“Whoa, who are you trying to impress?” he asked with a smirk. “This isn’t a date, you know.”
I rolled my eyes and hurried into the den, throwing my pajamas on the floor and shoving my boots over my leggings. “I just like to keep you on your toes.”
“Well, you do that, all right. One minute the ‘who gives a shit’ rock and roll tomboy, the next you’re all pretty and girly and stuff.”
I quickly laced up the boots and straightened up, flipping my hair back over my shoulders. I put my hands on my hips. “And which one do you like better?”
“I like all of you,” he said. He smiled, closed-mouthed and strangely sad. I blushed and quickly pushed past him through the doorway.
“I’ll text you when I’m coming back,” I called over my shoulder as I made my way to the door. Fat Rabbit noticed I was on the way out, flipped right up, and scampered over to me. I shooed him away with my foot.
“Oh wait!” Dex exclaimed and scooted over, digging into his back pocket. He pulled out his wallet and handed me a fifty-dollar bill.
“Are you paying for my lunch?” I took it from him, confused.
He nodded at it as he stuck his wallet back in his pocket. “Just give that to Rebecca. She’ll know what it’s for. K, kiddo?”
I frowned at him as a way of saying goodbye and left the apartment.
Once I reached the lobby and saw how wet it was outside, I thought about going back upstairs to get an umbrella but I could already see Rebecca’s hazy form through the fogged up doors, sitting in a running hatchback parked at the curb.
I stepped outside, not giving myself enough time to get nervous about my lunch date with one of Dex’s friends (and a Wine Babe, let’s not forget) and quickly opened the door to the car as the rain poured down on my newly straightened hair.
“Hi!” I said, waving at her.
I stepped in the car and shut the door, which shut in the inevitable awkwardness with us.
I turned in my seat to look at her and was met with a giant puff of pot smoke.
I coughed, my lungs seizing from something they hadn’t been exposed to in a very long time.
“I’m sorry,” she said in her proper English accent and blew the rest of the smoke out to the left of her and out the window, which was open a crack, the rain coming inside and saturating the rim of the door.
“That’s OK,” I said, getting a hold of the spasms.
“Do you want any?” she asked, offering me the joint in her pale, delicate fingers.
I shook my head, not wanting to explain that I wasn’t eager to go down that path again. I didn’t have a problem with anyone smoking pot, it’s just that there was a reason they called it a gateway drug. And even though 90% of the population can smoke it and call it a day, it was just the starting point for me. It was better if I avoided it entirely. On that note, it was probably better that I never drank again, either, but we can’t do everything that’s right for us. I was allowed at least one vice.
“More for me then,” she said with a smile. I noticed how much softer her face looked when she smiled, almost girlish. She was dressed impeccably, wearing a modest grey linen shift dress that was structured and tailored to her body. The sleeves went out into little pointy corners that combined a 40s look and a futuristic style, like something out of Blade Runner. She had a thin black patent belt at her waist, her hair was perfectly in place and a maroon felt hat sat on her head at a nice angle and perfectly matched her lips and nails. Even though I put in the extra effort that morning, I felt like a giant slob next to her.
“So where do you want to eat?” she asked and brought the car out onto the street. It felt like the beginning of awkward small talk.
“Oh, I’m easy,” I said. “I don’t know Seattle that well so I couldn’t really suggest any place.”
We paused at the corner and she craned her head around, looking out at the street. “Which one’s your car?”
“They let me park in the apartment parkade. I have a motorbike so you can just rest it in the corner and no one says anything.”
Rebecca laughed, rich and amused. “A motorbike?”
She gave me a quick look before she brought the car onto the main road and roared along beneath the Monorail tracks, one hand on the shift, the other holding the joint and the wheel. “No offense Perry, but you do not look cool enough to ride a motorbike.”
I’d actually heard the opposite. That I looked cool enough, but didn’t act cool enough. Same difference, I guess.
“None taken,” I said as nonchalantly as possible and looked out the window. Dex had been right about Rebecca being rough around the edges. I wondered if agreeing to lunch was a mistake. If she was going to end up being someone just like Jenn, I was in for a hellish time.
“I know just the place, anyway, and it’s close by,” she said.
Whatever, I thought. Then I remembered Dex slipping me the fifty note.
“Oh,” I said and pulled it out of my pocket. I waved it in the air. “Dex said for me to give this to you; he said you’d know what it was for.”
She eyed it without turning her head. She had unnaturally thick and long lashes. She laughed. “Oh, he’s run out all ready? I suppose he’s not taking quitting too lightly.”
I squinted at her, not understanding.
“Just hold onto it for now,” she said and flipped on the radio with her hand. “Come Together” was on. I rolled my eyes. This album was freaking following me everywhere.
I stuck the bill back in my pocket and soon we were pulling up into a metered parking space in the middle of downtown.
“Look at this luck,” she said. When she had finished parking, she pulled out the ashtray and put the joint out in it. I was relieved we didn’t have to go far. It always made me nervous when people smoked pot and drove at the same time. Probably because when I was a teenager that’s why my parents took my old car away. Had a little mishap with the cherry tree in our front lawn.
We got out of the car and she pointed up at what looked like a downtown mall. We were on the corner of Pike and 5th, amongst office workers out on their lunch break, shielding themselves from the rain with a multitude of overused umbrellas. There were retail stores everywhere, from Anthropologie to All Saints. My sister would have gone nuts here.
“Hey,” I said to Rebecca as she locked the car and we quickly walked down to the lights to cross the street. “I’ve got a gift certificate for this Designer Shoe House or something, is there one around here?”
She nodded and pointed down the block. “Just down there. Want to do some shoe shopping after lunch?”
I nodded. “I don’t have any nice shoes for the Christmas party. I mean, I thought I did but my sister said they looked Amish.”
I looked down at Rebecca’s shoes as they stood poised in the falling rain. Of course they were as high as hell, as shiny as her belt and as maroon as her hat, lips and nails.
“Not a problem,” she smiled and she looked soft again. I could also see she was being sincere, which started to put me at ease. That was the one thing missing from all of Jenn’s perfect smiles: Sincerity.
We went up a few floors in an office building cum mall and ended up at a spread-out restaurant and bar that was named after me. Or my last name at least.
I chuckled as the perky waitress led us to our table. “Have you been here before?” I asked Rebecca, thinking it was just for me.
“Actually, yes,” she said as we took our seats and took the menus from the waitress. “Work isn’t too far from here so we sometimes come here after meetings. Best happy hours ever and we all need one or five after dealing with Jimmy.”
I leaned forward on my elbows and looked at her. I couldn’t help but smile like a goof. It finally occurred to me that I actually had a job with co-workers who were interesting and seemed somewhat interested in me. I didn’t know much about Shownet, obviously, due to geographic restrictions, but I couldn’t get over the fact how nice it was to be able to talk to someone about it, someone who wasn’t Dex. Sometimes I got the impression that Dex was trying to keep me separate from that world, even though it was the world that gave me a meager paycheck every two weeks and broadcasted my fat, scared face to the entire planet.
Sensing this, maybe, Rebecca put her hand out on mine and held it there. “This is my treat. Don’t worry about what to eat and what not to eat. I’m really glad you decided to come out today.”
I straightened up in my seat and blushed again. “Well, thank you. I was nervous…I thought maybe you didn’t like me.”
“Oh, I know,” she said, patting my hand and then returning her attention to the menu. “Dex told me you felt that way.”
I sighed. It figured. She lowered the menu and peered at me. “I knew if Dex liked you, I mean seriously liked you as he does, then I would like you too. We don’t disagree on too many things.”
There was way too much in that sentence. What did “seriously liked you” mean and what else could she tell me? Having Rebecca here reminded me of having Maximus at my disposal in Red Fox, except Rebecca didn’t seem to have a hidden agenda and would just tell me whatever I needed to know.
I took in a deep breath and brought my attention to the drink menu. Part of me wanted to just enjoy the company and the free food and learn something about my partner if it came up. The other part wanted to spend the next hour asking Rebecca question upon question about the man I was in love with, even though I was desperately trying not to.
“They do a really good dirty martini here,” she said. “It’s strong.”
“It’s lunchtime,” I said, noting how early it was for martinis.
She raised her threaded brow. “You need it.”
Did I? She was the one who was high. Maybe she needed me to catch up. But I nodded anyway, and soon we had two of them coming, along with hearty salads.
When our martinis came, we clinked over the table. I avoided her eyes even though I could feel hers boring into mine, trying to figure me out or work through my secrets in a telepathic way. Her cold, dark eyes were so unnerving at times that I wouldn’t have put it past her. In some other lifetime, she could have been a vampire or a witch. But one of the sexy ones.
“So how do you like working on the Dex Files?” she asked after taking a small sip of her martini, her lips leaving a red mark on the glass.
I laughed at the ‘Dex Files’. “That’s a good one. I like it just fine.”
“Just fine? Oh darling, this isn’t a job interview here. Look, Dex is a dear. I love him very much, as much as anyone can, perhaps, but you can be honest with me. I’m not here because of Dex. I’m here because I just wanted to know you better. You seem familiar to me in some strange way.”
I felt the same way about her but I didn’t voice it. It wasn’t that I knew her, I knew I didn’t, but there was something strangely comforting underneath the slightly awkward situation. It was hard to explain and if I did try to explain it to myself, the best I would come up with was again how much like Dex she was. Only she was honest.
I took a gulp of my drink for courage, enjoying the salty brine as it slipped down my throat while fiddling with the stack of olives in the glass.
“I like working on the show,” I admitted. “I mean, I love it. Sometimes. I love feeling like I’m doing something that I’m good at…even though it’s not really a skill anyone would acknowledge. I don’t know. It’s hard to explain. But I’m grateful that I have this. It’s so much better than working reception, what I was doing before. I’m happier now.”
She was watching me, chin resting on her hands. “And you and Dex?”