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I hadn’t been gone two days before I started getting these strange messages from an unknown number. At first I thought it was her, but the verbiage was way different, though similar in some ways. At first the little cryptic messages made no sense and I was tempted to ignore them or even go so far as to block the number, but there was an underlying tone to each that sounded almost as if the person knew me.
I gave some thought to it being an ex fling but none of the women I knew would do this, and besides the number was not one I recognized. The hints were too broad to pinpoint any one thing in particular, but they were beginning to sound more and more like someone knew what was going on between Emily and I.
Emily, I can’t count how many times I picked up the phone to call her and put it away again. The first night I had to look at a photo of her just so I could get some sleep. The fact that I missed her enough to feel the pain in my gut should’ve been answer enough, but I’ve never been known to do shit the easy way.
By day three I was damn near a wreck and it showed. I was short tempered when I’m known for being cool under pressure. Things that I would normally let slide in the day to day rigors of business, got under my skin. By day four I wasn’t fit for company. And that’s when the shit hit the fan.
I’d almost decided that my new phone buddy was the friend I’d met the night I took her out. I couldn’t quite place her name. My mind had been so full of Emily that night I would be hard pressed to remember her friend’s face if she was standing right in front of me. But I had finally caught wind of the style in which she wrote, which was pretty much the way she spoke.
Then day four came. I was almost ready to sign on the dotted line. The business didn’t hold much interest for me; it was just an excuse I needed to get away at this point in my life. Or more to the point, the interest had waned once I realized I’d have to be here for an extended period of time, which would mean being away from her.
I’d begun to accept that I was fighting a losing battle, that for the first time in my life I was running away from something; and then it happened. Instead of the usual text, which I have to admit I’d started looking forward to. Always some old adage that I guess was meant to make me look deep into my soul and find myself or whatever new age crap they were pushing these days, there was a photo.
I didn’t quite grasp what I was looking at-at first. I knew it was her, and I, but I couldn’t…. and then it hit me. One of the many photographers there that night must’ve taken it when I was busy seducing her in the darkened corner of the club. I’d left town the next morning and hadn’t seen the local headlines.
I studied that photo for the longest time, sitting behind the desk in my hotel room. It was right there, for all the world to see. I kept running my finger over her image until the ramifications hit home. “Oh…shit.” I got dressed, threw my stuff in my luggage and called my pilot. We were going home a few days early.
I read the caption that came with the photo and my heart sank. I’d left her to face this alone. The heading alone was enough to make shit hard for her, but the byline wasn’t much better. The implications were hard to miss, unless you were thick as a brick.
I tried calling her before the plane took off, but there was no answer. It was already late in the afternoon by the time we landed and there was another message waiting for me. I recognized the name of the place and the address but had no idea why I was being asked to come there. Then I remembered who it was I thought was sending me these messages and knew it must have something to do with Emily. I tried calling her with no success, but decided to play along.
I barely had enough time to get home and clean up before heading back out again. I had no idea what I was walking into. The place was an upscale nightclub slash restaurant where what I would consider the younger crowd tend to gravitate. Lately though in the last few years at least, it had been drawing a more mid-stream clientele. Old men trying to recapture their youth, and cougars on the prowl I guess. So what was I doing here again?
I felt almost silly as I sat in the car on the way there. The night was coming on as the sun faded into the western sky and outside the streets were no longer bustling with worker bees, but the jet setters and those looking to unwind. I appeared more relaxed than I actually felt, as I leaned back into the corner of my seat with a finger playing across my lip contemplatively.
