“I am like, famished!” Sushi Girl exclaimed as she sprinkled balsamic vinegar over a small plastic container filled with chopped celery and carrots.
It was 1 p.m. Sushi Girl and I had just finished working on a Power Point slideshow that just about knocked the wit right out of me. (“I’m thinking like, buttery-yellow border for this one. Or maybe coral-pink? Kind of like my nail color–ooh, I really need to get a mani. Do you think I could be a hand model? Oh, right, the border. What’s going on this slide again? Oh, that graph. Can we make the line on that coral and then have a coral border? That would look good. Or do you think that’s too matchy-matchy?”)
By some grace of God, the two of us had gotten bumped up from paid interns to entry-level employees a few months ago. But the big promotion didn’t mean an upgrade in real estate: Sushi Girl and I remain cubicle mates. Older employees get a kick out of this and, because we are considered the babies of the office, refer to our shared space as “the womb.” “The tomb” would be more appropriate.
Feeling more claustrophobic than usual, I rose from my seat.
“I’m going to eat in the kitchen,” I announced. “I brought a hard-boiled egg again and I’d rather not watch you struggle with your gag reflex.”
“Thank God,” Sushi Girl replied. “I can’t believe you eat yolk. Who does that?”
Without another word, I picked up my bag and headed to the kitchen. My salad, a bed of lettuce, carrot peels, and tomatoes with the infamous hard-boiled egg resting atop the mound, was already sitting in the kitchen refrigerator, but I brought my bag because it contained my reading material. If other people occupied the long rectangular table, I would read this week’s New Yorker. However, if I had the table to myself and the area looked deserted, I’d discreetly take out my hefty paperback copy of the teen sensation Twilight.
Yes, I am reading Twilight. Yes, I’m ashamed about it. True Blood glamoured me. Once the season ended, I went into withdrawal. Despite the return of Gossip Girl and a marginal interest in the new show Flash Forward, I remained bloodthirsty. Picking up Twilight felt like a quick fix.
That said, I kind of hate it. Bella, the main character and the story’s narrator, is all like, “OMG Edward is so hot. I’m so clumsy and awkward. But everyone is so in love with me. Edward is a vampire and we’re in love. Did I mention that Edward is so hot?” So far, that’s pretty much the gist of the book but, despite how much I dislike Bella, I can’t stop reading it. True Blood was the filet mignon of entertainment: a cut above everything else, but also juicy and indulgent. Twilight is like a Big Mac.
I arrived in the kitchen to find the end of the kitchen table occupied with the one guy in the office that I kind of have a history with. In this case, “history” means that he broke wind next to me during an office meeting and them blamed it on me–an incident I carried a grudge about for months until I ran into him and his Polly Pocket girlfriend at a bar one night and drunkenly confronted him about it.
Luckily, the situation was seamlessly patched up by the wordless exchange of a Vulcan hand gesture. I’m speaking in dork right now–for the detailed translation turn back time to Stunned Trek. Needless to say, we are now on friendly enough yet remote, slightly uneasy terms.
“Hi,” I said as I got my salad out of the refrigerator.
He gave a little chin nod and a half-smile, the best he could manage since his mouth was full of a Subway sandwich that he clutched in one hand. His attention immediately returned to his book, leaving no room for small talk. What a relief. I took a seat a few feet away at the opposite end of the table. Just as I was reaching inside my bag to get my New Yorker, I glanced over, catching a glimpse of The Windbreaker’s book spine as he turned the page with his free hand.
“Hey, is that…Are you reading Twilight?”
He kind of winced, then grinned. “Aw, man, I saw no one was here and I thought I was in the clear.”
I laughed. “It’s okay. I won’t say anything if you don’t,” I assured him and I pulled out my own copy of the book.
He chuckled. “Wow. Well, I think it’s a little less questionable for you. It’s kind of more of a girl’s book, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, I guess. I sort of hate it though. Even though I can’t stop reading it. I’m slightly embarrassed by the whole situation. So why are you reading it?”
He paused. “It’s kind of hard to explain.”
Not wanting to press, I asked, “Do you like it?”
“I’m not really sure,” he said. “It’s like what you were saying. I can’t say I enjoy reading it…I started reading it because…Uh, I guess it’s not that hard to explain. My ex-girlfriend left it at my apartment. She called a couple nights ago wanting it back and I told her ‘No’ just because I’m an asshole. She asked why and I said I was reading it. I wasn’t. I just didn’t want to give it to her. But then I picked it up and actually read the first couple of pages. I thought it was really lame and felt smug because it was evidence that she was a moron. But before I knew it I was a hundred pages in and now here I am…a moron.”
“You broke up with Polly Pocket?” The words tumbled out of my mouth. An actual conversation with The Windbreaker had caught me off guard. Plus, my affinity for gossip and single men in their twenties overpowered logic.
“What?” he asked, puzzled.
“Oh, uh, nothing.” I shook my head back and forth in small rapid movements, trying to shake off the comment that threatened to stilt the entire conversation. “Is your ex that girl? You know, the one I saw that time at the bar.” Neither of us had ever acknowledged that incident.
“Oh yeah. Yeah, that’s her. We broke up like a month ago.” He shrugged. “It was long overdue.”
I felt a little pathetic, slightly desperate, but this newfound knowledge of his single status suddenly had me seeing The Windbreaker in a completely new light. I eyed him curiously.
“Do I have something on my face?” he asked. “Mustard?” He ran one of those cheap fast-food napkins over his mouth. I noticed he had a five o’clock shadow and his, oh man, undeniable well defined jaw-line.
“No,” I said, puzzled.
“Oh, ha, sorry. I thought you were looking at me funny.”
Jesus, I thought. I’m a hot second away from foaming at the mouth.
“So where are you in the book?” I asked, steering the conversation away from my gawker status.
“Page 256.”
“Oh, which part is that? I’m a bit further along.”
“They’re on that date thing in a pasture or some crap and she can’t stop talking about his hot bod.”
“Steamy.”
“I have to say, I’m pretty entertained by its dramatics. Like look at this passage,” he said, moving over one seat so there was only an extra chair between us. He stretched across the space, pointing at a passage two thirds of the way down the page. I sat there staring not at the book, but at that jawline. He began to read.
“‘He was too perfect, I realized with a piercing stab of despair. There was no way this godlike creature could be meant for me.’ Ugh. I’m so glad I was never a teenage girl.”
I laughed…and I gleeked.
Gleeking is a terrible, inescapably embarrassing form of spitting. A “gleek,” according to the official word on the street via Urban Dictionary, is “building up saliva in the salivary glands using some stimulus, like sour food or yawning, and then pressing the tongue upon the glands, causing the saliva to shoot out, usually at an impressive distance.”
I looked at the black, matte surface of the table and then at the pages of the book–his book–both speckled with droplets as though there had been a small rain shower. I gasped, at a loss of what to do or say.
Both of us sat there for a second, frozen.
“My thoughts exactly,” he said, breaking the silence. “It’s a ridiculous passage. It should be spit upon.”
“Oh, God!” I exclaimed. My face felt like it was on fire. I ran the sleeve of my cardigan over the surface of the table. “I am so sorry. Oh, man. I almost always abide by the rule of ‘say it, don’t spray it.’ This is horrible. This is so bad. I–”
“Don’t even worry about it,” he assured me. I reached over and brushed my sleeve over the open book as well. “I’ve seen…and done, so much worse,” he continued. “Last winter I coughed up a loogie while I was on the subway and it projectiled onto the back of some woman’s fur coat.”
“Oh, wow. That’s bad. I once coughed gum into some woman’s hair on the R train.”
“No way. Did you tell her?”
Our conversation continued comfortably and amiably until I was done with my lunch. As for the gleek, I still felt slightly humiliated, but I wasn’t must-binge-on-peanut-butter-and-nutella mortified. After all, this was the guy who had passed gas next to me in a meeting. A gleek wasn’t nearly as scandalous as a PDF (Public Display of Flatulence). I walked away feeling ecstatic about a potential friendship in the office—something a bit more durable than a fair-weather accessory. And a small part of me couldn’t help but think that The Windbreaker would suite me quite well, especially on those rare occasions when I make it rain.
Photo Credit: conventionfans.today.com
October 19th, 2009 at 10:36 am
haha. Quite the clever quip at the end. Love this.