Woman King (3 page)

It was difficult for me to hear him speak
because the blood was pounding so loudly in my ears. I had never
been superstitious before, but I was beginning to wonder if someone
or something had jinxed me.

You know how there are moments that define us
as adults? Well, this was one of them for me. I did not want to
lose the project. I was already worried about my reputation, having
lost one client already to Halbert. Professionally, I could not
allow myself to become enraged, so I swallowed my pride. After a
lengthy and awkward moment of silence on my part, I put on my game
face and smiled.

“Tom, if you think that bringing Stoner on
board will help improve our chances, then I am all for it,” I said,
my voice slightly cracking. “Why don’t we set up a meeting next
week to get the team together and brief him on the status of
things.”

Tom smiled, and this time it was a genuine
smile.

“I knew this wouldn’t be a problem for you,
Olivia,” he said beaming. “You are one tough cookie. I’ll tell
Stoner to call you and you two can arrange a meeting.”

“Great. OK,” I said, beaming right back at
him, “I will look out for his call.”

We shook hands and I showed Tom out. After he
left, I walked back to my office, shut the door, and, for the first
time in many years, began to cry.

Halbert must have been on Tom’s speed dial,
because he called me less than an hour later to arrange a meeting.
By the time he called, I had stopped crying and had moved on to
brooding.

“Aren’t you a good sport,” he purred into the
phone when I told him I would make the necessary arrangements to
merge our teams. “Not many people would be as gracious about having
to work with another consultant. What’s your secret?” His tone was
friendly, but oddly biting and I was anxious to get off the
phone.

“The important thing is for this project move
forward and for the client to be happy,” I said, trying to sound
indifferent.

I was, of course, lying

****

After everything that had transpired, it
seemed like a good day to leave work early. My head ached, the
result of a toxic cocktail of sensations swirling within me. I
needed to deal with my anxiety, embarrassment and anger. Since when
did I need help to complete a project? Why was I suddenly not
powerful enough? I had no answers to these questions, but I felt a
growing sense of unease.

At home, I tried to work in my garden.
Putting my hands into the dirt usually helps to distract me from my
troubles. For some reason, the lots in the Inner Sunset are more
generous than in other parts of the city, and my yard is larger
than most. Slowly, I had been transforming my plot into a Provençal
garden, complete with olive trees and lavender. I am an unabashed
Francophile, having visited the country many times with my mother
over the years to attend her exhibitions.

My introduction to French began in
kindergarten, as my mother insisted that I attend a French
bilingual school. There, a kindly older woman from Toulouse taught
me my earliest words. In addition, I lived in Paris briefly during
college through an exchange program, where I expanded my studies to
include French grammar. The garden is one way I stay connected to
France—right down to the antique wooden park chairs outside on my
deck.

This time, however, even the garden didn’t
help me relax. Though I managed to settle a half-dozen shade plants
into the soil on the south side of the garden, I still didn’t feel
any better than I had before. In fact, I felt worse. I went inside
and opened my laptop. I fiddled with my iPod and created a few new
playlists. I updated my Facebook status, and then went back to
Spotify to look at new music. Finally, after another hour of
spinning my wheels, I texted Lily and asked her to join me for
drinks. She immediately agreed to meet me.

I dusted off most of the soil from my
clothing and went upstairs to shower and change. I pulled out a
black cotton dress with ballet sleeves and a pair of leopard-print
flats, then rummaged through my closet until I found a slate-grey
cashmere cardigan that draped to my knees.

I headed off to the Mission, a part of San
Francisco where one should not show up in a suit and tie. The
epicenter of fashion and cuisine, the Mission is in constant
motion. It’s a favorite spot among the young and creative who are
drawn to its avant-garde clothing boutiques and stylish
restaurants. It also happens to be one of the warmest parts of San
Francisco—blessed with less fog than most parts of town.

I was meeting Lily at Foreign Cinema, a
popular restaurant where movies are projected onto an enormous
wall. On nice evenings, it’s heavenly to sit outside on the patio
and watch a film while enjoying
steak frites
and a nice
glass of Bordeaux.

Lily was waiting in the long hallway that led
to the hostess station when I walked in the door. She smiled, a
tentative smile, given that the last time we’d seen each other I
had left in a funk. But Lily was my best friend, and it wasn’t her
fault that Stoner Halbert seemed to be stalking my clients.

As we were about to be led to our table, I
noted a group of men checking her out. Lily’s beauty is such that
it can be startling. She is over six feet tall, with straight black
hair that falls down to the middle of her back, the blackness
accentuating her pale, seemingly glowing, skin. Tonight she looked
especially striking in a pair of slim jeans tucked into boots and
an amazing vintage military coat, complete with brass buttons.
She’d fashioned her hair into two long braids on either side of her
head and, as a result, a small tattoo at the back of her neck was
visible. The tattoo was a tiny bit of writing in a language I did
not recognize.

“What’s the tattoo?” I asked as we walked
into the dining room, leaving Lily’s admirers behind.

Lily smiled and rubbed her fingers over the
images. “It’s nothing. It’s a design a friend made when I was in
college. It’s gibberish, really. Sometimes I forget it’s even
there.”

“What does it say?” I asked, intrigued by her
reticence.

“It’s written in an old language,” she said.
“It means peace and order.”

“Peace and order,” I repeated. “Sounds nice,
where can we find some of that?”

Lily squeezed my hand. “You never know,
Olivia, it might be right around the corner.”

We were seated at a table outside in the
courtyard. The movie was starting early, before sunset, because it
was
Lord of the Rings
, the first part of the trilogy.

“Oh, I love that movie,” Lily said picking up
a menu.

“We could do with a bit of make-believe,” I
said, scanning the dinner specials. “It’s no fun to be in the real
world at the moment.”

“It was no picnic for Middle Earth,” Lily
said. “After all, they had a war to contend with.”

“Yes, but it’s make believe,” I said, pausing
to order a glass of wine with the server. “In the real world, there
are no such things as fairies or dwarves. There is no handsome
warrior who will come to save civilization and pledge his undying
love to the woman of his dreams. That kind of magic only exists in
movies.”

Lily seemed to be struggling with a thought;
she furrowed her brow and appeared to be on the verge of telling me
something. But the shadow quickly passed, and she laughed. “Well,
thank goodness for movies… and martinis,” she added quickly as her
drink arrived at the table.

We ordered dinner and sat back in amicable
silence to watch the Hobbits. Once our plates arrived, Lily turned
her attention back to me.

“How are you doing, Olivia? We haven’t spoken
since you came to see me at my office.”

“I’m not great,” I said honestly. “I feel
like Stoner is stalking me. He seems to have found a way to get in
between me and two of my clients; they all appear to think he’s
magic, a new, powerful consultant with a set of skills no one has
seen before.”

This brought the same dark look back to
Lily’s face. “Do you think someone in your company is helping
him?”

“No, I think I am helping him. I am not at
the top of my game,” I said, trying to keep my voice low because of
the movie. “I’m not doing my best work, and each time I make a
mistake, he seems to be right there. It’s beginning to take a toll
on me. I haven’t slept well in weeks.”

Lily leaned over and placed her hand on mine.
“You’re having trouble sleeping?”

I nodded. “ I fall asleep, but then I am
plagued with the same confusing dream.”

Lily’s face took on the same worried look
again, “What kind of dream, Olivia? Are in you danger?”

What an odd question to ask, I thought, but I
decided to ignore it and describe my dream. “I’m having this dream.
It doesn’t seem dangerous, but when it happens, I feel like this
animal is trying to speak with me.”

“What kind of animal?” Lily asked, looking
pensive.

“I’m sure it’s nothing.” I said, feeling the
need to reassure her. “It’s a black panther and she seems to want
to speak with me.”

“She?” Lily repeated. “How do you know it’s a
she?”

“Good question,” I said, pausing to take a
sip of wine. “I don’t know, really. It seems like a she. In my
dreams, the panther walks beside me, but she never blocks my way.
And when I wake up, it feels like she is still there, trying to
help me. Crazy, right?”

Lily shook her head and smiled. “Maybe the
panther is trying to tell you something. But it might take a while
to figure out what it is.”

“Well, let’s hope it happens soon,” I said,
“Before Stoner manages to take over any more of my business.”

I went home that evening feeling better. It
had felt good to tell Lily about my problems at work and about the
dreams. I was hoping that confessing my anxiety would help me
finally get some sleep. Instead, I was plagued once again by the
dream. This time, however, the panther’s purring sounded even
louder in my head. It seemed that the animal was trying to get my
attention. I woke up in the middle of the night feeling quite
unwell. Not only was I was disoriented from a general lack of sleep
during the last few days, but also hungover from the wine I’d
consumed with Lily. I went downstairs and climbed on the couch in
my living room. Wrapping an old wool blanket around my shoulders, I
flipped through the channels on my television until dawn trying to
relax.

I took the next day off of work, again. I was
too tired to go into the office. My trusty iPhone allowed me to
scan emails and return a few calls, but I remained in a funk and
could not seem to focus on my work. I decided to catch a movie, and
then go out again that evening for drinks. This time Lily wasn’t
free to join me, so I went out on my own.

Throughout the following week, I followed the
same pattern. I drank all night and slept all day. As the week
progressed, I grew inexplicably more despondent, ignoring my office
altogether. Although what I was doing would only make matters
worse, I could not seem to help myself. By the fifth night, as I
fumbled to open my front door, I felt angry. I don’t know how long
that emotion had been lurking in my psyche, but by the time I
turned the key in the lock, I was more furious than ever.

“What the hell is happening?” I yelled out to
no one in particular. I lived alone and had no pets, so I was
unconcerned that anyone would hear me. I threw my purse on the
floor and stomped into the kitchen. As I stormed through the
doorway, I caught my elbow sharply on the frame. Crying out in
pain, I slumped to the floor sobbing as I cradled my injured
arm.

I was angry that I had bumped my arm. I was
angry that I was behaving like my mother, staying drunk for a week
to avoid what was bothering me. Then, my thoughts drifted back to
what I had been avoiding all week: Stoner Halbert. I had to return
to work and face my clients. I had to work with
him
. I could
feel the unmistakable sensation of someone
gaining
on me,
and I feared soon I would have no business to go back to.

“What did I do to deserve this?” I cried out
again into the emptiness of my kitchen. “What I am I supposed to
do?”

Still holding my arm. I slid across the floor
and propped myself against one of the cabinets. As I sat on the
floor of my kitchen crying, the image of the black cat from my
dreams popped into my head.

“Why don’t you tell me what you want?” I
murmured, my head resting against the cabinet, my eyes closed.
“Please, speak to me.”

Not long after I said those words, I fell
asleep on the kitchen floor.

****

When I awoke the next morning, I felt very
cold. Then I realized that I was not in bed. Had I somehow failed
to make it home? Slowly, I began to remember the details of the
previous evening and I opened one eye. I was sprawled out on the
floor of my kitchen. My body was stiff from sleeping on the hard
stone floor, and I was chilled to the bone, having slept without
the benefit of a coat or blanket. I was about to get up when I
heard a voice speak to me.

“Let me help you up,” the woman said, her
speech revealing a hint of a foreign accent I could not place.

“Lily?” I asked aloud, thinking I was too
hung-over to recognize my friend’s voice. Maybe I had let her in
last night, or maybe I had called her and she had used her key.
Either way I was glad that she was there.

“It’s not Lily,” the voice said. “Open your
eyes, Olivia.”

I did as I was told and promptly let out a
scream as my eyes focused on the figure standing in my kitchen. It
was not Lily. I had never seen this woman before.

“Who are you and how did you get into my
house?” I asked, wondering if I had managed to leave the door open.
Maybe some deranged person had walked in off the street. I did live
in a city, after all. I began calculating how quickly I could get
to the phone and call the police. But as I glanced at her more
closely, I saw that she didn’t look homeless. She seemed about my
age and was tall, slightly more so than Lily. She also had long
black hair, but it seemed almost darker than black, like the color
of a raven’s wing, or say, maybe, a panther. She was wearing
skintight leather pants and a dark sweater. The fingers on her
hands were long and slender and adorned with several silver rings.
She wore a small silver hoop through one of her eyebrows, which
framed green eyes that almost glowed like a cat’s. I was beginning
to see a pattern that unnerved me.