I have always been attracted to what could be described as 'mousy' looking girls. You know, those women who hardly ever get a second glance from most guys. I guess you could call them nerds.
There are several reasons I lust after these 'Plain Janes' rather than perfect tens. First, I am no George Clooney or Brad Pitt myself, so I do not think any really good-looking woman would be interested in me. Secondly, my college girlfriend, who was the love of my life, looked like a nerd on the outside although she was a sexual firecracker on the inside. You can't always judge a book by its cover. Thirdly, I finally married a truly gorgeous woman who I did not know well, mainly because of her striking looks. Within months, everything went wrong. She took my money and she stole my heart.
That was more than twenty-five years ago, and I've been single ever since. After that experience, I lost myself in my work. While over the years I dated a lot of women (and slept with some of them), nothing ever seemed to work out. I had finally given up any hope of finding a partner at the age of fifty-five, but that did not mean that I couldn't still look.
So, I was probably the only guy on the 7:00 am flight from London City Airport to Zurich one Monday morning who noticed what most men would have described as a remarkably plain-looking woman, probably in her late thirties or early forties. She had dishwater blonde hair that appeared not to have been brushed or styled in weeks. She was medium height and rather thin. She wore the ubiquitous black trouser suit that businesswomen seem to prefer when travelling, along with a pair of low-heeled black shoes. About the only thing that you would have said was at the least striking about her was her red-framed eyeglasses, and even those were pretty nerdy.
Alas, she sat in the front of the plane while I was in the last row. However, I ran into her again at border control at the Zurich airport. She was in the queue next to mine, so I had a closer look. She was still plain-looking but kind of cute in her own way. In her hand was a British passport. At the same time, I noted that her nails were painted purple, and while she wore a couple of rings, none were on her left ring finger. I thought for a moment that she was staring at me, but that was probably wishful thinking. She was long gone by the time my passport had been checked.
As luck would have it, I saw her again late that afternoon when I was checking into the Swissôtel. I would have normally stayed at the Dolder Grand or the Park Hyatt, hotels where the staff treats you as a valued guest rather than just an annoying paying customer. However, this was a different visit to Zurich.
For the past seven years, I had been the chief of staff at a highly respected consulting firm based in London with satellite offices in Frankfurt, Paris, Milan and Zurich. My company helped other firms assess and manage the risks they faced, and over the years we attained a world-class reputation for dispensing wise advice. My job was to help our CEO make everything run smoothly, and my influence was felt in every part of the organisation.
Then, overnight, a large Swiss financial services conglomerate decided to buy us. Our investors couldn't say no to the exorbitant offer.
The takeover was not pretty. My CEO clashed with their management, so he resigned the day the Swiss took control. Other top managers left. I finally agreed to stick around for six months to try to smooth what was destined to be a contentious handover, if only to make things better for our employees. In exchange, I would receive an extremely healthy payoff.
It seemed that in the first several weeks of their ownership, the Swiss company was hell-bent on making my life as miserable as possible, forcing me to sit through interminable meetings at our London headquarters. Now they wanted me to visit Zurich, and they demanded that I stay in a cheaper hotel than I was accustomed. Ugh!
So, after a long day of dealing with a bunch of shit shovelled on me by these shitty people, I was checking into what I considered a pretty shitty hotel. The only good thing was that I saw her, the blonde, again. She was three people ahead of me in the long check-in queue, but I swore she looked over at shoulder at me twice. At least, I thought to myself, I knew where she was staying, so there was a chance I might see her yet again.
Since I was in a really bad mood, I ordered room service and tried to prepare for another long day of meetings. Tuesday would be extra miserable because the Swiss company was holding a 'party' for some of my former colleagues and me to 'welcome' us to the new company. I would have rather gone to a dog show.
By nine o'clock on Monday evening, I was so bored that I ventured down to the hotel bar to have a couple of stiff ones before retiring. I sat at the bar, making small talk to the bartender when the mousy blonde walked in with four other women who I assumed were work colleagues. They were all dressed in business suits, but they ordered fancy cocktails and giggled a lot... a typical girls' night out. They spoke in English, although judging from their accents, all of them except the blonde were Swiss.
I realized I was probably staring from my bar stool, so after one drink I signed the bill and began to head to my room. As I passed the ladies' table, I could have sworn that the blonde, about whom I was now seriously fantasizing, smiled at me as I passed.
The next day was even worse than I could have imagined. I attended meeting after meeting in which I was interrogated mercilessly about how my old company operated. I found many of their questions stupid and even insulting, and I became angry and therefore not very co-operative. The Swiss may be efficient, but I found these people to be humourless and rude, My resistance grew.
I had to go straight from their office to the party, which was not a party at all, but rather a stuffy banquet. Various executives made speeches, telling us how lucky we now were to be working for them. While I wanted to drink heavily, I thought better of it and sipped a single glass of wine for three hours.
Once I finally left, I headed straight to the hotel bar and downed a couple of snifters of cognac.
Then, to my surprise, the blonde and her crew of giggly gals returned to the lounge. Instead of wearing business suits like the evening before, most of them were dressed to the nines. They must have gone to a real party. The blonde was still looking mousy above the shoulders - same dingy hair, glasses, no makeup - but everything below looked utterly fantastic. She wore a dress that looked more like a large white shirt. It buttoned up the front and ended a good ten inches above her knees, revealing very shapely legs. Underneath, she was wearing bright red tights and a matching pair of stiletto shoes. The dress was thin and clung to her body, and I realised that she was not nearly as flat-chested as I had thought.
I was sitting on a different stool than the previous night, and I discovered I could see the group of women by looking at the mirror behind the bar... I did not have to turn around. The women were all very merry: joking, laughing and ordering lots of drinks. Most of them, including the blonde, appeared to be pretty drunk.
After about a half-hour, the redhead sitting next to the blonde poked her friend in the arm and pointed towards me. I could not hear what she said, but I saw the blonde emphatically shake her head sideways. The redhead continued to point, and all the others joined in. After a couple of minutes, the blonde shrugged her shoulders and stood. As she approached the bar, I noticed that she was having a difficult time walking, possibly because of her high heels but more probably because she was really tipsy.
She tapped me on the shoulder. She slurred her words slightly as she said: "This must be a small world because we seem to keep seeing each other. My name is Melissa, but I only use that for business. Please call me Missy." It sounded as if she had said "Mithy'.
I turned around, and said, "Yes, I must admit that I noticed you at City Airport yesterday and several times since. My name is Andrew. Do you work in Zurich?"
