“Now why don’t you tell me what you were actually doing near my desk?”
We have never done the Staring Game this close. I’m a pip-squeak at exactly five feet tall. It’s been my lifelong cross to bear. My lack of height is an agonizing topic of conversation. Joshua is at least six-four.
Five. Six. Maybe more. A giant of a human. And he’s built out of heavy materials.
Gamely, I maintain eye contact. I can stand wherever I like in this office. Screw him. Like a threatened animal trying to look bigger, I put my hands on my hips.
He’s not ugly, as I’ve mentioned, but I always struggle to work out how to describe him. I remember eating my dinner on the couch a while back, and a soft-news piece came on the TV. An old Superman comic book sold for a record price at auction. As the white-gloved hand turned the pages, the old-fashioned drawings of Clark Kent reminded me of Joshua.
Like Clark Kent, Joshua’s height and strength are all tucked away under clothes designed to conceal and help him blend into a crowd. Nobody at the Daily Planet knows anything about Clark. Underneath these button-up shirts, Joshua could be relatively featureless or ripped like Superman. It’s a mystery.
He doesn’t have the forehead curl or the nerdy black glasses, but he’s got the strong masculine jawline and sulky, pretty mouth. I’ve been thinking all this time his hair is black but now that I’m closer, I can see it is dark brown. He doesn’t comb it as neatly as Clark does. He’s definitely got the ink-blue eyes and the laser stare, and probably some of the other superpowers, too.
But Clark Kent is such a darling; all bumbling and soft. Joshua is hardly the mild-mannered reporter.
He’s a sarcastic, cynical, Bizarro Clark Kent, terrorizing everyone in the newsroom and pissing off poor little Lois Lane until she screams into her pillow at night.
I don’t like big guys. They’re too much like horses. They could trample you if you got underfoot. He is auditing my appearance with the same narrowed eyes that I am. I wonder what the top of my head looks like. I’m sure he only fornicates with Amazons. Our stares clash and maybe comparing them to an ink stain was a tad too harsh. Those eyes are wasted on him.
To avoid dying, I reluctantly breathe in a steady lungful of cedar-pine spice. He smells like a freshly sharpened pencil. A Christmas tree in a cold, dark room. Despite the tendons in my neck beginning to cramp, I don’t permit myself to lower my eyes. I might look at his mouth then, and I get a good enough view of his mouth when he’s tossing insults at me across the office. Why would I want to see it up close? I wouldn’t.
The elevator bings like the answer to all my prayers. Enter Andy the courier.
Andy looks like a movie extra who appears in the credits as “Courier.” Leathery, midforties, clad in fluorescent yellow. His sunglasses sit like a tiara on top of his head. Like most couriers, he enriches his workday by flirting with every female under the age of sixty he encounters.
“Lovely Luce!” He booms it so loud I hear Fat Little Dick make a wet snort as he jolts awake in his office.
“Andy!” I return, skittering backward. I could honestly hug him for interrupting what was feeling like a whole new kind of strange game. He has a small parcel in his hand, no bigger than a Rubik’s cube. It’s got to be my 1984 baseball-player Smurfette. Super rare, very minty. I’ve wanted her forever and I’ve been stalking her journey via her tracking number.
“I know you want me to call from the foyer with your Smurfs, but no answer.”
My desk phone is diverted to my personal cell, which is currently located near my hip bone in the waistband of my underwear. So that’s what the buzzing feeling was. Phew. I was thinking I needed my head checked.
“What does he mean, Smurfs?” Joshua narrows his eyes like we’re nuts.
“I’m sure you’re busy, Andy, I’ll let you get out of here.” I grab at the parcel, but it’s too late.
“It’s her passion in life. She lives and breathes Smurfs. Those little blue people, yea big. They wear white hats.” Andy holds two of his fingers an inch apart.