Ron - It's Not a Problem, It's a Challenge
“But you’re sitting there eating your corned beef sandwich
and suddenly this pair of breasts walks by and smiles at you,
and you’re like, ‘That’s not fair.’”
- Jason Robert Brown, The Last Five Years
“Hi. No one’s sitting here, are they?”
Ron Corwell looked up. And up some more – almost against his will his gaze paused, well, below the shoulders of the speaker addressing him, but finally he met the eyes of a long-lashed, full-lipped, softly smiling woman standing over him as he sat at a table by the window in a small café in Manhattan.
Ten different signals – or just one, depending on your perspective – hit the young lawyer’s mind at once, abruptly overcharging it. He opened his mouth. He closed his mouth. It probably should have stayed closed, but instead he opened it again and spoke. “Oh, no. Not at all.”
It was about then that his mind began to work again, and in the split second he had, Ron half hoped that the woman would merely take the spare chair and go to join a group of friends across the room. Possibly preferably, far across the room. But then she was sitting across from her, the casual smile still on her lips, and any sort of prayer was dashed. “Teresa,” she introduced herself, the ‘r’ trilling just noticeably, and delicately held out her hand to him.
“Ron.” He took it. With, he added to all and any gods of vengeance that might be watching, my left hand. You know, the one with my wedding ring on it? Good God, he wasn’t used to finding himself speechless in front of women, not even extremely attractive women. But the rules, of course, were all different now.
If the woman noticed the presumably rather conspicuous piece of jewelry, she made no indication of as much. “You work down the street at Glouster firm, don’t you?”
Good Christ, had she been watching him? Ron was sure that he would have remembered if he had seen the woman before. “Yes, I do.”
The brunette beamed. “I thought I saw you there. I just had an interview, so maybe we’ll be working together.” Her smile was just a little playful. “What do you think?”
Absol-fucking-lutely wonderful. “I, well, I don’t know much about…” But then a smooth, cocky grin slowly materialized on Ron’s face and all was lost. “But if they have any taste at all, I’m sure you’re a shoe in.”
The trouble, maybe, was that the woman sitting across from the young lawyer was physically everything that Lina wasn’t. Oh, Michelina Capernaum-Andreas Corwell was far from unattractive; she was absolutely gorgeous in Ron’s eyes and, for that matter, in the eyes of many others. But in contrast to the petite blond, Ron’s inadvertent lunchtime companion was dark-haired, curvaceous, and undeniably sexy.
And damnit, if she wasn’t sitting there smiling at him like there was no tomorrow.
And he just grinned back. “Been in the city long, then?”
She quirked an eyebrow at him. “Who says I’m not a native?”
“Oh, they’re easy to spot. Generally they’re the ones making it clear that they are and I’m not before I even open my mouth.”
“I think the sunglasses might kinda be a giveaway,” she noted sardonically, indicating the pair that were tucked in his breastpocket. He snorted. “But I’ve been here long enough to know the place. Finished up at Columbia a few years ago and I’ve been doing some work for one of those giant firms, but I thought it was time to get into something that would feel more like my own work, you know?”
Ron let out a low whistle. “So you’re telling me you’re beautiful and brilliant?”
She laughed. “You’re not very subtle, are you?”
“Nah. I never was very good at subtlety, so I guess I just gave up trying.”
The woman across from him – Teresa, right? – laughed again as Ron took a bite of his sandwich in order to put off saying anything further. Subtle he most certainly wasn’t, and with his brain slowly beginning to work again he realized that getting himself out of this situation might just be a good idea. “Well…” he finished off the last of his sandwich and stood. “Good luck and everything. Maybe I’ll see you around.”
She smiled at him. “Have a nice afternoon.”
“Yeah… You too.” He gave her a final, only slightly awkward grin, and turned to walk out of the café as calmly as possible. Nothing wrong with a little harmless conversation over lunch, right?
And if he was lucky he wouldn’t see her again after all.