“Here’s your tea. Here are your messages. Make-up in ten.” Herbie about-faces to leave Chloe’s office.
“How’s the tattoo?” Chloe asks in between small cautious sips of the steaming tea. Having almost escaped, the honest concern in her question pulls him back.
“Healing. The swelling has gone down.” He stands with his legs twisted, one leaving and one staying. Paused, he looks at Chloe, blowing long cool winds into the rim of the mug. The awkwardness of the scene evades her.
“Boss?”
She rises from the papers below her mug.
“Darling?”
“…”
“…”
“Nick is cheating on you.”
With his feet up on his modestly wide desk, Henry almost looks relaxed leaning back against his hard leather chair. It’s not easy, however, to miss the wrinkling tension contorting his face into a fearsome mask of angry and sad.
He grips in his hand a fat, flat Blackberry that appears almost small in the meaty blood-glow hold of his hands.
“Mr. Hurt?” His secretary bends in through the open door of his office.
“Mr. Hurt? There’s a complaint from one of the apartments.” His look scares her a little. The stone-ness of it and the screaming life behind it. She wants to step back before he jumps her.
“What is it?” His voice is eerily gentle.
“There’s a complaint—”
“What’s the complaint?” He interrupts not so gently. She doesn’t reply, staring at the black bottom of his soles towering on his desk.
“Alright.” He saw her eyebrows scrunch at his feet. He retrieves his feet from the desk, planting them hard, shoulder-width apart, in front of the straightened-up throne.
“Come here.” He pushes off the desk, wheeling the chair a couple feet away. The back presses the wall. She steps into the doorway and closes the door behind her. The room now private, she leaves a hand behind her back, holding the door handle. Her other hand fingers the buttons of her blouse open, from the one highest then each one below. She reaches the waist of her skirt and behind her the door clicks. Locked.
Nick unlocks the door to the Thursday Tattoo. He walks in, holding a thermos of too-sweet coffee in his hand, heads straight for the stereo system and plugs his iPod into the surround. A few clicks and the shop fills with hard drum beating, bass string booming, then suddenly, “I’m walking on sunshine! Whoa-oh-oh!”
Nick falls on the old couch in the waiting area and schizophrenically laughs and sings and laughs and sings until his lungs are gasping and his stomach muscles ache for respite. Lying flat on the couch, his head hanging back off its edge, he doesn’t see the front door open. He doesn’t hear the footsteps approach over the joyful declarations of Katrina and the Waves.
He also doesn’t startle or panic when he feels a weight fall on his outstretched legs. He just grabs at the object and feels around its waist until his hands meet at its back.
“This song is shit!” It’s too loud not to yell.
“That’s why I’m playing it! Because it’s shit! But it’s the best kind of shit, and I’m in the mood for sunshiny shitty music right now!” Still too loud not to yell back.
The weight walks off. Nick drops his arms lifeless, suggesting that they have no purpose when they have nothing to hold. Katrina is cut off and Joni Mitchell takes the stage; “Both Sides Now”. The low slow hum of strings. The quick entering then lasting fading of woodwinds. Joni’s gracefully rough dragging croon.
“Moons and Junes and Ferris wheels, the dizzy dancing way you feel… As every fairy tale comes real, I’ve looked at love that way…”
The difference is like that between a high-school dance and a funeral. It’s a brilliant song. It’s on Nick’s iPod. But the difference is like that of having your arms around someone on your lap and lying alone on an old couch with your dead arms void of purpose; empty.
Before he can sit up, Audrey lies on top of him and pulls his face up from the edge of the couch.
“Boss?”
“…”
“Chloe?”
“Get out.”
“Chloe—”
“Herbie. Darling. Get out.”
Herbie leaves Chloe’s office.
She sits on the edge of his desk. Her blouse abandoned halfway between Henry and the door. She looks down on top of his head. His hair getting messed by the hem of her skirt.
She grabs hold of the smooth wood at her sides. Under her knees, the hills of his traps lift her guiltlessly. Her head hanging back. When she opens her eyes, she sees the locked door.
“I have an appointment.”
“We have time.”
“He’s supposed to be here by now.”
“No one’s coming.”
“He’s running late. You took down the appointment yesterday.”
Audrey rises and walks to the desk. Around them, Joni sings on.
“But now it's just another show. You leave 'em laughing when you go…”
She comes back with the Post-It she wrote on yesterday. She falls back down onto Nick and hands him the note. He reads it aloud.
“8:00 a.m. Bob Hepburn.”
“And if you care, don't let them know, don't give yourself away.”
She climbs higher. She looks down at his face.
“No one’s coming.”
He bends her over the desk. His blood-glow hand presses her back down onto it. Her hands grip the wood around her.
He breathes fast. She breathes slow. Guiltless.
The cab smells like Pine-Sol. Chloe rolls her thin, flat Blackberry in her hand. The taxi-driver flips through the radio, one hand steadying the car, the other fingering the buttons below the tape-deck.
Her eyes roll side to side above her blood-glow cheeks, mopping up the leak before it spreads down her face.
The cab stops at a red light. Beyond is Hawthorne Bridge Southeast Portland . The Thursday Tattoo.
“Make a left.”
“Changed your mind?”
“I need to get home.”
“What are we doing?” She asks as she straightens her clothes.
He doesn’t reply as he straightens his own clothes.
“Does your husband still need a job?”
“Yeah…”
“Tell him to come in tomorrow. I need someone to fill in while the guys go on vacation.”
“Thanks… What are we doing?” She fingers the buttons of her blouse closed, from the lowest one then each one above.
“We’re going back to work. Get Audrey’s cell on line 1 and her work on line 2.”
“Ok.” She unlocks the door, opens it. Steps out.
“Wait.”
“Henry?”
“Wear that other skirt tomorrow. The white one.”
“Ok.”
“Close my door.” Guiltless.
She opens her door and closes it gently. Her hand behind her, holding the door handle for balance, she folds herself down onto the floor.
She sits there, rolling the phone in her hands. The forecast still fresh in her mind. Her sight still spotty from the hot blast of the studio’s lights. Behind her the green screen and its infinite possibilities.
“Saturday, sunny and delightful!” She recites in her On-Air voice.
“Sunday, isolated thunderstorms.”
“Hello?”
“I called your work twice. The first time they said you were running late. A minute ago they said you called in sick.”
“I’m fine. Just needed a day off.”
“You were fine this morning when you woke up.”
“Things change.”
“Should I come over?”
“No. I’m not home.”
“Where are you?”
“Home—I meant I’m not gonna be home. I’m going to Nick’s shop. I’ll come over tonight.”
“…”
“Henry?”
“Stop by Mai Thai and get me that spicy fish thing that I like. And wear that yellow sundress.”
“Fine. Love you.”
“Love you.” Guiltless.
Audrey drops her phone on the couch, between Nick’s legs. Nick sits up. Joni Mitchell is singing on repeat.
“I've looked at love from both sides now…”
“Why didn’t we kiss?”
“I’m with Henry.”
“Why didn’t we kiss?”
“Nick.”
“Audrey?”
She sits back down next to him. In Nick’s pocket is the folded drawing. Still a secret. “from give and take, and still somehow…”
“Understand.” She pleads softly.
“I do. I don’t.”
“You’re with Chloe.”
“I’m with Chloe.”
Nick slides his hand into the pocket. His palm sweating on the folded paper.
“It's love's illusions I recall…”
“I—”
“I know.” She interrupts gently.
“…”
His fingers hold the drawing. He slides it to the mouth of the pocket.
“I really don't know love at all…”
“I’ll see you later.” She kisses his cheek, formally.
He walks her to the door.
“Mr. Hurt?” She bends into his office, through the open door. He looks at her, past the towering shoes on his desk.
“Miss Moore is here.”
“Moore
“She’s interviewing for a secretary job. The Assistant Manager’s secretary is retiring.”
“Right. Where’s Rob?”
“Dentist. Anyway, she asked for you.”
“Send her in.”
Henry fixes himself behind his desk. He remembers a couple Moores
“Hi.”
He walks around his desk to shake her hand.
“Miss Moore? Nice to meet you. My secretary said you asked for me?”
“Yeah. I met your friend at my previous job. He told me you were hiring and that you owed him a favor.”
“My friend? What’s his name?”
“Nick.”
Henry bites his lip into a smile, suppressing a laugh.
“Nick heard we were hiring and he sent you.” He says moderately slow, as if answering a riddle; half sure, half unsure.
“That’s what happened, Mr. Hurt.” She giggles.
“Call me Henry. Have a seat Miss Moore.” Henry guides her to a chair in front of his desk.
“Thanks, Henry. And please, call me Candy.”
At the bus stop down the hill from the Thursday Tattoo, waiting for the 15, Audrey’s phone starts to vibrate in her jeans pocket. She feels the subdued shockwave down her legs, tickling her through to her flats. She listens for a distinct ring-tone to identify the caller. It’s a normal ring instead.
The phone revealed in her hand, she doesn’t recognize the number. She answers it.
“Hello?” She asks, ready for a misguided dialer, a foreign-born telemarketer, anyone.
“Hi—is this Audrey?” It’s a female voice. It sounds familiar.
“Speaking.”
“This is Chloe.”
She doesn’t ask which Chloe. She only knows a couple and she can hear the same voice advising her that she needs to carry an umbrella.
“Am I calling you at work?”
“No. I took a day off.”
“Are you with Nick?”
“…” The 15 arrives, the bus doors swing open. She waves the driver off.
“Hello?”
“Sorry, bus driving by.”
“Are you with Nick?”
“No, you’re with Nick.” She wonders if the words left her mouth or if they stayed in her head like she intended.
“I took the rest of the day off. Let’s do lunch.”
“Sounds great…” She moves away from the stop, another bus drives by.
“How about Chinatown ? In an hour?”
“Ok.”
“Meet me under the red arch on Burnside.”
“See you soon.” Guiltless.
Chloe drops the phone down on the floor, between her legs. Her head falls back against the wall of the door. Her eyes roll side to side above her blood-glow cheeks, mopping up the leak before it spreads down her face.
“Today will be sunny and delightful.” She recites incredulous.
“With isolated thunderstorms…”
photo1:http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3660/3506028652_522ec9fdfc.jpg
photo2:http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3317/4579005986_23599b9e9f.jpg
photo3:http://farm2.static.flickr.com/1010/1431654970_7f0ec94067.jpg
