Chapter 1: Becoming “temporary”

I knew my morning coffee was going to get me into trouble. I had a sixth sense. I just didn’t know that it would change my life so completely.

I’d had the same thing every workday morning for two months since I’d discovered the hedonistic pleasure: a venti skinny vanilla latte. It cost $4.15 including tax. I spent over eighty dollars a month on this indulgence; I had this addiction that needed feeding. I really couldn’t afford the new habit. I was in a sorry state and starting to think about a twelve-step program – ‘My name’s Megan and I’m addicted to lattes’.

I knew someone else that also had an addiction to some Starbucks concoction. I didn’t know his name until one morning in early May. We saw into each other almost every day at the cafe near my little apartment.

My mystery man appeared just after I’d gotten my morning “fix” and started to push my way out of the crowded coffee shop salivating over the odor of the brew as it wafted to my nostrils. He was on his way in to get his morning concoction and squarely in front of me.

“Oh, hello,” he said in a flash of recognition as we slid by each other face-to-face in the narrow vestibule of the shop. We both smiled at each other. He had a winning smile and was handsome to a fault. I looked past the smile into his steel gray eyes and at his ash blond locks. “Hello,” I said, “I see you’re here for your morning injection too?”

“Of course,” he said. “I see you here a lot. I’m Josh – Josh Bannock.”

“And I’m Megan,” I jockeyed my coffee into my left hand with my large purse and put my right hand out to shake his hand. I thought how clever I’d been to remember not to give my last name to a stranger. “Nice to meet you officially after months of passing each other frequently.”

Impulsively he asked, “Will you wait for me? Do you have time or are you late for work?” He nodded outside the store. Those steel gray eyes worked their magic on me and I suddenly felt like a soft ice cream sandwich on a hot summer day. I got all warm and mushy inside. I would like to know more about the guy out of pure curiosity; I did see him so often.

“Yeah,” I said slowly, “I’ll be outside.” We squeezed past each other and I went through the outer door onto the sidewalk.

I wondered why I was suddenly so willing to meet a strange man, albeit a good-looking one. My last experience with a man ended abruptly nine months earlier and I certainly wasn’t looking for another jolt of pain and suffering right now. My close friends were on my case about getting back on the dating circuit and how I was long overdue.

A hundred feet to my right there was an empty park bench. I angled towards it, deposited my shoulder bag, and then sat so I could see the door to the coffee shop. I felt awkward sitting as the world whirled by me all on their way to some meaningful employment. I also thought I should do this more often; meaning, sit quietly and people watch. I did not think that I should pick up strange men in coffee shops more often.

I took my first luscious sip of my morning latte and sighed with what was the closest thing to an externally-induced orgasm that I’d had in almost a year – except for all the other lattes I’d had since I discovered them. Could my tongue actually be connected to my sex organs in some way? I briefly pondered that in a lewd way.

I quickly tried to assess how I looked. I checked my hair a little, not something I would normally do and hard to do with the long, straight style I wore. I pulled out my compact and did a little brush up to my makeup. I didn’t meet a guy this good looking on a regular basis; he’d certainly turned my head. I then worried about what we’d say to each other.

A minute later I turned towards Starbucks and ‘Josh’ appeared looking around for me. At least, I remembered his name. I waved wildly until he saw me. He strolled towards me and I got a chance to look at him more carefully: mid-thirties, tasseled loafers, no sox, snug jeans that showed off long athletic legs and made me wonder about what else they might hide, a white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up two turns, and aviator sunglasses pushed up on his head. Best of all though was his smile – a perfect smile with white glistening teeth that made some orthodontist proud and his parents poor, no doubt.

“I almost feel as though I know you, Megan,” Josh said as he arrived at the bench. I gestured beside me and he sat. “I’ve seen you here almost every day for months. I even notice what you wear; it’s become a contest for me to see if I can remember when you last wore the same thing. For instance, today’s blazer – that was last Wednesday, right?” He’d gestured at my jacket as he talked.

I laughed, “Right, probably. I don’t remember.” I paused and looked at him as he savored the first sip from his Starbuck’s cup. I watched his eyes roll up into his head as that magnificent first sip touched his taste buds. “What do you drink?”

“This week it’s a cinnamon dusted latte light brew coffee. I change all the time; must be daring and take risks.” He looked at me and sniffed the air; “You’re having a vanilla latte. I did that two weeks ago. Yummy.” He paused and added, “I also like the hint of perfume you’re wearing – Chanel?”

I laughed and nodded at his acute sense of smell. I was starting to think this guy was a ladies man of some kind. I’d never met a man that would recognize Chanel.

We sat and talked on the busy street as we savored our coffees. Our conversation started in a predictable way. I shared that I ran the commercial department for a medium-size ad agency a block to the south. He’d heard of the company.

Josh talked about his work helping to manage the investment portfolio for a charitable foundation a block to the north. I got the sense that he’d married his job. He did mention having grown up near Denver as well as still having family out there.

Josh said, “I became an eagle scout growing up and was also skilled at mountaineering all over the Rockies. I love to camp out although I haven’t done anything with those hobbies since I got my MBA a few years earlier and assumed my current job. I haven’t taken much time off.”

Maybe he was all work and no play. I guess I’d become that way too. I knew I was hiding in my work to escape the whole relationship and bar scene. Why did my head suddenly think that dating this relative stranger would be a good idea? I could hear the voices. My rational voice intervened and told me to stop having such dangerous ideas.

During our chat we somehow signaled that we were both ‘unattached’ and then kept talking about a hundred other things in that ‘get to know you’ conversation. I said, “I grew up outside of Durham, New Hampshire, the daughter of a college professor at the state university there. I double majored in art and business – thus, my job down the street – a lot of computer graphics involved too.” We also established that I was four years younger than he was. I mentioned my older sister, but gave no details.

Josh impressed me with his easy style and polite demeanor. He smiled often and I found myself drawn deeper and deeper into those beautiful eyes. Sometimes, he got shy about something and would look off, as though he suddenly got embarrassed talking to a strange new girl.

I flirted slightly. Maybe I actually was ready to venture forth into the world of dating again. All my friends seemed to have a foot planted squarely against my rear-end pushing me to come back on the circuit. I’d turned down uncounted blind dates that they wanted to arrange. Been there, done that, got a relationship that turned sour.

Our cups slowly emptied and I know I prolonged taking the last sip of my drink to extend our chat. As we talked and got to know each other, we sat and spun the cardboard protectors around our nearly empty and cold cups, each of us slightly nervous and reticent before the other in this odd mating dance.

I didn’t want to break the spell that seemed to have captured both of us. An aura of comfortable friendship that hinted at a potential for something more had descended upon us. I felt it and figured he did too.

Eventually, nearly an hour after we sat down, Josh’s cell phone beeped and vibrated quietly at his side. He jumped and after looking at the source of the call, routed the call to voicemail. “I should be going,” he said reluctantly. “I can’t say when I’ve enjoyed my coffee more. Will you meet me here about the same time tomorrow? I think the weather is supposed to be just as good. Springtime in New England.”

There was that inviting smile again.

I nodded enthusiastically and agreed to our informal ‘date’. We rose, shook hands, simultaneously said, “Until tomorrow,” and headed in our respective directions to work. I had a smile on my face and a spring in my step for a change and I hoped that Josh also did.

I found it hard to concentrate at work because of Josh. He’d been so engaging and cordial, yet he didn’t come on heavy at all. I’d left my last relationship with a low self-image, mostly created by my then live in boyfriend who frequently ran me down and told me how worthless I was. Even now, many months later, I struggled to overcome the psychological luggage from that two-year relationship.

At one point when I was in the women’s room at work I stopped and looked at myself in the large mirror. Today was my black and red day. I had black shoes, black tights, a black skirt and a black blazer on with a blazing red scoop neck top. My brunette hair, worn straight, only added to the message of invisibility I was trying to send: ‘Please don’t notice me’. Maybe I still thought of myself as damaged goods.

I stood profile to the mirror. I needed to lose twenty pounds. The blazer hid the fact that ten of those pounds were becoming a paunch and the other ten were excess luggage in my butt. That said, my figure could be described as full with a more than adequate rack. I hadn’t started to sag thus I still turned heads when I wore the right, snug fitting top or bent over wearing something loose. I could be a pretty good tease when I wanted to be. I had a lot of experience doing that.

Based on what others told me, I was pretty. I had a ‘girl next door’ kind of face, smooth and oval without the angular cheekbones or jaws of many fashion models. Hazel eyes and bright white teeth accented the Mediterranean complexion I’d inherited from my father, a man of Spanish heritage. I was lucky that I always looked as though I had a bit of a sun tan.

I sighed and went back to work while rethinking how I could fit in more exercise and less food into my regime.

Tuesday morning I picked up my usual latte and as I left the store Josh arrived. I just said, “Bench” to him over the din in the store as we passed and gestured towards where we’d sat the day before. We gave each other big smiles. What a nice way to start the morning.

My God, this man was more gorgeous that day than the day before. I’d had several Josh fantasies throughout the previous night including one resulting in a self-inflicted orgasm of very pleasant proportions. I shivered as I remembered the wave of pleasure. I been getting good at doing that. I could conjure up really good fantasies.

By sunrise, however, I’d decided I’d seen Josh through rose-colored glasses and that he couldn’t be ‘that’ good. Yet, here he was again in his tall, dark, and handsome splendor. He could have just stepped out of a Dolce and Gabbana advertisement. My heart did a little flippity-flop as I walked to the bench with my latte.

I resolved to find out Josh’s top three hundred bad habits so I could get grounded again and lose this puppy-love crush I seemed to have developed overnight, heavily weighted by personality traits assigned by my own imagination.

A few minutes later he joined me on the same bench with his coffee de jour. He told me that on bad weather days he came by bus from his condo in Charlestown. I confessed to a studio on Beacon Hill and proudly told him I usually walked the short distance. I noted that his neighborhood, adjacent to the Bunker Hill Monument, was considerably more upscale than my modest apartment even though I had a Beacon Hill address. My only window looked out on an alley.

I asked him some more about his work as an investment manager at the foundation and that started a discussion about risk taking and being a risk taker. He talked about the risk pyramid he was working at developing for the charity.

I commented, “I don’t know where I stand on your risk-taking scale. I grew up pretty sheltered, had a pretty bland college life, especially since I lived at home, and then I’ve only been in two long-term relationships that flopped. On the other hand, while in those relationships some interesting and daring things did occasionally occur.”