Halfway Down the Stairs

by Gary A Braunbeck

  —no. He would not do this. Someone out there cared enough to reply.

  He removed the envelope and opened it. Inside was a single sheet of stationary.

  The script was delicate and exquisitely feminine, the spaces between each word painstakingly exact, the angle of her slant almost Elizabethan in its fluid grace, each letter a blossom, each word a bouquet, the sentence itself a breathtaking garland: Oscar Wilde, read the first two words. One of his plays, I believe.

  No more the death of fading roses, he prayed.

  No more.

  * * *

  The morning had been filled with frantic activity around the office, and Wayne's thoughts of his impending blind date retreated to the back of his mind where they curled up in a corner, covered themselves against the cold, and snapped off the light.

  When lunchtime arrived, he pulled his paper bag from a lower desk drawer, took the elevator to the lobby, and went outside to his usual bench.

  Someone was sitting there.

  No one all that special, really; no one who’d merit a second look, no; no one who’d make your heart triphammer and try to squirt out of your ribcage, don’t be silly; no one all that special, so calm down, Wayne old boy, this is no big deal, nothing to get excited about, nothing earth-shattering … just the most beautiful woman you’ve ever seen. Be cool, be smooth, be suave, and remember to not chew with your mouth open.

  Shaking and perspiring, Wayne picked up the pace of his steps and crossed to the bench. He stood in front of her for a moment, noting that she was alone, wore no rings, and didn't seem to be waiting for anyone.

  She looked up. “Hi.”

  Wayne gave her a smile. “Hello. Do you mind if I sit down? I always like to eat my lunch here and this is...well, you're the first person I've ever seen sitting here.”

  “Please, join me.”

  He sat down—not too close—and opened his lunch: a tuna sandwich, a bag of potato chips, an apple, and an eight ounce bottle of cranberry juice. Boring.

  He glanced at the divine woman next to him. She probably knew well the taste of caviar, rack of lamb, things exquisite. Chicken of the Sea from a tin can never came near those lips, nosiree. Nothing common for this beauty, and beauty always has her way.

  She looked at him. Her eyes were a deep, soft green.

  He felt his grip tighten on the sandwich.

  “Are you all right?” she asked.

  “Uh...yes, fine, thank you. I didn't mean to stare, I'm very sorry, please excuse me.”

  “That's all right, I'm used to it." She said this with a laugh, but her lips never formed a smile.

  I'll bet you are, thought Wayne. Her statement lacked the edge of arrogance he usually associated with women this stunning; it was almost self-deprecating. He found that refreshing.

  “Are you sure you're all right?" She seemed genuinely concerned, and Wayne wondered why until he looked down and saw that he'd completely crushed his sandwich. He shrugged, embarrassed, and began rummaging through his bag for a napkin.

  He wished she'd smile at him, just a little something to let him know that she didn't mind his being clumsy.

  She turned away. Wayne cursed himself.

  He began eating what was left of his lunch, chewing slowly (with his mouth closed, which he chalked up to the win column), hoping she wouldn't leave, feeling the food land in his stomach with all the tenderness of a baseball bat shattering a kneecap. Maybe it wasn't too late to salvage this; he could strike up a conversation, get her to talking, show her that he wasn't a total loss. It would be nice to know her name, where she worked, if she was seeing anyone seriously or if there might be a chance—

  —don’t send out the wedding invitations just yet, Don Juan.

  He gave her a quick glance. She was staring at something.

  “Zombies,” she said.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  She pointed to a group of well-dressed business people who were rushing past, briefcases or files or cell phones in one hand, some kind of sandwich in the other, trying to balance everything with all the dexterity of a circus performer as they raced their way up the ol' corporate ladder. Wayne always got a kick out of watching groups like this, wishing that just once they'd get so caught up in their wheeling and dealing they'd lose track of what was in which hand and take a bite out of their Blackberry. It’s the little hopes that keep you going.

  “Sad,” she whispered.

  “What makes you say that?”

  She looked at him, expressionless, and shrugged. “I just can't imagine anyone functioning in that type of environment for long without shredding their individuality, their specialness, if you know what I mean.”

  “But it's possible not to sacrifice that...if you're careful and have your priorities in place.” He heard himself and almost gagged; why did everything he said sound as if he wrote it down ahead of time and memorized it? He was trying to think of a way to sound spontaneous when she said:

  “And what are your priorities, Wayne?”

  He started. “How did you know my name?”

  A light in her eyes. “A Woman of No Importance,” she said.

  “Pardon me?”

  “The Wilde line. I knew it from one of his plays, I just couldn’t recall which one. It was A Woman of No Importance.”

  Wayne felt his stomach turn to marble. “Y-you’re—?”

  “I know that our ‘official’ date wasn’t supposed to be until tomorrow night, but I couldn’t wait. I hope you don’t mind.”

  “I, uh...no, no, of course not,” replied Wayne. But inside he was screaming Oh, shit, shit, shit, Shit, SHIT!

  “Besides,” she continued, “you always hated the formality of ‘official’ first dates—let alone the pressure of a blind first date, so I thought we could have our lunch together out here and consider this our first date. Is that okay with you?”

  Something occurred to him. “How did you know where to find me? I never told you.”

  “You always eat your lunch out here, weather permitting.”

  “Yes, but...I never told you that. How did you know?”

  “I know a lot about you, Wayne Bricker. I know that you've worked as an accountant with Burton, Kroeger, and Denver for the last eight years; I know that you live alone and have never been married—or had a steady girlfriend, for that matter; I know that you spend your weekends reading and going to the movies or renting a DVD if there's nothing playing that you want to see; and I know that you go to the nursing home three times a month to visit your mother, sometimes even take her out to dinner if she's having a good week and remembers who you are. Of course, if she is in good shape, she usually chews you out for spending all your time with your nose in some kind of book."

  The food had set his stomach on fire. He swallowed hard as a cramp passed. "Who are you?”

  “And if none of those activities appeal to you, you just ask for one or two weeks of the thirteen months of vacation time you've piled up over the years, hop in your car, and drive somewhere. You never tell anyone where you went or what you did because you think they aren't really interested.” She moved closer to him. The warmth of her minty breath tickled his chin. They were so close it probably looked as if they were two young lovers about to kiss.

  “You know me,” she said. “It'll take you a second, but you'll remember.”

  Definite panic now. “I'm sorry, but we've never met.” He looked around, half-expecting to see some of the office staff hiding behind a bush somewhere, laughing at their little, well-staged joke.

  “Yes, we have,” she said, her voice low, sultry, the sexiest he'd ever heard. "You've made love to me thousands of times. Sometimes my hair is a different color, and the last time we were together you gave me green eyes." She moved her face even closer. "How do you like them?"

  Wayne couldn't speak. This was outrageous, even cruel. He'd done nothing to deserve this kind of treatment Maybe he wasn't the most debonair of men, but he prided himself on being courteous, so why�
�

  —and then, in the back of his mind, something threw back its covers, rose up, wiped the sleep from its eyes, and turned on a light.

  Come, and I will teach you the disillusionment of the body...

  “Remember me now?”

  “...ohgod...”

  “While I was waiting out here, I got to thinking about our first night together. Remember that? Your father had gotten drunk and slammed his car into a parked semi. Your mother zoned out when the police told her about his death, so her sister came over and took her to the hospital, leaving you alone. You were thirteen years old. You were so sweet. Didn't have any close friends—”

  "Still don't," he said.

  “I know.” She took his hand in hers. “You rummaged around in your father's room until you came across his cache of girlie magazines, took them into your bedroom, and cried while you looked at the pictures and tried to...”

  ...the emptiness of lonely orgasms in night-flooded, loveless rooms...

  “You did this,” she went on, “because you didn't really love your father, though you wanted to. He was just a very cautious man, but that caution came across as coldness. You couldn't find any women in the magazines who did it for you, so you threw them aside, put a Monkees album on, closed your eyes, and when you heard ‘Daydream Believer,’ there I was.”

  “...yes...” he whispered, closing his eyes, bringing back the memory of that night.

  “I'm glad you remember,” she said, brushing his cheek with her lips.

  “I...I took the record off and you asked me to sing to you while you taught me how to dance.”

  “You wanted to learn so you could ask Marti Wilder to the spring dance.”

  “I never did, you know? Ask her.”

  “You wouldn't have liked it. You would have felt awkward and foolish.”

  “What did I sing to you that night?”

  “’There Will Never Be Another You,’ the Nat King Cole song.”

  “That's right! I was pretty bad.”

  “But your heart was in the right place.”

  He opened his eyes and looked at her. Her eyes were warm and sparkling but her face was a stone mask.

  And her eyes were now blue—

  —and her cheekbones were higher—

  —and her nose was smaller—

  —and—

  “Want me, Wayne. Want me now. Think of me the way I was in your dream last night.”

  He pulled her close, kissing her, a deep wet kiss, full of awkward but honest passion, his mind folding in on itself, turning drawers upside-down, shaking out all the excesses and trivialities of the day until he found himself gliding backward in time to the moment last night when she'd come to him, her body ripe and sweaty, her desire strong, her breath coming in bursts as she held him and moved with him, gasping and crying out, loving him as no other could, then lying in his arms afterward, looking up, her face lacquered in sweat that reflected like diamond dust in the candle's light, and he saw her face clearly.

  He pulled back now and opened his eyes.

  She was as she should be.

  “I need your help.”

  Images from an average life swirled around him, reminding him that he had never had a grand moment and never expected one and now here it was; signed, sealed, delivered.

  “Anything,” he said.

  She wrapped her arms around him, hands caressing the back of his neck. “Make me yours, all yours.”

  “But you are,” he whispered. “You always have been.”

  She shook her head. "No, Wayne. You're not the only person who's ever been lonely, who's scrambled to the back of his mind to build a fantasy lover and soulmate. Do you remember that old saying about monkeys and typewriters?"

  "Yeah," he cupped her face in his hands, reveling in the glory of her eyes. "If you put enough monkeys in a room with enough typewriters, eventually they'll write Shakespeare."

  “Yes...and if you have enough lonely people who search their imaginations for a so-called ‘perfect’ mate, eventually some of them will invent the same one. Oh, maybe this lover, this soulmate, will differ slightly from person to person: one might give her blue eyes, while another dreams her with green; someone may make her cheekbones higher and her nose smaller, but the thing is, she's never so different that she can't be recognized. Do you understand what I'm saying?”

  "How many others are there?"

  "Seven, eight, I’m not certain."

  "And out of all of them, you...chose me?"

  She brought her hands around, touched his face, pulled him close and kissed him. "Of course I chose you. You were the one who first gave me life. You made me real. The others, they only added to me. But none are as sweet and kind and loving and gentle and decent as you." Tears crept to the corners of her eyes, glistened in the afternoon sun, and spattered onto her wrist

  "I can't stand it anymore, Wayne. I have nothing of myself to hold on to, only what they give me. But you'll give me a real life, a fuller life, you'll let me become something I want to be and not just what you dream me."

  “Of course, you know that"

  "Take me home. I need to be with your now."

  They rose, arm in arm, and walked quickly to the parking garage, found Wayne's car, and left. Wayne Bricker didn't care about his job at this point; he didn't care about anything except being with the woman next to him, the woman who was as real as he, who was flesh of his flesh, blood of his blood, desire of his desire.

  In the sweet darkness, they made love for hours. Her body held discoveries for Wayne, her touch answers, her sounds the power of clarity and destination. Wayne moved with a grace of which he'd always thought himself incapable, never fumbling or making foolish mistakes he associated with being an average, unimaginative thirty-six year old man.

  When, at last, they finished, when there was no strength left in their limbs for anything other than holding on to one another, when their aching had been soothed and solitude had fled forever with its head hung in shame, only then did she ask him.

  “Give me a name.”

  "Esmeralda," he said. "My Esmeralda."

  "Such an elegant, exquisite name."

  "No other would suffice." He wished she would smile.

  She traced over his lips with her finger. "But why do you always imagine yourself to be so...ugly? Esmeralda was loved by Quasimodo. As I recall, that story didn’t end well. Why do you … ?”

  "I don't know. I've just never felt much like I'm the type women give second glances to."

  "That's you father's caution coming through."

  "I know." He lifted her head and kissed her. Her lips were different, not as full. And her hair was shorter—

  —and her hands thinner—

  —and—

  “It’s time,” she said.

  He tried to put her back to the way she was but hadn't the strength.

  "Don't waste your time," she said, her voice tight with panic. "You don't have it in you to pull me back every time this happens."

  "Then tell me what to do."

  She held both his hands tightly. Her eyes filled with pleading. "Do you love me?"

  "Yes."

  "And I love you."

  His soul, until that moment trapped in a rain of his own making, was lifted from a cold damp place with those words.

  "Then there's nothing l can't do," he said.

  "God, I hope."

  * * *

  His name was Dan Rosen. He wore thick glasses and had a clubfoot. He was a short order cook at a truck stop in Baltimore. When Wayne first walked in and took a seat at the counter, Dan looked across at him.

  In a way, they recognized each other.

  Wayne wasn't sure he could go through with this, but then remembered Esmeralda's words—"I love you"—and realized that he would, indeed, spend the rest of his life lonely and miserable and a little bit dead, filled with average and unimaginative activities that would help him pass the time until people would smile at him and his failures
and whisper to themselves that, well, he was Old, and you know How They Can Be.

  He ordered a hamburger and fries, ate them slowly, checking the clock. Dan's shift ended at three a.m. Then he'd go home to his dim and dirty studio apartment over the bar and grille where he filled his evenings with model ship building and dreams of Esmeralda—called Lori by him, the name of the girl who'd broken up with him in public one night, saying she had no desire to spend the rest of her life tied to a near-sighted, going-nowhere cripple. He'd cried, Dan had, more out of humiliation than a broken heart, because Lori had just left him standing there as she ran to a car driven by Dan's ex-best friend, calling "Why don't you run after me?" He'd gone home that night to a house where his drunken, widowed mother was snoring in front of the television, locked the door to his room, laid on his bed, and tried to guess whether or not the ceiling beams would take his weight. As he lay there cursing himself and his affliction, he imagined Lori apologizing to him, declaring her love. But then he decided to change her just a little bit, the hair at first, then the eyes, then lips and cheeks and body, running through hundreds of combinations until, at last—

  —Wayne shook his head. He hadn't really wanted to know all that, but Esmeralda had said it was important he understand. The lonely road toward True Love was littered with casualties.

  "I've never cared about the physical," she said. "Danny's very nice, if a bit on the self-pitying side."

  "What am I supposed to do once he leaves?"

  "You'll know when the time comes."

  And that time, Wayne noted with sleepy eyes, was just five minutes away. He pulled out his wallet and took out a five and two ones to cover the bill and a tip, thankful that he'd been so frugal over the years about dipping into his savings; he had more than enough to last him for a while and he'd been building up a lot of vacation time at work, anyway. Following his sudden disappearance after lunch the other day, Wayne's department supervisor had called to see if he was all right. In eight years, Wayne had not had a sick day. A quick lie about problems with his mother cleared that up and enabled him to take three weeks' vacation.

  He stopped his tired musing as Dan walked by him and out the door. Wayne followed him from the truck stop to his apartment, waiting until Dan was out of the car and on his way up the stairs.