Authors: Michael Malflic
Vincent
reappeared,
he sat on the couch and looked at
Nadrea
.
“Having fun?” he asked.
“I was until you left the room.”
Vincent laughed. “Maybe I can make it up to you?”
Nadrea
may have been tied to the chair and left frustrated but as Vincent untied her she saw and took advantage of the opportunity to not leave the Hotel aroused and un-serviced. So for Vincent round two began.
For
Nadrea
the time passed particularly quickly, her mind filled with tempting delights and perverted curiosities of last night. During the day
Nadrea’s
things were delivered to Vincent’s room at the W. They were once again unpacked, repressed and steamed then hung in the dark armoire with care. Like color pallets grouped together, filling the cabinet.
As the day wore on
Nadrea
toiled away, but by 2:00 Vincent had wrapped up his business headed out to the gym for some cardio before returning to the W for a quick nap. As Vincent entered the
cardio theater
, a dimly lit room the scent of antiseptic mixing with sweat and pure unadulterated stench associated with physical exertion, small red and green colored lights bathing the users in their soft glow mixed with flashes of chrome and the occasional reflective strip on a running shoe. People pushing themselves forward with great effort but without advancing even an inch, running and pedaling faster and faster, the increasing speed and velocity. Their heaving breaths combined with a sea of salty sweat pouring off their heated bodies, the sting of sweat soon to be pouring off of Vincent’s brow that had been slathered with Vaseline in order to direct the outcome of his efforts down the side of his face away from his eyes as his own salty stream flowed over his cheeks before it crossed his jaw and dripped onto his massive chest and arms. Vincent joined the cloned headset adorned masses in the darkness, staring like drones at the television screens projecting one of millions available images from their cathode ray tubes and LCD panels at forty three frames per second on each of hundreds of channels.
Steve followed suit back in DC by beginning to wrap up
his daytime existence at 4:30,
the remainder of his public day would be spent inconspicuously fumbling behind a wooden bar serving drinks to strangers. He would shift from the real world of large complex numbers to disregarding micro measurements for approximate quantities producing relatively the same cocktail in taste and content, but it was not at all scientific. The libations
while unidentifiably different were not at all to his exacting mathematical standards. So he stood behind the bar in his relatively thankless position and seeming to possess an inferior intellect would struggle to quickly produce libations while parched patrons patiently placate themselves with pleasant conversation.
The Husker stopped by for a
drink,
Christy had herself firmly planted in tow. She was like a jealous child who was futilely attempting to hold his attention completely undivided until of course Donna arrived.
“Robert!” Steve exclaims thrilled to see a friendly face. “How are you
doing
”
Robert returns a warm smile “I’m doing well. How have you been?”
Pointing to a growing list of drink tickets, “Behind as always.”
Steve had not yet gotten to
the point
of laughing at his own inept abilities. Christy rolling her eyes dreading the seemingly eternal wait asked “Can we order?” in a mocking tone.
Steve didn’t take it that way “Sure nice to see you again.”
Steve’s evening was getting brighter.
“Fume Blanc” she barked at him before Robert added “and a Grey Goose Martini
please
.”
Soon Christy began to press Robert for his weekend’s schedule.
“Brunch on Sunday”.
She pressed again with a scorned tone “Really?”
The Husker’s irritation was growing, but he didn’t let it show. Her presses, the intrusion, the unwanted inquires continued and he again side stepped her, in true political fashion, repeating the question, then provided a noncommittal answer. The drinks arrived quickly, being a known face most often has its advantages,
this
case was no exception. Steve was still miserably behind but as was always the case persistence pays off and he began to catch up as orders for wine by the glass, and beer started coming in rather than the complex cocktails that require the ability to mix the right contents into a glass, making his life moderately more bearable. Donna who was not running late but was thirty feet away at the other end of the crowded bar, they simply haven’t spotted each
other yet. Donna looked impatiently at her phone to see if the Husker had called yet and began to wonder back toward the hostess stand in the vestibule but spotted him at the bar. The hair on the back of
Donna’s
neck stood up as she sees Christy, she can’t stand the sight of the
nebby
little bitch.
An overzealous control freak
nobody neb nose, who didn’t have sense enough to get out of the way of her impending doom. Like a deaf and blind man standing in the middle of the rail road tracks, feeling the vibrations as the train bears down on him but doesn’t move.
Donna in her evening attire, a dark, but casual dress approaches the pair and greets Christy with a warm hello before kissing Robert and placing herself firmly in between the pair. She was marking her territory becoming a shield between the woman who thought she controlled his life and the one who had unintentionally been gaining an influence over him. It was Donna who unlike Christy that never thought of it, control and influence had never been her intention. She was territorial, and while Donna gently placed her hand on the Husker’s back and he leaned in closer to her enjoying her touch and the gentle tickling sensations her hand was creating Christy’s displeasure became subtly evident.
Christy continued to regard Donna as nothing more than a set of holes for some distant male primal need and nothing more. A worthless concubine to be discarded at a later date, set aside like last elections campaigns slogans and promises. How could Donna be anything more to him than a tawdry plaything without intellect or value other than an outlet for Robert’s sexual release? Despite her hopes and intentions Christy saw that woman, no matter how polite and well dressed, as a symbol of nothing more than Robert’s innate undeniable maleness. Something that almost always surfaced even in the best intentioned men of power and
influence,
was lust and sexual conquest not for the biological need it fulfilled or the pleasure it derived but for the possession and power that such acts could convey.
During the same time in NY
Nadrea
was retrieving her hotel key from the front desk of the office. Her parent’s housekeeper had it
messengered
over after her clothes had been delivered and
unpacked. Soon after she joined the crushing masses on the Friday afternoon street in lower Manhattan, the working class mingling with the wealthy and tourists on the streets of the city. She was trying to do the nearly impossible, catch a cab during the late Friday afternoon rush. The only thing that would have made it worse was if it had been raining. This was one of those times where wealth and looks had little to do with ones chances of
success,
instead it was like winning the lottery jackpot, nothing more than pure random luck that an empty cab would stop.
Back in DC the bar crowd had begun to thin as tables were turned from the first dinner seating and in large part the cocktail crowd scurried from their work lives to their family lives, their wallets a little bit lighter, a few new off color out of the office stories to tell to friends and family over the weekend like the little gossips that the professional world creates. Steve finally got a chance to drift back to the Husker, Donna, and Christy to talk. “Good night for tips?” Christy asked cutting off the otherwise polite conversation, an attempt to demean Steve.
“No idea. I don’t really keep track.”
“Guess it doesn’t matter as long as the rent gets paid” her tone bitter and indifferent. Steve still had a genuine interest in her, he still wasn’t catching the intention of her tone just smiled saying,
“ I
do this a few nights a week to keep busy, it kills time and I get to meet a lot of people.”
Christy feigned interest. “Really so what else do you do?” She expected a menial job at best some low level office drudgery, in her mind he didn’t seem capable of something nearly as important as choreographing with obsessive compulsive tendencies every conceivable second of an important man like Robert’s life.
“I work with numbers” Steve offered.
“An accounting clerk?”
Christy asked hoping he would finally realize her displeasure in talking to him and he would go away.
Steve laughed, it was not like when Vincent laughed, a persistent
laugh
because he was enjoying every possible second of life he could but because Steve found the mere thought of being an accounting clerk absolutely hysterical. He went on to explain that he spent his days calculating the impossible, the commercial
potential of an advertising campaign, the economic impact globally of investments in to a foreign nation, its effect on the standard of living the likely hood that it would be misappropriated by those in power to further their control, their influence and their wealth. Steve looked at Christy as he explained that he had an Ivy League education for both undergrad and his post grad work. He wasn’t insulted, but for once while mindlessly pouring drinks he had a chance to tell someone about his real life. To Christy suddenly, although nothing else had changed, except for a few words he had spoken he was interesting and acceptable, her own sense of reality was that he was doing this as part of a field study, why else would he be standing behind a bar.
Back in NY sometime later
Nadrea
let herself into the room to find Vincent parked in front of the plasma TV watching sports, clad only in a thin pair of gym shorts and Adidas sandals.
An inquiring look crossed her face as she began “Nice to see you’re dressed up.”
Not looking away from the TV “Nice high end Liberian look.” Vincent said with a smirk continuing “You know it doesn’t do anything for me.” Vincent just laughed with the conclusion of the sentence.
Nadrea
noticed the unmade bed through the doorway into the next room. “Enjoying a bit more company without me?”
Vincent laughed again “Yep and she was mind blowing. You might want to call housekeeping to change the sheets.”
Nadrea
playing “Or else you can have that side”
“Better look before you make that call. You might want to have them send up a mop.”
Now
Nadrea
was the one laughing, Vincent’s tone was so mocking, it was a dead pan give away. “Why did you wet the bed during your nap?”
Vincent just smiled at the thought but she had already grown bored with the topic and playful banter re-engaged with what she perceived to be a much more serious and pressing issue “What are the plans for tonight?”
Vincent looked up and with a sense of in difference “Up to you.”
Nadrea
pretended to be annoyed but in truth was relieved, she felt the pressure of an uncertain evening was off and she was thrilled to be able to proceed with her evening’s plans without dispute or
debate. Compromising is not one of
Nadrea’s
better qualities. Turning on a dime she stated to an open room, “Good, we’ll leave to be at a gallery show at eight, then have dinner with some old friends at nine thirty then off to where ever from there.”
“Fine”
It was in fact nothing more than a simple agreement in his intonation.
Nadrea
hid her own response to his single word reply, which she interpreted to be a curt response full of ambivalence and grave indifference. For
Nadrea
the stress filled ritual of preparation to go out began, the first of which was to fire up her laptop, connecting the external speakers and launching a favorite iTunes play list, to drown out Vincent’s television audio. The second consisted of ordering enough Vodka, liquors, mixers, and Martini glasses to get everyone on the floor fairly well lit up. As she poured for herself a Kettle One Martini dirty for herself, Vincent wondered away from the front of the TV a place he had occupied seemingly without the intent of moving since before she had arrived home. He poured four ounces of Vodka over a few ice cubes splashing in a few shots of Cranberry juices turning the drink just the slightest shade of pink.