“Okay, Curly Sue.”
I abandon my embarrassingly poorly played round of Sudoku to switch to the Uber app. “Thanks, Creed.” I don’t know if I should blame the tight hem of my dress or the two pomegranate martinis I downed quickly, but it’s a decidedly ungraceful exit I make from the back of his car.
“Hey, tell Dave I said ‘hi’, okay?”
“Sure,” I mumble. It no longer fazes me that Creed still thinks Jim’s name is Dave, despite that being a Halloween costume from years ago. It also no longer fazes me that he only calls me Curly Sue. All this, despite Jim or I using him as our Uber driver at least once a week.
Maybe it’s the ridiculously high heels, borrowed and a half size too big, that made it difficult to get out of Creed’s car. I stumble slightly as I walk across the concrete that serves as a communal backyard/parking space.
If I was thinking straight, I would take the (technically, back) door to the left into my small two bedroom apartment, one-third of a house that’s been divided into three subunits, and go to bed. If I was feeling like a masochist, I would take that same door and walk through my apartment, open the front door that leads into the communal foyer, and up the stairs to knock on my upstairs neighbor’s door. But Angela is probably praying for my soul or feeding her cats or looking for posters of babies dressed as vegetables. I choose neither and take the door to the right.
I’m knocking on Jim’s (technically, back) door, and I almost open it without waiting because I see him moving about the kitchen. But I don’t do just walk into his apartment anymore. Not since the Katy incident.
We’d been neighbors for about a year and it was a lovely late-spring afternoon. I was on the floor of my living room, working on 30x18 newsprint to replicate subway maps when a loud banging on the front door of the house shook my concentration. I tugged out my earbuds and opened my front door. I looked around the empty foyer. It’s the only common space, the antique-stained glass windows and pine paneling a testament to the former beauty of the old house.
Jim’s doorway, across the large foyer, marked with an ornate ‘A’ didn’t open. I glanced up the stairs and, unsurprisingly, Angela’s apartment, ordained with a similarly styled ‘C’ remained firmly closed. That woman has never had food, a package, even a bouquet of flowers delivered to her so I wasn’t surprised.
I opened the main door of the house to find a teenager, confused and apologetic, standing on the porch. He stumbled over his words before finally saying he was trying to deliver food for a ‘Jim Halpert in Unit A.’ This happened all the time and we had long since stopped keeping score. I grabbed my wallet, paid the poor kid, and carried the heavy bag of food into my kitchen while digging around inside for a fortune cookie.
As I slipped my feet into a pair of worn flip flops, I cracked the cookie open and let a small piece dissolve in my mouth, the vanilla melting slowly on my tongue. I read the fortune and grinned to myself. It’s a joke Jim and I have; you have to open the first fortune cookie you get your hands on and then you have to add ‘in the bed’ to the end when reading it aloud.
Hear with your ears, but listen with your heart. In bed.
Either way, not a bad fortune. Especially for us. If I hadn’t been concerned about jostling the garlic sauce in his beef and broccoli, I would have been swinging the bag with the thrill of a child skipping at the fair. I took the twelve steps from my back door to Jim’s. The two concrete steps were familiar, and I pushed open the door with my hip, sing-songing, “Okay, I’ve got a good one for you!”
The tiny slip from the fortune cookie floated from my fingers to the floor as I stopped myself from moving any further into the kitchen. A stunning woman, wearing nothing but an oversized Flyers t-shirt that I was certain I’d seen Jim wear on multiple occasions, stood at Jim’s kitchen sink. Her red hair had that delicious mussed quality that reeks of lingering, pleasurable sex and her mouth was frozen in a surprised ‘O’ shape.
I would have dropped the bag on the table and backed out quickly, except that our mutual stunned silence was interrupted by Jim’s, “Katy, have you seen my Fly — Pam?!”
A shirtless Jim, wearing only a pair of low-slung jeans, entered the kitchen. His hair was equally mussed and his face had that relaxed look of someone who had just had a midday orgasm, with not a worry except for what time dinner would be delivered. It wasn’t the first time I’d seen him shirtless; there’d been that one time shortly after he moved in that I saw him playing basketball with his friend, Danny. But I’d been dating Roy then, and it was a secret, guilty pleasure to watch him from my kitchen window, standing far enough from the line of sight to claim innocence.
“Hey, um, they came to my door,” I sounded — and felt — like an idiot. Thankfully there’s a nearby counter where I dropped the food. Like I had some bizarre compulsion, I glanced at Katy’s bare legs. The overalls paired with black and white striped bodysuit that earlier felt artsy and cute suddenly felt dowdy and matronly. I tugged on the sleeves of the slouchy cardigan I wore over the top as I stammered, “So, um, yeah, you guys have a good, you know, dinner or whatever.”
Jim, predictably, tried to alleviate the palpable awkwardness of the situation. “Katy, this is Pam, my neighbor. Pam, this is Katy.” The moment wasn’t lost on me; both Katy and I were waiting for some sort of ‘my-definition-of-our-relationship’ descriptor of Katy. Instead, Jim kept his look fixed on me, interrupted quickly as Katy asked how much they owed me. With that, she and I exchanged more awkward introductions and handshakes, I dismissed any offer to reimburse for the food, and she gushed just a little too much over what a great neighbor Jim had. I was grateful to make my way back onto the steps, firmly pulling the door shut behind me.
I didn’t want to notice that V-cut of muscle at Jim’s waist that reminded me not to be deceived by the time he spent sitting behind a desk at work. I didn’t want to see him swoop down to snatch up the fortune that fell from my fingers to his kitchen floor or the small smirk that twitched across his face when he read it. And I certainly didn’t want to hear Katy’s trilling voice ask if they should take the food ‘that girl brought’ back to bed with them.
But, I did. So, yeah, I don’t just walk into Jim’s apartment without knocking anymore.
The door opens wide and welcoming. He steps back far enough that I immediately know he’s alone so I step in. His unit has the original kitchen from the house, much larger than mine and more comfortable.
“You’re an asshole.” I swing the clutch purse I’ve been carrying all evening toward his abdomen.
He’s too quick and his jump backward has an accompanying grin that he tries to hide as he asks with feigned concern, “What’s wrong, Beesly?”
“Seriously, Jim? That guy?” He’s still wearing his suit and a red sweater — god, he should wear that color more often — that reminds me that he was at a work thing at his company’s CFO’s house. I’ll get to that, but first I need to give him hell for what he put me through this evening. “First of all, frisbee golf, Jim?” There’s a pizza on the counter and I pull at a slice from the untouched half that’s covered with mushrooms, green peppers, and onions.
I’m starving, having bailed after two drinks and an appetizer. I inhale a large bite and Jim’s eyebrows almost meet his hairline, surprised by my after-dinner appetite and likely wondering if he remembers the Heimlich maneuver. “I barely ate,” comes out slightly garbled, but he nods in understanding as I take another bite.
Through a mouthful of pizza, I continue my rant, rolling my eyes as I recall the evening, “He tried to order in pig latin, Jim. Pig latin.”
Jim, leaning against the counter and watching as I move comfortably through his kitchen to get a napkin, opens his mouth to say something. But it’s become too much fun now, so I intend to keep going. I point a finger to silence him, my mouth too full for me to talk and be understood at all. He smiles and huffs out an amused laugh just before shrugging in concession and then tipping back the glass beer bottle in his hand and taking a long sip.
“Oh, and did you know he went to Cornell?” I yank open the refrigerator door with a flourish on the last word but keep my eyes fixed on Jim’s, earning the smile that’s splitting wider across his face. “Cause I literally started counting and —”
It’s just beer. I opened the door, intending to grab one of Jim’s craft beers that I won’t at all appreciate, but there’s a six pack of Stella Artois staring back at me. Jim doesn’t drink Stella; he always calls it “bougie beer for people who know nothing about beer” as he watches my fingers peel off the label so I can appreciate the green bottle.
I’m suddenly very thankful for the shield the refrigerator door provides so that I can hide and get this ridiculous goofy grin off my face. I wish we would quit doing this thing where we set each other up on intentionally incompatible and equally horrible blind dates. I wish we would… It’s just beer.
A pink blush is creeping across my chest as I close the refrigerator door, leaving me annoyed at how exposed I feel literally and figuratively in this dress. I’m not sure if I’m more embarrassed at the predictability that I showed up here after a date or that there’s no place else I’d rather be than in my purely-platonic best friend’s kitchen. I stuff three-quarters of the crust into my mouth and silently hand the green bottle to Jim to open.
“So,” he tosses the cap onto the wooden top of the large island, “you didn’t like Andy?” His smile has faded and he pulls his eyebrows together in mock confusion. But his eyes are always his tell; they’re more hazel when he’s amused. He leans forward on his forearms, one handing slightly extending the green bottle my direction.
My silent glare as I snatch the bottle from his hand breaks him, and he lets out an appreciative chuckle. His eyes trail my bare arm reaching around him to grab another slice of pizza. He releases a quiet huff in disgust as he glances at the mushrooms, prompting me to take a larger than intended bite. He looks away, into the space of the kitchen, and, just before taking a sip of beer, says, “That’s a nice dress.”
It’s not that I think Jim finds me repulsive. I’m certain he doesn’t. I’ve seen the way his eyes flit over me sometimes and then quickly look away like he did just now. And this particular dress is definitely more provocative than what I would normally wear.
And we’ve “accidentally” made-out a few times, enough to know which of my curves he particularly enjoys when I’m fully clothed. Or partially clothed. But I’ve told myself I won’t do that anymore with Jim, not since what happened in May.
His eyes have enough heat to make my stomach warm a bit and knees shake slightly. I won’t have much resolve if he looks at me like that much longer. It’s easiest to play it off so I answer with, “You smell like a cigar,” before turning to make my way outside knowing he will follow behind me.
