The Proposal (15 page)

Nadine rang the doorbell
and waited. She tried to compose herself, wondering what it would be like to
look into those ever changing blue eyes again.

When Billy opened the
door Nadine was almost relieved to see him and not Ethan straightaway. She
guessed he must be Billy, though she didn’t know for sure. She needed time to
get used to Ethan again.

"Hey," said
Billy pleasantly. He looked at the tall, beautiful and smartly dressed woman
standing in front of him and knew that the nervous expression on her face
belied her outward appearance. He welcomed Nadine with a knowing nod of his
head.

She’s crazy about him,
thought Billy looking her up and down.

"He's not
here."

Nadine's face dropped.
She had built herself up to this moment.

Warming towards her he
said, "You'll get him at his workshop."

Nadine looked puzzled and
shook her head. "Workshop? What workshop?"

"He makes models and
exhibits for galleries. Didn't he tell you? Quite an artist, our Ethan. A man
of many talents. Here." Billy scribbled down the address on a sheet of
paper and handed it to her.

"Are you sure he'll
be there?" asked Nadine worriedly.

"He's either there
or here. He's not been anywhere else lately," said Billy.

"Thank you,"
the words couldn't come out fast enough.

Nadine raced to the taxi
and handed the driver the piece of paper. "Please take me here," she
said breathlessly.

*         
*          *

The taxi pulled up
outside a row of shops and warehouses. Nadine paid the taxi driver and got out
in front of the building that she presumed housed the workshop. She walked into
the building and spoke to the security guard who told her that number thirty
nine was in the basement. It looked like a unit of industrial buildings. 

There were no banks or
luxury shops around  here. Unsure of herself anyway, because of her impending meeting
with Ethan, and unsure of the place where she now found herself, Nadine felt
extra vulnerable.

"You'll be
fine," said the guard, noting her hesitation. "There are many artists
here, painters and sculptors. Don't be scared." She tried to give him a
reassuring look but wasn't sure she had convinced him.

She got the elevator to
the basement and walked along, looking at the doors on either side of the
narrow hallway. Some of the doors didn’t even have numbers.

As it was, Ethan's
room didn't have a number. With her heart beating loudly, Nadine walked up and
down re-checking the doors on either side. One was thirty eight and the other
was forty, so she deduced that the one in the middle must be his workshop.
There was no sign or name above the door either. She guessed that he must not
want to be disturbed down here. She walked back from the room labeled thirty
eight and stood ready to knock on the next door for there was no bell on the
door. Then she heard a whisper behind her. "Nadine?"

It was so unexpected that
it caught her off guard. And as vulnerable and unsure as she felt, she screamed
out in fright.

"Hey, it's only
me." It was Ethan. She turned just in time to see his face before bursting
into tears. The mixture of seeing his face again and his smile, coupled with
Sandra’s outburst and Zimmerman’s words earlier in the day were all so
overwhelming right now. She cried, letting it all out.

All Ethan could do was to
hold her tightly in his arms. He had longed for this moment ever since they had
parted.  

"Hey, what's the
matter. Don't cry." He held her face in both his hands, wiping the tears
away with his fingers. "Don't cry, honey," he wondered what could
have happened. This was so unlike the Nadine that he knew.

Struggling to gain some
composure, she managed a weak smile and tried to dab her eyes. "I'm sorry.
I-I –I don’t know where to start. So much has happened today, you would not
believe it And you scared me just now. I thought you'd be in there.” She
pointed towards his door.

“It’s alright now, don’t
be sad”. He took her gently by the hand and led her inside. 

As the door swung open,
she found herself before a huge open space with two large wooden tables and
bits of machinery and tools lying around inside.

It looked in a state of
use; there were metal shavings on the floor and planes of metal, some shaped
into various structures and shapes all spread out and lying around the side
tables.

Nadine walked around,
looking everywhere with interest and puzzled, not quite knowing why Ethan would
be in here.

He watched her and his
spirits lifted. The heavy sadness that had been lingering over him for days was
now starting to evaporate away.  He had missed Nadine and his heart and
mind had been filled with thoughts of her. Thoughts that he had tried so valiantly
to keep away. And here she was in the flesh. He could barely stop himself from
smiling. He had that urge to go up to her and hold her close. But first he
needed to find out what had made her seek him out.

"I didn't know you
had a workshop," she said slowly, running her delicate fingers over what
looked like a metal structure.

"There are a lot of
things you don't know about me." Ethan replied, easing himself onto a
workbench, content for now just to watch her and enjoy the moment.

Their eyes met as she
glanced away from the structure and looked at him. He looked tired and as
though he hadn't slept well.

What must I look like,
she thought?

She had had many sleepless
nights too. They had been lonely and sad, her days and nights without Ethan.

The memory of their last
painful meeting still haunted her. But she was here now and she had to put
things right. Wondering how to say it, she paused, looking for words that would
explain the many emotions that had gone through her head since their last meeting. 
But she didn't know where to start. He waited patiently.

"I'm sorry I didn't
trust you Ethan, that day when I saw Zoe."

She stood over by the
second table, leaning against it whilst he watched and listened, sitting atop
the other table. He didn't interrupt and let her continue.

"You made me so
happy Ethan. It  was the first time I …ever… felt… that… way.” She said it
slowly as though making the realization at the very moment that she said the
words.  She carried on, “our weekend, the time we had together, was so
............magical. I didn't want it to end." 

Ethan listened on. These
were the words he had been hoping to hear and he felt like jumping for joy. But
it was important to him to hear what else she had to say.

Nadine waited for a
reaction, for any words from him, but Ethan remained quiet, encouraging her
with his eyes. "I didn't want it to end. So when I drove away, two things
happened. I missed you but at the same time, I started to doubt that you felt
that way about me. And secondly, I don't know why I thought of it at that
precise moment, because it had escaped my mind the whole time we were at the
Stormont but I remembered we had a deal, an arrangement. And that I still owed
you the payment for that deal. So with my doubts about your intentions and my thoughts
about the payment, I was scared that most of the women you take out to dinner -
they fall for you. But for you it is only a business arrangement. I hated the
thought that you would see me as your business arrangement and nothing else."

So that was it. She had
wondered whether she was just another one of his clients. How was she to know
that he didn't see her as a client at all?

Not wanting to stop now
that she had found the words to tell him, Nadine gushed,  "So,
because I felt I owed you the money anyway, even though in my mind I wondered
if I might risk offending you by offering it to you, to my mind it was still a
kind of business deal. I owed you. And I don't like owing anything to anyone.
It's not the money. It was just that we had a deal, you do understand don't
you?" She searched his face trying to get a feel as to what he was
thinking.

"I get it Nadine.
You keep your promises. Even though you didn't feel as though we had a business
deal by the end of it, you were just honoring your side of the bargain
even though you thought I might be offended."

"Exactly." She
seemed relieved.

Now it was Ethan’s turn
to speak. "And for the record Nadine, I
was
offended. Because the
money never even entered my mind. I was so happy to see you turn up at my
door."

Nadine hushed him with a
gentle wave of her hand, wanting to get her side of the story heard. "And
then I saw Zoe, and then you showed up, not even more than five minutes after I
had left. You were half naked again. What was a girl supposed to think? It
validated all my fears about you, about us."  She stopped talking and
let her words sink in.

Ethan looked pensive. It
was just as Zoe had told him. It was exactly how a woman would jump to
conclusions as Nadine had.  And who could blame her?

"And so we had more
than a week apart," she mused.

"Ten days." He
replied, getting off the table. He wanted to go up to her but felt he should
remain where he was, so he leant against the table instead and put his hands in
his pockets, “Ten awful days," he repeated.

"Yes, they
were." Nadine whispered softly, "I've really missed you Ethan."
She fumbled around with the envelope which she still carried in her bag.

“Zoe came to see at work,
with this,” she pulled it out and held it out to him. Ethan’s eyes darkened as
he saw the envelope inside which was Nadine’s check. “The only good thing about
this,” he said, taking the check from her and ripping it into pieces, “was that
it led you to me.”  They both stared as the  pieces fluttered to the floor and
lay amongst the metal shavings. Taking a step towards him and taking a hold of
his hand, Nadine asked, “How come you addressed it to my work place instead of
my personal address?”

“Because when you turned
up with the check, I had my own fears
about you.”

Frowning and letting go
of his hand, “Me?” Nadine asked, a flash of surprise in her eyes.

Ethan carried on,
determined to be heard. “Because it seemed to me as though the whole thing was
nothing but a business arrangement for you. You had what you wanted, the
weekend went well, your bosses seemed to think we were an item and that’s what
you wanted, right?”  He arched his eyebrow and stood defiantly with his arms
now crossed over his chest, putting up a barrier between them.

Nadine opened her mouth,
ready to defend herself but he stopped her. “So you turn up with the money,
your weekend is over, the deal has been done, you accomplished your mission and
all that’s left is for you to pay up. Like I said before, the money never even
occurred to me. I’d forgotten all about our deal. But you showing up so fast
with the payment, you have to admit, it looked as though you were just closing
your side of the deal.” He stayed standing where he was wanting her to know how
he had felt.

Relaxing her shoulders,
knowing it was futile to argue the facts, Nadine said helplessly. “I get it
Ethan. We both messed up, it wasn’t just me. I get it now.” She wanted to be
walk up to him and make up. They had wasted time enough already.

But before she did she
said, “Sandra Donnelly knows that you’re a male escort.  Her friend, someone
called Antonia?” At the mention of this name, Ethan’s eyes widened in surprise.
His arms slowly unfolded and he cocked his head to the side, waiting for Nadine
to continue.

“I don’t really want to
talk about it all. Believe me, not only did Zoe turn up with the check but
Sandra accused me of losing the Noble Vintage account and-”

“What?” Ethan
interrupted.

Nadine nodded, “Yes, she
said it was my fault. Then she said you were a male escort and her friend sees
you for company. And….you want to know the worst thing about it all?” She
didn’t wait for Ethan to nod, she could see that he was hanging onto her every
word. “Michael Zimmerman heard the whole thing, he was standing right outside
and hea-”  Before she could finish her sentence, her cell phone rang and she
answered it immediately.  It was Melissa. 

Nadine’s face turned pale
as she spoke. “Hi Melissa – uh huh. He is? Okay put him on.” Nadine turned to
Ethan and let out a huge sigh. He moved closer and stood by her side with his
ear close to Nadine’s so that he could hear.

“Nadine, Zimmerman here.”

“Mr. Zimmerman, I’m on my
way ba-”

“Nadine, Melissa tells me
you’ve gone to finish off a few things.”

“Yes sir, but I’m done
now and I’m on my w-”

“Nadine. I won’t keep you
and I don’t expect you-” as he said these words, Nadine’s heart thumped louder
than ever, “to come back this afternoon. But, I expect to see you first thing
tomorrow morning.”

“Tomorrow morning sir, I
can come back now. I’m almost ther-”

Like a busy man with no
time to spare, Mr Zimmerman interrupted Nadine again, “Sandra Donnelly is on
leave for a few weeks. I need you to take over the Noble Vintage account.
Luckily, I managed to restore their faith in our company and I need someone
very capable to look after them now. So I’m handing them over to you.”