Sometimes you may think that you know that certain person with whom you work or who lives next door, who they are and what they are all about, but how many times have you been surprised by what you find when you truly get to know them ...
Part 1
'He walked right past me,' Kellie Andrews thought, her proud shoulders drooping and her spirit sagging just a bit. She sighed but held her head up. 'Bastard walked right past me without so much as a tilt of his head or a blink of his eye.'
Kellie had spent several precious minutes primping in front of the tall broad mirrors in the second floor ladies room, the one preferred by most of the top female executives; her unruly wavy hair swept elegantly into a twist, held in place by a sapphire-encrusted clip, her lip gloss and eye shadow seductively perfected, her soft, worsted wool suit smoothed into place, her silk blouse fluffed. An alluring unignorable smile had been rehearsed and presented with a casual, improvised nonchalance. But it was her eyes, her steely blue eyes, clear as a bright spring morning, deep as a crystal pool at midnight, popped open wide and sparkling like the stark afternoon sun glinting off a rippling pond, those had been guaranteed to lure a grin onto his face, curl his lips into a devilish smile, turn his head toward her for once, just once and bring him to notice her. But he didn't. Ross Byner, the bank's most eligible bachelor and the handsomest hunk of maleness on two feet, who had never failed to ignite an all-consuming, yearning flame in her belly, simply walked right past Kellie upon leaving the meeting they had both attended. Maybe it was her glasses, the tortoiseshell-rimmed glasses perched on her pert little nose, perhaps obscuring her most redeeming feature. Maybe she really needed to look into getting contacts or LASIK.
Kellie remained standing in the hallway at the end of the line of plush executive offices, her portfolio of important documents clutched to her breast, her hands shaking, her body trembling, her throat clenched so tightly that she could scarcely draw a breath. Ross strode away from her confidently down the hall toward the bank of elevators, his footfalls cushioned by the thick rich carpet, an emerald green color trimmed with a bead of red the color of blood. Head lowered, she turned back toward the stairs and slunk along, her feet complaining about the new shoes a size too small, the heels an inch too tall. Yet they did such wonderful things to the curves of her calves. Maybe that was it, the skirt of her suit hung too low and covered up those luscious curves. Men liked legs didn't they, legs in heels, legs in stockings, luscious legs that ran all the way up to her hips?
For a moment Kellie permitted herself a brief salacious dream of the warm and moist paradise that he would have found at the top of those legs and how she would surrender it to him, willingly, with no condition nor appraisal required, and how he might take it, ravenously, ardently. Then her moment was over and she drew a deep breath and she trudged down the stairway, her heels clattering down the steel and concrete steps, her palm chilled by the cool steel handrail. How could he have not noticed her? During the entire meeting she had surreptitiously attempted eye contact, smiling demurely, her bright blue eyes blossoming widely, her head attractively tilted toward him. After all, she had volunteered to serve on this ridiculous Team Feasibility Committee only for the express purpose of meeting Ross Byner, the Executive Vice President of the Business Finance group.
She had been so sure that he would notice her, would smile and say hello, or make some light passing comment about her avid participation in the meeting. His reputation for flirting with attractive female bank employees was notorious and Kellie was more than willing to offer herself as his latest conquest. Maybe it was her conservative suit or her eyeglasses that spoiled her tawdry little scheme. Her boss, the branch manager, had often complimented Kellie during her performance reviews on her professional appearance, conservative never overtly fashionable or outlandish. And she had recognized the polite yet leering grin that bunched up his face whenever she visited his office. But he was much older, decidedly married, with children in college and certainly the type who would have never entertained much less acted upon a prurient impulse with an attractive female employee. That left it up to the dashing Ross Byner and she had failed. Miserably.
'He walked right by me! Bastard,' she thought.
Turned out onto the downstairs lobby from the stairwell, Kellie passed the bank of elevators, slumping back toward the cage, the room behind her bank teller window. She should have known that the elevator door would open at that precise moment and that Ross Byner would emerge, accompanied by Derek Hampton, another hotshot young exec, and a pretty redhead whom Kellie didn't recognize. She glanced up at Ross expectantly but not hopeful. He smiled broadly, but not at her, and promptly took the arm of the woman to whom he had extended the smile. Watching the cheery threesome breeze past her, Kellie didn't know who the woman was, but she was jealous of her, she hated her, and yet she wanted to be that girl with her delicate arm held by that strong gentle hand that she would let him place anywhere on her body. Anywhere.
Kellie sighed heavily, wearily, desperately. It was bad enough that her ex-boyfriend, Jerry Kaminski, was dating the girl who inhabited the window next to her and that he called Heather constantly on her cell phone and had the uncanny knack of showing up almost every time the two girls shared lunch together. But then it had been Heather's suggestion that Kellie join the bank's Team Feasibility Committee, management's feel-good effort to improve communications between all levels of bank employees. It had presented her with a great opportunity to make nice with Ross Byner, the co-star of her most private thoughts and recent daydreams. Now in the face of this most recent defeat it seemed like the suggestion was some sort of sick joke, and maybe even Jerry's idea. Kellie didn't care anymore. She just wanted to go back to work and lose herself and her misery.
"So how did it go?" Heather asked in a perky cheerful clear voice that ground into Kellie like the sharp teeth of a cheese grater.
"Boring," Kellie replied setting down her armload of folders and booting up her computer console.
