Cheapskate in Love

by Booth, Skittle

  Pedestrians going in and out of restaurants along the street stared at him, as he stood by the salon’s window, making a strange display of himself. Some of the people thought that urban blight was taking root in their idyllic suburban town, and something had to be done. Oblivious to them all and their criticisms, Bill turned from the salon window, smiling, and proceeded on his way with a lighter step.

  Back home, after showering and gorging on bologna and cheese sandwiches to replenish all the calories his trek had burned, he was still elated by his visit to the empty hair salon and the train of thoughts it had triggered. He had such an emotional high that there was only one sensible thing to do: Swing dance. As the tunes of big-band dance music filled his apartment, he jittered and jived, dipped and spinned.

  He imagined he was dancing with Donna in the ballroom of the famous Waldorf Astoria hotel in Manhattan, with a crowd of other young people. In his mind, everyone was whirling and twirling around, trying to out-dance him and Donna, but they were the best dancers on the floor. They were raising smoke all over the place. They were on fire. They were hot and unstoppable.

  “Ow!” cried Bill, as he turned too quickly for the comfort of his lower back. He fell onto his couch, holding his hand back there. His dancing for the day was over. The momentary pain, however, could not erase the happy expectation he had for next Saturday. On that day, he would see his darling Donna again.

  The next morning, on Monday, the first of five long days before the Saturday he could hardly wait for, Bill brought cupcakes to the office as a surprise treat for his coworkers. Infrequently, he did this when his personal life seemed to be on the up and up; an irrational, exuberant, abnormal urge would seize him, and, to share his momentary contentment, he’d splurge on something he knew his coworkers would eat. When he placed the box of ten cupcakes, each topped with a thick inch of frosting, on a table, he invited them all to help themselves. Claire had not yet arrived, but Katie and Debbie jumped up and hurried to the cupcakes, oohing and aahing and examining the assortment. Matt watched them. He wasn’t a cupcake aficionado like the women. However, if there were any left after lunch, he would claim it was a waste to throw out such fat and sugar mounds and finish them off, even the crumbs.

  “This beats the oatmeal that I was going to have,” said Katie, taking her choice back to her seat. “Thanks, Bill.”

  “Three-day-old cupcakes are better than oatmeal?” remarked Matt with some rancor. He was slightly envious that the women were cooing over a gift from Bill, whom everyone knew was tight with his money.

  “These are fresh and cost four bucks each,” responded Bill, without any hostility. “And there are plenty more. Help yourself.” He sat down with a cupcake, too. Matt couldn’t answer such generosity with more negativity, so he looked fixedly at his computer screen and pounded out email text on his keyboard.

  At her desk now with a cupcake, Debbie held it before her face, as if it were an apple stolen from the Garden of Eden. “I really shouldn’t. I really, really shouldn’t eat this,” she said with a mixture of dread and desire in her voice. She was thinking of all the calories the cupcake contained. Abandoning herself to her fate, she pulled the cupcake to her lips and took a big bite. The sweet temptation disappeared quickly with a few more bites, destined to reappear on her hips after digestion.

  Late as usual, Claire entered the office and immediately perceived the box of cupcakes. “Cupcakes! What’s the special occasion?” Cupcakes were usually brought into the office for a birthday or other celebration.

  “Linda and him got engaged,” deadpanned Matt, looking at Claire. Bill ignored the comment. He had told them all he was no longer talking with that former girlfriend, and he didn’t want to tell them again.

  “Bill, I’m so happy for you. Congratulations!” Claire exclaimed. Everyone knew that Bill was an inveterate flip-flopper in regard to Linda. It was entirely possible that there had occurred another revolution in their relationship, and they were now engaged.

  “I’m going to be his best man,” proclaimed Matt, smiling broadly at his lie’s success.

  Claire looked intently at Bill, who was still ignoring their exchange. “Wait a moment,” said Claire. “Bill, are you engaged?”

  “Of course, he’s engaged,” butted in Matt. “A man who buys cupcakes is happy about something big. And what is bigger to Bill...”

  “No, I’m not,” denied Bill.

  “...than being engaged,” said Matt, trailing off lamely.

  “I should have known our creative department was at work again,” huffed Claire, tiffed at being so easily deceived. She picked up a cupcake on the way to her desk and started her morning routine.

  Although she had plenty of personal emails to attend to, Katie could easily relate to her coworkers when the subject was cupcakes. She wanted to know why the little cakes had appeared. “So what’s the special occasion, Bill?” she asked.

  “There isn’t one. I just felt like bringing in cupcakes. Everyone likes them.”

  “You’re so sweet,” Katie said, flashing a smile at him. Her cute, grinning face looked exactly like an emoticon, which she would put in emails.

  Matt couldn’t let Bill’s apparently unmotivated geniality pass unchallenged. “Will everyone who thinks there is no special occasion, please raise your hand?”

  No one raised their hand.

  “Your hair looks nice,” commented Debbie to Bill. “Didn’t you get it done for...What’s her name? Miss Green Card.” Debbie was a bit distracted, because the box of cupcakes lay in her line of vision, and she was considering when to raid it again.

  “Tanya,” said Claire, supplying the name. Her command of minutiae explained why she was the chief staff person.

  “Bill has to marry Linda,” announced Matt with a straight face. “Tanya doesn’t have her persistent, sadistic charm.”

  “I’m not marrying Linda,” Bill grumbled. “How many times do I have to say I’m not even speaking with her?”

  “Who are you marrying then?” asked Matt, unrelenting.

  “I say Tanya,” suggested Debbie. “The haircut and coloring are too good. That shows real motivation.” She asked Bill, “Did you go someplace near you? I need a new stylist, but you live too far out.” After ample nutrition, fashion and cosmetics were Debbie’s secondary concerns.

  “I’m not marrying anyone,” objected Bill, who was on the verge of becoming mad. “And I won’t bring anymore cupcakes, if there has to be an interrogation.”

  “OK, everyone, to work,” ordered Katie, taking charge of the situation, lest they imperil a chance for more too sweet bakery goods from Bill. “We want more cupcakes.”

  Everyone turned toward their computer monitor, looking busy, except Matt, who leaned toward Bill and whispered, “Who did you meet? Is she good-looking?” The men sat at desks side by side, behind the women, so their communication was semi-private.

  “Donna,” replied Bill with a ready whisper. He was willing to open up to a guy in secret about his recent conquest. “She’s gorgeous.”

  “Really?” said Matt, faking amazement.

  “Her picture’s here on the Internet,” Bill bragged, motioning Matt to come over to his desk. Matt went at once. Since Bill had sat down, he had been diligently going through the website for Donna’s hair salon, searching for pictures of her. He pointed out her fetching face and profile to Matt, who leaned eagerly over Bill’s shoulder, looking at his monitor. “See what I see?” Bill asked, making an hourglass figure in the air with his hands. “Are those curves or what?”

  Matt nodded, his eyes aglow. “Mmmmm. Nice.”

  Since he had discovered the story behind the cupcakes, there was no need to whisper any longer. He stood up and loudly addressed the rest, “Anyone want to see who Bill is marrying?”

  Vehemently and repeatedly, Bill denied he was marrying anyone, but it was too late to convince his coworkers. Debbie, Claire, and even Katie rushed to his desk, talking all at once, “Who is she? Where did you mee
t her? What does she do? How long have you known her? Is she pretty? Oh, she is good-looking. Lucky you. Now tell us everything.”

  Surrounded and bombarded with questions, Bill, who was tickled to his toes with Donna and confident of their future, decided that the easiest truth to tell his coworkers was that no definite wedding plans had been made yet.

  Chapter 28

  Two days before Saturday, Stan arranged to meet Bill for lunch in Midtown with the intention of talking some sense into him about Donna. Stan wanted Bill to apologize to Helen for his rude words in the social hall and take her out on a date. Donna, Stan planned to say, was another of his pipe dreams, while Helen was attractive, intelligent, and considerate. She was a long-time acquaintance, he would emphasize, who was visibly, seriously interested in him. As his friend, Stan would command him to wake up.

  This time, they went to an Indian buffet restaurant that a coworker of Stan’s had recommended. Bill had assented to this choice, because Stan had assured him that it would be inexpensive. When Stan arrived at the place, however, he found Bill reading the menu posted outside with a worried look. After they exchanged a few pleasantries, as they usually did, about how decrepit and near death the other appeared, Bill broached the subject of his real concern.

  “The prices are kind of high,” he complained.

  “It’s only three more dollars than the Chinese buffet we went to last time,” countered Stan, not considering the difference that three dollars make to a man of Bill’s economical views.

  “I spent a lot on cupcakes this morning,” griped Bill. “And it doesn’t seem like much food. I saw the plates people have inside. The Chinese place piled more on.”

  “If you want to go to the same place...” answered Stan, becoming impatient, since Bill was acting more shamelessly cheap than usual.

  “No, no, let’s eat here,” Bill interjected. “If you pay this time, I’ll pay next time when we go back to the Chinese buffet. How does that sound?”

  Since Stan was never going to argue with Bill for the distinction of being an equal or greater cheapskate, he agreed to Bill’s suggestion, and they walked inside.

  When they had sat down with their trays to eat, Stan immediately launched into the speech he had thought about, while Bill forked food into his face. Stan told him how impressed he had been by Helen, how good-looking she was, how much she seemed to desire him.

  “Forget about her,” Bill broke in. “I’m not talking with her again. Leaving me stranded at church was a mean trick. Here’s something for you to appreciate. What do you think about this? Does she have curves or what?” He handed Stan a picture, which he had printed from the Internet.

  “Yeah, she has some round spots,” Stan admitted grudgingly, looking at the picture.

  “That’s Donna,” crowed Bill. “She’s something to remember. That’s one ski course I want to slide all over.”

  As Stan gave the picture back, he joked in return, “Probably won’t be on your feet for long.”

  “I’d keep falling and falling, every time I got up,” answered Bill with glee, running with the metaphor. “But I’d get up again and again and go at it.”

  “Are you seeing her before the barbecue?” asked Stan, trying to determine the extent of Bill’s acquaintance with her.

  “She’s too busy.”

  “Find out any more about her?”

  “She has a BMW.”

  “Nice,” said Stan. “And you’re driving her to the barbecue in your rusting jalopy?”

  “No. She’s driving. I told her my car broke down again, and I ordered an Audi...”

  “You bought an Audi?” Stan was astounded.

  “Of course not. Not yet. If we have a great time, maybe. She likes nice things, so I want her to think I do, too. I said the new car isn’t ready yet, because all the extras have to be installed. I told her someone will drop me off at her place.”

  Stan was shaking his head in disbelief. Since his friend was apparently hopelessly infatuated, thinking that lies and deception would lead to love, instead of trying to converse with him rationally, he realized that the best means of communication would be ridicule. “I’m sure Helen would like to do that for you.”

  “I’m driving my car,” Bill responded tersely, irritated by the remembrance of Helen abandoning him. “I’ll just park it out of sight.”

  “What happens when Donna drives you home? You’re going to hitchhike back to her place?”

  “I’m staying the night,” Bill said confidently.

  “Oh, really? Does she know?”

  “She invited me to the barbecue. What do you think?”

  “That she wants a party companion, like Helen said. What makes you think that isn’t true?”

  “I know it,” declared Bill dreamily. “This time...”

  “You’ve found a sex-worker, who happens to own a salon and likes driving strange men from barbecues right into her bed,” spurted out Stan sarcastically.

  “Sounds sort of appetizing,” remarked Bill, delighted with the idea.

  “For five-hundred bucks an hour.”

  “That’s too much,” argued Bill. “I’ll bring chocolates and flowers. That’ll be enough for her.”

  “Bring your luggage, too. She should let you move right in.”

  “I was planning to leave a change of clothes in the car,” admitted Bill, “in case she wants me to stay Sunday, too.”

  “Bring everything. Rent a moving van, and be ready to unload all your stuff the next morning.”

  Bill considered Stan’s mocking suggestion seriously. “I’ll just need clothes. The rest I could toss. None of it’s worth much. I’m sure her house has everything.”

  “When you awake from this teenage fantasy, tell me,” demanded Stan, tired of the silliness. “I’m advising you to drop Donna. Throw yourself at Helen, grovel for her forgiveness, and ask her out. How you can be so blind to your unbelievable good luck, is beyond me.”

  That was not the sort of advice that Bill wanted to hear or consider, so he sulked for a few moments, scraping his plate to gather any grains of rice he had missed. Stan had to finish a good-sized portion of his food still, so he was content to let the conversation lapse. Besides, he thought his silence might persuade Bill to set a new priority; peer pressure can have a beneficial effect sometimes.

  Stan’s well-meaning interference in Bill’s affairs, however, failed to make any difference. When Bill finally spoke, he asked him where he should go to buy chocolates and flowers. “I need good ones,” Bill said. “Not super expensive, but nice enough to impress someone. I don’t know where to go. Linda didn’t like what I gave her.” Although Bill didn’t say who might be the recipient of these gifts, he didn’t have to. It was clear that he still had the same plans for Saturday.

  Stan’s response was quick, brutal, and ruthless. He supplied his friend with information about the most costly and exclusive places he could think of for those gifts.

  That evening, as Bill was walking up to the entrance of his apartment building with his briefcase in hand, Helen, accompanied by Tom, came out of the front doors. They were attractively attired in fine, informal summer clothes. Helen wore a dress and Tom a blazer. It was their first date. They were absorbed in conversation and didn’t notice Bill, although the distance between them was only about sixty feet.

  Bill noticed them, however. Although he had vowed never to speak to Helen again after what she had done to him on Sunday, he had not counted on seeing her in the company of another man, especially a man like Tom, who was handsome, well-dressed, and seemed to be of some importance. This was an unexpected development, a complete surprise. Bill was accustomed to Helen running after him, trying to talk to him, dote on him, entrap him. But she wasn’t doing that now. She was talking to another man, entirely unaware of his presence.

  When the couple had come close, Bill startled them by saying, “Hi, Helen.”

  Helen looked at him. A wave of disgust washed over her face. She wanted to pass him
in silence, but the recollection of a feeling, not yet extinguished, forced her to say a cold “Hi, Bill.”

  When Bill saw that she intended to walk past without saying anything more, he asked, “Where are you going?”

  The two stopped. Helen was shocked by Bill’s polite inquiry. This was the first time he had ever shown an interest in what she was doing. Then a tinge of spite got in her, and she wanted him to know that she was no longer pining after him. “Swing dancing,” she said. “Tom is willing to try.”

  “I’ll be the slowest swing dancer ever,” Tom remarked, with his usual conversational ease and good-natured friendliness. “Helen’s going to have to teach me every step and watch out for my two left feet.”

  “You’re a smart guy. You’ll catch on fast,” Helen said, flattering him. “Tom, this is Bill, a neighbor.”

  “You’re lucky to live so close to Helen,” Tom told Bill, shaking his hand.

  “I guess so,” Bill replied. Until that moment, he had never thought that his apartment’s proximity to her’s was an advantage.

  “Tom is a new friend of mine,” Helen said. Tom’s congenial, nice-guy character was already overcoming her natural reservation. The more daring, adventurous behavior of her friends and their encouragement was also helping her to accept Tom more quickly, than if she had met him on her own. “I’m so glad he’s willing to give swing dancing a try. I’m excited to hear big-band music again. You still like to listen to it, don’t you?”

  “Sometimes,” said Bill. “I have some records.”