Common Sense Doesn't Become Me (9 page)

I turned, and we both stood there staring at
each other with an internal battle of taking this date so much
further. Then I spoke. "Well, I'm not officially grown up until
tomorrow."

He replied without hesitation. "Yet,
something tells me we might want to wait a few more nights. You
mean more to me than an overnight quickie."

"Really?" I was taken aback. A man was
stopping me from being stupid.

"Besides. One day to thirty is just a day. If
you really want to do the mature thing, not that I do, but I know
it will be best for both of us if we did, then waiting a few more
days would be better, don't you think?" That gave me pause. Maybe I
met my match. A man who has been just as foolish in his choices to
be a bit too quick to have sex and realized it rarely led to a
commitment.

"Hm." I let the single word hang in the air
with a soft vibration while my mind was thinking that it's now that
I meet the mature man I need in my life. However, maturity aside,
all I wanted to do was something stupid like sleep with him
sexually on only our second date. I knew it never ended well
sleeping with a man too soon. However, with the kind of sexual
attraction we both seemed to be having, how could I wait? I plopped
my butt down on the couch in my work pants and Crawley blue polo
shirt and crossed my arms in front of me, started my pouting
routine and breathed out a huge puff of air.

He let out a light laughter and sat next to
me. "It's not so bad. You're Catholic, I'm Catholic, although from
the sounds of it, we both don't practice it. It's just something
about you makes me want to establish something more. I guess what I
have to tell you next might make sense as to why I am doing this."
He paused for a big intake of breath. "My last four girlfriends
ended poorly. All of which were more sexual attractions then any
friendship. I jumped in with guns loaded and fired. In other words,
it was nothing more than sex. With you, I feel it. The connection.
The desire to make it more than just sex. I guess we could blame my
sister and her Catholic lecture of don't you dare, and you better
wait and make sure. Kind of lame, especially for a man my age?"

I took a second to think about that, and I
turned my body towards him then looked at him straight in the face.
"Not really. Actually, it's pretty smart and self-controlled.
Something I lack a lot of at times. Hey..." I reached out and held
his hand. "Let's pick a number and tell ourselves that if we make
it to that date number than we can lift the restriction about sex.
What's your favorite number?"

"Two but that would make it tonight." He
flashed a wicked smile and winked.

"Ugh. Ok. Mine is two too." We both started
to laugh. Then I asked. "Pick a number between one and twenty."

"Twenty. That's too long to ask me to wait."
He looked shocked, and I started to laugh.

"Seven. Luck be a lady that night. Date seven
and if we decide that night that we can be mature adults after,
well you know, then we will have a go at it." I laughed lightly as
I patted my hand on top of his.

"Oh I won't just have a go at it; I will
conquer and succeed." His eye twinkle was back with that
mischievousness that made me think of things that he could do to be
successful.

"Men!" I could not put much more thought into
that comment because he started to kiss me and wrap me up into his
arms. When he pulled away, he pulled me into his body on the couch
while sitting; I clicked on the TV and asked what he liked to
watch. He replied with a simple 'anything with you', so I handed
him the remote. Not that I would always do that, but we were just
starting out on this dating thing. I had an impression to make.

Chapter Seven

At ten eleven a.m. today,
while sitting at my desk at work and watching the seconds click by
on the big office clock on the wall; I officially turned thirty. I
had a wave of somberness come over me, and then a floral delivery
came with a huge bouquet of mixed blue and white flowers. The card
from Mason simply read, Happy Birthday, with his name signed to it.
Whatever feeling was in my soul about getting older faded away with
the possibilities of a thing happening between Mason and myself. I
decided then and there that the Steve's of the world were long out
of my life, and I was marching forth with my plan of maturity now
and with any luck with Mason's help as he indicated.

Just as I was thinking about the future Mrs.
Montahue, which would be me, striving forward with an education,
charitable duties, and a drop-dead gorgeous husband with possible
kids on the way, a familiar voice dropped me out of the clouds.

"Amber dear, I thought it might be nice if
you and I had lunch today for your birthday." There, before me, in
my five by five cubicle, with a voice that could duplicate nails on
a chalkboard if she so desired, was my mom. All five feet three
inches of her and short brown hair with a lot of gray showing
through, donning a very nice pastel blue dress as if she was going
to church, stood the woman I had not bothered to call back since
Sunday night's fiasco. It seemed so long ago as Mason had been
filling my every moment with thoughts of could he be and what ifs
and oh my, I shouldn't be thinking of doing that at a time like
this.

Her voice jumped an octave cheerier, if that
was possible, as I had yet to respond to her standing here in my
office. "Oh my! What lovely flowers. Who's Mason?" She had to
question because not reading the card of whom the flowers were from
was not an option for my mother. Oh good jest, this was going to be
one heck of a lunch.

"Mom?" I finally found my voice. "What a
lovely surprise. I wasn't expecting you." I did not answer if I
could go to lunch because I was racking my brain for something,
anything, to come up with as an excuse.

"Darling. You haven't called me back since
everything that happened on Sunday." She whispered the words as
soon as she got to the word 'since', as if everything that happened
on Sunday should be a huge secret. Which it was. Except for those
that were there and Mason getting the short edited version.

"About that, mom." I cleared my throat as it
felt as if it was restricted and my eyes felt crossed. With the way
my mom was patiently waiting for me to say something next, they
probably were. "The thing is..." Just as I was about to babble out
more than three dozen words of nonsense, Bethany rounded the corner
in a navy blue power suit.

"Good. You're here. I was hoping I would
catch you two. Mom called me last night to tell me she was going to
surprise you for lunch. I wanted to beat her here, but I had a
meeting." She looked powerful in her suit and professional brown
haircut with her two-inch sensible heels. Are those? They can't be;
they'd set her back at least $600 for the pair. Those are some
seriously cute professional heels. The navy leather looks like
butter. I wonder if she got them wholesale, and if she'll let me
wear them sometime. Leave it to me to be sidetracked by a set of
seriously gorgeous set of heels.

My mother's voice interrupted my thoughts
that had diverted to Bethany's adorable professional heels away
from everything else. "Darling. Why would you want to beat me here?
I told you I wanted to have a private lunch with just your sister."
Ok, so now I am just Bethany's sister, not my mother's daughter.
And why private? Unless that is, she was going to ruin my birthday
by berating me about college and dating a married man. That, I was
sure was her plan. I owed Bethany HUGE, since I knew she had a busy
schedule with her new position and the last thing she needed to
deal with was my mama drama, even if it is her mom too.

Before I could say anything, my inner office
phone intercom beeped with my boss's voice. "Amber? Can you come in
here real quick?" I picked up the phone so that his voice was not
echoing out over the office.

"Sup?" My boss was four years younger than
me, with a business management degree, and wore baggie jeans, large
graphic tee shirts, baseball hats sideways with stickers still on
them, and large gold chains. He was part of the reason that I joked
around playing like a gangster sometimes. Over my shoulder, I could
hear my mother chiming in about the improper way I answered the
phone. If she only knew, but explaining it would only take too much
energy.

I hung up the phone with a smile on my face
and a shrug to my shoulders in the direction of my mom and sister.
"He needs to see me in his office before I can run out to lunch
with you two. Be right back."

Bethany was already on her phone punching in
something or other while my mom was talking to her about why she
did not hear her correctly about wanting a private lunch versus
asking my sister to join her. Bethany held her ground but never
looked her in the eyes. As I walked towards my boss's office just a
few feet down the cubical hallway, I heard Bethany reply. "Are you
sure mom? Because I distinctly remember you asking me to come,
otherwise why would I? I am super busy at work."

Then I stopped in my tracks on the way to my
boss's office and hide two cubicles down just to hear my mom's
reply. "Oh dear, I know you are. I must have been so frazzled that
I forgot to mention. It's quite alright. I am glad you are here." I
stood up from my hiding spot and walked briskly towards my boss's
office, angry that my mom always let Bethany off the hook, angrier
that she wanted to ruin my birthday by talking to me about junk.
Because that is what it felt like, a bunch of stuff that just did
not need to be talked about. I am thirty now for gosh sakes, and if
I am going to make mistakes, I do not want my mother's input on
it.

I opened my boss's door and there stood a man
all of five foot one, oriental persuasion, baggie logo'd jeans, and
matching tee shirt, only two gold chains today; he must have been
in a rush to get to work and no hat. No Crawly work shirt, which
was typically a no-no, but he was the boss, so he got away with his
current dress code that he considered dressed up for the job. Add
to the fact that he had some kind of mohawk haircut going on that
was all held back like a ponytail to the back of his head. "Amber!"
He was excited to see me. I walked in, closed his glass door to his
glass office that overlooked the production floor.

"What's sup?" I plopped down in an old green
leather chair and relaxed my body.

"Happy Birthday!" He stood over his desk, but
not by much height, as they had never found him a smaller desk for
his tiny pint-size body. He looked over to me from something he was
looking at on his desk. "Was that your mom and sister I saw out
there?"

"God. Yes. She wants to take me to lunch.
Berate me that I haven't quit my job and gone to college." My boss,
Mr. wannabe gangster but goes by the name of Wally Woo, knew all
about my life, even about Steve. I had sent him an early inner
office memo that I was passing off my new beau Mason, as Steve. He
sent me back a short comment. 'You work fast'. Wally Woo was cool
that way. He got it. All of it. The overbearing parent, the better
than me sister, the boyfriend issues and if I was not mistaken he
was about to help me out.

"Well. Here. Happy Birthday. Show this to
your mom." He handed me a packet, and I looked at it.

My reply was excited but sounded more
stunned. "Online management course paid for by Crawly. Rocking." I
finally looked up at him and practically jumped out of my seat to
hug him but refrained. Office etiquette had some boundaries;
besides, I would feel like I was hugging a fifth grader. "Dude.
How'd you get this approved?"

"Let's just say that your last review was
outstanding, and if I can get you trained and replacing me, I can
move up to International Sales Management. That gig pays a hell of
a lot more, and the chicks will dig me in a designer suit."

I laughed while holding the packet in my
hand. "Woo, they dig you any ways. There is no one quite like you
Woo." We both started to laugh. "See you at Pete's tonight?"

"You owe me a song." He chimed out.

I nodded and smiled as I walked out. We did
the perfect rendition of Ice-Ice-Baby last month that had the crowd
cheering. As a boss, he was super cool, but as a friend, he rocked
it. Perhaps he was one of the many reasons I didn't think leaving
this place ever made sense. I was truly happy here. It's not a
rocket scientist job, but it's a great job with great pay and
benefits so why would I want to go anywhere else. Oh yeah, the fact
that it would get my mother off my tail about getting an
education.

As I walked down the hall with the packet
about college in hand, paid for by Crawly, I knew that my mom would
find something wrong. I could only hope it was enough of a
distraction to keep her from going on about Steve and asking about
Mason. I know I needed to tell her, but I just did not want to deal
with her on any of this. As I rounded the corner to my cubicle,
half lost in the cover letter to my packet telling me that my
two-year online management course was being paid for by work, I
didn't notice the third person in my cubicle office until I
practically shouted out his name in excitement. "Mason!"

My mother was the first to chime in, while
Bethany actually looked as if she was quite taken with his looks.
He was dressed in nice black dress slacks and a blue business shirt
and tie, and here I was in my sexy bar jeans, work sneakers for
running the halls and production line, but had a nice pair of black
heeled boots for the bar after work. I had on my navy blue Crawly
polo shirt, which would be replaced with a really sexy top for
after work. My current hair status of up in a clip would get
replaced with a few curls and hairspray. I felt like I was dressed
in my typical dull at work in a production company, while everyone
else looked spiffed up for a funeral. I would think wedding but
sometimes my mom made me feel like doom and gloom.