Fifty Shades of Shade - "The Fifty Shades of Grey Parady" (4 page)

             
“Just these.” He put the everyday items that could easily be used as torture devices down on the counter.

             
“Great. That’ll be forty dollars, please.”

             
I look up at Shade. I shouldn’t have. He’s staring at me intensely, mouthing the words, “I’m looking at you.”

             
“Would you like a bag?”

             
“Please,
Chastity
.” His tongue molests my name in a way that wouldn’t be frowned upon. “You’ll call me if you want to do the photo shoot?”

             
“I’ll photo shoot you if I want to call. Got it,” I respond nervously.

             
Before he leaves, he turns to me and says, “
Chastity
, I’m glad Miss McCallahan couldn’t do the interview.”

             
He smiles, then leaves. I’m standing there watching the door he just exited out of. I don’t know for how long I was staring blankly, but apparently a huge line formed at the register and people started cursing at me.

             
“What are you staring at? I want to
buy this already!”

             
“Okay—I like I him,” I say to the angry customer.

             
“What?”

             
“Oh, sorry, my subconscious was supposed to say that.”

             
Okay—I like him.

             
The Wealthman Hotel is in the heart of downtown Portland. Its brown edifice
is like a shaven-down, upright turd towering into the sky. It was c
ompleted just in time for the syphilis outbreak of the 1930’s. Ramiro, Chad (new character alert!) and I are travelling in my Beetle. Melissa took her Mercedes, since we all can’t fit in my car and also because I’m going to eventually need an excuse to be left behind here later on, plot-wise. 

             
Chad is Ramiro’s lighting guy and fluffer. Wait, is that what they’re called?

             
Anyway, Melissa managed to secure the use of a
luxury
hotel room at the Wealthman in exchange for credit in her little, tiny student newspaper. Makes sense to me.

             
When we get there we tell them that we are using the room to photograph Sebastian Shade, big-time CEO. Once they hear his name, the entire staff present tremble with erotic desire. They then upgrade us to the second-largest suite in the hotel. The largest is, of course, occupied by Mr. Shade himself. They offered him the entire hotel at first, begging for his mercy and grace. But he just told them he needed a single room. So, reluctantly, they gave him just that.

             
We are shown to the suite by an eager young marketing executive we just met who is already in love with Melissa. Halfway up the stairs he actually proposed to her. She said, “No.”

             
As soon as we got to the suite, Melissa started giving orders.

             
“Ramiro, I think we should shoot against this wall, don’t you think?”

             
“That’s the shower,” Ramiro points out.

             
Melissa starts organizing the shoot there anyway. While Ramiro begins moving all the stuff to an
actual
wall they can shoot in front of, Melissa continues the orders:

             
“Chad, clear the chairs and dust the legs on the end table.
Chastity
, could you tell housekeeping to get refreshments and install more ceiling fans? And tell Shade we are here.”

             
Whatever you sa
y
. She can be so bossy. I roll my eyes six times at her. After the resulting headache subsides I proceed to do as I’m told.

             
Half an hour later, Sebastian Shade walks in.

             
Holy craptoids!
He’s wearing a white shirt, open at the collar. His chestflesh gleams with hotty hotness. His gray slacks hang from his hips and curtain his scrotum area perfectly. Somehow, a breeze comes through this totally enclosed room and
hits only his hair, rustling it in a sexy way. Shade is followed into the suite by
a mean-looking man in his mid-thirties with a buzzcut and a tattoo of Shade’s face on his own face. His face, as well as the face on his face, looks at us impassively.

             
“Miss
Stool
, we meet again.” Shade extends his hand and I shake it, rapidly, with both of my hands
and
feet. As I touch his skin I feel a current run through me. It lights up my innards like a Christmas nativity scene, except with slightly more sexual innuendo involved. I’m sure my heavy breathing and donkey-like noises are audible.

             
“Mr. Shade,
this is Melissa McCallahan.
”
She stops giving orders to a floor lamp and comes forward to meet him.

             
“The tenacious Miss McCallahan. Nice to
finally meet you.
I trust your terminal
illness is gone?”

             
“It is, thank you, Mr. Shade.” She shakes his hand. I can tell by Melissa’s ability to shake a hand that she went to the best private hand-shaking schools in the Northwest. She’s grown-up, confident, and sure of her place in the world.

             
“Thank you for taking the time to do this.” She gives him a professional smile.

             
“It’s a pleasure,” he answers. Turning his gaze on me I go flush again.

             
“This is Ramiro Ramirez, our photographer,” I say. Ramiro smiles and licks his lips at me. He stops when he turns toward Shade.

             
“Mr. Shade,” he nods.

             
“Mr. Ramirez.” Shade’s expression changes too, as he looks at Ramiro.

             
“Mr. Shade.” Ramiro nods at him again.

             
“Mr. Ramirez,” Shade coolly answers, again.

             
“Mr. Shade—” I step in and prevent the back-and-forth from continuing.

             
“Where would you like me?” Shade asks Ramiro.

             
Melissa answers for him. “Mr. Shade, can you sit here please?” She points to a standing vase.

             
“He can’t sit on that,” Ramiro tells her.

             
“Right. Then stand here.” She points Mr. Shade to the part of the wall where all the lights and camera were already set up.

             
Once Shade is ready, Ramiro is snapping away. First he takes a few handheld shots, then he puts it on the tripod and takes a few more, then he does a handstand and takes a couple. Then he holds the camera in his mouth and goes two inches from Shade’s face. The flash causes Shade to blink. As the top lid meets the bottom lid, I feel my heart race.

             
It’s the first chance I get to stand back and look at Shade, not counting all the other times where I was standing back and looking at him. I admire him from kinda far, but not so far, but still a little far away. Twice our eyes lock. And twice I fall back on the floor from the force of our connection. Now I have a headache again. What was I saying? Oh yeah, he’s supernaturally hot.

             
“I think we have enough,” Ramiro announces, holding the camera between salad tongs while standing on top of a bucket.

             
“I look forward to reading the article, Miss McCallahan.” He turns to me. “Will you walk with me, Miss
Stool
?” he asks.

             
“Okey dokey pokey,” I say, trying not to sound stupid. I glance at Melissa. She just shrugs at me. I look at Ramiro who’s making stabbing motions at Shade’s back. I don’t think Ramiro likes Shade.

             
“Good day to you all,” says Shade as he opens the door, standing aside to allow me out first.

             
Holy Crapsicles!
What’s this about? I pause as Shade comes out of the room.

             
“I’ll call you, Cheryl,” he tells the buzzcut face tattoo guy. Cheryl nods, then wanders his brutish frame back down the hall.

             
Shade turns his volcanic gaze to me.

             
“I wondered if you would join me for coffee this morning?”

             
My heart poops in my mouth. A date?
Sebastian Shade is asking me out on a date.

             
“I have to drive everyone home,” I murmur.

             
“Cheryl,” he calls. The man he calls Cheryl runs back down the hall to us. “Cheryl can take them home. He’s my driver. I have a large 8 x 8. It’s the size of two 4 x 4’s. Enough room for the equipment too. Now, will you join me for coffee?”

             
“Um, er, Mr. Shade, er, ar, um, this is really, er, ud, um, look, Cheryl doesn’t have to take them. I’ll switch vehicles with Melissa.”

             
Shade smiles a dazzling mouthsmile at me.

             
I walk back in and go up to Melissa. “Sebastian Shade invited me for coffee.”

             
Her mouth drops. She bites into my arm and drags me across the room to talk to me in secret. “There’s something about him,” she says. “I think he’s dangerous. And you’re so innocent.”

             
Usually, hearing someone that you’re attracted to is dangerous makes them less attractive. But, this time, it was different.

             
“Melissa, it’s just coffee. I have to study anyway. I won’t be long.”

             
She purses her lips, as if considering my request. Finally, she gives me her keys. Ramiro gives me a frowny face.

             
“Don’t be long, or I’ll hunt you down with vicious bloodhounds,” she tells me lovingly.

             
We walk four blocks to the Generique Coffee House. Shade holds the door open for me, letting it shut behind him on some old lady in a wheelchair and respirator.

             
“Why don’t you find a table and I’ll get the drinks. What would you like?”

             
“English breakfast tea, bag out.”

             
“English breakfast tea?”

             
“I know, it’s like I’m a makeshift American character written by a British author. I don’t get it either.”

             
He smiles. “Sugar?” 

             
First I think that’s his cute nickname for me. But then I realize he’s asking if I want any in my tea.

             
“No thanks.”

             
“Anything to eat?”

             
First I think that’s his cute nickname for me. But then I realize he’s asking if I want anything to eat.

             
“No, I’m good. Thanks.”

             
I retreat to the table and watch him wait on line. He’s tall, broad-shouldered and his pants hang from his hips…well, like most people’s pants come to think of it. But his hang differently. They hang…mysteriously. He runs his fingers through his hair.
Hm, I’d like to do that. With my tongue.
Then I realize it wouldn’t be as pleasant as my mind made it sound. Hands and fingers would be better.

             
“Penny for your thoughts?” Shade comes back. He startles me, even though I was watching him dead on the whole time. He sets the tray down and hands me a cup, a saucer, a small pot, a teabag, and a garden gnome. I set the garden gnome aside and pour out my tea. I look at his coffee and it has a leaf pattern imprinted on the milk. How do they do that? I’m amazed. I look over at the front door and I see a knob on it. I’m equally amazed. How do they put those knobs on doors? And aprons. The miracle of aprons. How do those baristas manage to tie them around their waists
every day
?  The modern world is a hoot.

             
“Your thoughts,” he prompts me.

             
“This is my fav
owite tea in the
whowe wide wuld.”
He makes me so nervous I’m talking in a toddler’s voice.

             
“I see. So…is he your boyfriend?”

             
Whoa. Whatty what what?

             
“Who?”