Twenty-five minutes later dinner is nearly ready but before I can reach for a single plate, the doorbell rings.
I hesitate. This doesn’t feel like coincidence. I look down at my dress. It was one thing to wear this in front of Dave but someone else?
And then an odd thought crawls into my brain. What if it’s Robert Dade?
I imagine Robert bursting though the door. He doesn’t see Dave, only me. “You don’t need to do this for me,” he says. And just like that I realize that it’s always been about us. Dave isn’t important. I turn my eyes to Dave and watch as he fades away, like an apparition or a shadow destroyed by the light.
It’s an indulgent fantasy, one I don’t allow myself to entertain for more that a minute but it’s long enough to excite me. My heart beats a little faster; I feel a small ache of yearning. . . .
It’s pathetic, really. The chances of it being him at the door are slim to none. He doesn’t even know where Dave lives. He’s not here, so why am I feeling these things?
I know you, Kasie. I know that even when I’m nowhere near you I’m inside of you. I can touch you with a thought.
The doorbell rings again, pulling me out of my fantasies and reminiscences. But by now I already feel a slight moisture between my legs.
I shouldn’t have removed my underwear. Self-consciously I walk to the entryway of the kitchen as Dave approaches the door.
“Who is it, Dave?” I ask.
He looks over his shoulder with a smirk. There’s malice in his eyes as he flings the door open.
Tom Love stands there, a bottle of wine in his hand and a puzzled look on his face. “I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to bring something,” he says to Dave, speaking hesitantly as if he’s unsure of what he’s walking into. “I didn’t expect the invitation.”
And then Tom’s eyes dart to me. He takes in the dress and his mouth goes slack, his eyes wide . . . and then a devious smile.
“What exactly am I being invited to?”
I feel the embarrassment start at my toes and then crawl up my legs through my very core until it wraps around my lungs and squeezes with the crushing power of a snake.
“Remember I said your boss would be joining us?” Dave asks. He approaches me; each footstep has the hallow echo of spite. “When I put together our engagement party, the only people from your firm who you even knew well enough to invite were my godfather and Asha. Afterwards, I realized that most of your superiors don’t know anything about what you’re like outside of the office. I thought we should give Mr. Love a glimpse.” With this his eyes fall to my hem. I’m tempted to pull on it, try somehow to make the dress longer but it would be useless. If anything, pulling it would bring the top a little too low, exposing the pink areoles that surround my nipples. I’m hyperconscious of the wetness between my legs, I can feel it trickling down and I squirm slightly wondering how to best make my retreat.
“I won’t be joining you,” I say quietly. The declaration is met by a sharp look from Dave and a surprised one from Tom.
“You’re not?” Tom asks, stepping in and closing the door behind him. His eyes move from me to Dave, then back to me. He takes in the dress appreciatively, but the leer is gone now that he’s beginning to understand what this is and what this isn’t. “You didn’t know Dave invited me.”
I shake my head, but Dave drapes a heavy arm over my bare shoulders. “No matter; she made enough for three. Kasie’s not a big eater.”
I imagine scratching his face with the ring he forces me to wear. Red blood on a red stone.
“I won’t be joining you,” I say again, but suddenly Dave’s arm gets tight as he pulls me to him.
“But you must join us, Kasie,” he says. Again the image of a snake leaps to mind. Dave speaks with the serpent’s voice. “What will Tom and I talk about without you? It will all just be business, like that account you’ve been working on or something. Maned Wolf, right—Mr. Robert Dade?”
“Ah,” this from Tom as he gently places the burgundy wine on the table. I sense the dawning of understanding, but not surprise. He keeps his eyes on the table, perhaps studying the metaphorical puzzle pieces that have just been exposed to him.
“We’ll need three plates,” Dave says definitively. The role of master was not tailored for him. It’s a size too big and he seems more vulnerable within the fabric of the character. Like a boy wearing his father’s clothes.
And yet this bullet has hit its mark. I report to Tom, and although I respect his professional abilities, I don’t like him. I don’t like the way he molds ethics and morality to support his ambitions. I don’t want him to see me dressed like this, the skirt barely covering my hips, the neckline exposing the curve of my breast . . . this was never meant for Tom’s eyes.