The phone was ringing.
"Jessica? Jessica?" I was in the middle of watching a playoff game and really couldn't stand the distraction of getting up and answering the phone. "Jessica? PLEASE!!"
"What's the matter? You break your leg?" Jessica yelled back from the kitchen, "Oh! I forgot. You've got the game on! Sorry, I forgot that that getting up, walking three feet to the desk, and answering the fucking phone would ruin the entire game. Jeez! It's probably a beer commercial anyway!"
I hesitated to comment that in the time it took her to rant about my not answering the phone she could have picked up the extension in the kitchen and stopped the intrusive ringing. But why escalate the conflict? The call was probably for her anyway.
The call WAS for her. That made me feel smugly satisfied. I was right and I was right. But, I found, it doesn't pay to be too right too often, especially if one one tries to gloat.
When a time-out did come up (and ,yes, the break was for a beer commercial) so I went into the kitchen to see what Jessica was doing. Well, for one she was gingerly holding the phone between her thumb and forefinger on her right hand holding it near her ear and attempting to talk. She was in the middle of baking and she had shortening or some such substance all over her hands. Chagrined, I mouthed "I'm Sorry" and, finding a non-greasy spot on the phone, plucked it from between her fingers, hit the "speaker" button on the handset, and put the phone on the counter so she could talk "hands-free".
Jessica carried on without missing a beat. "Sure, Laura! I think that would be fun. Let me get cleaned up and I'll meet you at your place.....Yeah.....O.K.....In an hour...maybe a little more....Yes....O.K....No, I'm sure it's fine....Yes....See you soon."
Jessica motioned to me with her gooey fingers to turn off the phone, which I did straightaway rather than risk further wrath. As I wiped off the phone with a dish towel, Jessica returned to her baking task and with swift efficiency put together two sheets of cookies and slid them into the waiting oven. No wasted movement there!
I walked back into the living room and picked up on the game again. Damn! In the brief interlude in the kitchen, the other team ran back an interception for a touchdown. Damn! There went my point spread. The game wasn't over but, knowing their opponents, it was too close to the end for my team to recoup. I switched the TV off and went back into the kitchen.
"What's up with Laura?" I tried to sound nonchalant but I was very curious, knowing what I did about Jessica and Laura.
"Not much. She just wants to do some shopping." Jessica sounded too matter of fact to be 'up to anything', "There's an after-hours sale going on at (a store in the next town) and she wants me to go with her."
"Just shopping?" I queried. "I mean you're going shopping and not 'shopping', right?"
"Yes, silly boy." She was peevishly condescending. "Yes, just real shopping! Beside that, you know I've got my period and that pretty much precludes any fun and games."
Yes, I did know about Jessica's period. But, if I got a blow job this morning like I did, how is it that Laura might not get similar treatment from my oral-sexy girlfriend? I think Jessica was reading my mind.
"Laura's got her period now, too, so you can put the stopper on your lurid imagination right now, mister." Jessica knew she got me with that one. "I suppose it is just synchronicity, huh? Our periods just brings out the shopping bug in both of us."
Jessica put some dishes in to the sink, tidied up the counter a little, and hung her apron on a hook on the side of the refrigerator.
"Watch the cookies. They will be done in fifteen minutes." Jessica was in her elementary school teacher mode. "Take them out of the oven- -USE the oven mitts- -and put the cookie sheets on the stove top to cool. I'll be in taking a shower. I won't be long."
I followed directions to the letter and was standing there looking like a third-grader who had successfully completed a school assignment when Jessica wafted back into the kitchen looking all scrubbed and fresh.
"All done. See?" I motioned toward the stove top. "Perfect? Right?"
"Yes, very well done, Marco." That school teacher tone again, "You didn't miss a thing--except for turning the oven off, closing the oven door, turning off the oven light, and hanging up the oven mitts again. Perfect!"
I could tell she was being facetious. How was I to know to do those things? They weren't in her instructions. Jeez!
"Marco, Marco, Marco!" Jessica twitted me, "You'll never be a woman- -at least when it comes to cooking!"
"So, Jessica, what am I supposed to do while you and Laura are gallivanting all over town?" I suppose I was trying to make her feel a little guilty. "The game's over and I'm pretty much at loose ends now. You want me to try to bake another batch of cookies?"
Jessica looked horrified. "No, No, NO! No baking cookies! I couldn't take coming home to the mess that I'm sure I would find if I let you do that. Why don't you just clean up a bit yourself and come along. You and Lu (Lurecia) can plot something while Laura and I are on our spree."
Did I detect something sly in her voice? Or, was I just imagining things again.
No matter, I went in to the bathroom, gave my self quick rinse off, slapped on some cologne, and put on some respectable clothes and left with Jessica.
We chatted in the car on the way over to Laura and Lurecia's place.
"Jessica? That night we had with Laura and Lurecia was pretty spectacular, huh?"