22.
Daisy
I didn’t actually have any plans to meet up with Caroline; I knew she was in the middle of a big project, but I didn’t want Ian to ask me to hang out after work. The whole work day had been rather unbearable, though I’d done my best to just do my job and not let myself be affected by his presence.
Which was difficult, because I could feel his gaze on me, feel him watching me from his desk as I crossed the room to get some water, or as I answered the phone, or as I sat, with my back to him, typing things into the computer. And I knew, when I’d gone back in to get my purse, that he wanted to hang out, and that it would be difficult for me to say no to him if he asked.
Since I didn’t have any plans, I went home. There was no sign of Noah, and I breathed a little sigh of relief as I let myself into the building, then into my apartment. I changed out of my work clothes into yoga pants and a t-shirt, made some tea, then got my computer and went and sat on the couch. I resisted the urge of Facebook and instead opened up my resume and looked at it, then started browsing a few jobs sites. I had spruced up my resume after I’d left the salon, but I tried to tinker with it a little more, hopefully making it as enticing as possible. I decided to leave my time at Hard Tail Security off of it—I’d just pretend that I’d never worked there. It would be better than trying to explain why I was leaving after such a short time.
But that got me wondering: was I a horrible employee? Was this how it was going to be for me for the rest of my life? I’d go from one job to the next, either getting fired or having to leave because I’d gotten myself into an unbearable situation in the workplace?
I sent my resume to a few places, offices looking for admins, a hair salon looking for a receptionist with experience. A few of the job postings were ones that I had applied to before I got the job at HTS, and they were still open and looking for people.
After a little while of this, I put the computer down and went out to the kitchen to look for something to eat. I needed to go to the grocery store, but that could wait until tomorrow. I made myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. While I ate, I started wondering if perhaps I really was having a quarter-life crisis, as my mother had suggested. A colleague of hers had been writing a book about it. Maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad idea to talk to him. Maybe he’d have some insight for me.
After I finished my sandwich, I found my phone and called my mother.
“Hi, it’s me,” I said when she answered. “I hope I’m
not interrupting anything.”
“I was just grading some papers, so no, you’re not interrupting anything. I was
thinking of giving you a call at some point, though. Would you like to go out
and get coffee this weekend?”
“Sure,” I said.
“I think that’d be good. We didn’t exactly end things on such a good note the last time, and you know that I don’t like it when things happen like that.”
“I know.” There was no point in getting into an
argument with her, in pointing out the fact that most of the time, the reason
things ended the way they did between us was because of her. “But, actually . .
. I was calling because I was thinking I
might like to talk to your colleague after all.”
“My colleague?”
I knew she knew exactly who I was talking about, but she wanted to hear me say
it. “Yes, your colleague. The one who’s writing the book about the quarter-life
crisis. You said that he was doing case studies and interviewing people.”
“Oh, Carl! Right. Yes, he’s still diligently at work
on it. And he’d be more than happy to talk to you—I think it’ll be a good
thing. I’m so happy that you changed your mind!” She really did sound happy,
and for a moment, it seemed as though maybe I was doing the right thing. Maybe
this was what I needed; it would give me some perspective, help me get started
down a different path where I made better choices all around. “I’ll send his
information over to you once we get off the phone,” my mother continued. “And
that way you’ll have it if you don’t get around to calling him right away. What
brought this sudden change of heart?”
I had been hoping to get the information without having to divulge too much,
but that obviously wasn’t going to be the case.
“Is that . . . person still following you? The one you
thought was stalking you?”
“Yes, he is. He’s rather persistent.”
“Interesting.”
“Interesting? I’m not sure if that’s the term I would
use. Isn’t there some sort of . . . I
don’t know . . . psychological treatment he could undergo?”
“It would have to be something that he wanted to do. Unless it was court
mandated, that is. But it doesn’t sound like he’s done anything dangerous, or
anything to break the law yet.”
I sighed. “And you’re not at all concerned that there’s this psycho following
your daughter around?”
“You know,” my mother said, “I had someone who you might be able to call a
stalker.” I wondered if she had even heard my question. “This was a long time
ago, back in college.”
“You never told me that.”
“It never really came up. But he’d hang around my dorm, or he’d coincidentally be there right as I was getting out of class. He knew which classes I had, and when, and at first I tried to be nice to him because I didn’t want to come across as rude, but then it started to get annoying. So I eventually had to tell him in no uncertain terms that I was not going to be fucked with and he better leave me alone. And he did.”
It was weird to hear my mom say “fuck.” And I had a feeling that there was more to the story, that this person hadn’t been as into her as she was claiming, because it didn’t seem like it would be so simple to just tell someone to leave you alone and have them do it.
“You weren’t afraid at all?”
“No, I wasn’t. And while I understand that fear is a perfectly natural reaction to have in a situation like this, from the sounds of it, you don’t really have anything to fear, either. What this sounds like is you’re dealing with someone who has low self-esteem, who you’ve possibly led on with your actions or what you’ve said—”
“I didn’t lead him on! If saying hi to someone and trying to be a decent human is leading them on, well . . . that’s just ridiculous!”
“I’m not saying you did that, or that you consciously did it. Sometimes we do things we’re not aware of, and people can be sensitive to that. Especially if this is someone who doesn’t feel very good about himself to begin with. Perhaps you should talk to Carl about this, too. It might be worth mentioning.”
“I don’t think it has anything to do with a quarter-life crisis.”
“Well, in your case it might.”
“I’m not even necessarily saying that I think it’s something I’m going through . . . I just . . . I don’t know. I feel confused about some stuff.”
“That’s perfectly understandable. But you do realize this isn’t going to be a talk therapy session, right? That’s not what this is. This is someone who is trying to collect data for a book.”
“Yes, Mom,” I said, sighing. “If it starts to border on a talk therapy session, I’ll tell him to start billing me, okay?” There had been times when I’d wondered if I should be expecting a bill in the mail from her. It honestly wouldn’t have surprised me.
“Well, I’ll get his contact info over to you, and then
the ball’s in your court. But Carl is very nice, and he takes his work
seriously.”
“Thanks, Mom,” I said. “I’ll talk to you later. We can figure out a good time
to get together for coffee or something in the next couple of days.”
Her email came through a few minutes after we got off
the phone. I looked at his phone number on the screen, but I hesitated in
calling. I decided to wait; maybe I’d do it tomorrow. For now, I would continue
my job search.
At work, though, it was hard to pretend that everything was normal. I could feel him watching me, whether it was when he was sitting at his desk, the door to his office slightly ajar, or when he was across the room, talking with Dan or Jonathan, his eyes landing on me, almost daring me to look over at him.
I wanted to. I wanted to look over at him so badly, even though another part of me didn’t want to see him again. I felt like I was getting pulled in two directions; the rational part of me demanding that I stand my ground and not let myself be pulled back in by whatever force had drawn me to him in the first place. But the emotional part of me was aching with desire to just be near him again, to have him look at me the way he did.
The whole day passed like this, intensifying to the point that I felt like I was going to explode. The air felt like it was crackling and I wondered if anyone else in the office could sense it. How could they not? I knew Ian could. Jonathan, though, seemed oblivious as he went about his business. Toward the end of the day, he stopped by my desk and asked when I wanted to get together for my first lesson in self-defense.
“Maybe this weekend?” I asked. “I don’t have too much planned.” I could feel Ian’s eyes on me.
“Sure,” Jonathan said. “Saturday afternoon would be good. I was thinking you could come down to the mixed martial arts gym I go to. There’s a space we can use.”
“Okay,” I said. “I think that’ll be good.”
He grinned. “Great. I’ll text you about timing and everything, but I’m thinking maybe two or three.”
“You two making plans without me?” Ian called from his desk. His tone was light, joking, but I could tell he was forcing it.
Jonathan looked at me and winked. “We might be,” he said, speaking slowly, as though deliberately taunting him. “Daisy’s interested in learning some self-defense. We’re going to try to get together to work on it this weekend.”
“I see.”
He didn’t say anything else besides that, and when I snuck a glance into his office, he was looking down at his desk, writing something.
A little while later, Jonathan left. I went to the bathroom, and when I was coming back out, Ian was there, standing by my desk.
“So, you’ve got plans with Jonathan,” he said.
I nodded. “We just made them today.”
“You’re suddenly interested in self-defense?”
“I think it’d be a good thing to learn. I don’t think it’s a bad idea,” I said.
“And Jonathan said he knew something about it.”
“He does. I do, too. You could’ve asked me about it.”
“I know. Jonathan was right there, though, when I was
thinking about it.”
“So it’s a matter of convenience?”
I finally looked at him, after avoiding direct eye contact all day. He was staring right at me, and I felt a warm shiver go down my spine, that I tried my very best to ignore.
“It’s a matter of I was interested in learning about something, and someone who knows something about it happened to be right there. So I asked him. That’s it.”
He nodded slowly. “I’d be inclined to believe that,” he said, “except you’ve seemed distant.” He took a step closer to me, and I swore I could feel the heat radiating off of his body. I took a step back, trying to put some distance between us. I didn’t want him to know how strong his effect was on me, even now, when I was trying to be completely immune to it.
But it’s not like you could just turn those feelings off, could you? It wasn’t that easy. If it were, I imagined that Noah would’ve forgotten about me a long time ago.
“Have I?” I said. I glanced at the clock hanging on the wall by the water cooler. “It’s a little past five. I better get going.”
I grabbed my purse and stood up, but as I was about to step around my desk, he put his hand on my wrist.
“The doors are locked,” he said. “I thought you’d appreciate that.”
He gave me a long look, undressing me with his eyes.
“Why would I appreciate that?” I asked, feeling my resistance starting to waver.
It felt as though his skin was searing into my own where we were touching. “I really need to go,” I said tightly.
But he didn’t release my wrist; instead, he pushed the straps of my purse off my shoulder and down my arm, so it fell on the floor. He turned me to him and reached up, pulling my shirt open, buttons popping off.
“Hey!” I said, but I could already feel my body giving over to him, wanting him closer.
“I’ve been watching you all day, and you suddenly playing hard to get has been such a turn on.” My shirt fell open, and he pushed my bra up, running his hands down the sides of my waist as he began to kiss my breasts. My head fell back, and I closed my eyes.
“I’ve got to leave,” I said, even though it was plain as day in my voice that leaving was the last thing I was going to do.
He held onto my hip with one hand and slid the other hand up my skirt, slipping his fingers into my underwear, which was already wet.
“That’s a good girl,” he said.
He kissed a trail from my breasts down to my navel, pulling my skirt, and then my underwear, down with his teeth. He let them fall at my feet, and then he stood up, unbuckling his own pants.
He pushed them down and his cock sprang out. He pulled me toward him and then put his hands on my shoulders. I sank to my knees in front of him, and he held onto the back of my hair as I slowly took the head of his cock into my mouth.
I moved my mouth slowly down the shaft, trying to keep my lips over my teeth, feeling the way his cock pulsed and grew harder inside my mouth. His fingers entangled with my hair. When I got him in as far as I could, I held him there for a moment, and then slowly pulled my head back, until just the tip was in my mouth. I moved my tongue around in circles, and I reached up and took hold of the rest of him, my hand slick with my own saliva, easily sliding up and down. He groaned. I let my mouth slide back down, then back up again, increasing my speed until it felt like his cock was going to explode in my mouth.
He pulled me up, an intense, concentrated expression on his face. And just like in the movies, he swept his arm across my desk, knocking off the cup of pencils, the folders, the stapler. He lifted me up and plunked me down, then quickly reached for his pants which were still down around his ankles, where he grabbed his wallet and pulled out a condom.
I stayed upright but leaned way back, letting my knees fall apart. He slid my ass closer to the edge of the desk and then slowly pushed his cock into me. It occurred to me then that anyone could just walk through the door. He said he’d locked it, but maybe he was just saying that so I’d be more comfortable. The idea, actually, aroused me, made me feel like I was doing something I shouldn’t be.
Which I totally was.
I wasn’t supposed to be here, practically naked, legs spread on my desk, his cock easing into me. Oh, but it felt so good. He was so hot, and I watched his face as he slowly started to move his hips back and forth. His lips were slightly parted, his brow furrowed, the expression on his face one that could easily be confused with pain. But if he felt even half as good as I did, pain was the furthest thing from his mind. I pushed back against him, almost as if he I was trying to get up, but he gripped me tighter, held me there on top of the desk while he fucked me.
Afterward, my whole body was buzzing, and I didn’t know how I should feel. He had a satisfied grin on his face as he hitched his pants back up. As the pleasure started to recede, all I could think about was him having sex with his other secretaries in this office, too, probably right here on this desk, like it was some sort of initiation into the club of women who not only worked for Ian but also had sex with him.
Most of the buttons on my shirt had popped off and now it wouldn’t close properly. Great.
He came over and put both hands on the sides of my shoulders, rubbing them lightly. He kissed my forehead.
“Sorry about your shirt,” he said. “We can’t have you leaving the office like that now, can we? Wait here.”
He turned and went into his office, returning a moment later with a blue button down shirt of his own.
“It’s clean,” he said. “And it’ll be big on you, but at least it’ll get you home without having to flash any passersby.”
“Thanks,” I said, taking the shirt from him. I left my own shirt on and buttoned his on over it, giving me a sort of odd, misshapen look. We both stood there, not saying anything. Finally, I bent down and grabbed my purse. “Well, I better get going. I’ll see you later.”
He walked me out, and I didn’t know what to say, so I felt awkward, but he seemed completely content, a happy half-smile on his face. At my car, he again put his hands on my shoulders, pulling me to him, then wrapped me up in his arms in a long embrace, his face nuzzled next to my neck.
“You be good,” he said when we pulled apart. “I’ll see you later.”
I got in the car and got out of the parking spot as quickly as I could, breathing a sigh of relief when I turned the corner and he was no longer in sight.
What the hell had just happened?
Yes, it had been so good, but I also felt disappointed with myself. Was I really one of those girls who was incapable of resisting a good-looking guy? Shouldn’t I have just yanked my purse back up and stomped out when that whole thing had started? Didn’t I have any self-respect, any dignity? Just because something felt good didn’t mean that it was the right thing to do.
I drove for a while, not really thinking about anything. My inner thighs were aching as a reminder of what we’d just done, and at that moment, I found myself wishing more than anything for a time machine to go back and not have done it at all. Now that the good feelings were done and over with, I wished that it hadn’t happened.
I met up with Caroline the next evening after work, glad that Ian had a late meeting with a client so he wouldn’t be there to try to tempt me into having sex again. It had been so good that last time. Well, every time that we’d had sex had been good, but the other night had been mind-blowing.
Caroline waved me over when I got there. “Hey,” I
said. “How’s it going?”
She held her beer up to me. “I’ve been working like a dog,” she said. “And I
totally deserve this beer. Probably at least three or four more after this,
too. How’s everything with you?”
“Oh it’s great,” I said sarcastically. “I’ve still got
a stalker, my boss that I slept with—lost my virginity to—is acting like he’s
only got eyes for me, which I know is a big act, but I can’t find another job,
and I’ve got an appointment with some shrink to go talk about a quarter-life
crisis.” I decided not to mention the part about our office encounter the other
day. At least not right now. I knew she wouldn’t approve and would probably
give me some sort of lecture about being a strong woman, about not giving in to
a guy just because he was hot and wanted to have sex.”
“Quarter-life crisis?”
“Yeah. Don’t ask. It’s something my mother set up.”
Caroline laughed. “Oh boy,” she said. “This ought to be good.”
“Apparently, he’s writing a book about people going through quarter-life
crises, and he wants to interview people and probably include their sob stories
in his book, and my mother said that I’d
be the perfect candidate for it. Under other circumstances, I might have
disagreed, but I’m starting to wonder if she’s right. I mean, what the hell am
I doing with my life? Aren’t I supposed to feel a little more adult by this
point? I still feel like I’m seventeen. Like I’m waiting for my life to start, like I have no clue what I’m supposed to
do but that’s okay because I’m still young and I’ve got time.”
“You are still young.”
“I know, but look at you. You’ve got a career. You
know what you’re doing.”
“That’s not true, but thanks for saying it.”
“Anyway, the point is you’re not working
some menial job, sleeping with your boss. You went to college, got a degree,
and got a job in that field. I am totally floundering, am completely adrift,
have no idea what I’m doing, and am just making some really bad choices, it
seems. So, I’m going to go talk to this guy, and maybe he’ll be able to shed
some light or something. At the very least tell me I’m not alone, which I guess
will make me feel a little better.”
Caroline patted my arm. “You’re being too
hard on yourself,” she said. “The whole thing with Ian—he’s hot, and it sounds
like he was great in bed, so who cares if you slept with him? You’ve realized
that he’s a dick, and now you’ll have a
better idea about it when the next guy comes along. And we all need to pay the
bills, right? And sometimes that means taking work that doesn’t perfectly align
with what it is we went to school for or got our degree in. But that doesn’t
mean you can’t still be working toward something. Have you written anything
lately? Have you been working on that at all?”
“No, I’ve been too stressed with this job stuff and Noah and every time I sit
down at my computer, the sight of the blank screen just staring back at me
makes me want to scream.”
“You know, I feel that way too sometimes. I think it’s just part of the process. You just have to let yourself feel it, and it’s uncomfortable, sure, but eventually it passes and you’ll get an idea, or inspiration will strike, and then you’ll be off and running.”
“You make it sound so simple.”
“It is, though. You’re just letting all this other
stuff get in the way of it. Which I understand; I’m not trying to say that all
the shit you’re currently dealing with isn’t super stressful. Girl, you have a
lot on your plate right now! But I think if you were writing, then it might
help.”
“Maybe,” I said.
“You’ve always been happier when you’ve been writing.”
She was right, I knew this, but it felt like so long ago that I’d last written something that I could barely remember what it felt like.
When I got home later that night, I saw a car that looked like Noah’s, parked a few spaces up from the front of my building. It was dark, so I couldn’t tell if there was someone sitting in there or not, but I hurried into the apartment, anger and anxiety swirling through me. Part of the anger because I was once again aware of how helpless I was, how completely inept I would be at defending myself. I hoped that Jonathan would be able to teach me everything he knew about self-defense. Another part of me, though, knew that I was feeling like this because everything seemed like it was out of my control. And that was really my biggest problem: I didn’t feel like I had control over any aspect of my life.