Michael�s phone rang but no answer. Finally, his voicemail picked up, ultra professional as only Michael could be, even on his private number. �Hi, you�ve reached Michael Collin�s phone. Leave a message and I�ll return your call as soon as I am able.�
�Hi Michael�� I began. I hated leaving messages. I hated recordings� I hadn�t known what I was going to even say, had planned to read Michael�s tone of voice and go from there, but with a recording, there was nothing I could do but plunge in. �I wanted to thank you for a lovely evening last night. The symphony was fabulous, dinner was wonderful. Leave it to you to know exactly the perfect places to go. Maybe I can take you to lunch later this week as my thank you? Call me.� Although I knew already that there was no way possible that Michael would allow me to pay for lunch. It was all simply premise, a game where we both already knew the rules.
I was still shivering uncontrollably and my muscles felt stiff and sore from the waist down. I drove home and pulled my car close up to the house where I could make a run for the back door without chancing that the nosy neighbors would look out their kitchen windows and see my bare ass, still undoubtedly stained with red handprints. I walked directly to the bathroom and unbuttoned Daddy�s flannel shirt slowly, taking a look at my body. It didn�t look any different for all of the events it had participated in over the weekend. I took a very long soaking shower, allowing the water to bounce off my face, taking great care to wash my backside meticulously, feeling surprised that my anus wasn�t more sore considering what Daddy had placed there.
During my shower, the phone rang twice. I listened for the answering machine but both times, the caller hung up before leaving a message.
Michael called me at work the next morning.
�Hi Lola! I was so happy to get your message!�
I smiled. �Good.�
�I was thinking maybe lunch tomorrow? I have about forty-five free minutes at 1:00? Or, if you would allow me, maybe dinner instead?�
�Hmmm� tomorrow?� I said, toyingly. �Let me check my calendar.� I flipped my planner forward a day and saw that the entire day was open. �I am busy most of the day tomorrow, so lunch really won�t work. I�m open after work, if you would like. Or we could reschedule lunch later in the week. Up to you.�
�Dinner is perfect. I know just the place. Pick you up at your house? Around� let�s see�. 7:30?�
�Sounds perfect!� I smiled again. �See you then. Bye.�
I hung up the phone and then considered what had just happened. What was I doing? Or really, what had I done? I had been on autopilot since leaving Daddy�s cabin the night before, not really putting into words my feelings about him. Was I casting aside my burgeoning relationship with Daddy for the stability and prestige of Michael? Or was this just a reaction to the events of the day before that had frightened me, left me shaking and unnerved for the rest of the day. In fact, I still didn�t feel physically quite right.
I wondered what he was thinking. It might have been him calling afterward but he hadn�t tried very hard if it was. Did he see me gone and just shrug? I was very disappointed that he hadn�t followed me. In fact, a sinking feeling in my stomach told me that this was a sign that I should not put too much emotional investment into the relationship because he obviously did not.
I felt my eyes well up, blinked three times, took a deep breath, and then continued to work, wondering where Michael would be taking me to dinner.
The next day, I was completely wiped out by the time 5:00 rolled around. Instead of my normal power walk out to my Jeep in the back parking lot, it felt like one of those dreams with a never-ending hallway that just keeps getting longer and longer. I drove home on autopilot and then stumbled around in a daze, deciding what to wear to dinner. I finally selected a pair of black slacks and my favorite button-down black cashmere cardigan. I actually had worn it one of the first nights I met Daddy. The sweater was very flattering, particularly if worn without anything underneath, but I opted to wear it as a twinset with the matching cashmere shell instead, wishing I could just bundle up in comfy leggings and a sweatshirt, perhaps suggest a local sports bar for hot wings and burgers, but I knew Michael and there would be no changes of plans, especially not one involving a sports bar. I could almost see his lip curl in a sneer just thinking about it.
At quarter after eight, he pulled up and honked his little sports car horn. It was rather nice outside, but I threw my trenchcoat over my shoulders, not willing to repeat Saturday�s drenching for the sake of fashion. Besides, I was freezing despite the spring breeze.
I gave him my best smile as I got in the car. He leaned over and kissed my cheek. �You look beautiful, Lola. Absolutely beautiful.�
�Thank you. Were you working late at the office?� I inquired.
�Yes, sorry about that. It�s this case that I was telling you about on Saturday�� and then he launched into a monologue of litigations and dockets and enough legalese to make my head spin. When I was in college, he had always encouraged me to drop marketing and take law classes with him, hoping that I would become a lawyer and we could someday be a firm called Collins & Collins, or, as he had countered, �you could even be my paralegal or something.�
Luckily, he declared that we would not talk about any more casework as we pulled into the parking lot of a very lovely little French bistro. I was surprised, as it wasn�t really Michael�s style. He wasn�t into quaint, unless it was designed by committee with the help of a focus group and demographics analysts, but when we walked up to the door, I spied the owner�s names on the menu and recognized them as partners in Michael�s firm, solving that mystery quite nicely. After we sat down, I glanced at the menu and realized that I simply wasn�t hungry which was a pity because they had all of my favorites. I finally opted for a dinner salad and water. Michael nodded approvingly. He had always felt that I could lose �a few pounds�, but when pressed, he had acknowledged that he felt women should eat like birds and weigh about the same. He was a study in contradictions, loving my ample curves and full d�colletage between the sheets, but often admiring reed thin tiny women in public. I always teased him that he followed Jack Kennedy�s examples a little too closely.
Dinner was pleasant and quiet, but somewhere along the way, I realized that the headache that I had been staving off throughout the day was hitting me full force. By the time Micahel�s order of coffee cr�me brulee arrived, I was shivering uncontrollably inside his suitcoat.
Finally, Michael retrieved the car, blasting the heat as much as the little imported sports car engine could give.
�Well, I was thinking that we could go for drinks at the yacht club, maybe watch the sailboats come in for the evening.�
I thought about that, thought about sitting on a damp cold deck and smelling the briny waters and felt my stomach flutter. �Um, that sounds lovely, but I�m really not up for it. I�m sorry, but I think I�m not feeling well��
�Well, you�ve got the heat on and you�re wearing my coat, I don�t know how else to make you feel any better. Good God, Lola, you�re sweating! Maybe we could stop for coffee somewhere? Or I could take you back to my flat and make you some of that double rich cocoa that you like so much. I have some new cocoa from Belgium that is really quite good.�
I felt my forehead. Clammy and wet.
�That sounds really delicious, but I think I should probably go home and get into bed.�
Immediately, he sighed, frustrated.
�I-I-I�m really sorry, Michael. Let me make it up to you? This weekend, perhaps, if you don�t already have plans?�
�Sure.� He snipped, downshifting in a manner that suggested this was anything but a happy concession. I sighed, about to say something, then decided instead to say nothing until he pulled into my driveway.
�I�m sorry, Lola, I was just so looking forward to seeing you tonight� to being with you.� He put one hand on my knee, allowing one finger to trail up my thigh.
�I know. I was too. But I wouldn�t be any fun tonight. I might sneeze right in your face!� I tried to chuckle but the excuse just sounded weak.
�I understand, sweetie. I hope you feel better soon.� He put both hands on the sides of my face and pulled me to him, kissing me slowly and softly, flipping that little switch between my legs that made everything tingle and pulse and swell and make me want to jump on his lap and say �God yes, fuck me now!�. For a moment, I tried to convince myself to stay there with him, to kiss until dawn or until we figured out how to have manageable sex inside the little two-seater with a stick shift. For a moment, it was everything I could do to remember to breathe. But then my heart palpitations turned into light headedness and I felt like I was going to swoon or vomit at any moment. I panicked for a moment but then remember that with Michael, it was acceptable to pull away.
He opened his eyes again, then felt my forehead with the back of his hand. �You ARE burning up, sweetie. Go on. Get in bed. I�ll call you later.� I took off his coat, thanked him for dinner and then ran up the walk to my front porch. I turned to wave to him, but he was already speeding away.
I looked around for my comfiest pair of sweats for five minutes before it dawned on me that they had been left in a soaking wet heap somewhere in Daddy�s bedroom. I settled on a pair of silk thermal long johns, a pair of pajama bottoms, a t-shirt and a fleece pullover. Then I got sick twice. I made myself some tea and in the process of waiting for the pot to boil, threw up again in the sink. I pulled the tea kettle off the stove, grabbed the cordless phone to call work and tell them I wouldn�t be in the next day when I noticed that the answering machine had received no phone calls.
I fell into a foggy delirium. The next day, I was worse. I went to the doctor, who gave me some pills but said it was most likely a virus and I just had to ride it out and drink lots of fluids. He recommended a week of rest, so I called into work, but I didn�t even remember what I told them. My head felt insulated, my fingers as though they were not a part of my body. At one point, I thought that the room had filled with a clear Jell-o and it was preventing me from moving. I couldn�t keep anything down. I had turned off the phone but didn�t care to listen to the answering machine. I had dreams of fish, that I was a mermaid, that all of my life was propelling through salt water and because of that my lips were always parched and I couldn�t drink because it would kill me. Then I had a dream that Daddy was there. He had picked me up from my bed, carried me into the bathroom, put me into a tub of warm water, all the while whispering �oh baby girl, babygirl, why didn�t you call me?� and he had forced me to drink weak broths and changed my clothes and held me close while I slept.
And then one day I woke and the world was no longer filled with Jell-o. The room was full of sunlight and I felt as though I had woken from a hundred year�s sleep. The buds on the trees outside my window had broken and were covered with tiny bits of green. I stumbled out of my bedroom. I didn�t even know what day it was. I used the bathroom, took a shower and then back into the bedroom to put on clean clothes, then spied a vase full of dozens of white and yellow daisies, sitting on one of the tables next to my bed. I had missed it when I got up.
Confused, I wandered into the living room, still a little unsure on my feet. On the couch, folded blankets and a pillow. Evidence that someone had been sleeping there. Things were moved. Someone had been there, but I didn�t know who. The refrigerator was stocked with juices and mineral waters and what looked to be a pot of homemade chicken stock.
It was all too much. I couldn�t process it. I shook my head and saw fireworks behind my eyes. Lie down. Needed to put on something and then lie down. I stumbled back into the bedroom, pulled open the dresser and instinctively threw on my old college sweatshirt and a pair of underwear.
Will think about this in the morning. Tomorrow. Whatever day that is. Whatever day this is. Will think about it tomorrow.
