“Bruce, I don’t even know. To be honest, I don’t believe a thing you’re saying right now.”
“I understand.”
“You’re not even going to argue with me?” I asked a little concerned that my friend who normally argued about everything wasn’t even making the effort.
“No, I really did have a horrible day. The woman tried to jump off my balcony after I broke it off. It was awful. I barely pulled her back and had to call the police. They took her to the psychiatric hospital.”
“Shit, I’m sorry, man,” I said as I realized this story was likely true and not something he was making up.
“Yeah, I’ll be there tomorrow and tell you about it. I need to crash. Emotionally exhausted,” he said before hanging up.
“So what sort of crazy excuse did he have this time,” Sheryl laughed.
“I’m not sure it was actually an excuse. He didn’t seem like himself at all.”
“Well, I’ll be the judge of that tomorrow. You have a good time with all those notes tonight,” she said with a sympathetic smile.
“That’s what he gets paid the big bucks for,” Miranda added as the two women waved good-bye and headed out for the night.
“Don’t worry about me. I’ll still be here in the morning when you come back,” I hollered after them.
“We aren’t worried,” Sheryl laughed.
I heard her lock the front door after it shut. I often had to stay for an hour or two after patients left. It was a normal part of keeping up with my paperwork. But since I’d seen so many patients that day I hadn’t had time to put any notes into the computer or the patient’s charts officially. Instead, I had taken notes on paper during their sessions. Now I had to go through each chart and nicely write my notes for the day and then make a pile of patients that I’d have to talk with Bruce about.
Our notes in the medical charts were a legal part of the patient’s case. If it was a patient of Bruce’s I liked to make sure I was reviewing the case thoroughly before adding to the chart. The last thing I needed was to say I gave a patient one medication when I really gave something else. Or to miss something important about their case.
Luckily this day was filled with consultations and routine checkups. We liked to keep certain days of the week for certain types of appointments as much as possible. If it had been a Friday, I would have been much more upset with Bruce since Fridays are our complicated cases that really require the assigned doctor to review them.
I moved to my desk and groaned at the amount of work I had to do that evening. It was entirely possible that I’d be there well into the night. But before I got too far into my paperwork, I dialed Julia to see if I could apologize to her.
“This is Julia, leave a message after the beep,” her sweet voice said right away after the first ring.
“Hey, Julia. I’m really sorry about what happened today. And about not realizing it was you. I did feel like we had a connection and I honestly felt like I knew you from somewhere but I just couldn’t place you. In my defense, you’re much prettier now than I remember you before. Crap, sorry. I didn’t mean that to sound bad. Sorry, just give me a call back. I’d like to apologize.”
I hung up and then let my head fall into my hands with exasperation. That was by far the worse apology voicemail in the history of men. Why hadn’t I thought things through a little more before calling her?
In every other aspect of my life I was fine with taking notes and precautions to ensure I said or did the right thing. With my patient charts I was meticulous. But yet I dialed her up without even thinking through what I wanted to say, without writing down any notes. And I basically said she was ugly back when I was in high school. She had to hate me!
Reluctantly, I pushed my phone away and got started on my paperwork. It was highly unlikely that Julia was going to call me back anytime soon. In fact, I wasn’t sure she’d ever actually call me back.
***
Three days later and I still hadn’t heard back from Julia. It was driving me nuts. She had to know that I wasn’t intentionally a total jerk. Even if she didn’t want to see me again, even if she didn’t want to use my office for her pregnancy, I still couldn’t live with the idea that she thought I was a monstrous jerk of a man. Finally I decided to call Rob and check in with him, maybe feel him out to see if Julia had told him about what happened.
“Hey, what’s up?” Rob answered.
“Not much, just checking in. Want to grab a drink soon?” I said.
“When have I ever not wanted to get a drink?”
“Very true. How about tonight?”
“You know me so well.”
It was true, I did know Rob well. If we tried to schedule something a little further out he would cancel on me. My best bet was always the same day invitation. I was the same way. Most of the time I didn’t make plans for my weekend and just grabbed whoever was available to head out, or I’d have a woman I could call for a date.
“So meet you at nine down at Henry’s?” I asked.
“Shit, no I can’t do it tonight. I forgot I was doing this thing with Marissa.”
“Oh, Marissa?”
“Yeah, just this stock broker I’m dating. Nothing serious.”
“Yeah, we can catch up another time,” I said as nonchalantly as I could manage. “Maybe you could invite your sister too. Isn’t she in New York now?”
“Julia’s been here for a few years Mike, I told you about her job at the Hotel. Remember, she’s a sales consultant for big wigs at King Hotels?”
The second he mentioned what Julia did, I remembered the conversation we had over a year before. It was a brief talk in the middle of a noisy bar just before we went and picked up some girls. It was one of the only times we had hung out in the last year and to be honest, talking about his sister wasn’t really hitting my radar that night.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry, I forgot. King Hotels, that’s pretty cool. What else is up with her lately?”
“Man, I don’t know. I can’t keep up with her life. You know how she is.”
Actually, I didn’t really know how she was at all. I’d been trying to reach her for days without any luck. But I wasn’t about to unload that juicy piece of information on Rob. I wasn’t sure he would think me sleeping with his sister was a great idea.
“Oh, I know how it is. Okay, well, call me sometime and we can grab drinks. It was nice catching up with you.”
“You too,” Rob said and we both hung up.
One of the best things about having a friend like Rob was that we had been friends for so long that a quick conversation was enough for the both of us. There was no need to fill each other in on why we had been too busy to call earlier. No need to pretend or keep secrets from each other, except for the part about me doing his sister. I was going to continue to keep that secret.
With only a small amount of effort I called around and was put through to a Mr. Schneider who was the head of the sales team at King Hotels. A few white lies and five minutes later I had the address of the hotel where Julia worked.
I grabbed my coat and hailed a cab with only an intention of scoping out the building and seeing what was in that neighborhood. Nothing more than that. I would just get the lay of the land so perhaps sometime down the road I could do lunch in that neighborhood and run into Julia.
It was freezing out. Not at all normal for a September afternoon. I had my coat buttoned up as high as it would go and still had to tuck myself into the collar in an effort to stay warm as I climbed out of the cab in front of the hotel.
As I stood in the freezing wind in front of the large glass building, I decided to head inside. The lobby of the hotel was modern and decorated with glass sculptures and odd pieces of art. There were several leather seats organized in a square off in the corner of the lobby, so I grabbed a seat and pretended to look at my phone for a minute.
Casually I looked around every few moments and tried to get the lay of the land. Unfortunately, even after thirty minutes I hadn
’t been able to ascertain whether or not the marketing and sales team offices were on the main floor or somewhere else in the building.
Then I saw Julia. My pulse quickened as I looked down at my phone and tried to peak at the offices where she had just walked out of. My technique of looking at my phone and then looking up was working fine until I made eye contact with Julia as she walked toward me.
The jig was up. She clearly had seen me looking at her. Now all I had to do was decide what sort of story I was going to tell her about why I was there. Maybe I had a meeting there? No, I didn’t even know what offices were in that neighborhood. There was no way I could pull that story off. Perhaps I could just say I was supposed to meet a friend there in the lobby.
“Mike, what are you doing here?” Julia asked as she took a seat across from me.
There was an open seat right next to me, so it was a telling sign that she had chosen the seat as far away from me as possible. She leaned forward with her elbows resting on her knees and a stern expression of disapproval on her face.
“I’m stalking you,” I said with a shrug of my shoulders and a smile. Hoping that a little humor might lighten the mood.
“I know you’re trying to be funny, but really, what are you doing here?”
“I’m here to tell you I’m sorry. I’ve said it a few horrible ways on your cell phone, but I needed to make sure you really heard me. I didn’t mean to act like that.”
“Okay, thank you,” Julia said and got up to walk away.
“That’s it?” I ran after her. “You’re just going to forgive me and then walk away?”
“What else do you want Mike? Do you want to embarrass me here at work like you did at your office? No, thank you. I accept your apology, so now you can go about your life and not worry about my hurt feelings any longer.”
She turned to walk away and I instinctively reached out for her hand and grabbed it. Electricity flooded my body at the touch of her soft skin. A visceral reaction pulsed into me and I was throbbing with excitement within seconds.
“Can I take you to dinner? You have to be getting done soon. We could go someplace close and I promise to be a gentleman.”
“Now you want to take me to dinner? That’s not necessary.”
Her eyes locked onto mine and she softly shook her head back and forth as I kept my gaze locked on her beautiful brown eyes. I wasn’t ready to let go of her. With her hand in mine I knew I wanted to spend more time with Julia and if the only way she would agree was for us to do it right then and there, I was game.
“Mike, I’m not sure if you understand why I was in your office. But that doesn’t exactly make this a possibility,” she motioned down to my hand which was still wrapped around hers. “Let’s just call it good. You apologized, I accepted. We can both move on.”
“So you’re saying no to a free meal?”
“I’m saying no.”
“Julia, is everything okay?” A man asked as he stopped next to us. He eyed my hand on Julia’s and I quickly let go of her.
“Everything is okay, Teddy,” she reassured him.
“Hi, I’m Teddy Schneider, the supervisor here. Is there something I can help you with?” He asked me as if I was going to book a dozen hotel rooms or something like that.
“No, I think Julia has it covered. She just offered to come to dinner with me so we could discuss me booking a conference here later next year.”
“Fabulous idea, yes. Please go and discuss it. Julie is my top sales woman. She will help you with anything you need.”
As Teddy Schneider walked away I tried to pull another playful smile out to see if it would help reduce the tension, but Julia’s stern face never cracked at all. She stormed back toward the hallway of offices and I followed her to the one that had her name on it.
I was about to put up a new argument when I realized she was grabbing her coat and purse. My smile took over my face as she pushed past me and walked quickly toward the front of the lobby. Her three-inch heels clicking away on the tile floor of the large room while I took large strides to catch up to her.
“Thank you, Julia,” I whispered while holding the front door open for her.
“You’re going to have to book a convention with me now.”
“Ok,” I replied without a moment of hesitation.
I happened to be on a convention committed for fertility doctors. I certainly could throw King Hotels name around at the next meeting and try to book with them. I had a new bounce in my step as I followed Julia across the street to where we were going to eat. I was happy that Julia had agreed to come on the impromptu date.
“We are going to eat a meal here and that’s it,” Julia said pointing at the Italian restaurant we were standing in front of.
“Perfect.”
“Nothing else, Mike.”
“Okay, that’s perfect.”
I held the door open for her and she gently brushed up against me as we made our way into the tiny local Italian restaurant. Giovanni’s was nicer on the inside than it looked from the street. I never would have considered taking a woman there on a date if I’d only looked at the rusted sign outside the building. Once inside, the floors were a brilliant stained wood and the sitting area roomier than many high end eateries in New York. Each table was dressed with a white tablecloth and artificial candles. It was actually really romantic and I could see Julia hesitating as we stood near the main dining area and waited to be seated.
“I’ve never been here before. I thought it was going to be different,” she snuffed just before a server made his way to us.
“Hello and welcome to Giovanni’s. Do you have a reservation?”
“No, I’m sorry, we don’t,” Julia said. “We can come back…”
“I’m sorry, it’s my fault. This is sort of a last-minute date,” I interrupted before Julia could tell the man we were leaving. “Is there any possible way we could get a table? I’d be very grateful,” I said and handed the man a hundred-dollar bill as I shook his hand. I figured it was worth a try to get a table. Sure enough the man started looking at his seating chart and whipped a name off the list and made room for us.
“Your name?” He asked looking at me.
“Doctor Cooper,” I said pulling out the doctor card to push even further.
“Thank you. Yes, it looks like I do have a cancelation tonight and can squeeze you in. Please, come this way,” the man said as we followed him to a back corner of the restaurant. “I’ll be your waiter; my name is Jessie. I’ll give you a minute and then come back with some menus.”
“Thank you,” I said and held Julia’s chair out for her. “This is a nice romantic spot,” I said as she sat down.
“You know I didn’t want a romantic spot. I thought this place was a dump.”
“We can make the best of it,” I said and sat down across from her. “Now, will you let me apologize?”
“Go for it.”
“First, about how I acted at the office. I’m so sorry. That was disrespectful and rude of me. My only defense is that my co-worker, Doctor Simon, abandoned me and I was doing double duty. One time in the past a woman I’d dated snuck into the office and when I saw you I jumped to conclusions. I’m very sorry and I sincerely want to apologize.”
Julia looked away from me and tears welled up in her eyes. She went from being hard and distant to sweet and vulnerable in a blink of an eye. I reached out and grabbed her hand in an effort to comfort her.
“It’s okay,” she managed to say through tears.
“I had a great time with you the other night. I honestly thought we connected and was looking forward to taking you on a real date.”
“I’m not really looking to date,” she said as she continued to look away and only glanced back at me for a moment. “Obviously, from me being at your office, you know I’m looking to start a different phase of my life.”
“Yes, I concluded that after I realized what was really going on.”
“Mike, I’m sorry I didn’t
say something about knowing you,” she said and turned her tear filled eyes toward me. “I thought it was fun when we were at the club. It was exciting that you saw me as this beautiful woman instead of a little girl. I should have said something.”
“No, that’s fine. I really did feel like we had met before or I knew you. It’s my jerky self who is to blame for that too. I should have asked you more questions and gotten to know you more. I’m sure it would have come out. But the truth is I was just enamored by you and well, attraction seemed to be in the lead of my brain that night.”
I squeezed her hand and she smiled back. It was the first smile I’d gotten and I finally thought we would be okay. I handed her a napkin to wipe her eyes with as our waiter approached the table and handed us our menus.
“Can I get you guys something to drink?” he asked.
“I could really use a drink,” Julia said before I could get a word in. “Bring us a bottle of red wine. Something good.”
“Yes, what the lady said,” I echoed.
“Our special is pasta primavera tonight. I’ll get your wine and be back shortly,” the young man said eagerly. “Our best red wine is three hundred dollars,” he whispered in my ear. “Is that what you want?”
“Yes, that sounds perfect,” I replied.
“Three hundred dollars, wow,” Julia laughed a little. “You really do want me to forgive you.”
“If buying wine is all I have to do, I’m all over that,” I held onto her hand still and didn’t want to let go. The soft touch of her skin was calming to me and I really could have sat there all night long holding onto her. If she didn’t want to pull away from me then I wasn’t about to give up the chance to hold onto her.
“So I guess I should tell you why I was at the office,” Julia said dramatically and pulled her hand away from me. “I am ready to have a baby, but I’m still in the beginning stages of the process and was basically wanting to interview Doctor Simon to see if he would be a good doctor to work with.”
“Can I ask you why?”
“Because I’ve heard women are really happy working with him and often come back to him over and over again for their babies.”
Built for Pleasure Page 7
