Another Time, Another Place

"It's not what you think," Kay said, not sure she wanted to really say what had happened while Estelle had been gone, at least not yet.

"Tell me the truth, did you even leave the apartment at all Saturday or Sunday?" Estelle asked.

"No," Kay admitted, "but that was because I had some thinking to do about ... something."

"Do you know what your problem is, Kay?" she asked.

"No, but I'm sure you're about to tell me," Kay said, half in jest.

"Your problem is that you spend too much time thinking about things and not enough doing them," Estelle said as she slipped into her shoes. "At least in things that don't pertain to work."

"It's not as bad as all that," Kay insisted, watching as the now fully dressed manager started to sort through a small list of emails on her monitor screen.

"Well, I'm just your friend, not your mother," Estelle said as she paused to read one that caught her interest.

"There are times I wonder about that," Kay grinned, remembering all of the unsolicited advice about her personal life that Estelle had given her.

Estelle looked up from the monitor, not really having heard what Kay had said.

"Well, it looks like you picked a winner in that Ross kid," Estelle unexpectedly said.

"Excuse me," Kay replied, taken off guard by the comment.

"The Ross kid, the one I shanghaied you into mentoring last fall," Estelle said as she turned the monitor around so that Kay could see that the subject line of the email she had been reading was indeed about Craig. "I can't remember the last time Chester ever wrote such a glowing quarterly evaluation about anyone, much less some kid just out of school."

"Well, Chester is usually a pretty good judge of people," Kay remarked, unsure of what else to say.

"In fact, this is so out of character that if I didn't know for a fact that he was as straight as a steel rod, I'd wonder if he didn't have anything going with the kid," Estelle grinned as she transferred the memo to the appropriate folder. "Not that I'd blame him if he was, that kid is nothing short of gorgeous."

"What?" Kay said in surprise.

"Oh, come on, son's best friend or not, you can't tell me you've never taken a good long look at him," Estelle laughed. "If I didn't have such a strong relationship with Paul going, I'd be tempted to give him a tumble."

"Estelle, you can't be serious," Kay said.

"Why not?" she answered.

"He's half your age," Kay replied, feeling a little hypocritical in saying it.

"I said I'd like to bed him, not marry him," the older of the two clarified. "One of these days we're going to have to get really drunk together and I'll tell you a little story about ... well, a story that you might find interesting."

"But what would people say if they found out?" Kay asked, wondering at the same time what story she was referring to.

"People can go fuck themselves," Estelle retorted.

"You're really serious," Kay said.

"Damn right I am," Estelle said, her tone giving little doubt that she was. "Honey, life is much too short to worry about what other people think."

Kay stood there speechless for a moment, surprised at this side of her friend.

"Why don't we find time for lunch today and I'll share all the dirty details of my weekend with Paul?" Estelle suggested as Kay reached to unlock the door she'd locked when she came in earlier.

"Not today, Estelle," Kay said as she paused, her hand still on the door handle. "I think I'm going to take a little walk down by the water during lunch. It seems that maybe I still have some more thinking to do about something after all."

"Suite yourself," Estelle said as the door closed behind Kay. "But let me know if you change your mind."

Walking down the short hall, Kay saw that the previous empty rows of cubicles had filled while she was in Estelle's office. At the far end of the next to last row, she could see Craig sitting at his desk, already at work.

They hadn't spoken a word to each other since he'd left her apartment, agreeing that they'd wait until she figured out what the next step was, if there was a next step. Actually, they hadn't spoken that much since Friday night, even though he didn't actually go home until late Saturday afternoon. The time in-between had been spent on activities that required little in the way of deep conversation. The memory of those non-verbal exchanges had been reinforced by numerous sore spots on her body, a collection of little aches and pains that had been so enjoyable in the making.

"Yes, I definitely have some thinking to do during lunch," Kay said to herself, even though deep down, she already knew the answer.

END (c) Ann Douglas 2009