Hi Kittens!
Preston Walker… the one you’ve been waiting for.
Trust me, the wait has been worth it.
xxx
Nicole
One
Delilah
Staring in the mirror, I threw my hair up in a bun. Today was another failure with contacts. I peeled the hard pieces of plastic out of my eyes and allowed them to breathe. How in the world did people deal with these things? They scratched at my eyes all day, made them bloodshot, itched like hell, and blurred my vision even more. I looked like I had smoked a bong by the time I left work today and I could hear the girls at the watercooler making fun of me. Those girls in their pencil skirts and their tailored blouses and their long, flowing hair. I envied those girls. The ones who could stop men in their tracks with their legs and walk gracefully in heels.
I had never been one of those girls.
Looking down at my leg, I saw my cat rubbing its butt on me. My calico kitten who had wandered up on my doorstep four years ago became my best friend. I named him Beethoven, took him to the vet to get his shots, and he had been by my side ever since.
And I loved him because he was odd like me.
He had a leg that didn’t move as broadly as the others, so it always looked like he was limping. He had a tight joint and was missing a ligament in his front left leg. He also had two different colored eyes. One was amber brown and the other was this icy blue. At first, I thought he was going blind in one eye. But the vet assured me it was simply my kitten’s eyes changing colors.
I loved his eyes. I loved them because they were different. Mine weren’t different colors or anything, but I never really knew what color they were to begin with. Sometimes if I wore green, they were green. If I was upset, they were hazel. If I was wearing blue or staring out at the ocean, then they were blue. I don’t know why. They had just always been that way. Every driver’s license I ever had always had a different eye color notated on them.
I always joked that one day I’d get taken and everyone would stand around arguing with the police officer on what color my eyes really were.
But who was I kidding? No one would actually notice if I was gone. I was an accountant with the company I worked for. Kiefer And Associates. We dealt in commercial realty. Well, my boss dealt in commercial realty. I wasn’t part of the main accounting department, however. I was the accountant that dealt with his investors. I had a small office tucked in the back of the top floor of the building. No windows, one door, and a darkened hallway that had a lightbulb that hadn’t been fixed in two years. I made sure our investor’s money went to the projects they deemed appropriate and divvied out the checks when it was time for them to cash in.
That was what I did. Day in and day out.
But today was an especially rough day. Not because I had tried contacts for the fifth time and they didn’t work, but because my boss was retiring. The head of the entire company was stepping down, and my heart ached. He was the only one who really understood me. Who understood that I didn’t keep friends because I didn’t want any. Who knew that I didn’t enjoy interacting with people unless I had to. My boss understood my anxiety when it came to crowds of people. He never got upset that I declined his invitations to Christmas parties and never required me to go to any of our ‘mandatory fun’ work functions.
I loved him for that, even though there were times where he could’ve respected me more.
And now? He was leaving. Stepping down and letting someone else take his place. The announcement was like a punch in the gut with a knife. I felt like the world was closing in on me the moment I walked into the room and saw balloons that said ‘retirement’ on them. Everyone clapped and told stories of him. How wonderful he was and how he would have a wonderful ‘second leg of the race’. I stood in the back corner and sipped on my soda as people passed around a microphone, praying to the heaven’s above that it wouldn’t come to me.
Then it did. And there was nothing I could do except choke back tears.
But he didn’t get upset. He came up to me and took the microphone and patted my shoulder. He got me. He understood what I could and could not do. Numbers made sense. Numbers were comforting to me. They could never lie and they could always reveal so much more than people could ever tell someone. I was good at them. I took care of the investors, I got them the money they were owed, and in my spare time I would double-check the company’s financial logs just to make sure everything added up.
Literally and metaphorically.
I placed my glasses on my face and wiped at my tears. I was drowning in the brown sweater I had pulled from my closet, but I didn’t care. This Is Us was coming on tonight, and I was ready to let go of some emotions. Crying over my retiring boss didn’t seem like a decent-enough excuse to curl up in a ball and sob over a pint of ice cream. But watching three siblings deal with the harshness of drug addiction, miscarriages, and foster parenting?
Totally a good excuse.
Beethoven was walking around my ankles, trying to coax me out of the bathroom. He always knew when I wasn’t feeling well. I walked over to the fridge and opened the freezer door, grabbing my pint of triple chocolate ice cream before I sat down. Beethoven curled up next to me on the couch as I broke into my ice cream and my fingers brushed at strands of hair already falling from the top of my head.
My apartment was where I felt safest. Locked away from the harshness of the world and surrounded by my books. When I wasn’t seeking solace in numbers, I was seeking solace in characters. Far away lands and nonfiction material that whisked me off to different worlds and expanded the furthest edges of my mind. Besides rent, bills, and food, the bulk of my paycheck went to the world of books. I had a used bookstore in downtown Philadelphia that I frequented often. Every Saturday and Sunday I was there, stacking my purse full of books to purchase. I’d lug them home, crack them open, and sprawl out on my bed as I lost myself in the world hidden between the lines of text.
With books, I could be anyone. A dainty princess with a mighty sword or a best friend consoling my future husband. I could be an heiress fighting crime or a millionaire mogul building her own brand. I could fall in love, break hearts, have long curly hair, and curves in all the right places. I could have porcelain skin or be a tan-skinned goddess with deep brown eyes and a mysterious stare that lured men in from their boats.
I could be strong and vivacious and confident. I didn’t have to be the secluded, damaged, anxiety-ridden girl I was.
“What Beethoven? What is it?”
My cat wouldn’t stop purring and pawing at my thigh.
“I’m just not feeling well. I’m sorry. I know the show’s on, but my mind is elsewhere.”
Beethoven cocked his head at me and I sighed.
“Fine. If you’re really going to pressure me into telling you, then I will. My boss is retiring, and I’m going to miss him.”
Beethoven smacked my thigh with his paw and I groaned.
“And I might be a little concerned that whoever replaces him is going to think I’m a weirdo and fire me.”
My cat turned his head back to the television, seemingly satisfied with my answer. And the truth is, that was the problem. I was different and I knew it. The girls teased me about it if they weren’t acting like I didn’t exist. The men in the company always gave me these weird looks. Instead of looking me up and down like they did those beautiful women, they crinkled their noses and snickered when I walked by. And sure, maybe it was nice not being catcalled or talked down to because of my breast size, but I knew they thought I was disgusting.
And that hurt, even though I didn’t want to admit it. I stuck out like a sore thumb, my pale skin boasted of a lack of sunlight, and my idea of fun was curling up in bed with a long shirt on, knee-high socks, and a good book.
Yep. I was going to get fired the moment someone else took over that company.
I cried myself to sleep thinking about This Is Us and woke up to my alarm blaring at six in the morning. I rolled myself out of bed and prepared myself for the day, opting for a long skirt, a form-fitting shirt, and a gray cardigan. I pulled half of my hair up and clipped it back with a hair clip, cleaned myself up a bit, then gave myself one last look in the mirror.
“You look like a grown toddler,” I said to myself.
Sighing, I grabbed my umbrella and headed for my car. They were calling for rain today, and the last thing I needed was to look like a wet cat. I got to work and dashed into the building just in time. The rain was torrential and the thunder was rattling the windows, but as I rose up the elevator and walked down the hallway the sounds of the storm receded. That was one thing about having a small office at the end of the hall with no windows.
All of the sounds of the world just faded away when I closed my door.
I kept my nose in the books until it was time for lunch. I cursed myself for bringing something I had to heat up because that meant I had to venture into the break room. I hated using the break room on the top floor because it was surrounded in windows. I felt exposed. Put under a microscope whenever I was in that room. So I always ventured down to the fifteenth floor break room.
The public relations level.
Yes, our commercial realty company had a public relations department. Many times, our company dealt with celebrities who wanted things confidential or spun in a certain light. Other times our corporate bigwigs would get themselves into trouble and need a story spun for the media. They were always on standby for emergencies and public statements that needed to be issued, but that wasn’t why I enjoyed their level.
I enjoyed it because their breakroom had no windows. Instead, they had televisions hanging on the walls. And if I took earplugs with me and sat in the corner, I could block out everything completely. As long as I didn’t bother them, they didn’t bother me.
But today, there were two new women in the room that I didn’t recognize.
“Did you hear about the guy they’ve gotten to replace Bernard?”
“No. Oh my gosh, have you heard something?”
“Girl. Come on. I cannot believe you haven’t already heard. It came across my desk this morning. They’re announcing the new owner today!”
The two girls were chattering away about the man taking my boss’s place. Instead of putting my earplugs in, I stood by the microwave as I listened to their conversation. They went back and forth with one another, exclaiming underneath their breaths. But what I heard wasn’t good, and it was beginning to make me nervous.
“I hear this Preston Walker guy is a real realty giant.”
“Oh, now that name I do know. He was just seen dating that model woman. What was her name?”
“Trisha Marx. The first ever plus-sized model to appear on the cover of Vogue magazine.”
“A real playboy that one. Last year, he went through a round of up-and-coming actresses. After dating him, they landed these massive contracts that skyrocketed their career.”
“Sounds like his cock has the Midas touch.”
Gross. Were they serious? A man like that could never take over Bernard’s place and do what he did. I had no idea who Preston what’s-his-face was, but it sounded like he would flunk out of his position before he even had a chance to give it a real go. From the way these women were talking about him, he sounded more like a piece of eye candy than a professional businessman.
“You think he’ll date someone once he gets here?”
“Are you kidding? That man’s a prowler. A prep school boy with millions underneath his belt. He’ll scoop someone up in a heartbeat. I think it’s gonna be Gracie from accounting?”
“A guy into a woman who likes numbers? Not a chance. I think he’ll take the front desk secretary first. He likes big racks, right?”
“Marsha? I don’t know, she’s a bit old. Didn’t she turn forty last month?”
Forty was old? Were these women serious?
“What about that investor on the board? Kim Lang?”
“She’s a rail. The women he’s dated have had some sort of fluff somewhere.”
“So that rules you out.”
I listened as they continued to rattle off names on who the new boss would screw around with. It was disgusting and completely inappropriate talk, but part of me was interested. I was waiting for them to rattle off my name. I wanted to know what they would say about me. I wanted to know what their opinion was of me if the boss did chance to look my way.
But as their conversation started to wind down, not once was my name brought up.
Not only was I weird, but I was also invisible. And maybe that would keep me from getting fired once the new guy took his place. Maybe he would be so inundated with dating women that he wouldn't give two thoughts as to the door that sat across from his all the way down the hallway.
Maybe if I was lucky enough, he would think my small little door led to a broom closet and not even bother with me.