by Annie Jocoby
Yet, there was the voice that was speaking loudly in my head, reminding me that it wasn’t my first kiss. It was just my first willing kiss. Mr. Lucas kissed me, although I refused to kiss him back. So it was nothing like what had just happened. But, nonetheless, the kiss with Nick brought up those unwelcome memories, so my exhilaration and elation immediately starting commingling with depression and fear.
Jack was working tonight. Was it at the bakery or the bar? I couldn’t remember. I only knew that I had to see him and tell him about what happened. There was just no way that I could go home right then. I knew that I had a paper due, so I had to concentrate on that as much as I could, but only after I talked to Jack.
I finally remembered that his job was at the bakery that night, so I went there to get myself a knish and talk to him. He was there, working the cash register, and his face lit up when he saw me. “Scotty!” he said. “What a nice surprise!”
“Jack,” I said, nervously, as the line was forming. “I need a knish, and I really need to talk to you,” I whispered. “Can you take a little break?”
“Sure,” he said. “If you can wait a sec, I’ll get somebody to relieve me after this crowd of people get what they ordered.”
I nodded my head, as I got my knish and sat down. I nervously got a newspaper that was there for the patrons to read for free, and tried to read. But I couldn’t read at all. The words were jumbled. I wondered if the entire world could see me and think that there was something wrong with me. My hands were still shaking like a wild woman.
You need to calm down right now, I told myself. You have a paper to write, and if you don’t get that in, there will be hell to pay. Of course, if there were exceptional circumstances, the professor would allow papers to be turned in late, but I hardly thought that getting one’s first kiss would qualify as a special circumstance.
Finally, after what seemed like an absolute eternity, Jack was able to free himself and sit down and talk with me. “Scotty Marie, tell me what is going on,” he said, looking concerned. “You look really shaken. Did something happen with your brother or mother?”
I shook my head. “No. There have been no mother eruptions,” I said. As for Aaron, I really didn’t know. It was a topic that I willfully avoided, as I had to, if I was going to keep my sanity.
“Then what’s going on?” he gently asked.
“Um, Nick, he…” I started to wrap my napkin into a knot. “He…”
“He what? He didn’t hurt you, did he?” Jack looked like he was going to find Nick and kick his ass. “I’ll kill him. I will.”
I shook my head. “No, no. The opposite of that. He, uh, he, kissed me.”
Jack look briefly stunned, and then looked like he didn’t know if he should be happy or upset about it. “That’s a good thing, right? I mean, you like this guy, so that’s positive?”
I nodded my head. “Yes. It’s just that, well, it was my first real kiss. I liked it. I liked it a lot. A lot a lot.”
Then he broke into a huge smile. “Oh, Scotty, I wish I weren’t at work right now. Because you know I’d be shrieking like a little bitch right now. I’m so happy for you!”
I smiled and laughed a little, but the laughter was mixed with tears. “Oh, Jack, I never thought it could be like that. Kissing somebody. It was so….magical. And terrifying. I felt things that I never thought I could.”
“Stand up,” Jack ordered. I did, and he hugged me. “Baby steps, remember,” he said, while he hugged me. “This is the greatest thing ever.”
I nodded my head into his chest. “Do you think it’s possible, Jack? That I could have a normal relationship with somebody? That I could allow myself to fall in love?”
“Oh, Scotty,” he said, putting my face in his hands. “Girl, I hate to break it to you. But you already are in love.”
As my heart pounded wildly after he said that, I knew that he was right. I was in love with Nick. And, all at once, I was terrified, more terrified than I had ever been.
“What am I going to do, Jack? I, I can’t think about being intimate with him. He won’t want me. He’s going to want a woman he can, you know, do things with. Somebody normal.”
“Scotty Marie. I need to talk you down. Cart before horse, big time. He kissed you, that’s all. Baby steps, Scotty. Baby steps.” He kissed my forehead. “Now, are you going to have to talk to him about what happened to you? Probably so. He has to know that you’re special, in more ways than one. But if he is a good guy, he’ll understand.”
I took a deep breath. “That brings me to my next topic. Then I’ll let you get back to work. But he wants us both to have dinner at his loft in Tribeca.”
“Tribeca? Girl. You didn’t tell me he was wealthy.”
“You didn’t ask.”
“When?”
“I said I’d let him know which evening you’re free.”
“Saturday night. I actually don’t work Saturday night. I work tomorrow night, though, at the bar.”
“Will you go with me on Saturday night?” I asked, elated beyond words that Jack had a free evening.
“With bells on, baby. With bells on.” Then he clapped his hands. “Ooh, can I give you a makeover?”
“Sure,” I said. “If you’re going with me, you can do anything you want.”
“Oh, I can’t wait. I just can’t wait. We’re going to glam you up, girl. Glam you up.”
“Okay,” I said. “Just not too much. I don’t wear much makeup, anyhow. Maybe he won’t like it.”
He looked disappointed. “Okay, that’s true. I always wanted to get my hands on you, though. Then again, you don’t want to go over there looking like a tarted-up drag queen.”
I laughed at the image of me looking like a drag queen. “Yeah, I’m quite sure that he wouldn’t want me looking like somebody in one of your shows.”
He tousled my hair, and hugged me again. “Scotty, I’m so happy for you. You’re going to be normal. You’re going to be normal.”
I nodded. That was all I wanted, really. To be normal.
I prayed that he was right.
Chapter 21
It was Saturday afternoon, and I was feeling anxious already. I had seen Nick at work the previous day, of course, and I told him that Jack and I would be at his loft at 7 PM on Saturday. He arranged to send his driver to pick us up, over my protests.
“That’s really not necessary,” I said. “Jack and I are used to taking the subway everywhere. We actually like it.”
“I insist,” he said, and by the tone of his voice, I knew that there was no argument.
Being at work with him was getting to be difficult. There was no longer any doubt, even in my mind, that Nick and I were somewhat more than just intern and supervisor, or professor and student. What we were was left to be defined, but that kiss demonstrated to me that there was more to us than what we were in our professional lives. Yet, there was no way that we could show it while we were at the office. That would be way too risky.
And Portia made it a point to make my life difficult there at the firm. I was a floating intern right then, which meant that I went around and found projects to do from every partner in the firm, including Portia. I knew that I eventually would settle down to be an intern only for Nick’s team, but, for now, I was floating. Which meant that I did projects for Portia.
Portia went out of her way to make me feel like my mother did. Like I was incompetent. I had typed up a contract for her, and I somehow got mixed up and typed in the word “their” instead of “there.” She read it, and looked at me accusingly. “You’re a graduate student at Columbia?” she asked me incredulously. “What are they teaching you there? Who doesn’t know the difference between t-h-e-i-r and t-h-e-r-e?” She shook her head. “Incompetent. I’m going to have to send this contract to a secretary to redo your idiotic mistakes.”
Another time, she asked me to submit a rudimentary floor plan for a project she was working on. I did, and she met with me in her office. I knew that I was in tr
ouble when she closed the door behind her. That was never a good sign.
“Have a seat,” she said, gesturing to the chair.
I obeyed.
“Scotty. I’m not going to beat around the bush here,” she began. “You aren’t good enough for this firm. I strongly suspect that Nick advocated for you to be hired because of your rather glorious rack, and nothing more.”
I crossed my arms, and cursed the size of my breasts again. I was very, very careful not to display them, unlike Portia herself, who favored low cut shirts and high cut skirts.
I tried not to take her other words to heart. That I wasn’t good enough. It was bad enough that I felt that, but it really stung to have a senior partner tell me what I felt about myself anyway.
“I’m very sorry, Ms. Anson. I’ll re-do that floor plan if you want.”
“It’s not just the floor plan. It’s your work, in general. I’ve seen it, of course. I was overruled in hiring you. Your work is amateurish and shows zero creativity. This floor plan you gave me is something that a high school student would submit.”
I felt my pulse racing. Was this what the other partners thought about me? Was this the reputation that I had around the firm? Did they all suspect that Nick hired me for the size of my breasts and not my talent? Was I even talented at all?
To say that my confidence was undermined by Portia’s talk would be the understatement of the year. It brought back all my old insecurities, stemming from my mother constantly telling me that I was stupid and worthless. Then, when one foster family after another refused to adopt me, that feeling of worthlessness compounded. Mr. Lucas’ actions drove it home - I wasn’t good for anything but my body. Now, here was Portia, telling me in no uncertain terms that this was the case.
I wasn’t smart, and I wasn’t talented. I was just a walking set of double Ds.
I willed myself not to cry. Crying was professional suicide, I knew, so I bit my lip to stop the tears. I looked up, and Portia was still staring at me, a cruel look on her beautiful face. “Re-do the floor plan, from scratch. Give me something that a 16-year-old wouldn’t be able to do. ASAP.” Then she gave the plan back to me.
I had no idea what to do, because I had no idea why the floor plan was wrong. She gave me no advice on how I could fix it. And I was scared, terrified in fact, of asking another senior partner to help me with it. What if it really was terrible? They would know it by looking at it, and then everybody would know that I was incompetent. I would lose my internship, and Nick would lose respect for me. Then I would be too embarrassed to see him in class, so I would have to drop his classes, which would lead me to not be able to graduate on time. If at all.
The whole thing would land me drunk on the couch like my mother.
I could ask Nick for help, but would he give me an unbiased opinion on it? Besides that, if that floor plan really was at the high school level, he would start to doubt ever having me come to work there.
So, when Nick came and found me for lunch, he could tell that something was wrong.
“Thanks for the offer, Nick, but I’m really not hungry,” I said. When he walked into the room where I was working, I immediately took my floor plan and put it on my lap. I didn’t want him to see my incompetent design.
He sat down, and then got right back up to close the door. Then he sat back down and took my hands. I drew a breath, but I was starting to get used to him at least touching my hands.
Baby steps.
“Scotty, honey, there’s something wrong,” he said, touching my cheek. He had a look of concern in those beautiful blue eyes of his. He kissed my forehead gently, and I felt like melting.
I wanted to tell him that this job wasn’t right for me. That Portia just confirmed that I wasn’t good enough. That I was embarrassed to be working there, because I didn’t belong. That my mother was right after all.
Instead I just said “no, nothing wrong. I, I, I just need to get something into Portia right away.”
“Portia,” he said, and then his demeanor changed. “That’s why you’re upset. She’s treating you like shit, isn’t she?”
“No,” I lied. The last thing I wanted to do was cause friction between the partners. That would be the surest way to get gone, if Portia had more allies on the firm than Nick did. Which was highly possible, as Nick had only started working there a few months before, and Portia had been there for years. “No, no. It’s just something that I need to re-do for her, that’s all. Not a big deal.”
“I know better,” he said. “You’re really upset.” He looked pissed. “I’m going to have to have a talk with her.”
“No, please don’t. Please. I just started working here. I don’t need there to be problems already. I already feel like I’m going to be skating on thin ice because…”
He nodded his head in understanding. “Of course. I don’t want to cause problems, either. I need you to succeed here, and the politics of this will be complicated. I’ll just have to pull my weight to make sure that you aren’t on her service, at all, anymore.”
“How are you going to do that? I’m on everybody’s service right now.”
“I’ll think of something. In the meantime, you need to eat, so you’re coming with me.”
“But Portia-“
“Can wait. Get your coat and hat, and let’s go get some pizza.”
So, on that Saturday afternoon, I felt apprehensive about going over to Nick’s loft. If it weren’t for the fact that Jack was excited to go, overly so, I would’ve tried to cancel.
“Love,” Jack said. “Why aren’t you more excited for tonight? We’re going over to Nick’s loft in Tribeca. Tribeca! Girl, you’ve hit the big time there.”
“I don’t know, Jack. I just don’t think it’s going to work between Nick and me.”
“Oh, what was I thinking. Of course, you’re right. Well, it was good between you guys while it lasted.” He rolled his eyes. “Do I have to do some Scotty ass-kicking?”
“Well, I might have jumped the gun. I mean, he kissed me, but I doubt it meant much to him. I get the feeling that he might be a man-whore.”
“And why, pray-tell, would you think that?”
I didn’t really know. I mean, he had slept with Portia, which was obviously why she had it in for me. My rational brain knew that was why she obviously hated me. My emotional brain thought that her biting, almost savage, insults were true.
But just because he slept with Portia didn’t make him a man-whore.
It was probably just an excuse I was making for not getting emotionally involved with him.
“I don’t know. I guess he isn’t.”
“Come on, now, girl. You have to get psyched for this. The man of your dreams is having us for dinner tonight. That’s huge! It’s huge that you even like somebody. I’ve never seen you give anybody the time of day before. Now, you’ve gotten your first kiss from a gorgeous and wealthy man. And, this just in, he seems to be crazy about you. You have to get happy.”
I knew that. I had tried so hard to erase my doubts about myself. It was starting to work. Then, Portia’s comments brought back everything that made me doubt myself in the first place. And, just like that, I was back to believing that I could never truly catch the eye of somebody like Nick.
I just hoped that he didn’t see me as another notch on his bedpost. That would be absolutely devastating to me. So, I knew that if he had any designs of eventually getting me into bed, he had another thing coming. It would be a long, long time before I could trust enough to do that with somebody.
Even if that somebody had beautiful blue eyes, a perfect face and body, and was, thus far, the kindest man I had ever known.
Chapter 22
So, Jack and I found ourselves in the limousine going to Tribeca. I had let Jack do a slight makeover on me, but made sure that he didn’t put too much makeup on my face.
“Well, Scotty, that’s just as well,” Jack said, as lightly sponged some foundation on my cheeks. Blusher, lipstick and eye sh
adow were on the table next to me, waiting to be applied. “It’s just as well that I don’t put a lot of makeup on you, because you’re beautiful when you first wake up in the morning. You’re beautiful always. So, really, I’m not doing much with this makeover. I just like to play, you know that.”
I nodded. I did know that he liked to play around with makeup, which was why I humored him in this. In fact, before he had the ambition to become a Broadway actor, he had the ambition to be a makeup artist.
My hair was another story. I never knew that to do with it. I badly needed a haircut, but I couldn’t afford it. I really didn’t want to go to one of the cheapo chop shops, so I pretty much just let it grow.
So, I did what I usually did with it, and put it up, twisting it into a top knot and securing it with a butterfly clip.
I didn’t obsess as much about what I would wear as I did the night that I met Ryan. I felt very blue about going that night, so I couldn’t get into looking through my wardrobe for something nice. Jack had to find something that looked somewhat classic, yet somewhat sexy, which was what I wanted.
Portia had taken all the excitement I had about the possibility of being with Nick. Because I saw the future. If I dated him, everybody would know, and Portia would have the long knives out for me then. At the moment, she was tormenting me just because I worked for Nick, and she apparently was jealous about that. I could just imagine how she would act if Nick and I became an item.
But Jack was totally excited for the evening. When Charlie pulled up in the limo, Jack was bouncing off the walls. “Look at that, Scotty, a limo. Fancy, fancy. Wonder if it has a mini-bar in there?”
“No, it doesn’t. It’s not one of those limos.”
“Well, it’s a limo. Sure beats the hell out of the subway. No chance of somebody urinating on us in a limo.”
“Sure,” I said, without enthusiasm. “It’s a nice limo, too, so, yeah, it sure beats the hell out of the subway.”
We got in the back, and Jack put his arm around me. “Cheer up, Scotty. You have to get happy before you see Mr. Wonderful.”
