Imagine my surprise when after all this time and trying to get your attention, we finally got to talk a bit and even though you say the word 'coffee' like you're a native New Yorker (sounds like cawfee), I was smitten by your easy smile, quick laugh and not to mention your love of fitness, which showed. I sure noticed that aspect.
After weeks and months of talking socially and swapping innocent emails, I couldn't help but wonder if you had some of the same feelings for me as I did for you. Interest, lust, curiosity. Not necessarily in that order.
Imagine my surprise again, when I bumped into you at the grocery store, shopping for the regular stuff. Your are the cook, shopper, care-giver for your only daughter. Your ex is somewhere in Pennsylvania. Is there someone else in your life? Do you have a man with you, a significant other? When was the last time you had sex? These were all questions I was dying to ask, but that would represent a step closer to the line of inappropriateness, which is a slippery slope indeed.
Once again, fate and surprise—or surprise and then fate—would intervene when a few weeks later I ran into you at the neighborhood hardware store, shopping for some light bulbs, wires, and a couple other assorted tools. A handyman to boot (or handywoman as it were).
"Some upcoming housework on the agenda for the weekend?" I offered.
"Someone has to do it because it doesn't get done itself."
I notice a couple flood light bulbs in the basket of goods, and they were of the indoor and outdoor varieties.
"Are you going to climb up on those ladders, like way up in the air?"
"That's where the lights are," was your reply, with just a little sarcasm. No doubt that's were some lights are...
"That's how people fall and break things. Cleaning gutters and changing lightbulbs. And before you know it, the ladder slips, or a bee stings you or some similar instantaneous tragedy." I had some experience with some people taking some major falls and some major injuries.
Your look was not impressed by my statement of the obvious.
"And how do you propose those light bulbs get changed to ward off the evils that come in the night?"
"I call someone...there's bound to be someone you know who can climb up there...a fireman, gutter cleaner and the like."
"That just costs money. I've done it myself for years. And see? Nothing broken."
"I have seen that many times at the gym," I state, again the obvious, but stealing a chance to acknowledge your very fit legs and gluteal region muscles.
"I'm glad someone notices...it's not easy these days."
"What do you mean?"
"Well, all the good guys are taken. So a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do."
"You mean around the house and all," not quite grasping the innuendo, pointing to the basket of housework coming up in your weekend plans.
"Whatever it takes," was your reply, and with a sly smile, and finally I picked up the meaning, a bit slow on the uptake.
"Ah ha...indeed so. That's most, um, unfortunate." I think I blushed, which I had thought would not be easy to get me to do.
"It's a common modern problem, and I've learned to cope." I think that's the most intimate thing you've shared with me.
"Like you said, you gotta do what you gotta do. We've all been there." I peeked around the aisle of the store to be sure some busybody wasn't listening in on this interesting conversation.
"Like when you hurt your elbow, right?" You said, with a very serious face.
"Huh?" Again, slow on the uptake.
"Like your friend said how much you couldn't do when you hurt your right elbow a few months ago. We all joked it was from too much something and you assured us that the cause was something else and that you were capable of all needed daily activities. Remember?"
"Oh year, I remember that. Funny."
"We all got a good kick out of that one. Girls are not so prudish as you might think. We can get a bit raunchy. Probably a lot like the guys do when you're watching football or playing golf or fishing or what ever you guys do when you're out and about."
"We just drink and brag about how many times we got laid the week before. And then we all just divide the number by half or more...depending on the girlfriend/spouse involved. And in the case of that guy you mentioned, we just divide by zero, because the answer is zero."
"I figured. Us girls just shop and buy makeup and shoes."
"Yeah, right. You even admitted there's more going on than that. What do you girls really talk about when you're together and having drinks?"
"Well, why don't you come over for a coffee and I'll tell you." You said coffee normally this time....perhaps the Yankee in you comes out only once in a while. "And perhaps you can help me with a couple of these light bulbs? There are two in the inside stairwell, that are still hard for me to get to."
"I'd love the coffee, but I ain't getting up 20 feet on those ladders. I can do some of the inside ones, but I like my legs just the way they are. NOT broken."
"Not to worry. I've done these inside ones before, but there's one that I can hardly reach, and you're taller, so it should be easy with the step ladder I have. It'll be safe...I promise."
"OK. Show me the way."
And with that and my good Samaritan intent, I followed you out of the hardware store, and in a couple minutes, got to your house.
Once inside, I looked around and saw a neat, organized and well appointed house.
"Where's your daughter?" I asked, following you around from the side door to the kitchen and then towards the stairs.
"She's with friends for the weekend."
"Growing up aren't they?"
"It's unbelievable. Seems like just a short time ago, she was a little kid. Now she's going on 18, even though she's only 13."
"Just wait until the drivers' license thing...that's a whole new spin on worry."
"I am not looking forward to that time, that's for sure. Come on this way...the light I need help with is down here."
I follow you down the hall, and can't help but appreciate the view that though I've seen and enjoyed many times in the gym, this setting was infinitely more interesting and erotic, because it was in your home and more you. Your perfume, your home, your smell. But there was a task to do and I was making some serious leaps of imagination. Just couldn't help it though. Your flowing brown hair and your smell and inside your home were really quite enticing. But I was here to help with the house chores, remember? That's what I kept telling myself.
Anyhow, I waited a moment for you to get a step ladder and followed you to the stair well where there was a set of lights 12' up from the landing.
"Here's the one I can barely reach. Do you think you can change these lights? I leave them on at night for safety."
"Sure...let me see if I can reach." I pulled the ladder underneath the lights and climbed to the second from the top step, just a bit teetering, but seemed stable with you holding the ladder.
I reached up as high as I could reach, and could barely unscrew the light bulb at the top of my outstretched arm. The first bulb came out without troubles and then you handed me a bulb to insert. No problem. Two more to do.
The second one also changed without troubles. The third one somehow was a bit stuck, and as I reached out yet more to try to apply a bit more force to unscrew the bulb, I felt my left leg slip and then the balance of the ladder was upset and in a strange slow-motion tragic cinema, the ladder started toppling and I was slipping at the same time losing balance. In the brief second between considering hanging on to the suspended light and falling 5-6 feet, I opted to try my luck at the latter, and tried to find a way to fall safely.
You held on to the ladder, thinking that would stop my imbalance, but it seemed to secure my legs from my swaying body, and I fell awkwardly to the stairwell landing, feeling a pain in my hip as I hit the ground and then I don't remember much at all.
When I came to, my leg was throbbing and the left side of my head felt like I was hit by a brick. I don't know how much time had passed or how I came to be laying propped up against the back of the sofa, but that's my next memory.
"What happened?" I managed to croak, trying to grasp the situation.
"You fell and hit your head and your leg. I managed to get you down to the sofa here. How do you feel? That was so scary."
I could see the concern in your eyes, and I felt some ice on the side of my head, and another one on the front of my hip. "I saw you hit your head on the wall, but then I saw some bleeding from your hip. Must have been how you hit the step of the ladder when you fell.
Now my head was starting to clear, and though with a bit of a headache, I looked down and saw my pants open and an ice pack also under the waistband of my underwear. There was some bleeding from a cut there, but as I looked under the ice pack, I saw a cut that wasn't too bad and mostly superficial.
"That's odd...I just don't remember a couple moments since I fell. That part I remember."
"I'm just so sorry. I thought it was within reach and that I was holding the ladder safely for you. I feel terrible."
"It's really not that bad. Just a bump and a scrape. How did you get me from the stairs to the sofa?"