“I’m not sure a date with one of your friends is the answer, Trevor.”
“He’s straight, Rebecca!” he cries, not bothering to disguise his frustration. “The fellow just moved here from Boston to sell copiers or ATMs or something useless and industrial like that. Does he sound gay to you?”
“Yee-ha. Maybe he’ll take me to a trade show.”
“Since when did you get picky? Let me fix you up with him.” Again, my hand moves to my face, feeling the harsh scar tissue with my fingertips. Of everyone in my life now, only Trevor truly understands. After all, he was there to see the damage firsthand.
“I’ll think about it.”
“He’s a real hottie,” he promises, “in that computer salesman sort of way.” I’m about to make a dubious remark about his taste in men when the whole room goes black without warning.
From down the corridor, Ed shouts, “Damned electrical department! They’ve screwed us again.” When Ed shouts, it’s more like divine thunder, and Trevor snaps to his feet without wasting a moment.
“Happy Monday to me, strapping lads in tool belts on their way,” he sings to himself. There goes Trev with his recurring Ty Pennington fantasy again.
His shadowed outline moves past the shuttered bank of windows, toward the hall. Moments later I hear him at his desk, phoning over to the electrical construction department.
After a few minutes of darkness, Ed bellows, “Anybody working on this yet? It isn’t brain surgery, people! Give me some damn light!”
Light. When all I’m thinking is that I can’t read my phone messages without it. Funny, because otherwise I’m never more at peace than I am in the dark.
It seems forever before electrical construction sends somebody over to deal with our crisis. I guess Brad Pitt’s latest blockbuster takes precedence over our development staff figuring out the next blockbuster for the studio to bankroll. Now, don’t get me wrong, I’m not an executive in charge of production or anything; I’ll leave that up to Ed and his team. It’s just about tracking hot projects and trying to land them for the company. Frankly I’m in it for the reading. Lord knows I’m not looking for a producing credit, since unlike most everyone else in this town, I actually want to stay put in my job, not ascend the power ladder.
I’m on my cell phone, returning a call to a literary agency back east, when a huge shadow lumbers past my desk. I glance up, mid-discussion about the viability of translating a bestseller to the screen, when the shape stops in front of me, hesitating, obviously a man shadow, what with the size factor involved and all. In an effort to remain focused, I spin my chair in the opposite direction, toward the wall, continuing my conversation.
There’s quiet mumbling from the stranger, then a flashlight illuminates some control panel on the lower part of my office wall, right beneath the covered windows. “Look, I’ve got to run, okay?” I say, wrapping up the conversation. “We’re in the middle of a blackout here or something.” I snap the phone shut, and sit in the dark, perfectly still. Slowly I rotate my chair in his direction, although I’m not sure what to say to a shadowy stranger, not like this. Finally I give it my best effort.
“You must be the electrician,” I say, tugging nervously on my ponytail.
“You must be from the South.”
“Geez, is it that obvious?” I ask, trying to make out the guy’s face as he lifts the flashlight to eye level, tinkering with the control panel.
“Subtle, but the accent’s still there.” Guess all the dialect coaching in the world won’t rid me completely of my Dorian, Georgia roots.
There’s the metallic clanking sound of a fuse box or panel opening as he settles on the floor until he’s leaning low on his elbows. In fact, from what his flashlight allows me to see, he’s now stretched out on his stomach like a cat sunning itself, and I’m mildly curious about a guy who can make himself so at home in my office. “You figuring out the problem?” More enlightened commentary from yours truly as he aims the beam of light into the open electrical panel.
I’m met by silence, until he gives a long sigh. It’s an exhausted kind of sound that actually surprises me. “The problem, Ms. O’Neill, is the antiquated wiring system in this building. Been patched and whatnot for about half a century, but what it needs is a complete overhauling.”
Ms. O’Neill? How does he know my name?
“Your assistant told me this was your office,” he continues, answering my unvoiced question. “Not trying to spook you or anything. Seeing how it’s dark in here and all that.”
“Now look who sounds southern,” I tease, feeling a strange familiarity rise between the two of us. The kind you get talking to someone you’re intimate with on the phone late at night—in your bed, well past midnight. Or maybe trading e-mails at three in the morning, when neither of you can sleep.
“Virginia, if that counts.”