The Hating Game (5 page)

The image of them face-to-face is weird. “I wouldn't bother, Dad.”

It's the segue Mom needs. “Speaking of planes, we could put some money in your account so you could book a flight to visit us? We haven't seen you in so long. It's been a long time, Lucy.”

“It's not the money, it's getting the time,” I try to say, but they both begin talking over me at once, in an unintelligible combination of begging, pleading, and arguing.

“I'll come as soon as I can get some time, but it might not be for a while. If I get the promotion I'll be pretty busy. If I don't . . .” I study the keyboard.

“Yes?” Dad is sharp.

“I'll have to get another job,” I admit. I look up.

“Of course you would. You would never work for that jackass Justin. “It would be good to have her home though,” Dad tells Mom. “The books are not adding up. We need some extra brainpower.”

I can see Mom is still fretting about my job situation. She's
a penny pincher, and she's been living on a farm long enough that in her imagination the city is a heinously expensive, bustling metropolis. She's not far off. I make a good wage, but after the bank sucks my rent payment out, I'm stretched pretty tight. The thought of getting a roommate fills me with dread.

“How will she . . .”

Dad shushes her and waves his hands to dispel the mere thought of failure like a puff of smoke. “It'll be fine. It'll be Johnnie unemployed and sleeping under a bridge, not her.”

“That will never happen to her,” Mom begins, alarmed.

“Have you made up with that friend you used to work with? Valerie, wasn't it?”

“Don't ask her, it upsets her,” Mom scolds. Dad raises his hands in surrender and looks at the ceiling.

It's true; it does upset me, but I keep my tone even. “After the merger, I managed to meet her for a coffee, to explain myself, but she lost her job and I didn't. She couldn't forgive me. She said a true friend would have given her warning.”

“But you didn't know,” Dad begins. I nod. It's true. But what I've been grappling with ever since is, should I have somehow tried to find out for her?

“Her circle of friends were starting to become my friends . . . and now here I am. Square one again.” A sad, lonely loser.

“There are other people at work to be friends with, surely,” Mom says.

“No one wants to be friends with me. They think I'll tell their secrets to the boss. Can we change the subject? I talked to a guy this week.” I regret it immediately.

“Oooh,” they intone together. “Oooh.” There is an exchanged glance.

“Is he nice?”

It's always their first question. “Oh, yes. Very nice.”

“What's his name?”

“Danny. He's in the design section at work. We haven't gone out or anything, but . . .”

“How wonderful!” Mom says at the same time that Dad exclaims, “About time!”

He puts his thumb over the microphone and they begin to buzz to each other, a hornet swarm of speculation.

“Like I said, we haven't gone on a date. I don't know exactly if he wants to.” I think of Danny, the sideways look he gave me, mouth curling. He does.

Dad speaks so loudly the microphone gets fuzzy sometimes. “You should ask him. It's got to beat sitting in the office for ten hours a day slinging mud at James. Get out and live a little. Get your red party dress on. I want to hear you have by the time we Skype next.”

“Are you allowed to date colleagues?” Mom asks, and Dad frowns at her. Negative concepts and worst-case scenarios do not interest him. However, she does raise a good point.

“It isn't allowed, but he's leaving. He's going to freelance.”

“A nice boy,” Mom says to Dad. “I've got a good feeling.”

“I really should go to bed,” I remind them. I yawn and my clay face mask cracks.

“Night, night, sweetie,” they chime. I can hear Mom say sadly “Why won't she come home—” as Dad clicks the End button.

The truth? They both treat me so much like a visiting celebrity, a complete and utter success. Their bragging to their friends is frankly ridiculous. When I go home, I feel like a fraud.

As I rinse my face, I try to ignore my Bad Daughter Guilt by deciding on the items I would take if I have to live under a bridge. Sleeping bag, knife, umbrella, a yoga mat. I can sleep on it AND
do yoga to keep myself nimble. I could get all of my rare Smurfs into a fishing tackle box.

I have the copy of Joshua's desk planner on the end of my bed. Time to do a little Nancy Drewing. It's disturbing that a piece of Joshua Templeman has invaded my bedroom. My brain stage-whispers
Imagine!
I guillotine the thought.

I study the copy. A tally—I think those are the arguments. I make a note of this on the margin. Six arguments on this particular day. Sounds about right. The little slashes I have no idea about. But the X's? I think of Valentine's cards and kisses. None of those are going on in our office. This has got to be his HR record.

I fold up my laptop and put it away, then brush my teeth and get into bed.

Joshua's jibe about my work clothes—my “weird little retro costumes”—has prompted me to find the short black dress from the back of my wardrobe to wear tomorrow. It's the opposite of a gray ankle-length shift dress. It makes my waist look little and my ass look amazing. Thumbelina meets Jessica Rabbit. He thinks he's seen small clothes? He ain't seen nothing.

Little runts like me usually come across as cute rather than powerful, so I'm pulling out all the stops. The fishnet tights are so fine they feel like soft grit. My red heels that boost me up to a towering five-feet-five inches.

There's not going to be a single mention of strawberries tomorrow. Joshua Templeman is going to spray his coffee out his nose when I walk in. I don't know why I want him to—but I do.

What a confusing thought to fall asleep with.

F
alling asleep with his name in my head is probably the reason for my dream. It's the middle of the night, I'm lying on my stomach and I press my cheek into my pillow. He's braced over me, pressed against my back, warm as sunlight. His voice is a hot whisper, right in my ear as he twists his hips to grind himself against my butt.

I'm going to work you so fucking hard. So. Fucking. Hard.

I get a full impression of his heaviness and size. I try to push back against him again to feel it again, but he mutters my name like a reprimand and crawls up higher, his knees straddling my hips. His fingertips smooth along the sides of my breasts. His exhale steams against my neck. I can't get a decent lungful of air. He's too heavy and I'm too turned on. Sensitive, forgotten parts of me blaze to life. I scratch my fingertips against the sheets until they burn with friction.

The realization that I'm having a dirty dream about Joshua Templeman suddenly jars me and I teeter on the edge of waking, but I keep my eyes shut. I need to see where my mind takes this. After a few minutes, I sink back in.

I'll do anything you want, Lucinda. But you'll have to ask.

His tone is that lazy one he sometimes uses when he looks at
me with that certain expression. It's like he's seen me through a hole in a wall and knows what I look like, down to my skin.

I twist my head, and see his wrist braced by my head, the sleeve of a business shirt loose with no cuff link. I can see an inch of wrist; hair, veins, and tendons. The hand bunches into a fist and the mere thought of him being overcome makes me clench inside.

I can't see his face. Even though this may destroy everything, I roll over onto my back, the blankets and sheets beginning to twist me up. I'm tangled up in his arms and legs. I realize I'm turned on, and the realization that I am probably wet hits me as I look into his brilliant navy eyes. I let out a theatrical gasp of horror. A husky laugh is his reply.

I'm afraid so.
He doesn't look sorry.

There's so much delicious weight, pressing me down. Hips and hands. I move against Dream-Joshua sinuously, feeling him bite back a groan, and I realize something shocking.

You want me desperately.

The words echo out of my mouth, true and undeniable. A kiss on the pulse in my jaw confirms what I already know. It's stronger than attraction; darker than wanting. It's a restlessness between us that has never had a true outlet, until now. The cream sheets are blazing hot against my skin.

You're tied up in fucking knots over me
. I feel hands sliding along my body, weighing curves, buttons popping and seams unfurling. I'm being peeled, inspected. Teeth bite, and I'm being eaten. I have never had anyone burn for me like this. I'm shamefully turned on and even though I'm on my back, the look in his eyes confirms it's me who is winning this game. I try to tug him down to kiss me, but he evades and teases.

You've known all along,
he tells me and his blazing smile tips
me over the edge. I tremble awake. I jolt my hand away from the seam of my damp pajamas, my face burning red in the darkness. I can't decide what to do. Finish the job, or take a cold shower? In the end, all I do is lie there.

The hanging shape of my black dress at the foot of my bed is menacing and I stare at it until my breathing slows. I look at my digital clock. I have four hours to repress this memory.

I
T'S SEVEN THIRTY A.M.
on a Cream Shirt Day. The reflection in the elevator doors confirms my trench coat is longer than my tiny dress, so I look like a high-class call girl, en route to a hotel penthouse with only lingerie on underneath.

I had to get the bus today. I could barely climb from the curb onto the first step without showing my underwear, and as the doors closed behind me, I knew this dress was a catastrophic lapse in judgment. The enthusiastic set of honks from a passing truck as I teetered up the sidewalk to B&G confirmed it. If Target were open this early, I'd duck in and buy some pants.

I can get through this. I will need to remain seated for the entire day. The elevator doors open and of course Joshua is at his desk. Why does he always have to be at work so flippin' early? Does he go home? Does he sleep in a morgue drawer in the boiler room? I suppose he could ask the same of me.

I was hoping I'd have a minute or two alone here in the office to get settled in for a long day of remaining seated. But there he is. I hide myself behind the coat rack and pretend to rifle through my handbag to buy myself some time.

If I focus on the dress as my main issue, I can ignore the flashbacks to last night's dream. He lifts his eyes from his planner, pencil in hand. He stares at me until I begin to untie the belt on my trench coat, but I can't continue. The blue of his eyes is even
more vivid than in my dream. He's looking at me like he's busy reading my mind.

“It's cold in here, no?”

Mouth pursing into a kiss of irritation, he waves his hand in circles as if to say
Get on with it.
Fortifying myself with a deep breath, I take off the coat and hang it on my special padded hanger. I feel the friction of the tiny fishnet diamonds between my thighs as I walk toward our desks. I'm pretty much wearing a swimsuit.

I watch his eyes drop to his planner, dark lashes making a half-moon shadow on his cheeks. He looks young, until he looks up and his eyes are a man's, speculative and hard. My ankle wobbles.

“Wowsers,” he drawls, and I watch his pencil make some kind of mark. “Got a hot date, Shortcake?”

“Yes,” I lie automatically and he puts the pencil behind his ear, cynical.

“Do tell.”

I try to perch my butt nonchalantly on the edge of my desk. The glass is cold against the backs of my thighs. It's a dreadful mistake but I can't stand back up now, I'll look like an idiot. We both stare at my legs.

I look down at my bright red heels and I can see faintly up my own dress, the tiles are polished so bright. I let my hair fall across my eye. If I focus on this stupid dress, I can forget how my brain wants him to lick me, bite me, undress me.

“What's up?” For once his voice sounds normal. “What's happened?”

I pick vaguely at an irregular diamond on my thigh. The dream is surely written all over my face. My cheeks are getting warm. He's wearing the cream shirt, soft and silky as the sheets in
my dream. My subconscious is a deviant. I try to make eye contact but chicken out and manage to saunter around to my chair. I wish I could saunter out of here, all the way home.

“Hey.” He says it more sharply. “What's up? Tell me.”

“I had a . . . dream.” I say it like someone might say,
Grandma's dead.
I sit down in my chair, pressing my knees together until the bones grind.

“Describe this dream.” He has the pencil in his hand again and I am like a terrier watching the motion of a knife and fork. We start playing Word Tennis. Whoever can't think of a reply first loses.

“Your face has gone all red. All the way down your neck.”

“Quit looking at me.” He's correct, of course. This mirror-ball office confirms it.

“Can't. You're right in my line of vision.”

“Well, try.”

“It's not often I see such an interesting choice of thigh-revealing attire in the workplace. In the HR manual for appropriate business attire—”

“You can't take your eyes off my thighs long enough to consult the manual.” It's true. He looks at the floor but after a second the red sniper-dot from his eyes recommences at my ankle bone and slides up.

“I have it memorized.”

“Then you'll know that thighs are not an appropriate topic of conversation. If I get my polyester sack dress I guess you'll be kissing them good-bye.”

“I look forward to it. Getting the promotion, I mean. Not your thighs— Never mind.”

“Dream on, pervert.” I type in my password. The previous one expired. Now it's DIE-JOSH-DIE! “It's my job, not yours.”

“So who's your date with?”

“A guy.” I'll find one between now and the end of the workday. I'll hire a guy if I have to. I'll call a modeling agency and ask for the catch of the day. He'll pick me up in a limo out front of B&G and Joshua will have egg on his face.

“What time is your date?”

“Seven,” I hazard.

“What location is your date?” He slowly makes a pencil mark. An X? A slash? I can't tell.

“You're very interested; why is that?”

“Studies have shown that if managers feign interest in their employees' personal lives it increases their morale and makes them feel valued. I'm getting the practice in, before I'm your boss.” His professional spiel is contradicted by the weird intensity in his eyes. He's truly captivated by all of this.

I give him my best withering look. “I'm meeting him for drinks at the sports bar on Federal Avenue. And: You're never going to be my boss.”

“What a total coincidence. I'm going there to watch the game tonight. At seven.”

My clever fib was a tactical error. I study him but can't tell where his face ends and the lie begins.

“Maybe I'll see you there,” he continues. He is diabolical.

“Sure, maybe,” I make my voice bored so he can't tell I'm simultaneously fuming and panicking.

“So this dream—a
man
was in it, right?”

“Oh, yes indeed.” My eyes travel across Joshua without my permission. I think I can see the shape of his collarbone. “It was highly erotic.”

“I should compose an email to Jeanette,” he says faintly after
a pause and a throat-clearing rasp. He does a poor imitation of typing on his keyboard without even looking at the screen.

“Did I say erotic? I meant esoteric. I get those mixed up.”

He narrows one eye. “Your dream was . . . mysterious?”

Here goes nothing. It's time to take my chances with the human lie detector.

“It was full of symbols and hidden meaning. I was lost in a garden, and there was a man there. Someone I spend a lot of time with, but this time he seemed like a stranger.”

“Continue,” Joshua says. It's so strange to talk to him when his face isn't a mask of boredom.

I cross my legs as elegantly as I can manage and his eyes flash under my desk, then back to my face.

“I was wearing nothing but bedsheets,” I say in a confiding tone, then pause.

“This is strictly between us, right?”

He nods, spellbound, and I mentally high-five myself for winning Word Tennis.

I need to prolong this moment; it's not often I gain the upper hand. I put on lipstick using the wall as a mirror. The color is called Flamethrower and it's my trademark. Vicious, violent, poisonous red. Slit-wrists red.
The color of the devil's underpants,
according to Dad. I have so many tubes that I always have a tube within a three-foot radius. I am black and white, but thanks to Flamethrower, I can be Technicolor. I live in terror of it being discontinued by the manufacturer, hence my hoarding.

“So I'm walking through this garden and the man is right behind me.” Today I am a pathological liar. This is what Joshua Templeman does to me.

“He's right behind me. Like, up against me. Pressed up against
my ass.” I stand and slap my own butt loud enough to make my point. The words ring so true, because mostly it
is
true. Joshua nods slowly, his throat constricting in a swallow as his eyes trail down my dress.

“I seem to recognize his voice.” I pause for thirty seconds, blotting my lips, holding it up to admire the little red heart-shaped mark on the tissue before scrunching it and putting it in the wastebasket near my toes. I start reapplying.

“Do you always have to do that twice?” Joshua is growing irritated by this stilted storytelling. He taps his fingertips impatiently on the desk.

I wink. “Don't want it kissing off, now do I?”

“Who is this date with, exactly? What's his name?”

“A
guy
. You're changing the subject, but that's okay. Sorry for boring you.” I sit down and click the mouse until my computer whirs to life.

“No, no,” Joshua says faintly, like he is completely out of air. “I'm not bored.”

“Okay, so I'm in the garden, and it's . . . all reflective. Like it's covered in mirrors.”

He nods, elbow sliding forward on the desk, chin in hand. He is inching his chair back.

“And I . . .” I pause, and glance at him. “Never mind.”

“What?” He barks it so loud I bounce an inch out of my seat.

“I say,
Who are you? Why do you want me so badly?
And when he tells me his name, I was so shocked . . .”

Joshua dangles from the end of my fishing line, a glossy fish, flipping and irrevocably hooked. I can feel the expanse of air between us vibrating with tension.

“Come over here, I need to whisper it,” I murmur, glancing left and right although we both know there's nobody for miles.

Joshua shakes his head reflexively and I look at his lap. He's not the only one who can stare underneath the desk.

“Oh,” I say to be a smartass, but to my astonishment color begins to burn on Joshua's cheekbones. Joshua Templeman is turned on in my presence. Why does it make me want to tease him even more?

“I'll come over and tell you.” I lock my computer screen.

“I'm fine.”

“I have to share it.” I walk over slowly and put my hands on the edge of his desk. He looks at my fishnet legs with such a tormented expression I almost feel sorry for him.

“This is unprofessional.” He glances at the ceiling for inspiration before finding it. “HR.”

“Is that our safe word? Okay.” In this fluorescent lighting he looks irritatingly healthy and gold, his skin even and unblemished. But there's a faint sheen on his face.

“You're a little sweaty.” I take the Post-its from his desk and plant a big, slow kiss on top. I peel it off and stick it in the middle of his computer screen.