At eleven forty-five this past Wednesday morning, Marcy, my one time and just about out of memory bank significant other, walked into my office. I was pacing and talking to my stockbroker on the phone when she opened the door. Surprised and flustered, I covered the mouthpiece and leaned over to peck her hello – but a split second before our lips met, she quickly turned her head so my kiss caught her cheek.
Suddenly I couldn’t remember whether I was buying or selling but decided to wait for the paperwork and not ask my broker because he was always yelling at me for not listening to him. I hung up.
She sat down on my desk and pulled from her pocketbook a pack of Marlboro Lights, turned over my THANKS FOR NOT SMOKING sign and lit up. She dared me with her soft green eyes as she blew an arrow of smoke from her first deep drag past my head towards the ceiling. Then she crossed her long legs, hitched her skirt thigh high, turned toward me and pursed her lips. She tapped her ash on the back of my sign.
It came thundering back – the essence of all that I disliked about this woman could be summed up in two words. Pursed lips. Marcy loved to purse her lips, and she pursed often. If only she had known how truly offensive I found it – she would probably have stay pursed.
“I’ve decided to forgive you. You can take me to lunch,” she announced, obviously forgetting that lost weekend she spent with the bartender and lifeguard that precipitated our break-up. Maybe she was forgiving me for burning her clothes and mailing the ashes to her at work.
Her announcements. I had almost forgotten about her announcements. I hated them second only to her lip pursing. The trouble was that she knew how much I hated her announcements and she would pick and choose them for maximum effect.
But still incapable of saying no to her, I got my coat and we rode the elevator with her chatting non-stop.
Out of the elevator and down the hall and out the door, idle, innocuous, inane chat.
Marcy’s specialty. Drivel.
With her still talking as we left the elevator, I steered her through the lobby and out to the parking lot and finally to my car. I unlocked my door, got in and started the engine only to look over and notice her standing primly next to her door waiting for me to open it. Primly. Do I have to tell you how I feel about primly?
Exasperated, I opened my door and got out and started around, when over the top of the car I saw Marcy standing ramrod straight, prim as can be, lips pursed, staring away from me. Waiting. Waiting and expecting. All the Marcy that I had pushed out of my mind for the past two years came crashing home as my internal klaxon sounded, and instinctively I spun around and got back into my car.
On this Wednesday’s lunch hour, that is how I last saw her – in my rear view mirror – with her Fall coloring – standing primly and pursed amidst a swirl of dust and smoke – as I sped off out of the parking lot, feeling as if I had just dodged a bullet.
© 2019 Paul Beckman’s Short Stories • Rights Reserved.
