“Whatcha guys doin’?”
The three of us flinch guiltily.
Lisa recovers first. “Nunya, Leslie.”
Leslie narrows her eyes and smirks. “Very funny, Lisa. As in ‘nunya business’?”
“Exactly. See ya.”
Leslie isn’t shaken that easily. “I don’t know about you guys, but I’m swamped.” She looks at the random office supplies on my desk and in Zoe’s hands. “Swap meet?” She grabs the stuff from Zoe and says, “Hey, you know who probably needs this? The new guy. Have you seen him? He is delicious with a capital ‘Come to mama.’ And wait until you hear him talk… I’d be okay with him just reading the building directory to me.”
“Good,” Lisa snipes, “since that’s about all he’d probably be willing to read to you.”
“We’ll see about that,” Leslie replies with a smirk. “I think I’ll go welcome him to the company and let him know I’m available… for all his administrative needs.” She licks her bright red lips suggestively and strides away, an extra wiggle in her hips.
“Guh-ross,” Lisa says when she’s gone. “What a tart.”
It’s just as well. There’s no way I’d want to introduce myself to him wearing this shirt, anyway.
I try to think of the perfect thing to wear when I do meet him. Black’s always good. I have a black pencil skirt that makes me look twenty pounds lighter. And I look great in purple. I have a purple, fitted satin wrap-around number that I always feel sexy in. I mean, professional. I feel professional in it, which is how I want to look. Since this is a professional setting.
“And who is this?” he’ll say, appraising me.
“Libby Fletcher,” I’ll answer confidently, offering him my firm hand to shake.
“Indeed. Libby Fletcher, it’s very nice to meet you. But I have to warn you, I’m high maintenance.” He’ll raise his thick eyebrows provocatively.
“Well, you’ll get over that quickly here,” I’ll flirt back, “Unless you’re in the habit of bringing presents to the admins. Then you can be as high-maintenance as you want.”
He’ll laugh at my wittiness and predict, “I think I’m going to like you, Libby Fletcher.”
2
That was three weeks ago. Our actual first meeting went like this:
“Oh, hey, Libby, I want you to meet Jude Weatherington,” Gary, Vice President of Commercial Accounts, said as he passed me while I was on the way to my desk after visiting the break room.
I was dabbing at a mustard stain on the left breast of my hideous aforementioned blouse. My attention to the stain was making it worse; my attention to the breast was making my nipple stick out through my shirt. At the mention of my name, closely followed by Jude’s, I pulled the shirt away from my chest and stood at an odd angle to him, hoping he couldn’t see the stain. Or my nipple, when I had to let go of my shirt to shake his hand.
I’m sure he was too distracted by my flaming face to notice anything below my neck anyway.
“Libby, was it?” Jude asked pleasantly.
Sometimes the simplest questions are the trickiest ones. “Uh… yes. Yep. I’m Libby.”
He looked at me and smiled slowly. “Are you sure?”
Gary said, “Libby’s one of the admins for our division. Along with Lisa, Leslie, and Zoe. Any one of them can help you if you need it.” To me, he said, “We’re on our way to see Wanda to get Jude a key to the floor. Have you seen her around, by chance?”
I nodded mutely, staring at the dimple in Jude’s otherwise smooth left cheek.
When neither of them said anything else and just stood there in front of me, I realized they needed more information from me than that.
“Oh! Yeah. She’s around here somewhere. I thought I saw her in her office when I was on my way to the break room.” My mention of that room reminded me of my stain, so I snuck my hand back up and cupped my breast in an effort to hide it.
That time, Jude did notice. He glanced down, then back up very quickly, blushing.
“Nice to meet you,” I blurted, rushing away from them, wondering if it was possible for me to be any more socially awkward. I was pretty sure it wasn’t.
Since then, we’ve barely uttered two words to each other in real life. For some reason, he doesn’t like to ask the boob-touching admin for her help. Go figure.
In Libby’s Fantasy World (a.k.a. “LFW”), however, we’ve had numerous conversations and two dates. I’ve found out that he’s a romantic who loves to write poetry in his spare time. He’s even written me a poem (it was beautiful—something about my lips reminding him of dew-kissed butterflies). We’ve also played tennis together, and he let me win. What a gentleman! We’ve discussed our favorite movies, of which we have several in common, including anything about the British royal family. Oh, I almost forgot! We spent a wonderful afternoon at a Cubs game. The Cubs won, of course. Yes, our relationship is progressing quite nicely in LFW.
When I told Dr. Marsh, my therapist, about the latest subject of my fantasies, he stopped me about five minutes in. “Now, wait. Let me get this straight. This is a person you work with? In real life?”
I nodded and tried to continue, but he interrupted me again. “Whoa. Back up a second.” He paused to jot something down in his notes. Then he set his pen down and moved his glasses from his nose to the top of his closely shaved head. Not for the first time, I found myself thinking he looks like that cartoon superhero, the Green Lantern. He licked his full lips and seemed to be thinking hard about what to say to me next.
I got tired of waiting and anticipated his comment. “What?” You told me that my fantasies were completely normal and healthy.”
“They are,” he affirmed. “Usually.”
“You’re saying my fantasies about this guy aren’t healthy?”
He answered my question with a question. “Do you think it’s healthy to fantasize about someone
