Then one day while I was immobilized behind my desk with a bad case of post-holiday exhaustion Geraldine walked into the dappled ante-area of the office, dressed in a white skirt and top, and carrying a rolled-up poster under one arm. Her legs shone out from beneath the skirt, weeks of winter tennis in evidence. She went without a word to the table in the center of the room and unrolled the poster, putting paperweights on each end to keep it flat. When she spoke her voice was calm but by design. “This can’t be built this way,” she said. “Why would you have the main entrance all the way inside, behind a series of locked doors?” She straightened up and put one hand on a hip. The pose was accusatory. As for me I was consumed by a sense of being deeply and permanently misunderstood. Yes, I had located the main entrance deep within the structure, but had I not also put exits at every corner that locked from the outside? And what about the boundary-curve staircases, or the elastic windows, or the teacup bathtubs? Geraldine’s other hand went to her other hip. I felt myself turning pale in the glare of her distrust. I thought she was going to scream at me. But she stayed dead silent and finally lowered her hands and left the room. I knew the next time I saw her, on the security cameras, playing tennis with a zeal I would certainly misunderstand as fury, would likely be the last.
©2020 Ben Greenman/Stupid Ideas
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