They met during a job interview. She was in charge of fundraising for a cutting-edge nonprofit organization, having left behind a stultifying job adding to the already overflowing coffers of a renowned Ivy League college. He was extricating himself from a long legal career, hoping to lead the nonprofit's strategic growth plan. It was a panel interview with five interviewers and one job aspirant.
He had a submitted a requested writing assignment that had taken the panel by surprise with its sharp originality and capacious worldview. He had aced three previous interviews, and his appearance before the panel was eagerly anticipated. As everyone gathered and made their introductions, she was pleased by his non-traditional appearance: older, shorter and grayer, yet crisply dressed in tailored wool slacks, ecru buttoned-down shirt, lyrical flowered tie, and fitted navy blue blazer. He sported a neatly trimmed beard that belonged on his face, and a thinning but still full head of hair, which, like his beard, alternated between salt-and-pepper and monochromatic silver. She pegged him to be on the other side of fifty, but infused with an irreverent wit and incongruously youthful outlook. In fact, he was fifty-three, but his self-image was rooted at twenty-two. She didn't find him to be handsome, but appealing in a more general way.
She was an attractive bottle-blond, now approaching forty, with a husband and children, who realized she was being worn down by the ordinary burdens of life. The uber-hip organization she had recently joined with such enthusiasm had been revealed as the kind of Dilbert-plagued dysfunctional bureaucracy she thought she had left behind, albeit with a much lower paycheck. She still adored the poor middle-school kids they worked with, but she felt the weight of rolling the rock up the hill every day. Still, she knew that her life was a very good one and she quietly appreciated the undeniable fact that she drew admiring looks from men and boys of all ages. Attentive exercise maintained her slim, lithe and athletic frame.
After he was offered the job, he called to ask if she'd meet for coffee to help him decide whether to accept. There were, in fact, two Starbucks from which she could choose, one near the office and one around the corner from her condo. She chose the latter, after a brief internal monologue she pretended to ignore. On the appointed date and time, she arrived to find him already seated next to a comfy chair he'd saved for her. He wore a handsome leather jacket broken in from long usage, a starched French blue shirt, pressed khakis, and leather boat shoes. She told herself he still wasn't particularly good looking, but he did know how to dress.
She had taken far too much time deciding what to wear, finally settling on a pleated skirt that was just a little too short and a white shirt-collar blouse that was a little too snug. Her legs were her most appealing feature she knew, long and graceful, and she stepped into heels that were a little too tall for the occasion, but improved her posture to advantage. Her breasts were small but pretty, and she slipped into a lace bra and panty set that she'd have a hard time explaining, if asked.
As it turned out, they talked for an hour without ever really discussing the job offer. She found him both engaging and reassuring, someone to whom she felt comfortable revealing things about herself that she normally only told her closest women friends of longstanding acquaintance. Their age difference, the fact that they were both married with kids, the small and large disappointments they'd each accumulated over the years, all combined to open a conversational intimacy that she found both safe and bracing. She felt almost as if she'd been drinking, with his physical appearance improving the more she told him about herself and the more he listened to her shared confidences with real sympathy. As their conversation grew animated, they touched each other's forearms and laughed too loudly without feeling self-conscious, aware of their shared feeling of falling into close friendship.
At one point, her hand wrested on his thigh and remained there with perfect composure. Neither of them felt awkward about it, but she was acutely aware of enjoying the physicality and warmth of his limb. He said something funny and she squeezed him gently to show her amusement. He leaned forward to touch her on the shoulder and they paused talking briefly to dwell in the moment, he taking in her perfume, she his cologne.
"Hey," she said. "I've got to call my husband and make arrangements for the kids." Her brain was calculating at a fast clip. "Could we stop by my house for a minute? It's around the corner." She fumbled with the key in the lock, working herself up into a barely contained state of tension about what the heck she thought she was doing, a rhetorical question she did not attempt to answer. She'd figure out a way to keep the house empty for at least a couple of hours, as she made a couple of quick calls and returned to the living room with an open bottle of wine and two glasses.
