Meg called unexpectedly and said she had a special job, lucrative and short, but challenging - would I partner up?
"Sure," I said.
"We worked well together."
"Yes, we did, in the day. I was hoping you'd call sooner."
"It's an evening buffet," she said. "A private party at the client's home, north of Fairfax, a cinch."
"On the mountain?"
"With a view. There'll be a dozen guests. A four, four and a half hour day, including prep, if we push it."
"Where's the challenge?" I said.
"I was told the client can be a bitch."
"Anyone I know?"
"A newbie, by referral. I did a small business luncheon for her husband."
"Who told you she could be a bitch?"
"He did."
Meg's delivery - I had to laugh.
"That's a good sound," she said. "I like hearing it."
"I was going to wait another week before calling you again."
"And I've been meaning all along to get back to you, Dee, but working my own business takes every drop of time and energy. I keep thinking to call, but by the end of the day ..."
"Meg, I get it, no problem."
"I should be calling for a date."
"You have. A work date."
"A date-date."
"Then you're on," I said. "Sign me up for both."
We talked for another half hour or so. I had to restrain my elation - Meg had legit concerns about taking our friendship toward intimacy.
"You've been out less that a year, Dee. You're only getting to know the life ... Are you sure it's what you want?"
"Meg, I couldn't be more sure."
"I like our friendship," she said.
"We've known each other nine months? I feel like we've been friends all our lives. I felt that way after the first two weeks."
"There are sides of me that I haven't talked about."
"Same with me."
"I mean my sexuality, my preferences, needs."
"I have a sense," I said.
"Trust me, you don't."
"B-d-s and m, right?"
"That means a lot of things."
"I'm not entirely naive."
"Not naive, inexperienced."
"You belong to a club."
"An association of people. Private residences, couples, singles too, sometimes bigger groups. Rented space for big parties."
"Tell me about it on our date."
"You haven't expressed a personal interest like this before."
"I've had fantasies."
"Then do tell."
"On our date."
Meg paused, then said, "I should tell you that I've met her, the bitch we're catering."
"At the luncheon?"
"At a gathering."
"Oh." It took a moment. "Club members are also clients?"
"It's how I've been able to break out on my own."
"And do you cater gatherings?"
"I haven't. I'm not sure I'd feel right about that."
"This isn't a gathering?"
"It's not."
"It won't turn into an orgy."
"It won't. It's a business thing, a pitch meeting, unrelated."
"That was a joke."
"It's a bad idea to mix business and play. That's why I didn't hit on to you when we worked together. If you fuck one up, you fuck 'em both up."
"This has turned into a doozy of a phone call, Meg."
We said goodnight soon after. I went to bed feeling dizzily aroused.
Meg, I thought, Meg oh Meg. Amuse buche.
The promise of sex with her brought a peppery heat between my legs and I rubbed briefly without needing to come.
Halfway to sleep and drifting into a dream, I tasted her - a lobster bisque - and the vividness of sensation on my tongue woke me up just long enough to remember and re-feel the excitement I felt as a girl, flush with first stirrings and discovering my fantastic, secret, dirty pleasures under the sheets.
Over coffee in her kitchen late the next afternoon, Meg laid out the specified bill of fare. We had hugged at the door, twice, and it was filling enough just to be near her. We strategized and got to preparations, sorting and washing, peeling, chopping and grinding. She put Cuban dance music on the player and shuffled to a rumba, while onions caramelized with tarragon and butter. The pork rub gave the air a tang of toasted cumin. Outside on the deck rail, a cat stretched in the sun, then settled, folded its paws and furled its tail, ready to nap. The time passed effortlessly.
After the food had been wrapped and the kitchen straightened up, we went through our checklist and began packing the van. Once, while passing opposite ways in the hall, she grazed my hand without breaking stride or looking back and said, "I like working with you."
"We're a natural team."
That was the extent of our flirting.
After we had run through our second check and closed up, Meg held out the keys and asked me to drive. I took them.
As we climbed in, she said, "This'll make it a whole lot easier to feast my eyes on you."
We drove over the big bridge and passed the headlands. I glanced at Meg and saw that she was watching my hands on the wheel.
"What do you see?" I said.
"They're strong," Meg said, "I'd call them honest hands."
"Do you read palms?"
"I read faces."
Our eyes met briefly and I felt the thrill of certainty that later this evening, within hours, we were going to kiss.
Meg said, "That look. What are you keeping to yourself?"
I'll be tasting your mouth and you'll be tasting mine and we'll be touching tongues.
"A silly thought," I said. "Nothing."
Meg pointed. "There's the exit. Left at the light."
I said, "Are you ever allowed to bring guests to your gatherings?"
She laughed and said, "Not on a first date."
Am image of leather and rope flashed in my imagination, then an image of Meg yanking my pantyhose down to expose my bottom.
We drove in silence until Meg said, "That's a pretty strong vibe you call nothing."
We were above Fairfax and near the top of the foothills. At the next fork the grades became steep and the roads switchbacked continuously. In the network of intersections that followed, the names of the roads changed in confusing ways.
"GPS is for crap," I said.
Meg was smiling. "We're fine," she said, "we've got a map."
We reached a T-section that I didn't recognize.
"Right or left?"
"Look right," Meg said.
I eased the van forward to see that the road was heavily shaded and that it ran level and straight and that it was lined on both sides by a row of live oak trees. Their long, arcing branches crossed overhead, densely enough to suggest a living tunnel. Up and down, moss hung from the branches in long tresses, like tattered filigree. In moonlight it could have been the setting of a folk tale.
"Take us under it," Meg said. "We have a few minutes and the Fines asked a favor."
I made the turn and drove about half of the length of the road before pulling to the side and turning off the engine.
In the quiet we leaned from the windows and listened to the chatter of leaves and the creaks and groans of rubbing branches. The wind smelled of dust and bark, sweetened by ocean air.
"This was all planned," I said, looking up with admiration. "Somebody envisioned this and planted these trees so that they would grow this way."
"With the mother of views. Look."
Through a narrow break in the oaks, half of the southern end of the peninsular lay visible, paling in the distance to a haze.
The isolation of the grove was piquing my desire for Meg. "We can't stay," I said. "It's too tempting."
"I'll only need a minute," Meg said. She reached under her seat to grab something, opened her door and jumped out of the van, unfolding a paper bag.
"What're you doing?"
"The moss, it's in bunches all over the ground," Meg said, ready to gather. "They asked me to bring some."
"They, the clients? It's a life form," I said. "It's protected."
"Just a few - what do you call them? Trusses."
"I'm pretty sure this is park land," I said.
Maybe the sounds of the arbor absorbed my voice. Meg kept bent to the ground as she gathered bunches of moss, sorting out the longer strands and shaking each clean of debris before placing it in the bag.
When Meg returned I said, "It'll die anywhere else but here."
"We'll return it," she said.
"It's illegal. Why would you -?"
"We'll return it, Dee. We'll bring it back on the way home. It's the perfect excuse to come back." She touched a fingertip gently to the corner of my mouth and said, "As if we'll need one."
I checked the impulse to love-bite her hand.
She lifted a grey blue-green strand from the bag and held it to the light.
"The shapes and the color, it's fantastic stuff."
"Like fractals," I said, "those curls, the branching. We'll kill it, Meg."
"Isn't it already dying on the ground?"
"I don't know. What do the Fines want with it?"
"Display, they said."
"As a
garnish
?"
Meg draped the strand around her neck.
I turned the ignition.
"Straight ahead or one-eighty, Meg?"
"One-eighty," she said, placing the strand in the bag. "We're not far."
The arbor was narrow enough that I had to k-turn. I was watching the side mirror when Meg said, "Has your year out been satisfying, Dee?"
"It's been a relief."
"What's been missing?"
