Tuesday afternoon, my cell phone rang out the tune of *NSYNC’s “Bye Bye Bye,” alerting me that Elizabeth was calling. A glance at my screen showed that she’d called twice before. I’d been too busy for the entire morning to take any calls. First, I’d had a brief meeting with Carlos Davies, Cipher Systems Chief Operations Officer, to talk about the payroll budget for a second receptionist and an accounts manager position he filled the day before to help with the tasks Janie was unable to do.
I went into that meeting slightly peeved and defensive, still unconvinced we needed to hire a new accounts manager. I was handling Janie’s job—and my own—without issue. When I said as much to Carlos, he gave me an exasperated look and replied, “You’re VP of Financial Operations, Steven. You don’t need to spend time fielding customer relations calls. And I don’t need to tell you how fast we’ve been growing. We need more help. According to Quinn, we shouldn’t hold our breath for Janie returning any time soon. There’s no reason for you to do it all.”
I knew he was right, but the conversation I’d had with Janie made me worry that there were some behind-the-scenes concerns that I wasn’t able to hold down the department in her absence. I didn’t like that it bothered me, and I needed to get used to the idea that we needed more help.
Then, later, because Dan had other appointments, Quinn came in to sit in on a call with the Schmidt-Fischer Project Manager. When our receptionist, Keira, sounded the Code Pink alert over the intercom, warning everyone of Quinn’s imminent arrival to the office, I had a Pavlovian urge to flee to the break room. But, alas, as everyone else tried to make themselves scarce or invisible to avoid exposure to our boss’ foul mood, I was left to hole-up with him in his office for the call. The meeting, though productive, lasted longer than usual. It was now past lunchtime and I was ravenous.
I shoved a potato chip in my mouth as I answered Elizabeth’s call. “I’mna eat wil wuh tck,” I mumbled in greeting.
“Busy day?” she asked with a laugh.
I swallowed. “Yeah, so far. How about you? I see you’ve called a couple of times. You must not be too busy.”
“I am, actually, but I’ve been calling you every chance I had because I need to talk to you.”
“Okay, shoot.” I grabbed my bottle of green tea and took a long swallow.
“Why is Dr. Ken Miles calling me for your number?”
I choked on the tea. What in the world? DKM wanting to talk to me seemed unlikely. For one thing, I got the impression that having a conversation with me was distinctly distressing for him. And by all accounts, he was straight, so there couldn’t be an element of attraction. I was also a friend of someone he disliked. What could he possibly need with me? Maybe…
“Maybe he wants me to help him get back in your good graces,” I proposed.
Elizabeth snorted. “That’s not a possibility. He and I are both fine with the way things are. If he wanted to use you to get to me, he wouldn’t have come to me to get to you.”
It was sound logic, I supposed. “I’m out of ideas. What did he say?”
“He was his charming self,” she said with faint sarcasm. “As soon as I called him back, he answered with, ‘Elizabeth, I need to get in touch with your friend, Steven Thompson.’” She affected a decent impression of Ken’s deep voice and tone, even if his haughtiness was exaggerated. “No, ‘Hello, how are ya.’ That annoyed me, so I asked him why. He said it was a ‘private matter.’ I told him your number was a ‘private number.’”
I laughed, imagining DKM’s annoyance.
“But,” she continued. “I told him I’d give you his number and you could do what you wanted with it. So, call him, then call me back. I’m perishing from curiosity.”
I heard noise in the background, and voices speaking close to Elizabeth.
“I need to go, but I’ll text you his number right now.” She clicked off.
True to her word, within thirty seconds, I had Dr. Ken Miles’ phone number displayed on my screen.
Though I was curious too, I had lunch to eat and two reports to finish before I’d let myself call him. But even then, when the afternoon became slow and I had ample time to make the call, I delayed.
I told myself it was because he was likely busy and then we’d have to play phone tag. I would rather call when we both had time to talk. My reasoning made no sense, considering I had absolutely no idea when a good time would be for an ICU doctor. Was any time a guaranteed opportune time?
I was being uncharacteristically hesitant. It wasn’t like me to put off tasks—even unpleasant ones. When things needed to be done, I did them. If things needed to be said, I said them. Putting things off always made them worse, I reasoned, so I never dilly-dallied. Weirder still, was that I didn’t anticipate the conversation was going to be unpleasant for me. I imagined it was going to be rather amusing. No, my problem was that I wasn’t sure how I felt about DKM, nor could I imagine a plausible reason for him reaching out to me.
He was hot. There was no denying that. He was handsome, muscular, and athletic. Seeing him last week in his running shorts with his shirt and brow damp with sweat had been a mighty fine way to start my morning. But…he was a little bit of a jerk, and a little bit of an odd duck.
I was now in the phase of my life where I was actively avoiding weirdos. My weirdo-meter had been pegged, and no matter how much delight I found in conversing with and observing him, the voice in the back of my head wondered if he was calling because I had some sort of kook-magnet or Bat-signal that made these people gravitate toward me. Ha, Bat-Signal. More like Batshit-Signal.
I gave myself a shake. Ken wasn’t crazy or even that strange, and he might very well have been calling me about something as mundane as my messenger bag.
Decision made, I called him, telling myself that if he threw up any red flags, I’d simply block his number, just as I’d done with King a couple of weeks ago. Simple. Elegant. Efficient.
The phone rang a few times before he finally picked up with a breathless, “Dr. Miles.”
It was six PM and he was panting. Clearly, I’d caught him at a bad time.
“Hello, Dr. Ken Miles, this is Steven Thompson. Elizabeth relayed your message. I’m sorry if this was a bad time to call.”
Two more panting breaths. “No, no, it’s fine, I’m at the gym, but I can talk.” He inhaled deeply and let it out slowly. “Thanks for calling me back.”
“No problem.”
There was a lengthy silence and I smiled to myself at the immediate and predictable awkwardness. It looked as if I were going to have to pull the information out of him.
“So…” I began slowly. “What did—”
“Did you know that there was a movie made of Mystery Science Theater?” he blurted loudly.
I pulled the phone away from my ear and made a confused face at the screen. What?
“Uh, yeah,” I said, returning the phone to my ear. “Yeah, I guess I did know that. But I don’t think I ever saw it.”
“A colleague of mine mentioned that it will be playing this week at the Music Box Theater. Do you know the Music Box, over on Southport?”
I couldn’t help myself. I was grinning from ear to ear. I knew the Music Box. Everyone knew the Music Box. This guy was too much.
“Sure, it’s where I see Rocky Horror every year,” I answered, not certain if he knew what Rocky Horror was.
“Good. Well, I thought I’d go see it, since it was on your recommendation, but I don’t really know if anyone I know would like to watch it with me. I thought maybe you’d like to join me.”
His words sounded slightly rehearsed and it went far in softening me toward him. If he were nervous about asking if I’d like to see a cult movie with him, he was probably in need of a friend. The thought made me sad for him and annoyed at myself for being judgy. If he were looking to me—someone who clearly made him twitchy—for someone to hang out with, then he must be lonely.
Poor, handsome weirdo.