting in the office we already spend most of our time at during the week. Jeez, I haven't even eaten dinner yet.”
“You know,” I said, not sure why I was suggesting this, but it just seemed right at the time, “I've got a ridiculous amount of Indian food left over from lunch at my place. Some friends came around to eat, but we ended up doing more talking than eating. We could head there, heat it up in the microwave, and maybe watch a movie to wind down from all this work if you’re up for it.”
“That sounds great. I'm starving. I could eat right now!”
I laughed. “I guess it works out then. I’m ready when you are.”
“Great. I'll just shut down everything here, and I'll meet you at your place.”
I asked if he remembered my address, which he did, and then I headed out of Asher’s office with a goofy smile on my face that I hoped he hadn’t seen.
***
After Asher finished off the last of the tikka masala, he sighed appreciatively and dabbed at his mouth with a napkin.
“That was fantastic,” he said. “Really hit the spot. Thank you.”
“I should be thanking you. There’s no way I could have eaten all of that myself. It was good, though, wasn’t it?” I agreed as I ate the last of my naan bread. “I should eat at that place more often. The food is just divine. And the service is fantastic, too.”
“Well, what shall we do now, Lilah? I can head home if you're feeling tired. It was a pretty long evening.”
“Actually, I'm still wide awake. Still bursting with energy, really. I think I slept in too long this morning. Or maybe my mind is still kind of wired. I don't know how I'm going to get any sleep tonight.”
“So, you don't mind if I hang around for a while?”
“I’d actually enjoy the company. So, by all means, stick around for a bit. I don't have any plans this evening, anyway.”
I tried not to overanalyze if inviting Asher to stick around was a particularly good idea or not. We'd been enjoying light, easy conversation all through dinner. As much as I hated to admit it to myself, that at ease feeling I’d had the first time we went to dinner was still there. In fact, I was comfortable around him in a way that I hadn't been with anyone else for longer than I could remember.
There was also the fact that neither of us had suggested drinking—and I certainly wasn't going to bring it up—so it seemed things were safe for the time being.
“Would you like some chai tea?” I asked him. “I usually have a cup every evening.”
“Sure. Sounds good,” he said with a smile. “I do enjoy a good cup of chai.”
I made my way to the counter and started brewing the chai as we continued talking. If I were to have guessed, it seemed that Asher was just as much at ease as I was.
Somehow, as we were drinking the tea, the conversation turned to family matters—a subject I had previously touched on briefly with him, but that he had yet to open up about. A strange look crossed his face as we broached the topic. A flicker of something I couldn’t quite place—anger, regret, or merely pain, perhaps. However, as quickly as it appeared it was gone. I wondered if it was a good idea to continue with the topic of family considering how private Asher always seemed to be, but curiosity edged me on.
“So, Asher, there's something that I've been wondering for a while,” I said. “I’m curious. Control of the Sinclair Agency was given to you when you were 20, right?”
“That's right.”
“Why did it go straight from your grandfather to you instead of to your father?”
His face tightened and he looked away. I could tell it was a sensitive subject, and I quickly started to regret asking the question.
“I apologize, I’m prying, and I shouldn’t have asked,” I said hurriedly. “It's not important. I'm sorry, let's just forget—”
“You're right. It's not a subject I'm entirely comfortable talking about, but it's a subject I do actually need to talk about, as unpleasant as it is. At least, that’s what I’ve been told. It does me no good to keep these things bottled up inside.”
“Are you sure? I mean, we really don't have to discuss this.”
He looked up at me with an intense look simmering in his eyes. A look that churned every emotion inside of me.
“Actually, I’m not sure. But I want to talk about it with someone I feel I can trust, and I do feel like I can trust you, Lilah.”
His words seeped into my soul and warmed parts of me I’d forgotten about. I smiled faintly as I sipped on my tea and he began to speak in a slow, calm tone. I could sense he was doing his best to keep things together and remain collected. The story was obviously stirring some deep-seated, emotional pain. Despite that, I could also feel that he needed this, that he needed a little catharsis from the pain.
“My father . . . Well, he was not what I would call a good man,” he stated. “He was a drunk, and he was violent. I was too young when everything happened to remember, but what my father did is why I don’t have a relationship with him. It’s why my grandfather took me in and raised me. That's why I always look to my grandfather for inspiration. I modeled myself after his example when I
was growing up. He was everything my father wasn't—good, noble, disciplined, hard-working.”
Asher paused and took a breath. I tried to wrap my mind around all he was saying. I couldn’t help but wonder what Asher’s father had done to cause him the chance to have a relationship with his son. As my mind was spinning with the possibilities, Asher continued his story.
“My grandfather grew up as the ninth child in a large, dirt-poor family of immigrants. When he and his family came to the United States, they literally had nothing but the clothes on their backs. And as the youngest of nine children, my grandfather rarely had anyhing but hand-me-downs from his siblings.
“But, this instilled a sense of ambition in him. He was absolutely determined to build an empire, to rise high above his humble beginnings. And, he did. He joined the army during the second World War, rose through the ranks, and left the army a war hero. Then, he started the Sinclair Agency and, through sheer grit and determination, he turned it from a two-man operation run out of a single, run-down, rented office in a slum into one of the greatest marketing firms in this city.
“He got married young. They wanted a big family, but having children proved difficult for him and my grandmother. In the end, after many years of trying, they finally had a child—my father. My grandmother considered it a miracle after all that they’d been through.
“As an only child, she spoiled him. He had little to no discipline at home because my grandfather was so obsessed with his work and always at the office or flying off somewhere on business—his only failing, I think—but a failing that turned out to have significant consequences.
“My father grew up in an entirely different situation than my grandfather. He only knew the comforts of a wealthy lifestyle and didn't have to work for anything. My grandmother, so happy that she finally had a child, lavished him with attention and gifts. From what I understand, my father grew up lazy and arrogant and, in his teenage years, began to develop a violent streak.
“My grandmother was diagnosed with cancer and died suddenly when my father was a young man. According to my father, he took it hard and turned to alcohol to ease the pain—and quickly became addicted. My grandfather was stricken with grief and became even more distant from my father. He told me once he wished he could do it over again, but life doesn’t give you that option. You have to make the most of it and do the right thing the first chance you’re given.
