It had been one of the worst weeks of my life. On Monday, I arrived home from work and discovered that my girl friend had moved out with no explanation. We had been living together for six months and dating for over two years. She had just packed up and disappeared. Her note said that it had been fun and wished me a good life. I stood dumbfounded holding the note in the middle of my now sparsely furnished apartment. It was like I was stuck in a bad dream and unable to awaken myself, only this was real.
On Tuesday, the other shoe dropped. Through a mutual friend, who felt sorry about the way I was being treated, I found out where my lover had gone. She had moved in with an old boyfriend. I felt sick as my friend recounted how my girl friend had been seeing this guy for several weeks while acting like her and I were the couple of the century. My feelings of loss and sadness quickly turned to anger and betrayal. I wonder if she ever read the nasty e-mail I fired off. I never got an answer and we have not spoken since. It is sad people can never seem to part friends.
Wednesday was yet another black day in what was becoming a dismal week. I got the news that the company I had labored at for ten years was downsizing. I was suddenly expendable. They gave me two weeks severance pay and asked me to vacate my office by the end of the day. I left the building an hour later with a small box of personal items. The box was carefully scrutinized by security before I was allowed to leave. I walked to the parking lot cursing the bastards and thinking that they better not have the nerve to call me for help with anything I left unfinished.
I sat in my car making calls on my cell phone. I was pretty well known by our competitors. It was the kind of business where you were always associating with others in the same work. I managed to get two interviews set up for that Friday morning. By seven pm Wednesday I was sitting on a stool at my favorite bar numbing my brain with the help of Mr. Jack Daniels. The bartender, who was an old friend of mine, put me in a cab three hours later. I am still not sure how I got into my bed.
Thursday I woke up around noon with a pounding headache. I had the kind of awful hangover you get when you go to sleep with alcohol still in your stomach. I stood under a steamy shower with the water nearly hot enough to scald my skin. I suppose I was trying to burn away both the pain in my body and the memory of the previous three days. Unfortunately, all I could do was ponder what new disaster might await me on what was an otherwise beautiful afternoon.
As I reached for my robe, I remembered I was once again a bachelor. I headed for the kitchen in the buff. I think I have always been a bit of a nudist at heart. My ex-girlfriend hated when I walked around nude. She was the one that bought me the robe. It was the first robe I had ever owned and I decided right then to burn the damn thing.
When I got to the kitchen I decided on toast and a taste of the hair of the dog. I never did get dressed that afternoon. I spent my time lounging in my recliner. That and the entertainment center was pretty much the only thing left in the living room. I thought that I had better do some furniture shopping after my interviews. By 6:00 my bottle of Jack was a dead soldier and I was having trouble focusing on the old John Wayne movie on AMC.
For some reason I decided to flip to the Spice channel. I guess I thought I could focus better on pussies being licked than the Duke killing a bunch of Hollywood Indians. Even though I had not watched porn since my ex had moved in, I had never bothered to cancel the subscription. Though she was fairly adventurous in bed, she was quite the prude in many ways. She had made it clear that watching porn did not interest her and she would find my watching it insulting. I had meant to cancel the subscription, but it was only a couple dollars a month so it was not a priority. Maybe, I just knew the bitch would leave me someday and I would need it again.
The movie playing was pretty standard porno fare. A man was conducting interviews with female candidates for some job. For no apparent reason he ended up romping naked with three of them in his way too spacious office. I have conducted a lot of interviews in my life and I have never ended up naked during a single one. Obviously no one watches this stuff for the realistic plot lines. As I watched the foursome on the screen I pumped my cock in my fist. This was not my ordinary masturbation style. It was violent, like I was taking out all my pain, anger and frustration from the week on my cock. Oddly, I came explosively, crying out to the empty room. Afterward, I lay in the big comfy chair shaking with droplets of cum splashed over my belly and chest until I passed out.
I awoke at 3:00 am with a different movie flickering on the television in the dark room. The actors were different, but the scene was pretty much the same. One man and multiple women enjoying unbridled carnal exploits. I dragged my ass to the bath to wash the dried cum from my body. I fell into my bed and went back to sleep quickly.
Friday morning I actually felt pretty good. I sprang form my bed when the alarm signaled it was 7:00 am. The shower felt good; it was a hopeful day. I hadn't really eaten in several days so I decided a stop at Mike's diner for one of his fabulous omelets was in order. The ham and cheese omelet, greasy home fries, toast and orange juice would provide fuel for my day. As always Mike's did not disappoint, I left there feeling full and ready to take on a busy morning.
Then came my first interview. It was with an old friend of mine. I soon learned that she had only given me the interview out of courtesy. She had no job to offer me; although she assured me that if anything came up I would be first on the list. She also promised to make some calls for me. I left her office dejected. I thought why should this day be any different than the rest of the week. Obviously I was in a down cycle. I considered blowing off the second interview in favor of another meeting with Jack.
However, I knew there really was an opening at Brown and Simon, Inc. They were the biggest competitors of my former employer. I figured they would be thrilled to get me and I knew I could bring customers with me. The interview was with a man I had been aquatinted with for many years through attending industry functions. As it turned out he did have an opening. However, due to my general funk, I gave the worst interview in history. I left certain I would not be hearing from Brown and Simon.
At 2:00 I was sitting at my favorite table at a trendy downtown eatery near my old office. I have no idea what made me decide to eat there amid the gloom of that day. Perhaps I wanted something familiar that reminded me of better times. I would find that it was a fateful decision. I sat sipping my second Jack and Coke as I waited for my lunch to be served. My favorite waiter was attentive and polite as usual, even when expressing surprise at my ordering a second drink before lunch. I was pretty predictable with my one drink at lunch rule. He asked if I was perhaps celebrating something.
"Yeah, my freedom, Jerry," I replied rather sadly, making it clear I was not celebrating anything.
Jerry didn't ask any more questions. I looked around the familiar cheery restaurant as he busied himself taking an order at another table. The lunch crowd was loud and animated. There were lots of happy faces and lively conversations all around me. It was Friday and most of these people would get little more work done today after their three-martini lunches. For the majority the weekend had already begun.
My eyes settled on the only other person in the room who was alone. She was a pretty young woman with shoulder length light brown hair. Her blond highlights simmered in the glow of the artificial restaurant lighting. Her beautiful dark eyes seemed to be staring off into another world. Deep contemplation and a sense of peace showed on her pretty face. A kind of glow seemed to be radiating from her, drawing me to her. I wondered what the captivating woman was imagining. She clearly was not present in the café with the rest of the diners. Her slight smile indicated to me that wherever she was it was a very pleasant place to be. I wanted to join her in the happy place she had found within her.
Perhaps she had escaped to a tropical island and was enjoying warm breezes and beautiful surroundings. Perhaps she was sitting by a mountain lake with her toes dipping into the cool waters on a late spring afternoon. Wherever it was I wished I had the ability to transform my surroundings. I desperately wanted to escape the doldrums my life had produced that awful week. Then a painful thought occurred to me. What if she too was having bad times and her daydream was just a brief escape from the unpleasantness of life. These thoughts made me sad. I wanted her to be happy. This desire struck as odd and silly since I did not know the woman. For whatever reason there was something about her that made it important to me that she be happy.
A glint of light from her gold ring attracted my attention to her finger. It rested lightly on her delicate sensuous lips. At that moment I wanted nothing more than to taste the sweetness I was certain those pretty lips held. I tried to find an excuse to walk over to her table and introduce myself, but no reasonable thought came to me. Determined to find out more about her, I signaled for Jerry to come to my table.
