Most of Adrian Greene's life had returned to normal. He had gone back to arriving at the Emertech office before any of his colleagues, being the last one to leave and working during the lunch breaks. He did still have the occasional lunch with Janey Samson, a red-headed colleague he'd first had a one-nighter with in the office storage room and then a physical relationship for a while, which ended when she got involved with Jason, a guy she picked up at a gym. She and Adrian did remain friends. Over time, however, he developed deeper feelings for her, but wouldn't acknowledge them as she was seeing someone else. This particular Friday was her birthday and she was at her and Adrian's usual lunch restaurant.
"How are you planning to celebrate it," Adrian asked.
"Jason and I thought we'd spend it together, alone. You know..."
"No party?"
"Nah, I'm not much of a party-goer. The earlier singing of 'Happy Birthday' and cake serving at the office was enough of a crowd. Anyway, Jason and I are just gonna bunk up at my place, have Italian, watch a good movie and maybe, well..."
"What we used to do together at your place?"
Janey seemed slightly uncomfortable when Adrian brought up the subject.
"Yeah, that. Thanks for not telling him about that when you met him, by the way."
"No problem."
"I mean, we had no commitments, it was before he and I even met, but still..."
"I understand," he assured her.
She glanced at her watch.
"Shit," she said. "I'm late."
"By the way," Adrian interjected, "I got you something."
He reached for his coat pocket and brought out a small package with red wrapping and a silvery plastic ribbon.
"Happy birthday."
"Oh," she said gratefully, "thank you, you shouldn't have!"
She accepted it happily and started glancing towards the exit door and back to him, as though she was torn between them.
"Shit, I'd really like to open it with you here, but I'm really running late."
"Okay, I'll see you after the weekend, then."
"I promise I'll wait with opening this until you're around."
"Sure."
She gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, very close to the lips, and hurried out.
When it became night, a thunderstorm rolled in over the city, much like the one that had occurred the first time Adrian and Janey first had sex at her place. Rain poured down from large clouds on the dark skies onto the streets, accompanied by the occasional thunder strike in the distance. The moment Adrian read the weather report, he decided to, like most of the city's inhabitants, to simply stay home (not that he had anywhere else to go). In the middle of the night, around midnight, Adrian was woken up when his doorbell rang.
"What in the..."
He quickly slipped into a robe and headed towards the door as the bell rang again, turning on light switches along the way as he went through the apartment.
"I'm coming," he said loudly.
When he finally got to the door, he looked through the peep-hole. What he saw through it brought
The Grunge
to mind; a woman with ratty, dripping wet hair and runny make-up dressed in a long dark coat, her skin covered with rain-drops.
"Janey," Adrian exclaimed surprised and opened the door.
"Hey," she said quietly.
Adrian quickly stepped aside to let her in.
"Were you outdoors in this weather?"
"No," Janey replied sarcastically, "I felt like taking a shower while fully-clothed before paying you a visit."
He helped her take off her coat before quickly going to the bathroom to get her a towel.
"Where have you been," he asked.
"Here, there, everywhere," Janey replied as he wiped her hair dry before she grabbed the towel herself to wipe off her mascara.
"Weren't you gonna spend the evening with Jason?"
Janey suddenly shuddered.
"Please, do not say his name," she said with restrained anger as she staggered into the living room and sat down on the middle of the couch.
"Has something happened," Adrian asked after he sat down next to her.
Janey hesitated for a moment before she began recounting her evening, obviously dying to share it with someone else to ease her own pain.
"You remember he and I had made plans to stay in, watch
The Big Lebowski
, have Italian, all that?"
"You didn't specify the movie, but yes."
"Well, after I left you after lunch, I went to the restaurant to pre-order the food, went to another store and bought the movie, did a few other things. Then, I was going to a hairdresser. I've been planning to dye my hair darker, so I made an appointment a few weeks ago. Anyway, when I got there, I changed my mind and went to buy the food instead. Thought I'd surprise Jason by coming in early."
Adrian started seeing where her story was going and placed his hand on her shoulder. She didn't seem to mind and continued bitterly:
"When I got in candles were lit and Celine Dion was playing on my stereo. I thought he was planning to surprise me, skip the movie and just screw my brains out, but when I got into the bedroom,
my
bedroom..."
She stopped for a moment, a single tear running down her right cheek.
"He was fucking some blonde bimbo."
"Janey," Adrian began sympathetically, "I'm so..."
"From behind," she continued. "Doggystyle. My favorite position. I'd tried to talk him into doing it with me, but he said he preferred to see my face while we had sex. 'See your face', my patootie, he thought my butt is too small. That blonde bitch had an ass you could tow an SUV with."
"Pretty graphic description," Adrian noted.
"Do you think my ass is small," Janey asked him casually. "You've seen a lot of it."
Adrian froze for a moment and looked into her eyes to see just how serious she was. She seemed remarkably clear; the bluntness of her question may have been brought out by her anger.
"I really don't know how to answer that," he finally said. Janey smiled vaguely for the first time in hours.
"Smooth answer."
She lied down on the couch, using Adrian's left thigh as a pillow, and continued telling her tale of woe:
"I hurried out of the apartment and into my car and started driving to clear my head, take some of the edge off. I guess I must have entered a state of highway hypnosis or something, because when I came to my senses, I was outside a border check."
"That's miles from here," Adrian said.
"Yeah, it is. Anyway, I turned around and started driving back. I filled up my tank at a gas station on the way and drove towards the city again."
"And then you ended up here?"
"Not immediately. I first went to a bar and had a Shirley Temple and a bowl of pretzels before I went here."
She sighed and sat up again.
"Anyway, I'm sorry I had to lay all this on you."
"It's okay," Adrian assured her.
"I gave it some thought and I, I realized that there's no-one I rather talk about this to than you."
