“A man struggles to set aside his expectations when he shares his lunch break with an attractive co-worker.”

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There she was, clad in all-glory, walking directly towards him. OK Reggie, he would say to himself, today’s the day. Today, you’re going to talk to that girl. And then she would walk passed, and he would say nothing.

Couldn’t say it wasn’t on-par. Reg thought he would see her working more during the Pandemic: sadly, the opportunities were less, walking out of the building as he did at opening when she started, from the graveyard shift he was just promoted to. Some promotion. Three AM start. At least it was only part-time hours, what with his wife just giving birth and all… what am I even doing thinking about going with her? She would part the Red Seas wherever she walked, like that song by Ben Folds Five. She never gets wet, she smiles and it’s a rainbow… This was true of Megan.
She was tiny: so tiny you could mistake her for someone half her age. And to Reg, that was her appeal: her youthfulness; her natural blond hair; her curves. And make no mistake, Megan was a curvy girl, with her own Ben Folds & hairpin spirals to make Reg’s eyes water every time she strolled by. He thought this would have made it easier for him to go introduce himself: his own affinity for larger women. But Megan had a vivaciousness. Every guy was talking about her and every woman was jealous of the attention she got. Reg was never the man he wanted to be & always the man others envisioned him to be, and he was miserable for it.

Reg recalled the first time he had seen Megan, standing by the timeclock with a few of her friends who had also just been hired for the Seasonal period. The company didn’t discriminate: you could be as over-or-under-qualified as you were & you still started at the same rate of pay as everyone else, and everyone still had to do their time to move up. The Seasonals came & went and there were always the few whose names would get around the warehouse every year. Reg saw a million girls come and go… OK, maybe not a million, but it was a few, and none stayed so long with him as Megan did that first day, with her tight, light Mom denim pants and big, baggy white sweatshirt; her dark-brown hair combed & coiffed and bouncing too-and-fro as delicately as the way she walked, like a unicorn.
Yes, he went so far. She was his enigma, is what she was. Reg looked at her that first day from across the MIMO counter and memorized her features. Her puffy, baby cheeks beneath a pink homemade mask with red heart decals sewn in; the hips; her eyes, a chocolate brown, with long lashes and effusive makeup that seemed to burn, to etch her feminine gaze to her face. The mask really brings out here eyes wait… is she looking?
She’s looking at me! Oh shit, what do I do, what do I do…
she’s talking to the others at the timeclock, and now they’re ALL looking at me! She’s probably calling me a creep.

I am. I’m a fucking creep. Remember what the counsellor said. Think of your baby. Don’t you want to try and save your marriage so your baby can grow up having a family? A family YOU didn’t have? Reg escaped on the train-of-thought that now burrowed an express tunnel into his soul, to a station he was the only patron of.
He broke his gaze with Megan. But Reg’s reckless studying must have planted a seed within Megan’s subconscious. One that wouldn’t let her forget this strange, bearded Boy, who she only ever saw at the very start of her shift – if she was lucky – and who looked at her like no other man ever did. A look that made her very aware of any time she was around him, too naïve to know whether she enjoyed the attention or not.

She had been there for two years before Reg gathered up the courage one afternoon to approach her – on his way out the door for his five-week vacation, no less – to say “hey” and germinate some fantasy-fodder. But no, he sighed at the last minute as he often did, it’d never turn out that way. She’s so pretty & I’m so scared, and besides, I shouldn’t be fooling around with young girls. How old must she be? 18? That’s half my age! What would my wife think? What would my parents think? My friends?
He was approaching the till where she worked as an Assistant, packing the buggies for the cashiers. If only she knew what she was really in for, ten years it took me to get anywhere in this company and here these girls are thrilled to be making a couple bucks more than minimum wage! They have bigger fish to fry than mess with an old rogue like me
“Hi!”

Are you talking to me?
“Sure I am! You going somewhere?” It was difficult to understand her behind her mask, but Reg made an earnest attempt.
I’m on vacation now so, just thought I’d take some work home with me! He was carrying a box full of everything from his locker.
“Looks like a lot!”
Yeah, I pretty much just stuck my arm in and pushed everything into the box.

What do I do now? Do I keep talking to her? Doesn’t she need to keep working? She did continue packing, but she kept talking. “I didn’t catch your name.”
It’s Reg.
“Nice to meet you Reg!”
You too.
“Hey, I’m going to take my break in a few minutes here, if you aren’t rushing away or anything,”

No, I didn’t have any plans.
“Do you want to take my break with me? We can sit outside?”
…Sure. Should I just wait outside for you then?
“Yep, just right by the door! I’ll come find you soon, promise!”
Reg kept walking until he was out the door, and then sat on the concrete enclave outside the exit. He didn’t know what to say, to himself or anyone. He kept going back to those counselling sessions, when he bared all for a woman he didn’t know about his young urges, and how he didn’t think he could survive another ten years in a sexless marriage. Since those sessions, Reg tried hard to suppress every dirty desire he had to get to know the girls at work, since – after all – he was only interested in them for the sex, or the promise of sex. A promise written in water. Ten years of relapse & failure and hard education later, and it took a random, drunken Summer evening & a baby for him to finally click. It was normal to lust for the young girls. It’s biological. And as was his biological duty, he procreated. Ensured his own line didn’t go extinct. And the new experiences he was going to have with this still-infant child should outweigh his biological need to be with a willing partner again. Isn’t that what the baby meant anyway? That his wife was willing to make an effort too? But, it wasn’t all about him anymore.
Here she came. She had a big, encompassing jacket on with a furry inner-lining. “Let’s go!”

They started walking, passed the Tire Centre doors & the east-side smokers gazebo to the back wall of the building, with a double-wide lane for trucks to drive around to the Receiving bay. During Christmas, it was so busy that one-half would be blocked by cars who couldn’t find parking in the rest of the lot, and prying eyes were everywhere. Now that everyone was broke, no one ever went down here during the day, and it was the perfect spot for Reg to sneak a joint when the stress was getting too much. Or casually, just whenever. Marijuana was a part of his daily ritual and he was thankful his wife knew & approved of him using it because it was the only thing he had some days to help him get through. Reg pulled the aluminum Redoxon container he used as a cigarette tin out of his breast pocket and offered Megan a puff. She politely declined. Would you rather I didn’t do it?
“What do you mean?”
Well, if it bothers you, should I light it at all?
“If you want some, I don’t mind. I don’t want any though.” Reg paused for a minute before putting the tin back in his pocket.
I would have to pull my mask down, anyway. It’s OK. He already had some this morning, and was this far in to the day & survived. He’d be fine. I’ll be fine. What do you do? When you need to relax?
“Why, are you nervous right now?”
A little.
“Why is that?”

Well, you know why! Men must ask strange around you all the time.
“Not all the time, but sometimes, yeah.”
Yeah, well, because you’re a babe.
“Thank you. I think you’re a babe, too.”
Really?
“Yeah, not as pretty as my dog though. She does the extra billy-goat hair a bit better than you.” She tugs on the bit of Reg’s beard that pokes out underneath his mask. Harmlessly. But intensely intimate. Reg felt a chill. “Do you have Facebook?”
No.
“Oh okay, here then, I’ll show you some pictures.” She handed her phone to him and opened the first in her folder containing her dog Cleo’s photos: all 165 of them. He flipped slowly through the first few as she rattled off about how cute she looked when she did this, or that, and doesn’t that look nice on her and yes it does, and oh God, how much longer do I have to listen to her talk about her DOG? This is HORRIBLE! And it made the boy glad, at least to a degree better than he felt just then, to know that if he was still dating, it would only be more of this. More pandering. The patience required for just this 15-minute break with her was immense, could he imagine a whole dinner date? But oh, how her pale skin shone under what little sunlight pierced the overcast cloud, and the smile that must be behind those cheeks, and her eyes you have to stop looking at her. You have to stop looking at her. Just keep looking at her phone.
But she’s looking at me too. Say something. Cleo is certainly a rabble-rouser.
“She sure is!” Rabble-rouser, you idiot. Keep it simple.

They reached the second smoker’s gazebo at the back of the building, at the far-less busy rear lot that housed most of the staff parking. They sat down. “That’s about six feet away, isn’t it?” She took off her mask.
He had forgotten the details in her face since the Pandemic started, so now, in all her majesty, all the assumptions & the denials couldn’t bear to match-up to the real thing. Her lips. Bow-shaped and red from the temperature, a lower-lip that spoilt her lineage. Full and robust. She takes out a fig bar portion pack and has a bite. She offers Reg the other of the two but he declines. “What are you thinking about?”

Nothing.
“Liar! You’ve got something on your mind. It must be that skunky weed you’re smoking, it has your noodle all screwy!”
I was thinking about you.
“Well duh. You can’t stop staring at me.”
But I’m married.
“And I have a boyfriend.”

“So what are we doing then, Sir?”
I don’t know.
“Well, I’m having a great time. My dog would love running around in this kind of weather, if it weren’t so busy around here all the time.”
You’d have to come in the early morning or late evening.
“Yeah, and I don’t really want to, so…”
Megan,
“Yes?”

Thanks for coming out with me today.
“No problem!”

Did you ever think
“Think what?”
That there could be something between us?
“Reg,”
No, listen, I’m just trying to be upfront with you
“just shut up. We don’t need to talk about this.” He receded in his advances. “Don’t spoil the moment.”
OK, OK, I won’t. I’ll try not to.
“Just go with the flow. That’s my favorite thing about my dog, is that, no matter what situation she’s in, she just takes a deep breath, sits down, and thinks it through. She’s a good girl.”
Sounds like it.

Well that’s over fifteen minutes now, we can get going. And they did, putting their masks back on and finishing the trek around the busy side & rendezvousing at the exit door. Reg said his goodbyes and Megan told him that she had fun. “And if you ever have to talk about your wife or anything, you just let me know. I can be a really good ear!” She put her hand on his arm, as close to a hug as you were likely to get from a conscious stranger these days, before she disappeared back into the crowd & the building.

Reg left on his vacation, making sure to stop at Little Caesars on the way home for some Crazy Bread and the cheddar dip, which he knew his wife & child both loved: like mother, like son. Like father. He liked it too, and always made sure to buy the extra bag, in case anyone sneaked a loaf they weren’t supposed to and left him with less. He thought about Megan from time to time over the weeks & her honesty, more than he could hope to be, that was for sure. But maybe someday soon, if he tried. Upfront, not honest. But honest. If I can’t go back to change who I am, at least I can change who I can be. The vacation went well, and Reg returned to work rejuvenated though maybe not entirely cured.
There was Megan. She had been promoted to being a glorified-hostess at the exit door. His first day back, on his way out at 9 AM, there she was, and there she would be, every time he wanted to leave the building. After talking to her, he wasn’t afraid of her anymore, and it filled him with the hope he craved. She waved to him, her cheekbones signaling a smile. He waved back. And he didn’t relapse.

//jf 1.9.2021

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