The Blueprint (8 page)

He stalked
to the wobbly railing where Lily blindly picked at a jagged fingernail.  “Kimmy has done an excellent job at keeping me from you tonight, but at the moment I think she’s a little too preoccupied to come to your rescue.”

Lil
y didn’t take the bait, holding her silence and stiffening her pose.  When Ben moved to wrap his arms around her, she quickly turned to head inside.  He beat her to the door, blocking her escape.

“Look, I just want to talk.  Have things gone so wrong between us that we can’t even have a conversation?”

“I’m getting tired of having the same conversation.”  Stepping back, she resisted the urge to yell for Kim and instead prepared herself for another fight with Ben.

“I just can’t figure out how one minute you’re in my bed and the next you want nothing to do with me.  Tell me what I did wrong, and I promise I won’t do it again.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.  It’s simple; you’re looking for something serious and I’m not.  There’s no middle ground.  There’s no compromise.  I’m sorry if I hurt you, but I told you from the beginning that I didn’t want a relationship.”

He reached for her, but her stance remained rigid.  Undeterred, Ben mo
ved closer and  caressed her shoulders.  His lips brushed her ear as he coaxed, “You know it’s good between us.  I’ve missed you.  Come home with me and we’ll talk some more.”

Lily’s body
started to succumb to this well-practiced seduction.  Countless times over the last four months, she’d try to break it off with him only to have her traitorous body lead her astray.  Not this time.  She turned off the pleasure centers in her brain and calmly said, “No.”

Ben s
tilled for a moment.  Then choosing to ignore her reply, he gave his hands and mouth permission to explore further.

She pushed him away and with more force this time, looked him in the eyes, and said, “No.  I’m not falling for this again. This thing between us is over.”

Stunned, Ben jumped to the only conclusion that made sense to a guy as confident of his looks, charm, and wealth as he was.  He growled, “Who is he?”

“What?”

“You’re obviously seeing someone else.  What’s his name?”

With a scowl surpassing his, Lily answered, “There’s no one else.  I’m done with this conversation.  I’m going inside.”

Before she’d made it to the safety of her kitchen, he shouted, “You're a liar!” and stormed off.

After that, Kim made a point of visiting
with the boys at their house.  Lily rarely joined her, and if she did, it was only with the guarantee that Ben was out.  On the unfortunate occasions when they did occupy the same space, he’d glare at her until she retreated.  All of Lily’s pathetic episodes with men ended the same.  Although she was careful to make it clear that she wasn't interested in a committed relationship and purposefully picked guys she thought were as disinterested as herself, they never kept up their end of the bargain.  She was always the one to initiate the
this is getting too serious
talk so she could once again focus on her job and future.

Kim tried her best to understand Lily’s dating rules, but just couldn’t get it.  How many times had she watched Lily push guys away, when she’d been trying so hard to snare what her roommate didn’t want?  Way more often than she’d like to admit, she been dumped for the same reason Lily did the dumping.  Although many might argue that Kim was too young to be considering such things, t
he idea of a committed marriage and bouncing babies appealed to her more than anything.  Being dropped off at the home as a toddler, with little information about her background, made her crave family, not condemn it like Lily.  Kim was searching for the fairytale.  Unfortunately men enjoyed having her around to taunt, tease, and play, but she often felt more like a puppy than a princess.  Their friendship was a gift and a curse.  If given the chance, she would change places with Lily in an instant.

As the fall semester progressed and the weather grew colder, Lily’s wish to concentrate on work was granted.  Even Kim was less inclined to search for fun, if it meant leaving the warmth of Fido and her blankets.  The approaching holidays meant an almost complete evacuation of campus, and they were both grateful that this year they didn’t have to leave as well.  Happily, they muddled their way through holiday meals of their own creation and exchanged Christmas presents that only they could appreciate.  Kim bought Lily a clown cookie jar whose pointy rainbow-swirled hat came off for the storage of treats.   Lily gifted Kim with a set of four bowls in the shape of pigs with their mouths open.  

Kim ate her morning cereal out of one of her new
bowls. After a couple of bites, she stopped and grimaced.  “I thought eating cookies out of a clown’s brain was disturbing, but eating out of those pig bowls is worse.  It’s like eating pig vomit straight from its mouth.  I think you win again Lil, you found the worst gift.” 

“Thanks. 
I’ll take you to the shop where I found them this weekend.  They have plates with painted pig’s butts that match.”

Kim groaned
and under her breath said, “I won't be gaining any weight over the holidays this year.”

6

“Lily, Stephanie---”

“My name’s Kim.”

“Right.
  Right.  Anyway, I need your help.”  Simon sat fidgeting at his desk while Lily and Kim hovered at the door just beyond the mess.  They’d never seen him so anxious and his agitation grew with each passing hour. Pulling at his hair he began, “I met someone over the break and I need ideas for a Valentine’s gift and reservations to a nice restaurant.” 

Lily
replied in what she hoped was a soothing tone, “Simon, today is Valentine’s Day.”

He shot
from his seat as stacks of paper and books crashed to the floor all around him.  “I know. I know.  What am I going to do?  I wasn’t paying attention and now I’m going to screw this up.”  He needed to walk, but there was nowhere to go; his desk was an island and with each motion the litter swallowed more land.  Defeated, he dropped back into his chair.  “I really like this woman and I think she likes me.  It’s not often that I meet someone who doesn’t seem to mind that I’m old, funny looking, and easily distracted.”   He cradled his head in his hands and mumbled, “This might be my last chance.  Please, help me.”

Lily restacked
the piles as she processed her boss' unprecedented outpouring of emotion.  She thought she knew everything she needed to know about Simon from his lunch preferences to his television viewing habits.  Their conversations had always been superficial and polite; his love life was uncharted territory.  Looking over her shoulder at Kim, she mouthed, “
Help
.” 

Relishing the idea of getting all this yummy gossip
first hand, Kim nodded and came to her rescue. “Simon, tell us a little about her so we can figure out what she might like.”

“Oh yes, of course, that’s a good place to start.
”  He relaxed a little as his dreamy recitation of facts regarding Judith Davenport, the anthropologist, began: divorced, 42, brown hair, brown eyes, small hands, small nose, and small ears.  She’d eaten bugs in east Africa, wore big hats, owned a pet parakeet named Jasper, preferred mustard over ketchup, and recently moved from South America.  He met her at a holiday party and they’d been on four dates.  Finishing his report, he asked, “So what do you think?”

“She sounds wonderful,”
Lily answered, giving her roommate another pleading look.

Kim rolled her eyes
.  Lily was fantastic in an organizational emergency, but useless with emotional drama.  But this kind of dilemma was right up Kim's alley.  “All right, Simon this is what you need to do.  You haven’t been dating that long, so we don’t want to scare her away with anything too mushy.  You’ll give her a simple bunch of flowers, nothing too over the top.  And then you’ll wow her with a little gift for Jasper.  The ladies love it when guys are nice to their pets.”

“Really?”

“Really.  She’ll eat it up.  Trust me.  Next, I’ll head down stairs and ask Juan, who’s an exchange student from Argentina and works the circulation desk, if he knows any good restaurants around town that serve decent South American cuisine.  I wouldn’t hold your breath that this town has anything that interesting, but I’ll check.  If nothing else, I have a friend who’s the hostess at that nice Mexican place downtown, and she can probably get you a reservation.”

Simon and Lily were all smiles and Kim was feeling pretty proud of herself until Simon ruined the moment by adding, “Oh thank you, Stephanie, that sounds like it just might work.”

"My name is Kim,” she grumbled and marched off to run her errand.

After work, Lily returned
home to more drama.  She entered the door that connected the carport to the kitchen to find Kim stomping around preparing dinner.  Her always sunny roommate had been replaced by a pissed off imposter.  She watched in silence as Kim slammed the pantry door shut, stalked over to the stove, and snapped spaghetti into tiny pieces over a pot.  Lily tried sneaking to her room, but her passage was barred by a giant pink and purple teddy bear holding heart pillows that read
Be Mine.
 

Kim
barked, “Read the card.”

Lily
obeyed, hoping this would help solve the riddle of why the happiest person on the planet was mutilating enough noodles to feed the whole block.  She read the nondescript card.  Noting who sent it, she instantly identified the problem.  The card was signed: 

To our favorite neighbors, Lily the sexy one and Kim the fun one.
  XXOO, the boys

Lily knew
Kim was expecting a response.  She said the only words that came to mind. “I’m...sorry.”

Kim shot back, “And what exactly do
you have to be sorry about?  Are you sorry that every man on earth thinks you’re sexy?  Are you sorry that you have the figure of a
Playboy
centerfold?  Are you sorry that you could have a date with a different guy every night, if you wanted to?  Or are you sorry that everyone treats me like your pet poodle?”

Drained from
her tantrum, Kim left her mountain of boiling noodles and slumped into a chair at the kitchen table. 

Lily
joined her and picked at a cuticle. “You know better than anyone how much I hate the attention guys give me.  Of the two of us, you are by far the better catch.  And
I’m sorry
that none of these jerks have figured that out.”

“Me
, too,” Kim grumbled.  She covered her roommate's hand with her own.  "And stop that." 

Lily quit tearing at a sore and hid her mutilated fingernails under the table.  

Kim wiped the unwelcomed tears from her eyes. “I’m 22 years old and I’ve never dated anyone for longer than two months.  Everybody loves me, but nobody falls in love with me.  Now even Simon’s got a girlfriend.  It’s stupid of me to give dating advice when I’m obviously doing something very wrong.”

Lily was too often reminded of the injustice of men's attention directed at her instead of Kim.  She'd gladly change places with her roommate. 
“What makes you think it’s you and not them?  Look, we both know I’m no good at this relationship stuff.  If it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t know a half of the people I know now.  You're special, Kim.  You’ve got that thing that makes people swarm to you, and it’s not something as shallow as your bra size.” 

Kim
's faint smile encouraged Lily to lighten the mood some more.  “What I’ve got will pucker and sag overtime. What you’ve got will ensure that you’re never alone.  The guy that figures out that you’re the whole package will be the luckiest guy in the world."  She looked over at the gifts they'd received and shook her head.  "But if he buys a grown woman an enormous pink teddy bear, you don’t really want him anyway.”

Kim
agreed, “Jewelry.  Always jewelry.”  She jumped up at the sound of water boiling over and was struck with an idea.  “Hey, the bears can be our dates for dinner tonight, but then let’s use them for target practice.”

“I think we’ve got ourselves a new Valentine’s tradition.”

Simon glided into work the next morning with a goofy grin and reported to Kim that his date was a great success.  Judith had been impressed by his thoughtfulness in remembering her bird and equally impressed in his choice of restaurants.  Making sure no patrons or colleagues were near, he motioned his confidant closer and whispered, "She invited me in and we made out on her couch for ninety-two minutes."

Queasy with the unwelcome image newly etched in her brain, Kim swallowed and replied, “I’m glad the date went well.”

“Now you’re invaluable to me.  This is job security for you.”

“Fabulous.” Kim left Simon basking in his promising future with his lady love and went looking for Lily's hiding spot in the stacks. 

Had she known that giving dating advice to Simon was then going to make her privy to daily updates on his love affair, she’d never have ope
ned her mouth in the first place.  The once mostly absent, even when present, boss, took an unimaginable step and learned Kim’s name and work schedule.   He presented her with the play-by-play of each date with all the enthusiasm and passion twelve year old girls display when discussing their romances.  Dragging Lily into every briefing, Kim politely listened, sharing advice and praise while also controlling her gagging reflex. 

Warmer weather gave Lily and Kim a much needed respite from lovesick Simon.  Progress on the library expansion ramped up, and he was often expected at meetings.  So they began gathering for long lunches outside by the fountain in front of the library to enjoy the change of season and scenery.  

People watching reached its peak on
campus in the spring.  The excitement of graduation and summer's approach caused the simmering pulse of students during the cold months to break through to a hard boil.  As hormone levels rose, so did class absentee rates.  With Aphrodite as the unofficial campus mascot, clothes came off and rubber necking emerged as a popular pedestrian hobby and hazard. 

The library fountain was
positioned off the quad where the oldest and most beautiful of stone buildings endured, but also connected with major thoroughfares from dormitories, parking lots, and the stadium.  Everyone knew this was the place to find long lost friends at last emerging from hibernation, and offered the best surveillance on campus.  The fountain's five tiers of spray splashed in greeting and offered itself as entertainment.

Kim and Lily left the library to
appreciate the weather and the show.  As expected, co-eds were sprawled out across the expansive knee-high stone border surrounding the fountain, talking, flirting, and observing.  The space was thick with positive energy and the promise of good things to come.  They found a spot just beyond where the blowing mist wet the concrete.  Sitting perpendicular to the library’s glass encased front entrance, they could easily see the skeleton of the expansion.  Thankfully, their offices on the third floor placed them furthest from the construction and the noise.  Silence coming from the work site meant the work crew was at lunch, and it was safe to do the same without being inundated with background banging.   This was their favorite time of day.

Kim
sprang from her stone bench and embraced missed friends, accepting invitations to parties and for coffee.  She always introduced her roommate, whom the men extended further invitations to and the women did not. 

Lily
didn’t want or need the responsibility of navigating so many relationships, but she liked knowing that others appreciated Kim’s charm and humor as much as she did.  She only wanted to be close enough to watch the sport.  She’d lost the desire to play long ago. 

The established routine of
work and home suited Lily.  For her, the necessities of life included only a roof and a job; anything more proved too complicated.  Knowing that Kim was accepted into the graduate program in Social Work and would be a constant in her life for a while longer was a welcome bonus.  She knew Kim would move out of the shack they shared and have a husband and children of her own one day.  Kim would leave her.  Everybody left.  It was easiest to expect it.  

Kim knew her roommate
was envious of the ease with which she met people.  She also knew that Lily had no inclination to improve her people skills.  Lily preferred small circles, but even then stayed on the periphery.  What made their unconventional friendship work was their total acceptance of each other, their differences, and their shared past.  However, no matter how solid their alliance, the sadness and fear that shaped the mortar for the thick walls Lily built around herself as a child held firm.

Lily and Kim were sitting in their usual lunch spot eavesdropping on a young couple, probably freshmen, discussing their inevitable future together, when out of the corner of Kim’s eye she noticed two male construction workers headed their way.  Both wore hard hats, dusty t-shirts with jeans, work boots, and tool belts. One was tall with broad shoulders and thick arms, the other, short and skinny, was rushing to keep pace while tugging at his belt to keep it from falling around his ankles.

An image of the band,
Village People
,
flashed in Kim’s mind and she started to sing under her breath, “
It’s fun to stay at the YMCA.”

Lily glanced over
, saw what was coming, and choked on her sandwich. 

Kim slapped her on the back and tried hiding her mocking smile.  She
whispered, “This should be fun.”

Tall and handsome drawled,
“Well, aren’t the two of you cuter than a couple of speckled pups.”

“Yeah, they look like
puppies,” agreed short and skinny.

Ki
m’s smile faded.  She glared at the little guy with scruffy blonde hair sticking out from his hard hat and asked, “Did you just call us dogs?”

“No…. What I meant….Y
ou’re not dogs… You're puppies,” sputtered short and skinny.

“Zip it!” growled tall and handsome.  He tucked his thumbs inside the edge of his tool belt, shook his head, and sighed.  “Ladies, I’m real sorry about my brother
, Ed; he’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer, if you know what I mean.  My name’s Jimmy.”  He removed his hat, revealing dark cropped hair which emphasized the blue of his eyes against high cheekbones, a thick brow, and crooked nose.  His big hand felt like sunbathed concrete when they shook and exchanged further introductions. At his touch, both women’s heart beats fluttered.  Lily looked away and Kim matched him smile for smile.