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Dear Diary,
My mirror tells me the
same story every morning as I get ready for work: you are beautiful, divine, and sensual
beyond compare. Style your hair, slap on makeup and a tight dress and turn heads, girl.
Make the men groan aloud in their work cubicles as you sashay by. And I do, Dear Diary, I
do.
Monday morning
The hippie janitor was putting
new towels in the ladies’ room and mopping up. I uttered a little helpless female cry of
distress at not being able to enter and he came out, looking contrite.
“Ummagumma!” he said. “I’ve never seen you so close up before! You have eyes
like fire and hair like a horse’s mane!”
“I know,” I said. “Will I
have to wait long to get in here, john-boy?”
“No way, wild thing. I
would count it a personal dishonor to make a beautiful woman like you wait to use the
johnny. For you, I will personally hand-dry the stalls with paper towels and install all
fresh rolls of tp. Just give me a sec, foxy lady.”
He was starting to
sweat around the tattoos on his upper arms and the stud in his nose was looking moist
even before he tackled the john, so I left and went to another ladies’. I like to entice
them, but not drive them over the edge. Unfortunately, with this one I had already gone a
bit too far. As I watched, he dipped his mop in a commode, then pulled it out and mopped
his shoes instead of the floor, staring fixedly at me all the while. Talk about foot
odor.
Ugh. “Bye, john-boy,” I cooed. “Catch you later.”
Wednesday afternoon
I went to the file room to get
a folder I needed from Pete, the old codger who usually helps me. Pete spied me at a
hundred paces despite his failing vision, and although sixty-four and arthritic, he
bounded over three rows of file cabinets like he was doing the triple jump in the
Olympics.
“Oh, mama,” he signed. “You’ve got teeth like pearls and
hair like a horse’s mane!”
“So you often tell me, file-man,” I
gushed. “You’re looking fairly presentable yourself today.” Actually Pete was bald, had
tons of wrinkles and liver spots, and his white chest hair stuck out over the top of the
stained checkered shirt he always wore. He might have played the Scarecrow in The Wizard
of Oz.
“Come to the Bahamas with me,” he pleaded. “I’ll withdraw my
entire bank account of $2000 and use all my accrued vacation time for a gala trip with
you to that tropical paradise, my wahine.”
“And what would your wife
say to that, file-man?” I breathed, eluding his arm that tried to encircle my slender
waist.
“Oh, who cares what she would say!” he blurted out. Then he
stood shaking and perspiring as guilt crushed him, for he certainly realized what the old
girl would do to him if she learned of his plan. She would likely hide his denture
adhesive so that he went about toothlessly making smacking noises.
I
located the file I needed, signed for it, and turned to go. With a toss of my luxuriant
hair and a glance over my shoulder, I saw that he had pulled out his wallet to show me
his credit cards. Among them were Sears and Target. I ran for the elevator, blushing.
Friday morning
I needed a coffee and muffin lift
to make it to the noon hour when at last I could go out and make grown men cry on the
street. The company cafeteria worker, a preppie kid I hadn’t seen before, at once
skipped over to help me.
“Holy smokes!” he said. “You have lips like
rubies and hair like a horse’s mane!” His cheap cologne overpowered the aroma of the
coffee, the pastry, and every other odor in the vicinity.
“Those
bread tongs look so heavy, kitchen-boy. Are you strong enough to serve me one of those?”
I lisped, pointing to a sweet roll.
“I will gladly pile a plate of
baked goods to the sky for you,” he said. Sweat began to drip from the band of his
hairnet that held back heavy dark locks. He gripped the tongs in his thick, masculine
hand and nearly squeezed the breath out of an oat-bran muffin.
“You’re too rough, kitchen-boy. You’ve deflated my poor little
cupcake.”
“The lunch special today is fish fingers, Tater Tots, and
green peas, Cheri,” he gasped, his eyes widening to the diameter of satellite dishes as
they raked over me. “Say the word and I’ll reserve you a spot with me at my special
table. Moreover, for an appetizer I’ll bring Munster from Germany, Brie from France, and
Cheddar from England,” he said, showing that, besides me, he had just one thing on his
mind: cheese.
“Sorry, kitchen-boy,” I whispered. “But cheese is a
milk product and I’m lactose intolerant.” He bit his lip so hard that he winced in pain.
“A thousand apologies,” he stammered. “I should have known in that
special way that a lover has of knowing the loved one’s innermost needs and desires. I
could slash my wrists with my potato peeler in shame.”
“Whatever,” I
whispered. “Anyway I’m on a diet and I never eat lunch. See you.” Before I moved away, I
watched him remove prepared salads from a cooler, insert them into a microwave, and heat
them until the lettuce started to smoke, all without taking his eyes off me. How could
such an inattentive oaf ever please me? Pass.
Sunday evening
I suppose, Diary, that eventually I’ll meet a guy at the office who
I’ll succumb to. There’re some pretty neat guys there, and I get to them all. But first
I’ll spend a little more time just whipping them into froth. I really can’t help
myself, you know?
