He showed up unannounced at my apartment door, knocking with confidence that I would open that door and let him in. And I did – slowly – cautiously – after peering at him a few moments through the peephole.

“Uh, hi, Walter. I’m rather busy. We didn’t have a date scheduled for tonight, did we?”

I knew very well we didn’t. So did he.

He laughed and pushed past me into the living room. On our third and last date, he had taken me to his favorite upscale restaurant, intent on showing me he was a class act. Halfway through the meal he had cut a piece of steak, speared it with his fork, and stuck it in my face.

“Sure you don’t want a bite?” He had smirked as he asked it.

“No thanks. All yours.”

Everyone at the office, including Walter, knew I was a vegetarian. I didn’t make a big fuss about it. People could eat what they wanted. I wasn’t out to shove my views on them, as Walter had seemed to be doing to me. In fact, I had only mentioned my eating preference once at a Christmas party when someone had handed me a plate with a big slice of roast turkey on it. I had declined as gracefully as I could.

So, Walter had just blown his “class act image. From that moment I understood why he was thirty-seven and a bachelor. What I didn’t understand, though, was why he, a department manager, had asked me, a twenty-two-year-old purchasing agent, out to dinner. I’m not ugly, but I’m no raving beauty. Plus there would be no career advantage to us being a couple. In fact, it could be just the opposite. He seemed to sense this, keeping our dates between ourselves.

After that “steak incident” dinner, as I had come to think of it, Walter’s motivation became clear. He had driven me from that restaurant back to my apartment building, walked me to my door, and wormed his way inside. He had made it clear that the time had come for me to “thank” him for the time and money he had spent on me so far.

“Sorry,” I had said, “but I can’t.”

“Why not?”

“Uh – disease – pregnancy.” Inwardly, I had begun to think he was prodigiously dimwitted and had to wonder how he had been promoted to department manager.

He left.

The next day at the office, he had walked past my desk without a word, not even his usual terse “good morning.”

And now here he was back in my apartment three days later.

Without a word he took off his shoes, suit jacket and pants, and his wrinkle-free shirt. He stood before me in his white T-shirt and BVDs and his dark blue socks.

“All ready,” he said.

“For what?”

“Us.”

“Us?”

“C’mon, you can’t be this naïve.”

“I’m not.”

“Time to pay up.”

Part of me wanted to press his belly to see if he giggled, like the Pillsbury Doughboy. He wasn’t quite as rotund, but close, and the white underwear enhanced the resemblance. The other part of me stood gaping a moment and then opened the apartment door that he had closed so firmly after entering.

“Please leave.”

“Why?”

He seemed to ask that a lot.

I stood silently by the open door, thinking, “How do I explain reality to a Cretin?”

A couple who lived down the hall from me walked by, pausing at the door a moment and then moving on. Walter saw them and reddened. He dressed hurriedly and stepped toward the door.

I stepped back a little.

He looked at me with disgust. “I’m going to go find a real woman.” Then he left.

I slammed the door after him, knowing that he wouldn’t recognize a real woman if he tried.

By A.C. Cargill

From: United States

Website: https://accargillauthor.wordpress.com

Twitter: AcCargill