When Destiny Calls

by Eric Asher

  “I bet she didn’t, well at least he has finally realised how much I did for him.”

  “Anyway, a few of us wanted to ask you to come out with us tonight. We didn’t get the chance to say goodbye and we’ve missed you.”

  “Tonight? Well erm.”

  “No excuses Faith. We need to say goodbye properly.”

  I laugh “ok ok, where and when?”

  “Yay! Meet us in The Porterhouse on Grafton Street at eight and then we can go from there. I feel a bit of eighties music might be just what we need.”

  “Perfect, see you then Janie. Thanks for thinking of me.”

  “See you tonight then.” I hang up the phone.

  I walk into my bedroom and unpack the clothes I bought yesterday. I find a dress that I hadn’t initially wanted to buy, but Bridie had promised me that it would look nice and when I tried it on she was right. I felt really sexy; I would never have picked it by myself.

  It is plain black, it has a rounded neckline that isn’t too low, the arms are batwing style and the dress comes down over my bum and halfway between my knee and my bum. But from the back it has practically an open back, the back crosses over itself down to one side of the dress and then it is ruched over my bum. It is absolutely beautiful and I decide that tonight is the night I am going to wear this because I want to feel special. I want Jake to see what he is missing out on.

  I take a taxi into town and am just pulling up outside the Porterhouse when I see Jake and Sasha walking in together. My heart is beating really fast, I can do this, I can make out I don’t care anymore.

  I pay the taxi driver and walk in to the pub and look around for Janie, but I don’t need to worry because she sees me first and runs up and hugs me. “Wow Faith, you look beautiful. What have you done? You look really different, there is a glow about you.”

  “Thanks Janie, but I haven’t really done anything, I bought myself a new dress and new makeup that’s all.”

  “Well it really suits you hun” she says grabbing hold of my hand and pulling me towards the back of the pub where the rest of the group are. “Look who I found coming in the door.”

  Everyone turns and they all come over and hug me “we’re sorry you left and we didn’t know Faith. We thought you were still on holiday after your aunties funeral.” Ben says. I’ve known Ben since I started working there, he has been there longer than me, he works in the post room and knows everyone.

  “It’s fine Ben, honestly it’s for the best. It’s what I needed to give me a good kick up my bum. I’ll be fine. I don’t need to look for work yet so I am going to have a break and think about what I really want to do.”

  “Well we didn’t want you to leave and for us not to give you a good send off.” He says pulling me into a hug.

  “Thanks guys, well then the first round is on me.” Everyone starts shouting no, they should be buying me a drink. “No I insist, my life has turned completely upside down in the last two weeks and I’m fortunate enough to have some really good friends and I want to thank you all.”

  Eventually Janie and me take everyone’s orders and go to the bar. While we are walking over to the bar, Jake and Sasha turn with their drinks when they see us. “Oh hi Faith. It’s good to see you” Sasha says, handing her drink to Jake so that she can give me a hug. I let her, because I like her and it’s not her fault she was taken in by his charm, after all I have been too.

  When she lets go she turns to take her drink and then Jake says “it’s good to see you Faith. You look well.” That’s it, that’s all he has to say?

  I feel disappointed but I am not going to let him spoil my night, I want to have fun. We order the round of drinks and then carry them all back to the group. I see Jake stood talking to another tall, leggy, blonde and Sasha just sitting there looking at him. I can see now how I look when we come on nights out.

  We have fun in the Porterhouse and it is soon time to go to the nightclub, we have decided to go to Club Nassau, which is only around the corner. It’s an eighties club and the music is always savage.

  We don’t have to queue for long to get in and we head straight to the bar and buy another round of drinks, this time I order baby Guinness’ to go with each of the drinks. We hand them out and then we all clink the small glasses in the middle of the circle and everyone says “to Faith”.

  I blush and say “to me.” We down them in one and put the empty glasses on the table. “Come on who wants to dance?” I say pulling Janie with me.

  We walk onto the dance floor and start strutting our stuff. Janie leans over and says into my ear “you look different tonight. You’re acting different tonight. I like this Faith, she’s great fun.”

  I laugh and say “I’m not different, I’m just allowing myself to be me.”

  We dance some more and then Janie says to me “don’t look behind you but you have an admirer. He hasn’t been able to take his eyes off you all night.”

  I smile and start swaying my hips “is it Jake?”

  She shakes her head “don’t tell me you are still hung up on him. No this guy is well hotter than Jake. Hang on he’s coming over.”

  I don’t turn around. I don’t dare turn around. She is just smiling at me and I can see her eyes following someone. All of a sudden I hear this deep voice “Faith how nice to see you again. You are looking very well tonight.”

  My heart almost stops in my mouth, I know that voice and I can smell his aftershave, it’s Armani Code and I can feel my hairs standing up on my arm. I slowly turn around and when I do I am met with the most beautiful blue eyes of Toby. “Hi Toby, I can’t believe this is your kind of hangout.” God, what a stupid thing to say.

  Before he can answer, Janie has pushed her way past me and is standing in front of me obviously waiting for an introduction. “Janie this is …. This is Toby, a new friend of mine.” I hope he understands that I don’t want Janie to know where I know him from.

  “Hi Janie, pleased to meet you, I’m Toby. Faith’s new friend.” He smiles at me and then winks. God that is so sexy.

  “Hi I’m very pleased to meet you. Faith where have you been hiding him?” She says giving me a dig in the ribs.

  I take a couple of minutes to check him out. He is now wearing a grey T-shirt that shows off his very muscly frame, he clearly works out at the gym. His beard is trimmed so that it is barely there but it is only on the edge of his face and the little line up to his bottom lip. His lips are pink, he then licks his lips. My eyes float up to meet his and they are twinkling, oh my god he saw me checking out his lips. I am totally embarrassed now.

  I start to turn away when he reaches out and touches my arm, the jolt of electricity hits me hard and I can’t move.

  “Don’t go Faith, stay and talk to me for a while. My friend here, Seamus seems to be eyeing up your friend.” I look over to his friend, who I hadn’t noticed before, and he is talking to Janie.

  “OK I won’t go yet.” I smile at Toby.

  “Can I get you both a drink seeing as you’ve been dancing your hearts out.”

  I nod and follow him to the bar. He orders us all a bottle of beer, taking the other two bottles back to Seamus and Janie. He then turns back to me.

  “You look beautiful tonight Faith. I don’t know why you are even thinking of having any work done.”

  I stare up at him and say “shush I don’t want anyone to know.” I put my finger up to his lips; it’s an automatic reaction to make him be quiet.

  His eyes light up and he looks into mine. He makes me feel all wobbly inside, I slowly take my finger away and he grabs my hand and lifts it to his lips and he kisses the top of my hand.

  He leans forward and whispers in my ear “I can assure you I wasn’t the only man looking at you tonight on that dance floor. Every man in here was watching you, you are just oblivious to how beautiful you really are.” He stands back a bit and then he leans forward again. “I think your boyfriend is looking for you.”

  He puts a couple of feet between us and l
ets go of my hand. I look at him “I don’t have a boyfriend.”

  “Well the looks I am getting off that guy over there says different.”

  I look in the direction that he is pointing and see Jake watching us. I smile at him and he turns and walks away. I turn back to Toby “he’s my old boss who let me go on Monday. Tonight is my leaving do.”

  “Ah I see. Well forget about him, let’s dance.”

  He takes my hand and leads me on the dance floor. I laugh as I realize that they are playing YMCA and we both dance doing all the actions. When it is finished, I grab his hand and drag him off the floor and back to Janie and Seamus.

  “I’m thirsty now after all that dancing” I reach out and take my beer and almost down it in one. “We need to get back to our group, we’ve been gone long enough, they’ll send out a search party soon.” I laugh trying to get Janie’s attention.

  “Well your friend looks like she isn’t going anywhere right now.” I look and see that her and Seamus are getting to know each other by using their tongues.

  I blush “looks like it. Do you want to come over and meet my other friends? Or is that just a bit weird?” I feel stupid now for asking, he is my doctor for gods sake, not my friend.

  He smiles and says “I would like that. Thank you.”

  He taps Seamus on the shoulder and tells him and Janie that we are going over to our group and they can meet us over there. Seamus just groans so we can assume he heard him.

  We laugh all the way over to the group. They all look in my direction when we walk over to them. “Hey where were you? We thought you had left without telling us.” Ben says.

  “I wouldn’t do that Ben. Everyone this is my friend Toby. Toby this is everyone. I won’t give you all their names because you’ll forget.”

  “Hi everyone” he says smiling at them all.

  We sit down and he starts talking to Ben about what he does. I can hear Ben telling him all about the post room and how important his job is. My heart skips a beat when I hear Ben ask Toby what he does for a living.

  “I’m a doctor, I lived in the States for years and have only been back in Ireland for two years. I have my own practice.”

  “Wow that’s impressive.” I don’t listen to anymore of their conversation.

  I turn to look at Jake, he is standing next to Sasha and he keeps looking in Toby’s direction. What is his problem? Jake disappears and Sasha comes over to me. “You look great Faith, is that a new dress?”

  “Yes it is do you like it?”

  “I do, it makes you look really sexy. Who’s your friend?”

  “That’s Toby I met him the other day. Do you want me to introduce you?” I feel a little bit jealous, I can’t be rude because she wants to meet him, but I know that once he looks at her, he won’t look at me the way he did earlier. That disappoints me because I really liked it.

  “Of course I do Faith. Have you looked at him? He is like a god!”

  I laugh because he is and I try to hide my emotions. I interrupt Toby and Ben “sorry guys, Toby this is Sasha, Sasha this is Toby.” I step back to allow her to talk to him. I can’t watch this gorgeous man, who has been paying me a lot of attention switch his attention to Sasha.

  “Hi Sasha” he says. “How do you know Faith?”

  “I worked with her. I’m quite new to the company, she helped me to settle in.”

  “Very good” he says. He looks at her face and then he says “I hope you are enjoying your night” and he turns away to continue talking to Ben. But before he does he winks at me again.

  I blush and Sasha looks at me strangely. “Where’s Jake?” I ask her.

  “He’s gone to order a taxi, he’s had enough. It was a hard day at work today.”

  “Are you leaving with him? Or are you staying here?”

  “Well I was going to stay” she says looking at Toby “but I might get a lift with him, my place is on his way home.” She looks disappointed and yet I am very happy that she is going home. I don’t want her getting together with Toby, I know that has nothing to do with me, but I just don’t.

  “Well thank you for coming out tonight, it was good to see you. Just remember everything you ever said to me about Jake. He’s an arrogant prick, yes he’s good looking but he’s a prick.”

  She smiles and I feel sympathetic towards her. I give her a hug and then she says goodbye to everyone and leaves.

  Toby stands up and comes over to talk to me “Ben is really nice, I like him. If he ever decides to leave that company I’d give him a job any day.”

  I smile at him and he takes my arm and moves me away from the group. “Faith I have been watching you and I know we have a meeting on Tuesday, but there are a lot of men in here who agree with me when I say you look hot. I have to go and find Seamus now before I say or do something that I shouldn’t, but you really don’t need me to make you beautiful. You already are!” He leans in and kisses me on the cheek. “See you Tuesday Faith, I think there’s more to this than you’ve told me and it’s my job to find out why you want this so badly.”

  I watch him walk off and I run my finger over my cheek where he kissed me, it feels like it has burnt me. Janie comes over a few minutes later looking slightly disappointed that Seamus has left.

  “Well you looked cozy with Seamus” I say teasing her.

  “Oh I was. Such a shame they had to leave, at least I got his number and he seems really keen to ring me and arrange a date. Thank you so much for knowing Toby and introducing me to Seamus.”

  She makes me laugh so I hug her. “You’re welcome. Now come lets dance and make fools of ourselves.”

  We had a great night together and she comes home with me and stays the night. It was a great night and I am so glad she asked me to go out.

  It’s Tuesday morning and I’m on my way to A New You’s office for my first counseling session. I assume he will be introducing me to the counselor and then leave us to get on with our session. I am going to be embarrassed when I see him, thinking of how he made me feel on Saturday night. It was the first time I wasn’t bothered that Jake went off with another woman.

  When I walk in Bev sees me and says “hey Faith, how are you?”

  “I’m good thank you. A bit nervous, I suppose I don’t know what to expect.”

  “Don’t worry Dr Whyte will put you at ease, he has a very good manner.”

  “Oh I didn’t realize he was doing the counseling, I thought it was going to be someone else.” My heart starts to race a little at the thought of explaining to Toby why I want to change so much.

  “No he has told everyone that he wants to counsel you.”

  When she says it she smiles at me.

  I feel his presence before I hear him. “Good morning Faith, are you ready to get started?”

  “Yes I suppose so.”

  “Do you want a tea or coffee?”

  “I’d love a cup of coffee please.”

  Bev says “I’ll bring them in Dr Whyte.”

  I stand and follow him down the corridor into his office. He lets me walk through the door and then he closes the door behind me. He doesn’t walk to his desk though he walks over to the other corner of his office where there is a couch and he indicates for me to sit down. I do.

  He sits down next to me and reaches over to the table to get his iPad so that he can write his notes.

  “So how did you enjoy your weekend Faith?”

  “I had a great weekend. I am doing some work around the house and I have been shopping for wallpaper.”

  “Very good, can you hang wallpaper?”

  I laugh “no but my dad is really good at it.”

  He laughs and Bev knocks on the door and comes in with the coffee.

  When she’s gone I pick up my coffee and take a sip, I use the time to study him. It feels really strange that this man wanted to talk to me and not Sasha on Friday night.

  After he puts his coffee cup down he says “so, I’m just going to explain how this works. We just chat, ab
out anything. Some of what I need to know you won’t tell me directly but you will when we are talking about other things. Does that make sense?”

  “I suppose, I don’t know what I expected, but I thought you might have some structured questions that you want to ask me or a multiple choice questionnaire which gives you the answers you are looking for.”

  “That can work but I prefer to make things as casual as I can so that you feel comfortable.”

  We talk about work and family and just basically about me and my life. Half way through the chat he asks me “so why now Faith? Why did you ring here last week? What happened to make you want to change your appearance so dramatically?”

  I think about my answer for a few minutes, he doesn’t say anything he just looks at me. “I have always been unhappy with the way I look. I am just plain, I never stand out and I want to stand out. I want someone to look at me and not see anyone else in the room. I don’t think anyone can do that without me changing the way I look.”

  I stop and think for a couple of minutes and then I carry on. “My auntie Jenny died a couple of weeks ago, I was very close to her. We knew she was getting close to dying and I visited her as much as I could. She had no children, I was the closest thing she had to a daughter and she treated me like one.” I stop again because I can feel the tears pricking my eyes.

  “Here Faith, take this” Toby cuts into my thoughts and hands me a tissue. I take it off him and dab my eyes.

  I smile, feeling ready to carry on. “So I had to deal with the fact that she is no longer here with us and then we went to the reading of the will. She left me the contents of her bank account, which is a lot of money. She left me half of her jewelry collection and the contents of a security deposit box. I decided I wanted to change my appearance to finally make me happy. This is what I need to do to make me feel whole.”