...she glanced to her right and saw Mike and Steve step out of the elevator. Right near the top of her subconscious she almost noted that by taking the stairs – arguably the more difficult path – she had beaten them to the third floor. Steve was smiling and talking and as they entered the executive wing, Mike burst out laughing the way men did, “haw, haw, haw,” and slapped Steve on his shoulder. She often wondered what men talked about – and joked about – among themselves. In her presence, they always seemed more reserved. They never said anything around her that made them laugh as Mike just had or slap each other on the back. She’d seen Judy Somerset - short, petite, elegant Judy - standing among a group of men and observed them acting as though it were just men, talking, laughing – braying like donkeys, and not just from what was said by one another, but paying rapt attention to Judy when she spoke, and often erupting in male laughter. She shook her head as she thought about it. Judy was something. The glass ceiling that women stared up at was a well-known and frustrating barrier to professional acceptance by men, but there was also a kind of glass wall that most women stared through that impeded their social acceptance by them at work as well. The fact that it was erected by men out of a kind of well-intentioned chivalry didn’t make women feel any less excluded. But, Kelly reflected, what if the glass wall were truly shattered? Did she really want to hear the vulgar jokes and endless sports debates and womanizing war stories? Maybe not. And that was probably what Mike and Steve had been laughing about – some off-colour joke or maybe Steve was sharing some story about scoring with a woman.
As she approached her office, behind her, Mike branched off to her left and Steve headed to her right, heading for their respective offices. She smiled as she thought, they have me surrounded.
Steve passed by her and said, “No time for a lunch break today, Kelly?”
She paused at the threshold to her office.
“Mondays are hectic around here, Steve. There’s a lot of activity leading up to the Management Committee meetings on Tuesday afternoons. Sometimes, I take a proper lunch break after the MC – if I think I can keep food down.”
He smiled. “I keep hearing about the MC meeting. Is it really that bad?”
Kelly’s eyes widened as if to say, you’re gonna find out, but said, “It depends on how the business is doing.”
“In that case, maybe I better call in sick tomorrow.”
Kelly laughed, then, “I see you’ve met Mike?”
“Yeah, he came by and introduced himself this morning. He’s a great guy.”
“We kinda like him around here.” She hesitated, then said, “That must have been some joke you told him.”
Steve smiled. “Actually, I was boring him with a story about my kids – something my daughter did when she was younger.”
Kelly felt a twinge of guilt at having jumped to conclusions – stereotyping her assumption about what they’d been talking and laughing about. She smiled at Steve, interested in his story, wanting to encourage him to tell it, but not wanting to overstep.
He was looking off and smiling at the memory which aroused her curiosity further. “How old is your daughter, Steve?”
His gaze came back to her. “She’s eight - but she was about three at the time.”
She cocked her head. “What did she do?”
“Are you sure I won’t be boring you?”
“No, not at all, tell me.”
“Well, her older brother, Peter – who would have been, let’s see - nine – was tormenting Caithness – my daughter – as big brothers will. As a rule, unless there was bloodshed, I tried not to over-react or get too entangled in their sibling rivalry; it normally worked itself out.” He started to laugh. “But, this time – I was doing something – reading – or on my laptop – when I heard ‘Daddy! Caithness tried to bite me!’ So, I put on a stern face, and said ‘Caithness, did you try to bite your brother?’”
He chuckled a little more. “And, she said ‘Yeah - but I missed.’”
He laughed, and Kelly joined him. As the laugh subsided, he continued. “It took all my self-control to keep myself from laughing, but I managed to restrain myself and said, ‘Now, Caithness, we don’t bite in this house,’ and I turned around and just barely made it into the kitchen before I had one of those, kind of silent, spastic laughing fits where your whole body shakes to keep it inside. My wife was at the kitchen table and I whispered to her what had happened, and the two of us were in there, not making a sound, but doubled over, having these silent laughing spasms.”
What a wonderful story, Kelly thought. Hearing it and watching Steve tell it, had brightened her day. The hardest of men became sweet, soft, adorable creatures when they talked about their kids. It was obvious that Steve loved being a father. She felt another twinge of guilt as she remembered, moments ago, thinking that he must have been telling Mike a dirty joke.
“Sorry to take your time up with my dull stories, Kelly. I know there’s nothing worse than a guy that goes on and on about his kids.”
Actually, she thought, there are a lot of worse things than that.
“Not at all, I enjoyed it. Kids can be so funny, can’t they?”
“They really can. Honestly, I never laughed so hard in my life until I had them.”
“So, you just have the two?”
“Yes, they’re eight and fourteen now.”
“Does her big brother still torment her?”
His expression went from smiling to wistful.
“Actually, he’s had to step up. He’s become very protective of her – he has to be the man in the family when – when I can’t be there.”
She watched his face contort for an instant then compose itself. “Their mother and I don’t live together.”
She nodded; she understood. She watched him grimace and look away and knew in his mind he was reliving memories of misery. He said, “Divorce really sucks for the adults – but, man is it ever hard on kids.”
His words brought her own miserable memories top of mind, and her eyes stung. She knew the truth of what he’d said only too well. She blinked and put on a brave smile. “They’re lucky to have a father who cares so much about them.”
Her voice caused the fog he’d drifted into briefly to lift and Steve became suddenly aware that a casual conversation between colleagues – new colleagues, at least, as far as she knew – had gone a long way down a road that was probably off limits for the time and place. He hoped they’d become friends, perhaps at some point he’d remind her of their long ago first, brief encounter – but he hadn’t planned on unloading his twenty years of emotional baggage on her within hours of seeing her again. She’d been easy to talk to and he’d gotten carried away and now felt self-conscious.
He said, “You’re standing with your lunch in your hand – probably starving – and too polite to tell me to go away, and here I am burdening you with my sad story.”
“No, Steve, it’s okay – really.”
“No, it’s not.” He smiled. “Better eat your salad before the lettuce wilts.”
He turned and walked toward his new office.
What an amazing – and unexpected – conversation, she thought, as she watched him disappear through his office door. He’d become uncomfortable and closed up when the conversation strayed into personal territory. Men didn’t seem to open up that way to one another, so they probably assumed that women didn’t want to hear it either – when it was the exact opposite. Her mood had brightened considerably. But her stomach grumbled, so she stepped into her own office, plunked down at her desk and tore into her lunch like a lioness on a fallen gazelle.
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