by Alice Bello
I could tell my fellow male co-workers were beside themselves with grief. Hot chick starts at work, and before any of them (all ex-high-school jocks) can score, or even get to second base, a nerd with a pocket protector snags the hot cheerleader.
I smiled as I waved to my wounded co-workers.
I watched as Nicole leaned in and whispered something into the nerd’s ear. The rest of him got as red as his ears and he looked like he was about to explode—or shoot straight up into the air like a cruise missile.
He was still smiling ear to ear as he staggered out of the physical therapy department.
“What was that about?” I asked.
Nicole looked up from her charts and smiled. “That’s Lonny from accounting.”
“Now the pocket protector makes sense. What doesn’t make sense is why you were flirting so hard with him?”
“What do you mean?” She didn’t look offended—she barely looked up from her chart.
“I didn’t think he’d be your type, that’s all.”
“Oh, you think I’d be interested in a rich doctor or one of those Cro-Magnon frat boys here?” She glanced their way and rolled her eyes. “Not a chance.”
I couldn’t conceal my curiosity. “But the nerdy accountant, that’s your type?”
“He’s opened my door for me every morning since I started here. He’s always out front reading a book when I get here. The other day he was reading an Alice Hoffman book—she’s my all-time favorite author—and the next thing you know we were having lunch together. He even bought me a book he thought I’d like, some guy I’d never heard of before, but I just loved the book.” She finally looked up from her chart. “A hell of a lot better than any bouquet of roses.”
I had to agree, thinking back to last night’s sack of snickerdoodle cookies.
Nicole’s eyes rolled up in her head and she bit her lower lip. “But I’m going to have to overhaul his wardrobe. I love the glasses but the pocket protector has to go.” She smiled at me. “It’s not like I want to change him, just his clothes.”
Nicole was just one surprise after another.
Later I saw the two of them sitting side by side in the cafeteria and all I could think was how much I wanted Dean to be waiting at the door to my apartment with some tiramisu and a box of condoms.
I tried to shake this image. But by the time I paid for my meal and finally sat down to eat it, I found I’d picked out three bowls of lime jell-o and five bottles of orange juice. I ate one of each, tentatively, and then pitched the rest.
I still had half my shift to go. I prayed I’d make it.
Chapter 11
My first client after lunch threw me a little. He was already seated at a table in the back when I arrived, and from my vantage point walking over to him he looked just like Dean. My heart jumped and I started feeling hot all over, all over again. But as he turned and said hello I saw it wasn’t Dean—his eyes were too close together and his nose too long. But for a moment there I thought my daydreams were coming true.
The rest of my day trudged on by: new hips, thrown out shoulders, post-op knees, and one unlucky devil that had just gotten his cast taken off his right hand after six months of mending—it had been shattered in a freak beer keg incident.
But when I finally got home Dean wasn’t waiting with cookies and that box of condoms. There weren’t even any messages on my house phone—though I’d been checking my cell between clients.
About seven o’clock my cell rang. I didn’t know the number so I thought immediately it was Dean, so I took a deep cleansing breath to try and calm myself, and answered.
“Hi, is this Dana?”
Not Dean. The guy’s voice was scratchy and he had a Brooklyn accent.
“Um, yes. This is Dana.”
“Fuckin’ A!! The other day this hot chick had me detail her car for her, said I should give you a ring.”
Cripes! “I’m sorry...what’s your name?”
“Tony.”
“Yeah, Tony, I’m real sorry. That hot chick is my cousin and she still can’t accept that...” I couldn’t believe I was going to say this just to get rid of a guy. “I’m a lesbian.”
“Huh?”
“She just keeps thinking that all I need is the right man to set me straight.”
“I can’t fucking believe this!” Tony gave a defeated sigh. “First my girl goes all dike for her best friend and now I get set up with another. God fucking hates me!”
Click, Tony was gone.
I felt bad for a few minutes. Bad for lying, bad for using the “lesbian thing,” bad for so many things. Maybe I’d go confess my sins—and sinful thoughts and plans for Friday—to the priest at Immaculate Conception. But I wasn’t Catholic.
Bess was Catholic, and I’d gone along once with her and sat outside as she took confession. That poor priest dropped his Bible three times.
~*~
My dream started that night with the original hands that used to dig through soil. Soon they were rubbing me, strong and gentle. But soon enough I realized the hands no longer belonged to Gus. I sighed as I saw Dean’s handsome mug. I was fiercely checking out his gorgeous naked body as he tugged me over onto my back. This was always my favorite part of the dream, being so exposed as he fondled me and eventually made love to me.
Dean’s hands caressed my every inch, down my breasts, over my usually ticklish belly, and then down into my nether region. Fingers flicking and teasing and probing inside me as the other hand reversed its journey, gently rubbing my flesh as it ascended again to my heaving, tingling breasts—pinching each nipple playfully.
And then suddenly Dean stopped. His hands abruptly left my tender skin, magically extricated from my sex without my noticing.
I opened my eyes and there stood Dean dressed as he was the night before. A beautifully colored button down shirt, well fitting black slacks and a casual, though sexy, sports jacket. The look on his face though, it was reproachful.
“You’re not wearing that, are you?” He said.
I was suddenly, inexplicably standing, and I turned quickly to gaze in a full length mirror that wasn’t actually in my apartment. I stood there in an old stained t-shirt, oversized bleach stained sweats, over my ratty old water damaged boots. Not a bit of makeup on, and my hair was a frizzed-out disaster.
I awoke with a start, my breathing coming hard and rapid, this time I was covered in a cold sweat.
“Oh my god! What am I going to wear?” Not to mention what was I going to do with my hair! And I didn’t even own a tube of lipstick.
The blast from my alarm clock scared the crap out of me, making me jump and fall right out of bed onto my cold hard wood floor. I crawled over and reached up to turn it off. Then I pulled myself up using the bed frame. I whirled around, the alarm still racketing in my head, along with my terror over wardrobe and makeup.
Don’t forget that hideous hair, a voice in my head chimed.
I whirled around on the spot, one word blaring neon in my skull: Bess!
I scrambled to my phone and hit her speed dial. Ring, ring, ring, ring... voice mail!
“Bess, it’s me. Call me!” I blurted out, and then shrank back at the shrill tone in my voice. “It’s an emergency.”
I called back an excruciating five minutes later and got the same answer: “Leave your message after the beep.”
“I know I sound desperate, but please, please call me back!” I stopped and listened to the utter nothingness on the other end, hoping Bess would miraculously just pick up. “It’s Dana.”
Then I texted her.
I skipped making a pot of coffee. I was wired enough. With the adrenaline pumping through my veins, another stimulant might well make me run up a wall and explode like a Gremlin.
I took my phone into the bathroom and had it beside the shower while I hastily washed up. Every few seconds I thought I heard the damn thing start ringing, but every time I stuck my head through my shower curtain (all seven times) my phone would be lying
there innocently taunting me.
I checked my messages as I pulled on my scrubs and pulled my hair back into a ponytail. Nothing. I checked them again as I bounded down Hamilton Avenue toward the hospital. Somehow I’d run behind and now I was going to be late for the first time since I’d started at St Luke’s.
I jogged across the intersection, almost mowing down a couple of nuns, and running right into a transvestite in a business suit. She was the tallest woman I’d ever seen, her five inch size thirteen heels not helping with that fact. Her makeup was perfect, as was her hair, pulled up in an elegant twist. Her suit fit with a shrewd sensuousness, hugging each of her hormone-injection augmented curves.
“Slow down honey, you’re gonna knock yourself out,” she said in a high baritone.
It wasn’t until she’d disappeared around a corner that I suddenly wanted to ask her to help me with my makeup problems.
Once at work I suddenly remembered Nicole. I shot my gaze around the physical therapy room as I pushed through the doors. She wasn’t there, damn!
I asked the receptionist if Nicole was scheduled for today, but she informed that she’d taken a long weekend.
I was sure that the pale little accountant would be tagging along on this extended weekend jaunt. Simultaneously being seduced and made over.
I was staring at the receptionist. She was about ten years older than me, but she concealed it well beneath makeup and a hip, younger than she was hairdo. I was about to ask this perfect stranger if she would help me find a dress, buy makeup and then do my hair and makeup tonight at my apartment—a completely desperate and pathetic move—when my phone sprung to life, Heartbreaker by Pat Benatar. Bess’ personal ring tone.
I sighed deeply as I answered. “Thank god you called me back!”
“Suddenly realize you can’t dress yourself?” Bess said.
“Among other things.”
“Don’t get your panties in a bunch. I’ve got the perfect dress picked out for you. Thank god we’re the same size. But I don’t have time for lingerie shopping today—I’ve got a brownstone in Manhattan to show. So you go to Macy’s and buy a red satin thong.”
“Red? A thong?”
“Yeah, a thong. Anything else will show through the material of this dress.”
Oh, I thought. “It’s not see-through, right?”
“No, cupcake, it’s silk.”
Yikes. “What about a bra?”
“Already built into the dress. I wish I could be there to see the good doctor go all non-verbal on you. You might not make it to the rest of the date.”
I smiled in spite of myself. I wasn’t even sure I wanted to sleep with Dean yet... well, there was probably one percent of me still on the fence.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Bess said, “and yes, you really do wanna fuck this stud. So live it up. I-gotta-go, see-you-tonight!”
And she was gone.
I had to give her credit, she could read me like a book, even over the phone.
~*~
I’ve never shopped for lingerie before. And the only times I’ve been in Macy's were with Mother, and until lately I’d never imagined that she would have a use for such items. So after work I searched for a good half hour before I found that department.
I could’ve asked a sales clerk, but number one, I’d die of complete embarrassment (hello, my name is Dana and I’m planning on being a complete ho-bag slut tonight); and two, whomever I asked might follow me there and then try to sell me something — and I needed alone time to make this purchase.
It wasn’t hard to find thong underwear. There weren’t any regular panties, barely even a handful of bikinis — but there were seven rows of thongs in every color and fabric choice imaginable.
As I sifted through the racks, finding red silk and red nylon, red leather, even fuzzy red sheepskin thongs, the red satin thong was eluding me. I wondered as I searched what difference it would make... but then Bess had been completely right about the last outfit, so to doubt her now would be foolish.
Suddenly I started to feel self-conscious. It felt like every woman passing by me was staring at me. Paranoia started to set in and I started to think they were whispering about me, sifting through each and every thong in the store.
“See that poor thing... must be her first trip to a department store.”
“Hope she knows those aren’t head bands.”
“Bitches,” I grumbled under my breath.
“Hi, can I be of assistance?” A bright cheery woman’s voice sounded beside me, making me jump about six inches off the tile floor, and causing the three dainty silk thongs I’d had in my hands to soar up into the air — one pair landed on a well-coifed older woman’s shoulder as she breezed by.
Oh god, I thought. She’s probably friends with my Mother!
The sales chick had ninja like reflexes, reaching out and snapping the thong right from the older woman’s shoulder without her ever knowing. Then she retrieved the other thong missiles and returned them to their slots on the racks.
“Thanks,” I said.
“I didn’t mean to scare you... it just seemed that you were kind of lost — you’ve been searching over here for roughly forty-five minutes.”
“No way!” I looked at my watch. It was already ten after six. Bess would be at my place in twenty minutes, followed way too soon by dean at eight! “I’m never going to make it.”
“Of course you will.” the sales chick assured me. “Just tell me what you’re looking for.”
I felt my face blush to a vibrant beet red. “I need... I mean I’m looking for ...” I took a really deep breath. “A red satin thong.” There, I said it. I suddenly felt so relieved.
But the look on the sales chick’s face wasn’t a good sign. She was in deep contemplation. “I believe we sold out of those during last week’s reduction sale.” She tapped her beautifully manicured finger against her chin.
“But, if I’m not mistaken, we received a new shipment this morning. Stock probably just hasn’t had a chance to bring them out to the floor.” She patted me on the shoulder. “Just give me a few minutes and I’ll go look, okay?”
I nodded my head, feeling grateful for her help, but still wracked with shame — this poor woman was going hunting through the loading docks for a lousy pair of slut bomb undies for me.
By then I was sure every eye-in-the-sky surveillance camera was honed on me. I could hear them now. “Crazy woman in scrubs is touching each and every pair of women’s panties. Keep an eye on her.”
Then I started to imagine that the sales chick wouldn’t be able to find the thong. And then I had a brief yet jarring scene from Miracle on 34th Street run through my head, where my Macy's sales chick came to tell me that they didn’t have the thong I wanted, and then bringing out a huge newspaper ad strewn scrap-book she would tell me that Gimbels had what I was looking for, “for half off.”
I shook this silly fantasy off just as the sales chick rounded the bend and rushed back to me. She looked a little winded, her hair was windblown and she had a dark gray smudge on the shoulder of her white blouse.
“Oh god, I’m so sorry. You didn’t have to crawl into anything, did you?”
“Nope, just jumped down into the cargo flat, rifled through a few crates and voila —” She produced the satin thong.
I had a vision of Indian Jones with her starring in it, daringly jumping down into a pit of snakes to find the holy thong. “You must be the best sales person here,” I said in awe.
“It’s nothing, ma’am.” She led me to the closest check out station and rang me up. When the price popped up on the viewer I gasped in sticker-shock.
“A hundred and fifteen bucks!”
“It’s Dior.” she said, reading the look on my face.
I shook my head in disbelief, and then rummaged through my book bag for my credit card. “For that much you’d think these puppies would go down on you.”
“They do,” the sales chick said, her smile rather wicked a
nd knowing.
I handed her the card. “Ring me up, then.”
~*~
Fifteen minutes later I was dripping wet from the shower and Bess was ringing my door bell. I tossed a towel around myself and splashed water all over my hardwood floors as I rushed to answer. Swinging the door open I suddenly realized that it wasn’t Bess... it was a UPS delivery man with a certified package.
His eyes took in the sight of me as I clutched at the towel to try and cover what was already showing. Then he looked away, an infuriating smile spreading across his face.
“If you’d just sign here.” He held out his electronic clipboard.
Cripes, I thought. Now this goon will go back and tell Thomas another tale about his crazy, total tramp ex-girlfriend.
I signed and he handed me an itty-bitty package about the size of a DVD case.
I closed my door and collapsed back against its cool painted surface. Oh god, this couldn’t get any worse, I thought as I absently tossed the package on the table.
Another knock on my door. Probably that UPS asshole with his camera phone out, trying to get a new picture to add to their hall of fame.
“Look asshole,” I screamed through the door. “If you don’t leave me alone I’m fucking calling the cops.”
“Fine,” came Bess’ voice back at me. “You can do your own makeup and hair then. And forget wearing my slinky red silk dress.”
I tore open the door and drug Bess into my apartment. “You wouldn’t believe my day.”
Bess spun around and pulled the stunning red silk dress from its carrying sleeve. “Forget today, you’re not gonna fucking believe your night!”
Chapter 12
“Tomorrow we’re going to have to buy you your own makeup,” Bess said while applying my eye shadow. I gave her a hysterical glare with my free eye. “Don’t worry, I’ll teach you how to apply everything. I’ll even show you how to do your own hair.”
I couldn’t imagine being able to do these things for myself, but then I couldn’t imagine I’d ever look the way I did with this junk on.
